SEVENTY-SIX

Court stood on the tarmac at Tegel Airport at eight a.m. in a light rain shower, outside a beautiful Gulfstream jet that he was very confident he would not be boarding. Zoya was in the car in the lot; Hanley hadn’t asked her to come to this meeting, and both she and Court took that to mean he would be getting a new assignment today.

She figured she’d get hers soon enough.

Hanley’s two Yukons arrived. He climbed out of the rear vehicle and was surrounded by Chris Travers and his team. They walked forward, and the Ground Branch team began loading bags into the cargo hold while Matt met Court at the foot of the jet stairs.

The DDO asked, “How’s Zack?”

“He’ll be okay. We got him treated, then on a train to Dresden. He’s in a hotel; I have a friend looking after him, she’s a doctor. She’s in the next room, which is a lot better than staying in her apartment in Berlin, where I blew the back of a guy’s head off next to her bed.”

“Makes sense.”

Court said, “How bad is the fallout going to be from what happened here?”

“You mean, in addition to the forty-seven dead last night?”

“Yeah.”

“The director wants me in his office the instant I land, so . . . it’s not looking too good.”

“Sorry, boss.”

“Had to happen. Fucking al-Habsi.”

“How long had he been planning this?”

Hanley shook his head. “We don’t know it all, but here’s what we figure. Originally, the plan had been to use Shrike Group to obtain intelligence on Iran’s activities throughout the EU, for the purposes of discrediting them. They wanted to keep the sanctions strong. When Europe relaxed the sanctions, al-Habsi decided to hold the intelligence product Shrike had gleaned and to use it to move into a new phase of his operation.

“The plan was to tie Tehran to Mirza, and then to goad Mirza in a bold and brazen attack on the Reichstag. Tehran would take the fall, and Euro sanctions would be reinstated.”

“But then Rajavi happened.”

“That’s right. When al-Habsi came across the intelligence that Rajavi would be traveling covertly to Iran, he told the Americans. This, as well as other intel he’d manufactured to make it look like Rajavi was planning an imminent strike against us, forced Washington’s hand. We then killed the general, to al-Habsi’s pleasure.

“But he knew this wouldn’t start a war. Iran would never attack America with conventional troops. He decided to use his original plan, an attack by Mirza, to goad the U.S. into all but destroying the Shia nation. All he had to do was to change the target from the Reichstag to the U.S. embassy or some other symbol of America in Germany. If the attack was vicious enough, costly enough for America, and if Tehran was blamed for it, it would almost definitely lead to war.”

Court said, “And the ambassador was chosen.”

“One of POTUS’s closest pals, a symbol of America, all that shit. Al-Habsi is damn good at what he does.”

“I guess so. He got away.”

Hanley shrugged. “Did he?”

Court cocked his head. “Did he not?”

Hanley looked off over the tarmac as an Egypt Air 727 landed. “I can’t do anything about al-Habsi or the UAE. At no point can the CIA discredit the SIA publicly. It would come back on us, on the U.S., it would hurt intelligence efforts in the Middle East, it would damage a Gulf State economic ally, and it would get the White House so far up the CIA’s ass for defying a presidential order that we’d probably be shuttered and mothballed. Sultan’s got America, and the Agency, over a barrel, and he knows it.”

Court sensed there was something Hanley wanted to say, and he correctly figured out what it was and said it himself. “But if a private contract killer were to take Sultan al-Habsi off the playing field, someone not associated with the Agency . . . then that would be beneficial to the U.S.”

Hanley said, “Assassinating a world leader is a big deal, Violator.”

Court nodded slowly. “He’s not a world leader yet.”

Hanley’s eyes met Court’s for the first time in the conversation. “I’ve been over to spend time with him in the UAE. Twice. He doesn’t live in the palace. Not yet, anyway. His home is in Dubai, on Palm Island. Lots of windows.”

“Windows?”

“Yeah. Looks out over the bay. The Palm Hotel is just across the water. Great hotel. Posh, but also quiet, and easily accessible.”

Court was being given his operating instructions, and he was smart enough not to say anything about them directly. He did, however, speak in hypotheticals.

“I wonder how someone could get themselves into that hotel.”

“UAE coastal patrol would look into the occupants of a boat if it sailed too close to the mansions or hotels on Palm Island.”

Court nodded at this. “So if someone didn’t really want to get checked by the UAE, they’d either have to hide out on the boat during inspection, or—”

“Or,” Hanley said, “I guess they could probably go to Bahrain. Find a helo pilot. Someone who ferries people to and from cargo ships and oil rigs. For the right price, I bet that pilot could get someone onto the helipad of the Palm Hotel across from al-Habsi’s place. Pretty sweet line of sight from that helipad.”

Court nodded and started to make another purely hypothetical statement, but he shut up when he saw Hanley take a pen and a small notepad from the breast pocket of his coat. He looked up something on his mobile phone, and then he wrote down a note on the pad. He tore off the sheet, folded it in half, and then put the pen and notepad back in his coat.

“By the way,” Hanley added as he did this. “You deserve a raise. A private shell company in Cyprus wired one million dollars into your Antigua account this morning. That money is there for anything you might . . . need.”

Court nodded. Operational funds.

Hanley shook Court’s hand. “All right, Violator, I have to go home and get my lashes from the director. Thanks for everything. Good to see you.”

Hanley nodded, then dropped the paper on the tarmac as he turned around and headed up the jet stairs. Travers followed him up after shaking Court’s hand, as well.

Court rolled his eyes a little, but then he knelt down and retrieved the little note. Opening it, he saw that it was a phone number with a 973 international country code.

Court thought a moment. Bahrain. An island neighbor of the UAE.

And then, under this, Hanley had scribbled one more line: AW139.

Court nodded. The AgustaWestland AW139 was a medium-sized helicopter.

Hanley had just given Court ingression instructions, and had just given him a green light to assassinate Sultan al-Habsi.

Or, Court told himself, it was more like a yellow light. The DDO had made it perfectly clear he did not want to be associated with whatever Court did, but that was standard operating procedure, and Court was well used to this.

He headed back to the car to tell Zoya he’d have to take a little trip.