Mehdi Hosseini brushed his teeth and washed his face. He performed his morning prayers and made chai. Studied for a few hours and when the sun was up and Tehran had woken up, he dressed and went to the university.
He hadn’t gotten anything the previous day. He would hang out again in that hallway and see if he got an opportunity to slip through that door. That guard had looked at him sharply a few times but hadn’t said a word. Surely, he needs to visit the bathroom. That will mean his post will be unmanned. That could be Hosseini’s opening.
‘The boss will be here,’ Nassour went over the plan again with Radan. He laid his finger on the map, where the traffic lights were. ‘He will watch the traffic flow for half an hour. Your men will be spread out. Don’t move until you see the Americans.’
‘We won’t, agha. Our command vehicle will be here,’ the killer pointed to the right of the intersection. ‘A tourist bus with dark windows. We will hack into the cameras and run our software, check every face. In addition, we will have aerial surveillance to check rooftops and have a view from the top.’
‘They won’t be in the open. They will be hiding.’
‘We will find them if they show themselves.’
‘No killing. The boss wants them alive.’ And I want those women. Nassour didn’t express his thoughts however. Radan didn’t need to know.
‘What if they fire at us?’
‘Shoot to injure. We have good marksmen for that.’
‘We do, agha. Don’t you think it’s risky for the boss to show himself like that?’
‘Our commander is the bravest man in Iran,’ Nassour boasted. ‘He’s not scared of these American operatives.’ He wasn’t going to tell Radan that the man at the traffic lights would be Mostofi’s body double. The Quds leader would be nowhere near the scene. He would leave the traffic police headquarters through a discreet exit and return to his office.
‘What about you, agha?’
‘I will be watching on screen. I am sure you are capable of capturing them.’
‘Yes, agha,’ Radan’s chest swelled with the responsibility bestowed on him. ‘I won’t let you down.’
‘This building,’ Meghan jammed a finger on a map she had printed out. It was a block of apartments, several stories high, that overlooked the traffic lights. ‘We flew the drones over the area yesterday. There’s a water tank on top, aircon fans, pumps, ducting. Enough hiding places for Broker and his Barrett.’
They were huddled in a restaurant in Khani Abad in the early dawn. Gathering in person, taking the risk because going over the operation again was worth the risk.
The restaurant owner was a Mossad sayan, who had opened his establishment just for them. He stood outside, smoking in the chill air keeping watch for any police presence.
‘And here,’ Beth drew their attention to another building, shorter than the first one, ‘is an office complex.’ It was on the opposite side to the apartments. ‘Meg will be on top, with her MRAD. Protection from a water tank, there too. Good firing view. The rest of us will be scattered around the lights, in our vehicles.’
‘Which will be rigged with explosives. Getaway vehicles are here, on Qaem Street, in this pharmacy’s parking lot. One ambulance and one cop car. Tinted windows on both, our comms equipment inside. Store owner is friendly. One of Levin’s men. A sayan.’
‘Bwana, where will you be?’
‘In this kebab place that’s fifty feet from the lights. I will come out when we spot Golzar.’
‘They will surround you. Ask you to surrender.’
‘Yeah,’ Bwana’s teeth gleamed in a smile. ‘At which point, I will expose these.’ He flipped open his jacket to reveal his suicide belt, rows of grenades and explosives, rigged to a thumb trigger.
‘People will scatter,’ Meghan nodded. ‘Quds soldiers will surge back too. Broker, you’ll fire a warning shot to send the civilians running. Roger—’
‘I will trigger our secret weapon,’ the Texan grinned. ‘That will create chaos.’
‘Which is when either Broker or Beth or both take the shot at Golzar. Zeb, how about a shot at Mostofi? We won’t need to deal with the conference venue speech then.’
‘He’ll be very well protected. He’s lived his life in such situations. He’ll have people around him.’
‘What if he’s exposed long enough for a shot?’ Meghan persisted.
Zeb looked up from the map, his eyes flinty. ‘You and Broker take him out in that event. I don’t want to risk any of us getting close to him. Let’s not forget our objective, however. Golzar, the possibility that he might be there, is why we’re doing this. I prefer getting Mostofi at the IICC. That’s when his guard will be down. But, if we get a shot at him, we kill him.’
‘Roger that,’ the operatives chorused.
‘What if Mostofi turns up?’ Beth queried. ‘No Golzar?’
‘We terminate Mostofi.’
‘Is it worth exposing Bwana for that?’
‘Heck, yeah,’ their friend scoffed. ‘I am the center of the show. He will want to see me. That will give Meg and Broker the opportunity.’
‘Exfil,’ the older twin resumed, ‘is by detonating our rigged vehicles. That will create chaos, panic, giving us the opportunity to escape to our getaway rides. If anyone’s captured, and we’ll know that by the GPS transponders in our gear and we circle back to rescue immediately. Clear?’
‘Clear.’
They fist-bumped and broke up.
Zeb led them out and glanced at the pale sun as it emerged in the skyline. A few hours to noon.
Golzar, Mostofi, or both could be dead in a few hours. He hoped his crew would be able to escape unscathed.
I can still call it off. Strike at Mostofi at his Fourth July speech. It would be an unequivocal message to the Supreme Leader that no attack against the US would go unpunished.
Meg’s right, though. Getting Mostofi and Golzar’s more important than messaging.