“What time does the meeting begin?”
“The General Assembly convenes at five PM. They’re holding it off as some of the Iraqi delegates won’t arrive until later this afternoon.”
“So if Vanderveen wants to get them all in the same place, we have until five.”
“That seems to be a reasonable assumption.”
Julie Harper had gone upstairs while they were talking. Kealey stood and went to the counter, where he poured himself a second cup of coffee. As he returned to the table, he said, “I’ve been thinking about something you said last night, John. If Vanderveen already has the daisy cutter here in the States — and I think we have to assume he does — how did he get it over the border?”
“A truck.”
“Right, but that’s risky. What if he got stopped? He couldn’t risk a customs inspection.”
“If the weapon was disguised he could.”
“It’s kind of hard to disguise a fifteen-thousand-pound bomb.”
“But not impossible,” Harper pointed out. “Besides, there are other ways to circumvent customs.
Like I said before, just having the right paperwork makes a huge difference.”
“Exactly,” Kealey agreed. “But how do you get the right paperwork?”
The older man frowned. “I don’t know as much about this as I probably should. I know there are systems in place to facilitate companies that do a lot of cross-border trade.”
“I think that’s where we need to look. A company based in the New York area that spends a lot of time going in and out of Canada.”
“That’s a lot of companies.”
“Yeah, but who files the paperwork with U.S. Customs? The owner, right?” Kealey fell silent for a moment, thinking it through. “The question is, who would risk everything to help Vanderveen with this, and why? What’s the motivation?”
“Money.”
“Money is one possibility,” Kealey said absently. “Let’s get this to the New York FO, John. Ask them to start looking at businesses in the five boroughs listed with the CBP. Have them focus on companies owned by people of Middle Eastern descent.”
“That’s the worst kind of racial profiling, Ryan.”
“I’m aware of that,” the younger man said, unable to hide his irritation, “but we’re not asking them to break down any doors, are we? If they check discreetly, no one will be the wiser. We have to look at all the angles, and I don’t care if we hurt a few feelings along the way. We don’t have time to fuck around anymore.”
By 6:45 they were ready to leave. They had opted to leave their luggage behind, so they were traveling light. Naomi had changed into a snug cashmere sweater, along with a pair of stretch chinos and suede flats. She was unarmed, owing to the fact that she would be spending most of the trip at the Bureau’s FO, but Kealey had his Beretta, which he’d left with Harper before departing for Berlin. He planned to check the weapon at the airport, knowing that whatever happened in New York, he would almost certainly need it. If, by some miracle, he did manage to get his hands on Hakim Rudaki, the man would not be quick to volunteer the truth.
Julie Harper walked them to the door. She hugged Ryan briefly and urged him to come back soon. As Jonathan pulled him aside to deliver some last-minute instructions, Kharmai found herself alone with the other woman. To her surprise, she found herself being drawn in for a warm embrace.
“Take care of him, Naomi,” Julie murmured. “He deserves to be happy again.”
Naomi nodded when the other woman released her, touched by the gesture. She was also a little embarrassed; she wasn’t aware they had made it so obvious. “I’ll do my best. It was great meeting you.”
“You too, dear. Take care.”
The Suburban was already waiting at the curb. Naomi walked down the stairs, followed by Kealey and Harper. She got in first. Kealey moved to follow, but Harper pulled him back for a second. There were equal amounts of hesitation and steadfast determination on the older man’s face.
“Ryan, I asked my driver to bring along a couple of cell phones. I have the numbers, and you have mine. If there’s anything I can do from here, don’t hesitate to let me know.”
Kealey nodded. “Thanks, John. I’ll remember that.”
“And good luck,” the older man said. He looked up at the overcast sky and frowned, as if the weather could foretell the day’s events. “I think you’re going to need it.”
CHAPTER 47
NEW YORK CITY
In the parking area outside the warehouse on West Thirty-seventh Street in Midtown Manhattan, Will Vanderveen lifted the rolling door of an Isuzu truck, placed his hands on the cold metal floor at the back, and stared in at the contents. Thomas Rühmann’s men had done their work well; to look inside, one would never guess that, concealed beneath the thin metal walls of a Parker commercial boiler, was an elaborate, delicate wooden framework, and beneath that, a device capable of unleashing incredible destruction, a device capable of destroying the heart of the Iraqi Parliament, the United Iraqi Alliance. As he gazed upon the sight, he was aware of Raseen at his side. He looked at her and saw she was equally rapt, her dark eyes shining. Behind her, standing off to the side, was Amir Nazeri. He looked calm and assured, his glasses reflecting the pale morning sun, but there was an undercurrent of tension there that had not escaped the other two. Vanderveen, in particular, was still trying to figure out how steadfast Nazeri was. It was the last — but most important — thing he had to consider. Nearly everything else was done.
The previous day, they had used a forklift from the Montreal terminal to load the device at the Lake Forest storage facility, after which they returned the forklift and started west to the border crossing at Buffalo. After passing through customs on the Peace Bridge, Vanderveen had followed I-95 to Syracuse. From there, it was a short drive to Ithaca. The Bridgeline warehouse was located just north of the city, in a commercial sector that had seen better days. Yasmin Raseen and Amir Nazeri had entered the United States hours earlier in a passenger vehicle owned by Nazeri’s company. Vanderveen met them in Ithaca just after 5:00 a.m., where they transferred the bomb to an Isuzu H-Series box truck with a GVWR of 33,000 pounds. The rear axle was capable of withstanding loads up to 19,000 pounds, which was more than adequate for their purposes.
According to Nazeri, the vehicle was completely untraceable, meaning that no link would ever be found between the shattered remains of the Isuzu and Bridgeline Transport, Inc. Vanderveen didn’t know if this was true or if it was just wishful thinking on Nazeri’s part, but it didn’t really matter. Nazeri had no idea what was about to happen. He didn’t know that he was about to embark on a suicide mission, and when it was over, Bridgeline would be implicated almost immediately. An anonymous call to the FBI would point the investigators in the right direction.
The death of thousands of American citizens would, in due course, be attributed to the Iranian who had come to America in search of a better life, only to find that the U.S. government had stripped him of the only thing he had ever cared about.
The death of Dr. Nasir Tabrizi in Paris at the hands of Iranian fundamentalists — combined with the revelation of Iranian funding for the purchase of Rashid al-Umari’s refinery in Iraq — had already generated enormous suspicion in the Western media. Many people already believed that the regime in Tehran was behind the escalating situation in Iraq, and Nazeri’s actions would only clinch their suspicions. The American public would never believe that the Iranians did not have a hand in it, and with thousands dead in the worst attack on U.S. soil since 9/11, President David Brenneman would be under immense pressure to exact swift, harsh revenge on the Iranian capital.