Page 140 of Whisper

The Sheikh. Osama Bin Laden.Nawawiun, nuclear. The devices.Nawawiundevices. Nuclear devices. A new plan of Osama Bin Laden’s, and somehow, al-Qaeda had managed to get their hands on nuclear material.

Kris called Ahmad back. “How did you get this?”

“We have a mole. Someone we turned in Jordan and sent to Afghanistan. He’s worked his way up, and he emailed us that file a few days ago.”

“Tell me everything.”

“His name is Hamid, and the Jordanians picked him up when he was agitating for Saqqaf online. Posting in jihadist chat rooms and advocating violence against the West. Raising funds to send to Saqqaf. They traced his ISP and plucked him out of his Amman home. He wasn’t who you’d expect. Married, father to three boys. A doctor. He tried to volunteer to travel to Iraq to help as a doctor, but never took the final step.”

Kris led the top-level intelligence briefing from the command center at Camp Carson. On the main monitor in his secured conference room, George and Director Edwards, back at Langley, and Ryan in Kabul, each filled a corner of the screen. The president’s national security advisor and chief of staff were also on the call, scowling into the cameras from the Situation Room.

“Is he a coward?” Ryan glared across cyberspace. “Willing to talk the talk but not walk the walk?”

“He turned on his old jihadi brothers in Amman at the fingernail factory.” The grim nickname for Jordan’s intelligence headquarters. “He begged for the chance to make things right. The Jordanians told him the only way they’d wipe his record clean was for him to start working for them. They gave him a thousand bucks and told him to go to Afghanistan, pose as a doctor looking to support the jihad. They wanted him to identify threats against Jordan or any potential jihadist returnees to their country.”

“Sounds like a giant gamble.” Director Edwards frowned.

“They didn’t really care much whether he lived or died. If he bit the dust, they were out a thousand dollars. If he came through with intel, great. He fell off the map for two years, after he sent an email from Peshawar. Said he was linking up with some fighters and making his way into Afghanistan, but that he was going to be offline for some time. That people would be watching him. Said he’d be in contact when he could. After six months, the Jordanians closed his file and declared him dead. There were tons of drone strikes in that region. They assumed he’d been hit.”

“What the fuck has he been doing for two years in Afghanistan?” The chief of staff glowered at the camera, his dark eyes picking Kris apart, even from ten thousand miles away. “I don’t buy it. He disappears into the badlands, and then comes back with this video?”

“Our analysts have authenticated it.” Director Edwards spoke before Kris could.

“Zawahiri hasn’t been seen since 2002. Not by anyone outside of al-Qaeda or from the West. There have been zero sightings. Getting him on video, like this, is huge. It just doesn’t happen. What has Hamid been doing for two years? Working his way up the ranks, most likely. Until he got something he knew we’d want. And don’t forget the reward for either Bin Laden or Zawahiri. Twenty-five million buys a whole new life,” Kris said.

“To be clear, the Jordanians have been running him, yes? No American intelligence officer has met this agent? There’s no American assessment of his reliability?” The national security advisor jumped in.

“No, sir. Not yet. The Jordanians have said they believe he’s reliable. Apparently before sending him to Afghanistan, his handler built a rapport with him. Made him see the light. Hamid was begging for a chance to redeem himself, they say.” Kris took a deep breath. “Our plan is to meet with Hamid personally. We do need to get an American assessment of his abilities, his access, and yes, his reliability. Ahmad, his Jordanian handler is flying out. We’re working on contacting Hamid and arranging a meeting time and location. We want forty-eight hours with him for a full debrief.”

“Is there a possibility that the video is a fake?”

“No, sir. The analysts at Langley authenticated it.”

“Could he have stumbled on old video?” the chief of staff asked. “Maybe it’s something that he found somewhere and is passing off as his own intelligence?”

Kris shook his head. “I highly doubt that. We have current intercepts that reference the conversation Zawahiri is having with his Shura council. Wherever this video comes from, it’s recent. Very recent. And it refers to a threat we have to take extremely seriously. Al-Qaeda may be in possession of a nuclear device, and they are currently debating how to use it.”

The chief of staff and national security advisor sat back. They glanced at each other, then at Director Edwards. “What’s the CIA’s recommendation if this Hamid ends up being legitimate?”

“We track him. We put an active tracker on him and follow him around the clock. He’ll give us a signal when he’s back with Zawahiri, or if he’s taken higher. He’s a doctor, and there aren’t many of them in al-Qaeda. Both Zawahiri and Bin Laden are in poor health. We’ve always wanted to pursue the health angle and try to insert some kind of medical personnel into the movement. This is exactly what we’ve wanted.” Director Edwards smiled at Kris, over the screen. “Bin Laden is hiding in a cave somewhere, marginalized. He’s a symbol. But Zawahiri is operational. When the next attack comes, it’s coming from him. This may be the big break we’ve all been dreaming of.”

“A real double agent inside al-Qaeda.” The chief of staff finally cracked a tiny smile. “Don’t put the champagne on ice just yet, but…” He nodded to them all. “Fuckingwelldone.”

Ahmad arrived at Camp Carson two days later. He hugged Kris and shook David’s hand, both his eyebrows rising when he found out they were married and quartered together. “I didn’t realize, in Iraq—”

“We kept it quiet. But we’ve been together for years.”

Ahmad nodded. He smiled at them both. “To find happiness in these days is a great and beautiful thing.Alhamdulillah.”

Kris and David debriefed him, learning everything they could from him about Hamid. Exactly howhadthe Jordanians found him?Exactlyhow fast did he flip, once Ahmad had him inside the fingernail factory? They went around and around. Where had Hamid been for two years? He’d been adie-hardSaqqaf supporter? Had Ahmad and Hamidtrulyconnected enough that Ahmad believed he was genuine? Was Hamid really willing to sell out his brothers, hisheroes, for cold hard cash?

“Twenty-five million buys a new life. Many new lives. Is there something you wouldn’t do for that much money? Or does that much money buy your allegiances as well?”

“It doesn’t feel right. Not to me. He turned too quickly.”

“Zahawi turned during our first conversation at Site Green,” Kris pressed. “And how many supposedly hardened jihadis did we flip while hunting Saqqaf in Iraq?”

“And how many wedidn’t. Low-level thugs who treated his movement like they were joining a street gang, who weren’t hardened believers in the cause, gave up the ideology. For them, the ideology was a justification for their violence, not the root cause.”