Hoshi frowned. “Another one of these, ‘you can get into major trouble but I’m asking you to do it anyway’ type things?”
“No. But Shep won’t be happy. Knox won’t be happy, either.”
“So a typical day at the office.”
Uzi had to laugh. “Are you implying that I’ve asked you to do things like this before?”
“You know I can’t say no to you. What do you need?”
“There’s an operative with the Agency. Mahmoud El-Fahad. I need whatever you’ve got on the guy. Classified stuff, shit that’s buried behind walls.”
Hoshi lowered her voice. “You’re asking me to hack classified databases and you don’t think that’d bring major trouble if anyone found out?”
“It sounded a bit better when I said it, didn’t it?”
“Just a bit. And what do you suspect? You think the guy’s a mole?”
“No.” Uzi rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know. I guess I just want to make sure he’s legit, that he can be trusted. He’s Palestinian and Batula Hakim was—”
“It’s time you let go of that.”
Uzi stared at her. Was she right? What was the right amount of time to let something like the brutal murder of your wife and daughter fester? Was there a right amount of time? Of course not. But there was a normal amount of time. There had to be. If his favorite shrink was still around, he could ask him. But he was not — and Uzi was never one for psychoanalysis, anyway. What he had with Leonard Rudnick was special, a onetime thing. So for now, he would go with his intuition. And at the moment, he felt like he needed to dot all his i’s, to make sure everything was as it was supposed to be. Then he could relax.
“Okay.”
“What?” He realized he’d been staring at the far wall.
“I said okay, I’ll dig around. You need anything else? You were kind of spacing out.”
“That’s it. I’ll be in my office if you find anything.”
Uzi settled into his chair and pulled out his Lumia. He put it in encrypted mode and dialed. Gideon Aksel answered.
“I need you to look into something for me.”
Aksel laughed. “I don’t work for you. In fact, you used to work for me, remember?”
Uzi buried his face in his right hand. “How could I forget?”
“What is this favor? Which, by the way, will be the second one you’ve asked for in, what, twenty-four hours?”
Uzi ignored the dig, massaged his eyes. “I need whatever you’ve got on Mahmoud El-Fahad.”
“Name is familiar. Should I know him?”
“As director general of Mossad, I really hope not, Gideon.”
Aksel was quiet a long second, then said, “I’ll see if there’s anything to find.”
17
Eastern Market was dominated by a block-long nineteenth-century Neo-Renaissance brick building that sat a quarter mile from the seat of US government. A hundred years ago, it was considered the unofficial town center of Capitol Hill.
Ten feet from the edifice and running its entire length sat a permanent green corrugated metal roofed pavilion where vendors sold their wares, sheltered from the sun and rain. People milled about: men, women, and children, couples young and old purchasing fresh fish and meat, baked goods and various kinds of cheese.
But in the mall’s administrative office in a corner of the far-flung facility, things were not as lively: an array of black-and-white security cameras displaying various angles of the retailers’ stalls and cafés stared back at Omar Jafar. Jafar reclined in his creaky chair and watched the activity on his monitors.
The job was generally tedious, the most excitement coming from an occasional shoplifter or the equally random elderly individual suffering a heart attack. The majority of the time, he passed his shift watching hordes of people pass the prying eyes of his lenses buying merchandise, eating food, and drinking coffee, beer, or wine.
Jafar leaned forward, the back of his chair springing up and snapping against his torso. He tilted his head and spied a male dressed in a black hoodie carrying a backpack and moving through the crowd, which, in and of itself was not unusual. But the man’s demeanor, the wandering nature of his gait, told Jafar that something might not be right. After the mysterious explosion at the Metro station, he had been warned by his boss to keep an extra vigilant eye on customers exhibiting suspicious behavior.
Jafar studied the screen: the “person of interest” was about five foot nine with a dark complexion. Thin, no distinguishable marks that he could see. Watching the man move from one monitor to another as he made his way through the market, Jafar thought back to his security guard training. What information did the police want? Physical description and his reason for suspecting the individual of foul play.
Jafar grabbed his two-way radio and headed out of his office, walking briskly toward the location of his target. He did not want to call the police yet, not until he had a better indication that something was really wrong.
As he approached the two large doors that formed the main entrance to the building, he saw his suspect thirty feet ahead. The man stopped to talk to one of the vendors, then pulled a large brown paper bag from his backpack just as Jafar heard a loud crashing noise off to his right.
Smashing glass — crumpling metal — revving truck engine—
Patrons yelling, diving to the side as an armored vehicle blasted through the doors he had just passed, coming to rest inside the market’s entrance.
“What the f—”
Jafar reached for his radio and fumbled for the dial when automatic gunfire burst out. People screamed as bodies fell—
A man’s guttural proclamation of “Allahu akbar!” snagged his attention. Jafar swung his head left and saw a masked male wearing military-style gear running toward him, spraying the area with high-powered rounds from some kind of machine gun.
Jafar pushed between a woman and a child and dove to the floor. He clapped both hands over his head and hid — until a massive explosion turned everything black.
18
Vail and Robby walked into Foggy Bottom’s Burger Tap & Shake at Pennsylvania Avenue and 23rd Street.
They stood in the back, away from the line, looking over the menu that featured a description of the restaurant’s meat: “Throughout the day, we grind on premises a custom blend of three-day aged, naturally raised local harvest beef chuck and brisket.”
“My taste buds are moaning,” she said, then noticed Robby was looking at her. “No comment please. I’m just plain hungry, okay?” She glanced at her watch. “Where the hell is Jonathan?”
“Late.”
She took Robby’s hand and squeezed it. “Thanks again for getting us Prati. Still a lot we don’t know. But the stuff we do know … it’s just kind of depressing.”
The door opened and Jonathan walked in with rumpled clothing and mussed hair.
“This is how you show up for lunch with me and Robby?”
“I was still sleeping when you called,” Jonathan said, bumping a fist with Robby. “Late night.”
“Oh yeah?” Robby asked.
“It’s Saturday, I knew I could sleep in.”
Vail frowned. “One advantage of you going to school so close to home is that we can get together once in a while.”
“Some might call that a disadvantage,” Jonathan said, his slight chuckle suggesting he was only half joking.
Robby gave him a disapproving shake of the head.
“Just kidding. It’s definitely nice to be able to see you guys.”