The Last Refuge (25 page)

The floor-to-ceiling glass took up every inch of the outer-facing walls of the skyscraper, Dubai’s third-tallest building. Oval-shaped, designed by Frank Gehry, the building seemed simple enough until you stood at its base and stared up at it. There, looking straight up, the building swayed noticeably in the prevailing wind off the Persian Gulf. The skyscraper also tapered as it ascended; the top floor of Petros Towers was less than a quarter the diameter of the bottom floor. The effect was magical and strange, as the architect had intended, like a spindled black caterpillar spiraling up into the endless blue sky.

On the sixtieth floor of Petros Towers, a visitor could be temporarily stunned by the view. The outer-facing walls were all glass, so too were the inner office walls. From every angle and point of view, except of course for the restrooms, the feeling was as if one was trapped inside a sun-blasted prism, with sunlight being cut and recut a hundred times by different angles of glass, and where shards of multicolored light seemed to always be noticeable in rainbowlike chutes. At the same time, the feeling was like flying. To the east, the Persian Gulf in a bold half-circle; oil tankers, container ships, transocean liners, and pleasure boats dotted the blue waters. In the other direction, westward, the city of Dubai, skyscrapers, apartments buildings, then suburbs, and then, starting at midview, the endless, light orange sands of the Arabian desert.

At a quarter after three in the afternoon, a tall man with curly, dirty blond hair and a neatly trimmed beard stepped out of the elevator. Tim Bond, the director of French oil conglomerate Totalfina Elf’s Eurasian Operations, swiped a gray plastic card at an infrared reader next to a set of doors that had a geometric triangle logo and the word
TOTAL
etched in its glass. The lock on the doors clicked and Bond pushed into the lobby.

“Hi, Tim,” said the receptionist, who was middle-aged with a short, perfect Dorothy Hamill bob to her blond hair. “How was Africa?”

“The same as always,” said Bond in a British accent, smiling. “Hot, smelly and, in its own way, amazing. Did I miss much?”

“No.” She smiled. “They’re waiting for you in two.”

“Okay,” he said. “What’s this?” He nodded at the folder.

“Your manifest for Riyadh.”

“Thank you.”

“Also, you have a visitor,” the receptionist said, subtly leaning her head to the left and back.

Bond glanced in the direction of where she was indicating. In the large waiting area, a woman stood, back turned, staring out the glass at the Persian Gulf. Her long blond hair was braided neatly down in back. She wore a stylish white leather jacket. As if sensing Bond staring at her, the woman turned. She had a serious expression on her face.

“I’ll be damned,” whispered Bond.

He walked from the desk to the entrance foyer and pushed the door open.

“Katie,” he said.

“Hi, Tim,” said Foxx.

“How long have you been standing there?” Bond asked, staring at her.

“Half an hour,” said Foxx. “Nice view.”

“How’d you know how to find me?”

Foxx looked at him blankly.

“Stupid question,” said Bond. “Give me a few minutes, will you?”

“Sure.”

*   *   *

Ten minutes later, Bond returned.

“I’m sorry you had to wait, Katie,” said Bond.

“It’s okay. I didn’t have an appointment.”

“You’re lucky I’m here,” he said.

“It wasn’t luck,” she said, smiling.

“Troublemaker.”

Foxx followed Bond down the long, glass-walled hallway. They turned right at the end of the hallway. He led her to the corner office. Foxx stepped inside the large office. Its walls were entirely glass, the Persian Gulf’s dark blue waters everywhere like wallpaper.

Bond shut the door. Foxx walked to a modern white leather couch and sat down. Bond sat down in a red leather chair across from her.

Bond stared at Foxx for several moments. She had on knee-high black Prada leather boots, a navy blue skirt that only came halfway down her thighs, showing off her legs, and a jacket, which she removed and placed on the couch, revealing a red sleeveless blouse and sculpted, honey-colored arms. Bond scanned her up and down several times, trying without much luck to hide his obvious admiration.

“You got more beautiful,” said Bond.

Foxx was silent. She stared at him, saying nothing.

“Are you not going to say anything?” he said.

“Like what?”

“Like, ‘gee, Tim, thanks for the compliment.’”

“Thanks for the compliment.”

“Are you still mad?” asked Bond.

“No,” she said. “Why would I be mad?”

Bond chuckled and shook his head.

“Well, that’s good,” he said.

“We’d be divorced by now anyway,” Foxx said.

“I don’t know about that,” said Bond. “But you’d probably be dead. All I asked was that you give it up.”

“I know what you asked. I was there, remember? The one with the big smile, the engagement ring, the Vera Wang dress. The broken heart.”

Bond smiled.

“I didn’t want to see you die, Katie.”

“It’s what I do for a living, Tim,” Foxx said. “What if I had asked you to give up what you do?”

“What I do won’t get me killed,” said Bond. “What I do won’t leave children without a parent.”

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” said Foxx, waving her hand in the air. “It’s over. You did me a favor. I’m not cut out for marriage.”

“I heard you left Langley.”

“Yes,” said Foxx. “A couple years ago.”

“You need some work?” asked Bond.

“No,” said Foxx. “But I do need something.”

“I figured that,” said Bond. “What?”

“A clean insertion into Iran,” said Foxx. “Through Turkey. Do
ğ
ubayazit. I need a deep cover that will back-check at the border and withstand a database pull; VEVAK, China, Interpol. That’s it.”

Bond nodded.

“A little vacation?”

“Funny guy.”

“Who’s it for?”

“Male, age thirty-nine.”

“American?”

“Yes. The cover needs to be someplace else, obviously.”

“If he looks non-Arab or has a stamp that’s not from the area, he’ll get interrogated.”

“We’ll dress him up. Language will be a problem.”

“Let me think about that,” said Bond. “We can make him Iraqi or Turk, but born somewhere else, London or Montreal.”

“Okay.”

“Why not let the CIA drop you in at the Iraq border? Isn’t that the obvious access point?”

“It’s a private operation. Also, I need to do it in broad daylight. It’s the working permit that’s most important. He needs to be some sort of truck driver.”

“Truck driver?”

“Yes,” said Foxx. “He’ll be driving something that looks like this.”

Foxx reached to her Hermès Birkin bag and removed a photo of a semitruck; blue cab, silver trailer. It was the photo provided by Qassou of the truck holding the bomb, though that wasn’t visible.

Bond inspected the photo.

“What’s going to be inside said truck?” asked Bond.

Foxx stared at him, her expression as blank as a wall.

“If you’re going into Iran to cause trouble, if it’s going to trace back to Totalfina, that would be a problem,” said Bond. “Total is not a branch of the British government or the U.S. government. I work here. We’re dancing a delicate dance over here, as you can imagine.”

“I won’t make promises I can’t keep,” said Foxx. “There could be trouble. There’s no reason it should result in Total taking any blame.”

“What do you mean by trouble, Kate?” asked Bond. “If this has something to do with Natanz—”

“I can’t get into details,” said Foxx. “You know that.”

“You’re about as easy to read as a brick wall,” said Bond, staring at Foxx. “So I’m not going to try and guess what you’re doing. But I know your background. If you’re going in to take out Nava or, God forbid, Suleiman, as much as I personally wouldn’t give a shit, the fact is, they would come after any and all Total employees inside the country. I can’t allow that.”

“It’s not an assassination,” said Foxx. “Your precious oil fields will be fine.”

“Fuck you. I don’t need attitude from someone asking for a major fucking favor, a favor that could get me fired and probably killed.”

Foxx smiled and shook her head.

“If you don’t want to help me, fine,” she said. She reached for her coat.

“I’ll help you,” he said. “But you have to protect me. The only reason I’m doing it is because I still love you.”

Foxx stood up, leaving the photo with Bond. She put her leather jacket on, then picked up her bag. She took a step and stood next to Bond, who was still seated, just inches from her. He reached his hand out and softly touched the bare skin just above her left knee, just above the dark leather of the Prada boot. Foxx looked into Bond’s eyes as he did it, expressionless. After half a dozen seconds, she stepped away and walked to the door.

“I’ll e-mail you the details,” Foxx said from the door, not turning, not looking at Bond. “I’ll let myself out.”

33

GOLESTAN STREET

MAHDISHAHR, IRAN

Golestan Street was dark and empty. Omid steered the truck along the potholed, dusty two-lane road, past small homes with sleeping families, past a strip of shops, then a closed gas station. Omid was alone. He wore civilian clothing, despite the fact that he was a commander in Quds Force, the special forces division of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Normally, Omid operated in Yemen. He’d been flown back to Tehran the day before for the sole purpose of making the delivery.

It had seemed irrational to him as he departed from the cavelike nuclear weapons lab outside of town to travel unaccompanied by patrol vehicles. Why would we travel alone with the republic’s first nuclear bomb? It was insanity, he thought to himself. Now, as he moved along the dark street, he comprehended the logic to the orders. He was just a truck driver, any man, moving in the night.

Then he remembered: the Americans. If they knew who he was and what he was doing, they would light him up with a missile from one of the dreaded UAVs. Omid knew that they were out there. The drones were the one thing that sent a shiver up the spine of any Quds soldier with half a brain. They could strike you whenever, wherever, and you wouldn’t know it until the moment just before you were hit, as the high-pitched whistle of the incoming missile screamed in the air. For a few moments, he listened for it, then reached and turned the radio on.
If they’re going to kill me, I’d rather not know
, he thought.

But his fears were baseless. His drive went without incident. At a plain-looking warehouse off Golestan, he took a right into a parking lot. He chugged across the tar, behind the building. As he came closer, a pair of large steel doors slid open. Bright lights shone abruptly out through the door. He drove through the doors and watched, in his side mirror, as they quickly slid shut. He came to a stop, then shut off the truck.

In front of him, his commanding officer, General Soleimani, stood, arms crossed. Next to him was a man he recognized, but had never met. Omid climbed down from the cab and stepped toward the two men.

“You’re late, Omid,” said Soleimani.

“Rush hour,” said Omid.

Soleimani smiled.

“Omid,” said Soleimani, “General Paria.”

“It’s an honor, sir,” said Omid.

Paria nodded at Omid, but said nothing. He stepped past him and walked briskly toward the back of the truck, whose doors one of the soldiers had already opened. Omid followed him. At the back of the truck, Paria looked up at the bomb. He turned to Omid.

“Good work,” said Paria, reaching out and patting Omid on the shoulder. “You can tell your grandchildren you were part of history.”

34

THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON, D.C.

President Dellenbaugh sat behind the desk in the Oval Office, running his right hand absentmindedly along the burnished edge of the old, majestic block of wood as he stared into the half-filled coffee cup in his hand.

On the desk in front of him was the morning’s
Washington Post
. A photo of Amit Bhutta, Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, was displayed in the lower right-hand corner of the paper, next to an article entitled
THE MYSTERY OF IRAN’S MISSING AMBASSADOR
.

There was a knock on the door to the Oval Office. The door opened; Jessica and Calibrisi stepped inside.

“Good morning,” said Dellenbaugh.

“Good morning, Mr. President,” said Jessica.

“Morning, Mr. President,” said Calibrisi.

Jessica and Calibrisi moved to the two chesterfield sofas in the middle of the room and sat down.

“I want to start by clarifying something,” said Dellenbaugh, standing up and walking around the desk. He took a seat in one of two navy blue wing chairs in the center of the room. In his hand was the newspaper he’d been reading. “I’ve been on the job for less than a week. I think it would be an understatement to say I’m still getting my feet wet. It’s been a confusing and, to be honest, difficult week. I liked President Allaire. I didn’t agree with him on everything, but I liked the man. Now I’m forced to figure out a way to both honor his legacy and those policies he espoused, and which citizens voted for, and my own set of beliefs, which as you know are different from his; not on everything, mind you, but on certain subjects.”

Jessica and Calibrisi were silent.

“You two have been enormously helpful,” continued Dellenbaugh. “And I appreciate it. But what I need to know is whether or not you are with me going forward. I’d like you to be. For my sake and for America’s. Not only are you both widely respected, you’re good at your jobs. I also think continuity at this hour in our national security infrastructure, both at home and abroad, is important.”

Dellenbaugh paused. His nostrils flared slightly.

“If you’re on board, though, I need you to be willing to work for, to fight for, to adhere to my policies, even those that are different from President Allaire’s. Do you understand?”

Calibrisi glanced at Jessica, then looked at Dellenbaugh. In his hand, the president held
The Washington Post
.