“Yes, Excellency. I understand. But our po—”
“They are trying to destroy us — to replace the republic with a government based on Western sin and corruption — and you just sit by. We have to show these people that the faithful will fight to the death to contain their blasphemy.”
Discontent had been growing since the last presidential reelection. He himself had strongly opposed the way the government handled the voting but had been overruled. In his mind, the results needed to be close enough to appear legitimate, but Khamenei disagreed. He was unwilling to allow any indication that there was anything but overwhelming support for his regime.
The entirely avoidable chaos that ensued had given birth to Farrokh — a young, technologically sophisticated devil with a gift for corrupting youth and spreading his subversive ideas.
To date, every attempt to find him had been thwarted. In fact, until recently, they hadn’t even been sure he existed. A month ago, though, their futile attempts to find Farrokh had been reborn. A chance interception of an unencrypted e-mail allowed them to capture a member of Farrokh’s inner circle — a woman who had actually been face-to-face with him and who had intimate knowledge of his network.
It had taken some persuading, during which a number of her family members had been put to death in front of her, but eventually she had told them everything.
“Give the order to fire on the crowd,” Khamenei insisted.
“Nothing would make me happier than to see these cowards die,” Omidi said honestly. “Their defiance is an affront to God. But an escalation at this point would be counterproductive.”
“Why? Are you going to tell me it’s because the world is watching? What world? America? The Jews? You’ll do as I say.”
Omidi sighed quietly. He had explained this over and over, but the aging holy man simply couldn’t understand that they were using this riot to trace Farrokh’s communications back to him. Disbursing the crowd would send the rat back into the foul hole he lived in.
“Excellency, please—”
The van’s rear doors were suddenly thrown open and his most trusted lieutenant stood backlit by the afternoon sun. Omidi smiled and said a silent prayer of thanks. “We have him, Excellency.”
Mehrak Omidi examined the massive house perched on the side of a forested hill, focusing his binoculars on a satellite dish growing from its roof and then dropping his gaze to the arches and pillars that so gracefully combined French architecture with Persian.
He was hidden in the trees a few feet from the edge of the road, listening through his earpiece to the chatter of the men taking positions around the building. He had hoped that Farrokh would be in the city center, making it easier to bring assault forces in unnoticed, but while this was a more complex operation to set up, it also offered their quarry fewer opportunities to escape. Every road was blocked, helicopters were in the air, and traffic was being diverted. In Tehran, Farrokh could potentially disappear into the constant bustle. Here he would be alone and exposed.
When all thirty men involved in the elaborate trap signaled their readiness, Omidi started up the hill, running hard and using branches to help propel himself forward. He could hear the much younger men behind him breathing heavily as they tried to keep up. At their age, he had been in an elite unit attached to the Revolutionary Guard and he lived his life as though he still were, meticulously maintaining his body and mind to serve God and his representative on earth, Ayatollah Amjad Khamenei.
When he arrived at the edge of the meticulously tended lawn surrounding the mansion, Omidi stopped and brought a radio to his mouth. “Now!”
The roar of a car engine became audible as it raced up the long driveway, and Omidi leapt out onto the lawn just as it skidded to a stop a few meters from the front entrance. He reached for his pistol and held it in both hands as he ran up behind the men pulling a battering ram from the vehicle.
The ornate double doors flew open with the first impact and Omidi followed his men inside.
Normally, he’d be directing the operation from his control van, making sure there were no gaps that could be exploited by the enemy and coordinating on-the-fly tactical changes. But not this time. This time he wanted to be part of it. He wanted to be there when Farrokh was finally brought to his knees.
A woman in immodest Western dress appeared at the end of the marble entry, letting out a startled scream and then demanding to know who they were. She was quickly silenced by a rifle butt, and Omidi stepped over her motionless body as he passed through the archway at the back. Two young children appeared ten meters down the hallway but then immediately darted through a doorway.
He went after them, abandoning caution as he sprinted down the ornate passageway. More than a year of his life spent trying to find a ghost was coming to an end. Farrokh was there. He could feel it.
Omidi came to the end of the hall and signaled the men behind to cover him as he leapt into the adjacent room, scanning it over the sights of his pistol.
“Who are you?” a young man demanded, trying to free himself from the children clutching at his legs. “What are you doing here?”
He was in his early thirties, plump and dressed in clothes calculated to project wealth more than fashion. His round face was unremarkable and the fear was visible there despite his attempt to hide it. The great Farrokh seemed almost impossibly small when stripped of the electronic illusions he liked so much to hide behind.
“Don’t move!” Omidi shouted.
“Who are you?” he demanded again. “Do you—”
“Silence!”
Omidi moved closer, reaching out for one of the bawling children while keeping his gun aimed at the man’s face.
“So when the great Farrokh can’t cower behind a computer screen, he hides behind children?” Omidi said as his men circled behind the godless terrorist.
“Farrokh? Are you crazy? I’m—”
The Taser hit him in the center of the back and he collapsed, convulsing satisfyingly on the floor.
Omidi shoved the pleading children away and knelt, grabbing the man by the hair and lifting his head. “I know exactly who you are. And so does God!”
20
Jon Smith felt the rented snowmobile loft into the air and was forced to throttle back a fraction when it landed. The heavy powder billowed over him, filling his open mouth and sticking to the stubble on his chin. Tall ponderosa pine were becoming more plentiful, and he slowed a bit more, picking his way through them as his eyes struggled to adjust to the transition from blinding sunlight to deep shadow.
He adjusted his trajectory slightly, using the thirteen-thousand-foot peak of Mount Dana to keep his bearings as he navigated the wilderness at the edge of California’s Yosemite National Park.
A herd of deer watched him burst from the trees and head for a distant column of smoke bisecting the horizon. He’d never been to the Sierras when there was snow on the ground and regretted not making the trip sooner. The scenery was as spectacular as anything he’d seen in his extensive travels — massive granite walls, frozen waterfalls, untouched forest.
On the other hand, to say it was hard to get to would be a wild understatement. The nearest cup of coffee was a day’s travel in good weather. In bad weather, you’d more likely just end up a permanent part of a snowdrift.
The tiny log cabin that was the source of the smoke came into view at the very limit of his vision, and Smith pulled off his hood and sunglasses to make sure he was easily recognizable to the man he knew was watching.