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  Sitting back down, Abdullah reread the message, committing it to memory. Then he took the original notebook page and all the pages underneath, as well as the entire yellow pad, into his bedroom and ran them through the shredder.

  TUESDAY, MAY 12, 7:30 P.M. PDT

  SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

  Naheed Yamani put the copy of The Cairo Trilogy back onto the bookshelf. After rereading then destroying the message, she flopped herself down on her overstuffed Payton sofa and tucked her feet up. She ran her hands over the khaki linen material and enjoyed its coolness.

  Do I really believe in what I’m doing, or am I just bored? Naheed had always been somewhat of an adrenaline junkie. Summers as a rich, spoiled, semiroyal teenager on the French Riviera usually found her Jet Skiing, parasailing, or shoplifting worthless junk from the tourist stores. But no matter how much she tempted fate, it was never enough.

  Then one day she had been approached at a family gathering by her cousin, Saleh Jameel. Saleh had always been the one about whom the rest of the mothers told their children, “Why can’t you be more like him?” Good grades, impeccable manners, never forgetting to hold the door open for giggling old ladies—you name a positive quality, Saleh possessed it.

  But Naheed had always been suspicious of her cousin. Somewhere beneath that sickeningly sweet exterior, she knew there was a different Saleh. It could have been the quick flashes of anger on the soccer field or the way he sometimes was unnecessarily harsh to the servants. Whatever it was, it was enough that when Naheed and Saleh were sitting together on a bench at another overdone family feast, she was ready to hear him out.

  Saleh began by telling her that he had been watching her for a long time. He followed that with a long description of his recent involvement in a secret paramilitary organization. He finished by telling her, “You’re just the kind of person we need to defeat the Great Satan and to end the oppression.”

  Naheed’s interest had been piqued. Maybe this was the ultimate adventure she had been searching for. Maybe this was the piece of her life that had been missing—a purpose, a cause.

  Soon she began spending two days a week after school at Saleh’s family compound. His parents, who helped finance a budding terrorist group, willingly confirmed the lie that Naheed told to her father about being there to study.

  For Naheed, the only drawbacks to the training were the ranting sermons with which the mullahs began each session. Despite joining up with Allah’s army, she was not particularly religious. Of course, Naheed believed there was a God. She just didn’t buy the fact that he was quite so unforgiving with his people.

  So she had endured the preaching with an appropriately pious look on her face. She shook her fist and chanted when necessary. She endured the lengthy, repetitive tirades because she knew that afterward would come the training—how to kill with a gun, how to kill with a knife, how to kill with one’s hands. Naheed excelled at stealth, cunning, treachery, and violence. For once in her short life, she felt totally alive and in her element.

  Finally, the time had come when her preparation was at an end. She had far exceeded the others in her group, including Saleh. There was no graduation ceremony; I guess this is not really a cap and gown kind of event, she had thought, laughing to herself.

  But there was a meeting—a very special meeting—with an old one-eyed Iraqi.

  For someone who prided herself with being fearless, Naheed was terrified in this man’s presence.

  “Are you ready to fight for your God?” this man had asked.

  Calling on all the religious fervor she could fake, Naheed had replied, “I am ready to die for my God. Allahu akhbar!”

  A twinkle in the old warrior’s eye had told her that he knew her religious talk was just bluster. His next words still made their way into Naheed’s dreams at least once a week. He had reached his damaged right hand up and lightly patted her cheek. “Such a beautiful young woman,” he had said with a smile. “Rest assured, my dear, you will die. But whether it will be for God or for reasons of your own, that you must decide.” The old man had then moved on to the next graduate, leaving Naheed weak-kneed and flushed.

  Three days later she had been told to go to America and build herself a life. She would be told when it was her time to act. So she had gone to her grandfather and begged him to set her up in America. He had agreed and unknowingly placed a ticking time bomb into the heart of the art culture in San Francisco.

  What will be my reason for dying?

  As Naheed sank deeper back into the pillows of her couch, her hand lightly touched her cheek where the old man’s hand had been. Is it a love for God? Is it a disdain for others? Is it because death is the final and greatest adventure?

  Whatever it is, you better spend some time thinking about it now, she told herself, because the time for coming up with an answer is rushing to a close.

  CHAPTER TEN

  WEDNESDAY, MAY 13, 2:30 P.M. MDT ENGLEWOOD, COLORADO

  “You mean being franchised isn’t a good thing?” Khadi asked Riley. “I thought it was a compliment. Like it was their way of saying we really, really want you.”

  Riley and Khadi were enjoying the May Colorado sun in front of Caribou Coffee. Skeeter sat two tables over. Riley took a sip from his ceramic mug, placing it back on the black metal table before answering.

  “Yeah, most people think that. But in reality, most players dread it. Since I’m franchised, I’m not going to be able to become a free agent like I was supposed to.”

  “Do you really want to be a free agent? Doesn’t that mean that there’s a good likelihood that you’d be moving to another team?”

  Riley sighed. He really didn’t want to talk football, especially with someone who didn’t know football. His gaze shifted to another outdoor table where a man in running attire was sitting with his black lab stretched out next to him. Two days ago, Riley had sat at that same table with Whitney Walker.

  That had been a very enjoyable conversation. Whitney knew her football. She’d asked great questions, and she’d proven that she could be trusted to distinguish “on the record” from “off the record.” After the two of them had talked for an hour, they’d gone across the street to the wildlife museum and shot a quick interview for television.

  It was a huge asset for a player to have a go-to media person, someone he could trust if he had information he wanted to get out. Riley wondered if maybe Whitney could turn out to be that person for him.

  Part of Riley thought he should tell Khadi about his time here with Whitney. But then he thought maybe that would end up being more trouble than it was worth. Why open that can of worms? It was just an innocent coffee—wasn’t it?

  “The goal in free agency,” Riley continued, shaking the picture of Whitney Walker’s green eyes out of his mind, “is to start a bidding war. That helps to drive up the terms of a player’s contract, especially his signing bonus, which is the only part of the contract that’s really guaranteed.”

  “Seriously? So a contract isn’t really a contract.”

  Riley smiled. “Well, yes and no. A team can release a player at any time without having to honor future salaries. That’s why guys want the big signing bonus. The teams have to pay that. But since I’ve been franchised, it means no signing bonus for me, and I’m being forced into a one-year contract that only pays the average of the top five players in my position. Basically, it’s going to cost me between five and seven million this year.”

  Khadi almost spit out her mouthful of coffee. “Ouch! That’s harsh. So are you going to stay with football?”

  Just then, Riley’s cell phone rang. He picked the phone off the table, quickly looked at the caller ID, and then silenced the phone.

  “I don’t know. I mean, I understand where they’re coming from. There are still a lot of question marks in my own mind about football. I’m sure they’ve got even more. They don’t want to dump a seven-figure bonus on me and have me leave football or end up dead in some foreign country.”


  “You’re not going to end up dead in some foreign country,” Khadi corrected him.

  “Sorry, I guess I’m just feeling a tad pessimistic right now. But as for football? For right now, yeah, I think I’ll stay with it. I mean, what else is there for me? I don’t really want to go back full-time into the Air Force. And I’m not going to go into the CTD. I’m not really the analyst type.”

  “And just what is the analyst type?” asked Khadi the analyst.

  “Smart and beautiful,” Riley said with an embarrassed smile. “Unfortunately, I’m just beautiful.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.” Then seeing Riley’s feigned look of shock, she corrected herself. “I mean, you know you’re smart.”

  “But not beautiful?”

  “Shut up!” Khadi said, laughing.

  Riley took another sip of his coffee. “So anyway, I don’t see myself doing the analyst thing, and long-term ops holds no appeal for me either. Too much shooting and getting shot at.”

  “So, it’s football by default?”

  “Looks that way.”

  Khadi’s cell phone began ringing. “Feel free to get that,” Riley said as Khadi checked who was calling.

  “No, it’s fine,” she said, silencing the ring. “Hey, didn’t you go visit Meg last week? How are she and Alessandra doing?”

  Before he knew it, Riley told Khadi all the details of the visit, including the final few minutes of their time together.

  “You know she’s interested in you,” Khadi said matter-of-factly.

  “Oh, please! She’s a lonely, grieving friend.” Riley had known it was a mistake telling Khadi about the hug as soon as the words left his mouth. But for some reason, around Khadi his mouth often took the lead while his brain played catch-up. “Seriously, her husband’s less than five months dead. Now you’ve got her on the prowl for a replacement.”

  Khadi looked at him for a moment, then said, “Riley, tell me about the things you know.”

  Although he couldn’t see Khadi’s eyes clearly through her Salvatore Ferragamo sunglasses, Riley could hear their sparkle in her voice. “What are you getting at?”

  “Come on. What are the things that you are an expert in?”

  Leaning back in his metal chair, Riley said, “All right, I’ll play along. Let’s see, I know a lot about professional football defense. Military operations. Various guns and weapons. . . . Uh . . . I’ve seen all of Clint Eastwood’s spaghetti westerns at least a dozen times each. I rock at recipes involving fire and large pieces of dead animals. . . . I do a mean Sean Connery impersonation. And I used to be the neighborhood expert on the Justice League of America—although I’ll readily admit that my prowess here has slipped a little over the years.”

  Khadi was laughing. “Okay, other than the Sean Connery impersonation, I agree wholeheartedly.”

  “Hey—”

  “Riley, we’ve had this discussion before. An impersonation needs to be more than a benign hand gesture and the repetition of the word Scotland. But we digress. The subject you did not mention, my dear sir, is women.”

  Straightening up, Riley said, “You’re right. My oversight. I am an expert on all things female!”

  “Yeah right. Just like I’m an expert in that League of Justice thing.”

  “Listen, the Justice League of America was a very well-respected team of superheroes who battled evil and injustice for many years.”

  Khadi just stared at Riley.

  “Well they were,” he said defensively.

  Riley was saved by Khadi’s phone going off again. “Sorry,” she said as she silenced it. “So, back to my point. You have great wisdom about a lot of things, but you’re clueless when it comes to women.”

  “Fair enough. But you weren’t there when Meg gave me the hug.”

  “I didn’t need to be. All I’m saying is be careful. She may be looking for more from you than you’re ready to give. At least more than I think you’re ready to give.” Khadi now began sounding a little bit flustered. “If you are interested in her, there’s nothing standing in your way, since I’m . . . I mean, we’re not—”

  “No, of course we’re not,” Riley jumped in trying to save her. Unfortunately, he instead found himself falling into the same verbal pit. “I mean, not that if things were different with us it wouldn’t mean that things would be . . . uh, different with us. But, no, I’m not interested in Meg. I’m just trying to help her and Alessandra get through this.”

  “Sure, that’s what I figured. I just wanted you to know that if you felt, you know, different, that I wouldn’t blame you. She is a very beautiful woman,” Khadi said, leaving that last statement hanging there as if some sort of response were required.

  “Khadi,” Riley said instead.

  “Yes.”

  “Can we change the subject?”

  “Please.”

  “So . . . how about this weather?”

  Riley and Khadi looked at each other silently until they both broke down laughing. Shaking his head, Riley picked up their mugs to take them for refills, then swung by Skeeter’s table and grabbed his empty before going inside. As the air-conditioning hit his face, he smiled and prayed, Lord, why did You place the most perfect woman I know so far out of my reach? It just ain’t right, Lord; it just ain’t right.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THURSDAY, MAY 14, 12:35 P.M. EEST ISTANBUL, TURKEY

  His words were directed to God, but behind his closed eyes, al-’Aqran saw someone else entirely. This man was asking him questions in butchered Arabic spoken with an American accent, slowly, with the vowels drawn out. He was tall, well built, and was wearing a khaki green shirt splattered with blood—al-’Aqran’s blood. Over and over, this agent of Satan kept asking the same questions: Who is in America? Give me names! Who is in the U.K.? Give me names! Who is in central Europe? Give me names!

  At first, al-’Aqran had responded by spitting in the man’s face or yelling curses back at him. But with each act of defiance, a belt-wrapped hand would land across his face or a blackjack would connect with a joint. His body had screamed out in pain. He had prayed for Allah to take his life. Eventually, the old man was so broken down that all he could do was respond to the questions with a look of contempt. But I never talked! Before Allah, I swear I never talked!

  Pop, Pop! rang out like rifle shots in the quiet room. Although the other men politely gave no indication that they had noticed, al-’Aqran silently cursed his aging body—especially the way his knees seemed to find it necessary to remind both him and anyone around him of their constant deterioration.

  Prior to his time in captivity, these percussive protestations had happened only occasionally. But now he had audible accompaniment to his physical movements multiple times every prayer session. His joints mocked him whenever he shifted from prostrate to kneeling. And they downright rebelled whenever he tried to rise to a standing position.

  Sitting back on his heels at the end of the Dhuhr, or noon prayer, al-’Aqran turned to his right and muttered, “As Salaamu ’alaikum wa rahmatulaah” to the angel over his right shoulder who was there to record all of his good deeds. He then repeated the blessing of peace—although with a little less feeling—over his left shoulder, where the angel spying for his sinful actions resided. Someday, the lists these two were creating would be weighed against each other on the great scale. The old man prayed that when that happened, things would go “right.”

  The prayer having ended, al-’Aqran willed himself to rise. Immediately four hands grasped his arms to ease his journey up. Roughly, he shook them off as his anger flashed. But then words from the Koran flashed into his mind (ten years ago, he could have recited the exact Surah and verse) and stayed his temper. “Today you will be paid back with humiliation, for you were unjustly proud on earth.”

  “I am sorry, my brothers. Please—your assistance?” Al-’Aqran resigned himself to the help but pulled himself away as soon as he was fully upright.

  Babrak Zahir, the youngest o
f the men with him, carefully began to roll up the sajjada as soon as al-’Aqran stepped off of it. A gift from the five men with him, the prayer rug was colored a rich red with an intricately embroidered black and gold outline of the Kaaba covering its center. Al-’Aqran used a craggy and pitted old wooden walking stick to help him shuffle his way across the faded linoleum floor, again cursing the Americans for what they had done to his body. Coming to a small, rectangular table around which were crammed six chairs, he took his place at the head of the table, hearing the air whistle from the bottom cushion as he sat.

  The five men with him immediately began a subtle jostling as several of them tried to maneuver themselves to the places of honor at their leader’s right and left. The sight reminded al-’Aqran of a game he had played as a child called Dance of the Chairs, in which the children walked around a group of chairs while someone sang. The only difference here was when the music stopped, there would be chairs enough for everyone—just not necessarily the chairs they wanted.

  Al-’Aqran closed his one good eye and thought back through the weeks since he had come to Istanbul. While it was good to get back to his people, he could sense the general disarray that had beset the Cause since he had been gone. The days since then had been spent in honing the leadership, reestablishing lines of communication, and preparing for the next big operation.

  After the glory of the Platte River Stadium attack in Denver, Colorado, things had begun to go wrong for the Cause. Al-’Aqran was determined to make those responsible for the organization’s black eye pay and to place the terror of the Cause back in the heart and mind of every American.

  The sound of air shooting out from the five other cushions drew his thoughts back to the meeting at hand. However, just because the seats were taken, that didn’t mean the loud discussion had ended.

  And these are my leaders? al-’Aqran thought. These men who can’t even sit around a table without an argument?