Jeffery Deaver - Watchlist

As he had expected, the only heat signature within a kilometer of the location was that of Sanam. He was standing near his car, exactly where Archer had told him to be.

Satisfied, Archer gave the pilot permission to set them down.

As soon as the runners touched the ground, the side doors flew open and out jumped four of Archer’s men-men who had only recently served his father. Each was armed with a Mini Uzi obtained from a diverted shipment meant for the Sri Lankan army. They were all Hindi, but had had plenty of practice under Sikari on how to pretend to be Muslim.

Archer waited an additional 30 seconds, then he moved into the doorway and stepped down onto the grass.

Per instructions, two of his men moved over to walk just behind him, while the other two stayed near the helicopter, pretending to cover his flank.

It was a show, of course, all aimed at Sanam. Now, more than ever, Archer wanted to reinforce with the Pakistani just how powerful he was.

“ As-Sal mu ‘Alaykum ,” Archer said, stopping two feet from Sanam.

“ wa ‘Alaykum As-Salaam ,” Sanam said. His eyes strayed to the gunmen standing behind Archer. “You face no threat from me.”

“Of course not. It is not you I am worried about. But we are in territory controlled by our enemy. And if they knew I was here, they would do everything they could to stop me.”

Sanam bowed his head in concession.

“You are alone?” Archer asked.

“Those were your instructions.”

“Good,” Archer said, then he smiled broadly. “Shall we walk?”

They headed across the field in no particular direction. Archer could sense Sanam reluctant to start the conversation, so he took the lead.

“Your message mentioned a problem,” Archer said.

“Yes,” Sanam said.

“Well?”

“The remote controls for the detonators. We’ve tested them, but the thickness of the dam prevents them from working.”

Of course they didn’t work. But he now raised his voice in indignation. “Are you saying I gave you faulty equipment?”

“No, I am not saying that. The remotes under normal conditions work fine. But the radio signal is unable to penetrate the concrete.”

“Perhaps you don’t have them rigged properly,” Archer said. He was enjoying toying with this man who thought of him as an ally.

“They are rigged exactly per the instructions.”

Archer grew silent, acting as if he were in deep thought. “Somehow the security services must have added special masking material in the dam,” he said. “But we cannot miss this opportunity.”

“I agree. We are hoping you can get replacements that will work in time?”

“I will try. But the window is short and I fear they may not make it.”

“But if they don’t, we will be forced to abort.”

Archer paused for effect, then leaned toward the Pakistani.

“Actually, that’s not entirely true.”

Sanam played Archer’s words over and over in his mind on the drive back to the hut where he would be spending the night. Archer had promised to do all he could to get the new remotes, but Sanam knew the probability of this was very low.

It was Archer’s suggested alternate plan that was troubling Sanam most. It would solve the problem, but Sanam wished he could come up with something better. Unfortunately by the time he arrived, nothing had come to him.

Umer and two of his other men were waiting for him inside.

“So?” Umer asked.

“He is trying to get us replacements.”

“Trying?” Umer said. “If he doesn’t get the replacements, all our work will mean nothing.”

The other two men voiced their agreement.

“What do you expect to happen?” Sanam said, more anger in his voice than he meant. “That they appear out of the air?”

No one said anything for several moments. Then Umer asked, “Did he at least say when he would know if he could get them?”

“He told me he would contact us by the morning.”

Umer nodded. “Then we will at least know if we will be able to carry out the plan. If he can’t get them in time, we can use the explosives elsewhere. There are plenty of other worthy targets.”

“But none as big as this,” Sanam said.

The room fell silent, everyone knowing he was right.

With a deep breath, he looked at his men. “The plan will go forward with or without the remotes.”

“What are you talking about?” Umer said. “How will we set the explosives off without the remotes?”

“There is a way,” Sanam said.

“What way?” Umer asked.

Sanam paused, still hoping an alternative answer would come to him, but none did. “We will set them off manually. They can be rigged so only one man can do it.”

Umer stared at him.

“It is the only way,” Sanam said.

“It can not be just anyone,” Umer said. “It would have to be someone we trust will not back out. We don’t have anyone I trust that much.”

“We have one,” Sanam said.

Sanam locked eyes with his friend, and in that moment he knew Umer realized the only possibility.

“Me,” Umer said. Not a question.

Sanam said nothing.

The trouble with laptop computers was battery life. The trouble with stolen laptop computers was that they rarely came with chargers. Unless you were lucky enough to target the kind of dork who carried an ugly nylon case everywhere, full of wires and accessories. But the Sorbonne student hadn’t been that kind of dork. All Nora and Charley had was the guy’s MacBook Air, thin, sleek, naked and eating power like it was starving. An icon shaped like a black empty battery suddenly changed to a red empty battery. Then it started flashing. It was winking away to itself, upper right margin of the screen. Directly above Wiki Chang’s face.

Tesla told him, “This thing is going to shut down any minute. We’ll have to find an Internet café.”

Chang said, “No, don’t do that. You’re in Paris. For all we know the Internet cafés are hooked up to the security services.”

“So what do we do?”

“Duh? Go buy a charger.”

“Where?”

“Anywhere.”

“It’s an Apple. It’s got a weird little doohickey.”

Chang’s eyes left Tesla’s and flicked away to another screen. Then they came back. “They were planning to build an Apple store under the glass pyramid at the Louvre. Maybe it’s open now.”

“OK. We’ll find it.”

“Not yet. Stay with me. I have news. At least, I think I do. The trace on the destination cell? It’s still bouncing around. I got Kashmir, Argentina, Sweden, New Zealand and Canada.”

“That’s not news. It means their software is still working, that’s all.”

“I’m not so sure. It switches every two seconds. Like clockwork. Which is how I would expect it to be written. But at the beginning it showed Kashmir for three seconds. Not two. I’m wondering if it failed to lock first time. Maybe it exposed its true location.”

“That’s a leap.”

“Not really. Think about it from the other end. Who wrote this program? A guy like me, that’s who. And what do I know about countries of the world? Not much. I can’t sit here and name them all. I certainly don’t know them all. To me, Kashmir is a Led Zeppelin song.”

“So?”

“So I would need some kind of list.”

“They’re called atlases.”

“A printed book? I don’t think so. Not for a programmer. He’d hack a list from somewhere. The UN, maybe, but that’s probably too secure. My guess is he tried an inside joke and hacked Nokia or someone for cell phone sales by country. And you know what? Turns out, Kashmir isn’t a country. Not officially.”