Gorud had plotted a route east of the city over mining and desert roads that would keep them away from most towns. But the roads were nearly as treacherous as driving through the town would have been. Soon after they started, they hit a long stretch of hard-packed pavement completely covered with sand. Even though the bus and truck passed over it without a problem, Gorud lost traction for about twenty yards until the front wheels found the hard surface again.
“Maybe one of us should drive,” suggested Turk, noticing that Gorud’s injured arm had given him problems.
“Yeah,” said Grease.
“Let me,” added Turk. “You can watch with the gun.”
“I’m OK to drive,” protested the CIA officer.
“It’s better this way,” said Turk, tapping him on the shoulder. “Come on.”
They changed places. Turk, too, had trouble with the loose sand. Once on the highway, the car steadied and he settled down a bit. He didn’t relax—his heart still pounded like a racehorse nearing the finish line. But his view expanded, the cloud of fear lifting slightly. It was as if the horizon had pushed back—he could see farther out and plan before reacting.
Then, almost imperceptibly, either seeking relief from the present or simply lulled into a relaxed moment, his mind began to wander. He thought of Li and their last moments in the hotel room. He ached to see her. He felt her weight against his shoulder. He wanted to brush his fingers across her breasts.
Grease’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “You getting tired of driving?”
“No, I’m good.”
“Careful where you are on the road.”
Turk steered back to the lane gently, trying to stay in control. He glanced over his shoulder; Gorud was dozing in the back. He was tempted to ask Grease if he thought they’d get out of this, but the question seemed too defeatist, as if it implied he’d already decided they wouldn’t.
“They’re looking for a place to change the bus,” Grease said after talking to the others by radio. “I don’t know if we’re going to reach your target area by tonight.”
“Yeah, I was thinking that myself.”
“You have to talk to them, don’t you? You haven’t checked in.”
“Oh, God.”
“Keep driving. They’ll wait.”
Turk hunched forward, leaning toward the wheel as if that would help him focus. He needed to use his pilot’s head—he needed to be clear and precise, not dreamy, not distracted. Being on the ground unhinged his concentration.
No more thinking of Li. No more thinking, period. Except for the job.
“Road,” said Grease.
This time Turk jerked back. His fingers gripped the wheel so tightly they started to cramp.
“I’m thinking maybe we just abort,” said Grease, his voice almost a whisper. “Go straight north while we still can.”
Shocked, Turk jerked his head. “No fuckin’ way.”
Grease stared at him for half a moment, face blank. Then, though the rest of his face hinted at sadness, the ends of his lips peaked upward ever so slightly. “You’ve been hanging around with us too long.”
THE FIRST PLANE PASSED NEARBY ABOUT AN HOUR LATER.
They were south of Sar-e-Kavir, a small town in the shadow of the desert hill where Highway 81 connected with the east-west highway they needed to take. Turk couldn’t see the aircraft, but from the sound he knew it was propeller-driven, something small, very likely similar to the aircraft they had crashed the night before. It didn’t linger, but that was small consolation; for safety’s sake they had to conclude they had been spotted.
Not that they had many options.
Granderson turned up a mountain path about two miles from the town. The steep and rocky path turned out to be a driveway to a pair of small farms dug into the rock outcroppings. Both had been abandoned some years before, though when they first drove up they didn’t know that, and they spent ten minutes checking and clearing the dilapidated far buildings on the larger of the two properties. Sure they were secure, they took the bus into the barn, where there was just barely enough room amid the clutter of old crates and a dilapidated trailer to hide it.
They parked the pickup under a lean-to roof shed at the side; the rear poked out a little, but it would be hard to see even directly overhead. Turk drove the car fifty yards down the hill to what had once been a grove of pomegranate trees but was now mostly a collection of dried stumps. Here and there green shoots and a leaf struggled from the twisted gray trunks, nature refusing to give up even though the underground spring that once supplied the crisscross of irrigation ditches had dried to bone.
He got out of the car and walked a short distance away before using the satellite radio to check in.
Breanna Stockard herself answered. “Turk, are you OK? Where have you been? Why haven’t you checked in?”
“We had a setback in Jandagh,” he told her. “The police—there was an incident in town. A lot of our guys are hurt. We escaped with a bus.”
“The mission tonight, can you—”
“We won’t make it in time.”
Breanna went silent.
“I’ll be in place tomorrow,” said Turk. “Tonight’s going to be too tough. We’re still pretty far away. And we’re pretty banged up.”
“All right. All right. Listen, I know where you are. We have intercepts from the Iranian police and the interior ministry about a stolen bus in one of the towns where you spent time. Is that you?”
“Must be.”
“All right. Stand by.”
Turk heard another aircraft in the distance. This was another propeller plane, but larger; two engines, he thought.
“The report concerning the bus stolen in Jandagh talks about terrorists,” said Breanna. “They’re looking for Russians.”
“That fits with our cover. Do they mention the other vehicles?”
“Negative. The descriptions are vague: three Russian males. Some of these communiqués claim it’s a robbery.” Breanna paused, obviously skimming through screens of data. “They haven’t made a connection with the attack.”
“OK.”
“Turk, what kind of condition are you in?”
“I’m fine. Not a scratch.”
“Your team?”
“Very shot up,” he said. “Only Grease, me, and Granderson are really at full strength. We have two guys—no, three now—who are just immobile. Coming in and out of consciousness. Everybody else is hurt to some degree, though they can still fight.”
“Have you considered aborting?”
“No.”
“You’ve already completed the mission you were sent on.”
“We . . .” Part of him wanted to say yes, they were through; it was time to go home, time to bail.
But the larger part wanted desperately to complete the mission—the next phase. Because the object was to stop the Iranian weapons program. If there was another site, they had to hit it.
So much of a sacrifice, though. For all of them. Was it worth it? Couldn’t they just send in bombers and be done with it?
There was no guarantee they’d make it out alive in that case either. Better to go ahead. Better to do his duty.
At such a cost.
“I can do this, Bree,” Turk insisted. “We just have to get to the other side of the desert. And if they don’t really know what we’re up to—”
“I can’t guarantee that they won’t,” Breanna told him. “The reaction force can’t reach you that far deep in Iran.”
“It’s all right. I’ve done harder things.”
In the air, perhaps, but not on the ground. Definitely not on the ground. But Breanna didn’t call him on it.
“I want you to contact me at the top of the next hour,” she told him. “Do you understand?”