KING KHALID INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA
“DOCUMENTS?”
Rapp handed his Iraqi passport to the control officer while myriad cameras—on the walls, in the ceiling, behind the glass in front of him—studied his features.
The king, whom he knew well, had stepped back and turned the country over to his extraordinarily ruthless son. The prince had immediately consolidated his power, imprisoning critics and rival family members, murdering journalists and bloggers, and inserting people loyal to him in every level of government. Phase two of his takeover had been to spend billions creating an elaborate surveillance system designed to spy on every corner of Saudi society. With virtually unlimited funds he’d already surpassed the Chinese in both the number of cameras per capita and the sophistication of the artificial intelligence running it. The technology wasn’t perfect yet, but gaming it was becoming increasingly difficult.
Rapp was wearing glasses that looked clear to the human eye but caused distortion when filmed. He’d also taken advantage of having Ward’s movie makeup artist at the lodge, but with full acknowledgment of the risks. If he got flagged, there was a good chance they’d uncover the artificial bump in his nose and the surprisingly painful wires flaring out his nostrils.
And then Mitch Rapp, the man everyone thought was dead, really would be.
The control officer flipped through the well-worn pages, occasionally glancing up to examine Rapp’s face. With the alterations, it didn’t exactly match the photo, but the changes would be less obvious to a human than to a computer algorithm. Or at least that was the theory.
The passport was a gift from an Iraqi official whose life Rapp had saved a few years back. He’d kept it in reserve for a situation just like this one. The CIA had no knowledge of it and thus it wouldn’t appear in the database that Kennedy now believed to be compromised.
After less than a minute, the official gave him the stamp he needed and slid the document back across the counter. Rapp nodded respectfully and shoved it in his pocket before joining the crowd flowing toward baggage claim.
If anything, there were even more cameras watching the conveyors than there had been in passport control. Fortunately, he had carried on his luggage and was able to pass through quickly with his head down. Not that it mattered at this point, but old habits died hard.
The rental of his car went smoothly, and he slid behind the wheel of what passed for a low-profile vehicle in the Kingdom—a new Porsche Cayenne. He pulled out of the parking garage and used the built-in GPS to navigate to an apartment he’d rented on Airbnb. The Saudi computers would already know where he was staying and what car Enterprise had assigned him, so no point in trying to hide. With precisely zero help from the Agency, his best bet was to just act in as predictable a manner as possible. Of course, the General Intelligence Directorate would figure out who he was eventually. The trick would be to make sure he was long gone before that particular light dawned.
Rapp turned on the radio and listened to a man sing in Arabic about unrequited love. He knew both the artist and the song well. Perfect language skills weren’t enough—he spent an enormous amount of time keeping up with the Middle East’s popular culture. Music, television, politics. It was a mash-up of a hundred different things that made passing as a native possible.
He rolled down the window and let the warm night air flow through his car. The GPS continued to call out turns, allowing him to focus on his rearview mirror and the light traffic surrounding him. Again, though, it was mostly just habit. With the cameras set up along the highway and modern drones, old-school tails were becoming a thing of the past. Roughly the equivalent of exchanging a suitcase full of cash for a suitcase full of documents on a lonely Siberian bridge.
He finally arrived in a neighborhood lined with low-rise apartment buildings—utilitarian white squares with tiny balconies and decent-sized windows. The passcode the landlord had given him worked and he descended into an underground parking area. Cameras were once again ubiquitous, likely installed by the property owner but undoubtedly also uploading to the government.
Rapp passed the numbered space he’d been assigned, driving hesitantly and leaning into the windshield. Airbnb guests getting confused about where to park wouldn’t be all that uncommon and he used that fact to take a full tour of the parking area. The car owned by Muhammad Singh was near the southeast corner and he made note of the location before circling back to his space. One small duffle was all he had with him and he pulled it from the backseat before locking the car and taking an elevator to his apartment.
It wasn’t bad. Faux hardwood floors, heavy curtains, and Oriental rugs lent a stylish utilitarianism that avoided the Saudi tendency toward garishness. He’d chosen it for tactical reasons, but no point in complaining about a decent kitchen and comfortable mattress. Particularly after so many years sleeping in bombed-out buildings and caves.
It was 11 p.m. by the time he unpacked but still he changed into running clothes and headed for the door. It wouldn’t raise any major alarms—the Arabs tended to be night owls in general and avoided exercising in daytime temperatures that were currently exceeding 105 degrees Fahrenheit. He hit the elevator button that corresponded to the parking garage and after a few moments stepped back out into it.
Empty.
Preferable, but not really critical to what he was there to do. Walking by Singh’s parked car, he knelt and made a show of tying his shoe. Nothing he was doing was particularly creative or high tech, but with no Agency support, it was the best he could come up with.
As he stood, he stuck a cell phone to the inside of the vehicle’s fender with the aid of some epoxy putty. It would provide a way to track the man’s movements and hopefully lead to something interesting. But the clock was ticking. Saudi Arabia’s facial recognition software would eventually kick the airport photos of him out for further analysis. And then there was the phone he was using as a tracer. It was in a battery case and the app was designed to maximize battery life, but he wouldn’t get more than a couple of days out of it.
With Gideon Auma’s ransom video out in the wild, though, Rapp had a hunch that two days would be enough. The moment it hit the Internet, Singh would go from critical operative to untidy loose end. And in Rapp’s experience, the Saudis didn’t much care for untidy loose ends. They’d move against the man. Soon.