Blowback

“Our paper is very fibrous, and it doesn’t take much for things to get embedded in those fibers. The best example would be cocaine. According to statistics, trace amounts of cocaine are believed to infect four out of every five bills in circulation.”

“That’s impossible,” answered Reynolds. “There aren’t that many people doing drugs in America.”

“The drug users may be the root source, but they represent an almost negligible minority when it comes to how bills get contaminated. When a powdered substance like cocaine is very finely milled, it passes easily from one surface to another. The biggest contamination culprits are ATMs. Once infected, they were shown to spread trace amounts of cocaine to all the bills they distributed. Counting and sorting machines like those used in banks and casinos are just as bad. Even the machines tested in several Federal Reserve banks were shown to be contaminated.

“Basically, a single bill with trace amounts of a substance like cocaine can infect an entire cash drawer, and when that cash encounters a counting or sorting machine, which fans the bills, the contamination grows exponentially. It makes perfect sense.”

Reynolds looked back at Jillian. “You’re the scientist. What do you think?”

“From a personal standpoint, I think it’s terrifying. But from a strictly scientific point of view, it’s absolutely brilliant.”

Harvath hadn’t liked it when al-Qaeda’s strategic genius was praised after the September 11 attacks, and he didn’t like hearing this current terrorist strategy described in such a way either, but he understood what she meant. “So is this a viable means of infection?”

“It makes sense,” said Jillian. “Contaminated currency would be a perfect, virtually unstoppable way to spread it. It would also have a chilling psychological effect on financial markets worldwide. The American dollar would be quite literally worthless. Not only would al-Qaeda succeed in killing scores of infidels, but they would also decimate the American economy. Quite a one-two punch.”

Harvath turned to Reynolds and asked, “How much time before we get to the warehouse?”

“About five more minutes.”

“Is your cell phone secure?”

“More secure than most in the kingdom, why?”

“Just in case we don’t walk out of that warehouse, Gary needs to know what we’ve discovered.”

As Harvath raised the phone to his ear, he glanced in the Land Cruiser’s side-view mirror and watched as a blue Mercedes behind them turned off onto a small side street and another car merged into traffic three lengths back. It was the same car that had been behind them when they turned onto the main road leaving Riyadh Air Base.

Cupping his hand over the mouthpiece, he said to Reynolds, “I think we’ve got company.”

EIGHTY-FOUR

Reynolds trusted Harvath’s instincts. Without even waiting for an explanation, he yelled for everybody to hang on and pulled a hard right turn followed by a quick left. Pulling a walkie-talkie from beneath his seat, he asked Harvath to describe the car he had seen. Once he knew what they were looking for, he raised the walkie-talkie to his mouth and said, “Bluebird, this is Pelican. Do you copy? Over.”

“Who’s Bluebird?” asked Harvath as he glanced over his shoulder to see if they were still being followed.

“He’s one of my men. His name is Zafir.”

“Is he a Saudi?”

“No, Pakistani. He’s ex-military and one of the few people I trust with something like this. He’s on a rooftop down the street from the warehouse keeping an eye out for us. In about a block he’ll have a clear view, and we’ll know if anyone is following us.”

“Pelican, this is Bluebird. I copy. Over,” broke a voice across Reynolds’s radio. “What’s your status? Over.”

“Pelican is inbound with possible company. Please check our tail for a beige, late-model Nissan Sentra. Over.”

“Late-model beige Nissan Sentra. Roger that,” said Zafir. “Take a right turn at Al Mus’ad and another right turn at Khair al Din. Will let you know. Over.”

“Roger that. Pelican out,” said Reynolds as he handed the radio to Harvath and prepared to execute the turns.

Three minutes later, Zafir radioed back that they were all clear. Either Harvath had overreacted and they weren’t being followed, or they had managed to lose whoever was behind them. Something told Harvath it was the latter. He had a bad feeling that they were about to walk into something they might have a very difficult time walking out of.

Taking the radio back from Harvath, Reynolds did one final check with Zafir, who told him the warehouse had been quiet all day. Even though the parking lot was empty, Reynolds chose to park on the street about a block away. The last thing he wanted to do was draw attention to the fact that someone was visiting.