Page 106 of Rising Tiger

Harvath stifled a grin and walked over to the window. “This is the part of the job they never dare mention during recruitment.”

“The long hours of boredom punctuated by random, brief moments of excitement?”

“Precisely.”

“What kind of fool would sign up for that?” she joked. “There’s a reason the intelligence agencies so love the James Bond movies.”

“The ultimate government program: six decades of somebody else doing their work for them.”

They both laughed and began unpacking everything. As Asha set up atiny wireless camera at the window, Harvath powered up the tablet they would be using to monitor the NGO. Things had come a long way from trying to stay hidden behind venetian blinds while peering through a huge pair of binoculars.

On the table in front of them they laid out all of the pictures of the Universal Relief Initiative’s employees. There were only two, however, whom they were interested in seeing.

Target number one was Basheer Durrani himself. Harvath had already begun running scenarios in his head about how they could apprehend him if he showed up.

Their consolation prize was Amit Paswan. They both felt certain that they could convince him to assist in their cause if need be.

Regardless of which target presented himself, Harvath was determined to spin them into gold and drag his mission across the finish line. He was ready for it to be over, to get out of India, and to return home.

“Contact,” said Asha, recognizing a face down on the street and expanding their image on the tablet.

“Who do we have?” asked Harvath.

She looked at the faces on the pieces of paper on the table and then tapped the corresponding one. “Katrina Kapoor.”

Harvath took out a pen, leaned over, and marked the time of arrival on her profile.

They went back and forth like this eight more times, logging in employees, before Amit Paswan showed up.

Harvath marked down the time of arrival on his profile sheet.

“Now what?” Asha asked.

“We wait and see if Durrani shows up?”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“We do what any good intelligence operative would do. We improvise.”

“In other words, we hope to be lucky rather than good.”

Harvath smiled. “Like James Bond, I plan on being both.”

“NowI’mthe one who’s uncomfortable.”

After another hour, Harvath was giving up hope of seeing Durrani. Perhaps the man was on sick leave, or had taken some vacation time in order to carry out his assignment. Whatever the reason, Harvath didn’t think he was going to show up.

“I’m going to the café down the street for coffee,” he told Asha. “Do you want one?”

“Yes, please. Black.”

“Like your ops,” Harvath replied.

She rolled her eyes. “If you’re waiting for me to make a bad coffee pun in response, you’re going to be standing there all day.”

He smiled. “Call me if anything starts percolating.”

Asha pointed at the door. “Get out of here before I pull my Glock on you again.”