David briefly explained his situation.
“Really, a meeting with the Mahdi?” Zalinsky said. “That’s huge.”
“I know,” David said. “So shouldn’t I stay on track for that?”
“When do you need to be back in Tehran?”
“By eight tonight.”
“Then you should have plenty of time. Find the convoy, follow it, and report back every half hour. That’s priority one right now. Then we’ll make sure you’re back to Tehran by eight.”
“Are you really sure it’s carrying warheads?” David asked.
“No, but the convoy left Facility 278 in the dead of night, and the fact that this is the first convoy to leave the facility at all since the nuclear test seems significant. There are several military bases along the main highway south, and we need to know for certain where they’re headed. Anyway, this is our best lead right now. Actually, this is our only lead. We need to see where it takes us.”
“Fine, but let’s say the convoy does have a warhead. What am I supposed to do about it? I’m unarmed and alone. Is there a special forces team nearby?”
“I’m sending in two paramilitary teams,” Zalinsky replied, “one to the safe house in Karaj and the other to the safe house in Esfahān. But they are HALO jumping into the country and won’t be there until lunchtime at best.”
David was startled. “I thought you already had teams on the ground. That’s what you told me.”
“We did. The White House had us recall them.”
“When?”
“After the president heard from the Mahdi.”
“But why?”
“All I can say is that the Agency is under enormous pressure not to do anything too provocative.”
David couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He was furious and felt hung out to dry. He was risking his life inside Iran, and the administration didn’t want to do anything too provocative? What was wrong with them? Didn’t they see what they were facing? There were times he wished he worked for the Mossad.
“Look,” Zalinsky said, “I know how you must feel right now.”
“Do you?”
“Yes, but I need you to do this for me. I’m sending the paramilitary teams in without the director’s permission. I haven’t even told Murray. I will when the time is right, but not now.”
“Why?”
“I made you a promise. I told you I’d back you up, and I will. But in the meantime, I need you to get on this target and stay on it until we get more people into place and figure out what to do next.”
David held his tongue. He had plenty to say, but there was no use unleashing on the one guy who was helping him.
“So,” Zalinsky said, “can I count on you?”
David took a deep breath. “Sure. Which way are they heading?”
“South on 37.”
“That’s directly parallel with me, but ninety minutes away,” David said, adjusting his GPS system to get a wider view of the area. “If I turn around, I’ll never find them. I’d be better off taking a right on 56, cutting through Arak, and trying to intercept them at Borujerd.”
“How long will that take you?”
“An hour and a half, maybe less if I hit the gas. An hour fifteen if I’m lucky.”
“Do it,” Zalinsky said. “And keep me posted.”
44
Nasreen Shirazi abruptly stopped breathing.
Her husband frantically began giving her CPR and screamed for help. Azad had just stepped into the hallway to take a call from Saeed, but when he heard his father’s yells and an urgent Code Blue message over the hospital’s loudspeakers, he came rushing back in. Seconds later, a team of doctors and nurses rushed in as well. They took over from Mohammad Shirazi and worked feverishly to save Nasreen. But nothing they did worked.
Twenty minutes later, Mrs. Shirazi was pronounced dead. Her husband collapsed in a chair in the corner sobbing while Azad tried in vain to comfort him.
It was 2:30 a.m. in Iran when David reached the junction of 56 and 37.
He pulled his Peugeot to the side of the road, put on the parking brake, grabbed a flashlight from the glove compartment, got out, and popped the hood as if he were having car trouble. He had not passed the convoy coming through the city of Arak or any of the smaller towns and villages along Route 56, so there were now only two possibilities. His best-case scenario was that they had not reached the junction yet. If that was the case, they should be coming through any minute, and he could pick up their trail. If they had just passed through, then he was in trouble. It meant they were still heading south on 37 until they hit a fork. At that point, they could either go west through Khorramabad, a city with about a third of a million people, or continue south on 62 toward Esfahān, Iran’s third-largest city with more than a million and a half people. At that point, it would take a miracle to find them.
David called Zalinsky to report that he had nothing to report except that he was freezing. Strong winds were gusting across the western plains and making the already-chilly March air even colder. David promised to check in again soon, hung up, then opened the trunk and pulled out his coat. The moon was just a sliver, and there were no streetlights or houses or shops to be seen for miles, so it was dark and barren and David felt a stab of deep sadness. He was anxious to find the convoy, to be sure, and worried all his efforts so far would be for naught if the Iranians launched their War of Annihilation against Israel or against his own country. But it was more than that. He felt very much alone, as if something precious to him had just been ripped away.
He thought about praying. He sensed that God might have the answers that he so desperately needed. But he felt guilty turning to God now, when he had been resisting Him for so long. For weeks, it seemed, God had been trying to get his attention — years, actually, but especially in the past few weeks. Through Marseille. Through Najjar Malik. Through Dr. Birjandi, and now through meeting his six secret disciples. Through one near-death experience after another. The car crash. The gun battle. The waterboarding. Through it all, God had been protecting him, watching out for him, providing for him even though he didn’t deserve it. Yet had he taken time to really process what he thought about God, what he thought about Jesus? He knew the answer, and his guilt became all the more crushing.
Just then, David heard a truck coming south. He whipped around, but it was only a pickup, and it was alone. He went back to tinkering with his engine.
As he did, he began to ponder all that he had seen and heard and wrestled with in recent weeks. He did believe in God, he decided. Actually, he was pretty sure he always had. How could he not? He knew deep in his soul that God had been revealing Himself in ways large and small ever since he was a child.
What if his parents had stayed in Iran and he had been born here? He’d never have known freedom, never have met Marseille, never have had the incredible opportunities he had today. He might even be serving in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps at this very moment, he realized. He might be serving the Twelfth Imam and be a full participant in the great evil now unfolding. Hadn’t God spared him from all that?
Or what if Jack Zalinsky had never come to see him in the Onondaga County juvenile detention center when he was sixteen? What if he’d been sentenced for a more serious crime, given a longer sentence? What if his record hadn’t been expunged and he’d never gone to college? Wasn’t God’s hand rescuing him then, too?
Yes, David was sure that a God existed, one who had a plan for him and was trying to get his attention. He was certain of this now. But he was also certain of something else: the god of Islam was not Him. David wasn’t naive enough to think that Muslims were the only people to do horrific violence in the name of their god. Throughout history, people calling themselves Christians had done terrible things too. The difference, David concluded, was that the Muslims waging violent jihad were actually obeying the Qur’an’s commands to kill the infidels, while people who said they were Christians but killed or mistreated Jews, Muslims, and others were explicitly disobeying the teachings of Jesus.