Twelve Days

by Alex Berenson

  A pause. Despite his age, Abdullah’s mind and memory were intact. Wells imagined him looking at the phone, sorting through possibilities.

  “John Wells?”

  “Yes, sir. Sorry to bother you—”

  “No matter.”

  Not quite the same as no bother. “With your permission, I wish to come to Riyadh. To put a question to one of your nephews. A general.” Wells spoke formally now, conscious of just how rough his Arabic sounded.

  “I have more than one nephew who’s a general.”

  “Nawwaf bin Salman, sir.”

  Abdullah didn’t speak. Wells wondered if he’d overreached somehow.

  “Where are you now?” the King finally said.

  —

  From Zurich, Wells flew to Rome, where he caught an overnight Saudi Arabian Airlines flight to Riyadh. Saudia—as the airline was known—had the quirks of the country it served. It was at once deeply religious and highly status-conscious. The 777 jet included two prayer rooms, one at the front of the plane for first-class passengers, one at the rear for everyone else.

  The pilots were Saudi, but the flight attendants were Filipino women. Male Saudis considered working as cabin crew beneath their dignity, and no Saudi woman would ever be allowed a job where she could mix so closely with men. No alcohol was available, and every flight began with a prayer in Arabic: Bismi-Allah wa al-Hamduli-Allah . . . In the name of Allah, Praise be to Allah, Glory to Him who made this transport for us, as we could never have created it.

  The words both comforted and disconcerted Wells. Arabic was the language of his time undercover in Afghanistan and Pakistan. For better or worse, those years had hardened him into the man he was now. He had fought alongside jihadis who hated the United States. Though he never accepted their beliefs, he admired their endurance and fearlessness. They weren’t fools, most of them. They fought knowing that they could never overcome the United States. They would have been wiser to focus their energy on the corrupt regimes closer to home. Yet their choice had a certain peculiar logic: America was the devil, and fighting the devil was the highest calling, even if only Allah could overcome him.

  So the jihadis were brave and tough. Callous and cruel, too. They cared little for the lives of the civilians around them, less for any enemy unlucky enough to fall into their hands. Facing a foe with overwhelming advantages, they used deceit as a tactic. They fought without uniforms or front lines, picking off one or two soldiers at a time, then disappearing. But was Wells any different? He had lived with these men for years, pretended to be one of them. All along he’d hoped to destroy them, and he’d killed more than one in cold blood. He had come back from those mountains almost a decade before. Yet he still couldn’t talk about what had happened there. Not with Shafer, not with Anne, not even with Exley. He couldn’t find the words, in any language. He circled that time in his mind like a plane trying to land in heavy fog. A psychiatrist would probably say he had post-traumatic stress disorder, but Wells didn’t plan to ask.

  In the cabin around him, heavy-legged men in white robes and leather sandals settled back in their seats. Wells wondered what these Saudis would make of him, an American who had taken their religion as his own. In theory, Islam was the most equal of faiths. Becoming Muslim didn’t require approval from a priest or rabbi. Anyone who read the Quran with honest effort could join the umma, the worldwide community of believers.

  Yet the Saudis had a way of making other Muslims feel like outsiders. Blood, language, and land joined the Gulf Arabs to Islam. They could trace their lineage to the original tribesmen who had supported Muhammad. The Quran was written in their native tongue. Their country included Islam’s holiest sites. Their very flag included the Shahada, the Islamic creed: There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.

  No, Wells knew how they’d see him: misguided at best, a faker at worst.

  He closed his eyes as the jet leveled off and found himself dreaming of the Kaaba, the forty-three-foot-high cube at the heart of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, tall black granite walls set on a marble base. The Kaaba protected al-Hajar al-Aswad, the Black Stone, a smooth piece of obsidian that was sometimes thought to have come from a meteorite. The people of Mecca had believed in the stone’s mystical powers even before Muhammad brought Islam to them. Now it marked the spiritual center of the religion. Muslims faced the Kaaba when they knelt to pray.

  Wells had been to Mecca, yet he hadn’t seen the Grand Mosque. The failure seemed to summarize the contradictions of his life.

  In his dream, he finally arrived at the Kaaba. But he’d made a mistake. Pilgrims were supposed to circle the cube counterclockwise. He was walking the wrong way, squeezing through the crowd. He tried to turn but found he could only march forward. Bodies pinballed off his, bouncing him side to side. At first the other pilgrims didn’t notice. Then one yelled: Imposter! The cries spread: American! Apostate! Men linked their arms to form an unbreakable wedge. They jammed Wells backward. He knew that if he stumbled the crowd would swallow him whole. Then a final jolt threw him on his back and the men around him roared—

  “Sir? Sir?” The words in English, not Arabic.

  Wells opened his eyes. A flight attendant leaned over him, her hand poised above his shoulder, close enough for Wells to pick up the scent of her too-sweet perfume.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you, but we’ve run into turbulence.” Indeed, the cabin rattled as the plane passed through dirty air. “You’ll need to buckle your belt.”

  Wells latched his belt and closed his eyes. He hoped the Kaaba would return, that he could win some spiritual succor in his dreams at least. But it was gone. He spent the rest of the flight listening to the snores of the men around him.

  His only consolation came from the back of the cabin, where two women whispered intimately in Arabic. Wells couldn’t hear their words, only the low lovely trill of their voices through the stale pressurized air. He wondered if they were sisters, wives to the same man, or both. He wished he could ask, but the question would have been beyond impolite.

  —

  Two men in the black uniforms worn by Abdullah’s elite guardsmen waited as Wells stepped off the Jetway at King Khalid Airport in Riyadh. Wordlessly, they led him to the front of a long immigration control line. A nervous customs officer hardly looked up before stamping his passport.

  Outside the terminal, a cool, blustery wind rustled the date palms. Even Riyadh had winter. The men led Wells to a sleek black Mercedes limousine, where another uniformed officer waited. He ushered Wells into the limo as the two escorts stepped into a chase car, a black BMW sedan parked nose-to-tail with the Merc.

  “As-salaam aleikum.”

  “Aleikum salaam.”

  “I’m Colonel Fahd Ghaith. Deputy Commander, First Special Division of the National Guard.” The Mercedes rolled off. Its windows were thick and bullet-resistant, and Wells guessed it had an inch or so of steel armor in its doors, too.

  “None of this was necessary.”

  “The King has asked me to ensure your trip is pleasant.”

  “I appreciate that.” Though Wells feared the star treatment would only bring unwanted attention to his arrival. He watched through the back window as a third car pulled away from the terminal, a four-door white Nissan with a tinted windshield and a nick on the driver’s door. The windshield and the distance hid the faces of the driver and passenger.

  “That one yours, too?”

  Ghaith followed Wells’s gaze. “No. Are you concerned about it?”

  “Should I be?”

  “You’re His Majesty’s guest, Mr. Wells.”

  Not exactly an answer, as they both knew. Terrorists had attacked the royal family before. They would be glad for a chance at Wells. The Mercedes and BMW followed the signs for the airport exit, the Nissan a few cars back. Lack of sleep and that dream about the Grand Mosque were probably maki
ng Wells twitchy.

  Probably.

  “General Nawwaf will see you this evening. Eight-thirty. His office is in the Ministry of Defense at the Riyadh Air Base. In the meantime—”

  The Mercedes sped through a police checkpoint and accelerated onto Route 535, a crowded highway that ran southwest from the airport to the center of Riyadh. The chase car remained a few lengths behind, the Nissan still coming.

  “A hotel?”

  “His Majesty’s guests don’t stay in hotels. A small residence south of downtown.”

  “Small residence?”

  “Very modest. You’re still looking at that car?”

  “He’s still there.”

  “This is the main road from the airport. As you can see from the traffic. Nonetheless. I’d rather not have you worrying.” Ghaith turned to the front seat. “At the house in twenty minutes, Khalid. Let’s have your siren.”

  A moment later, the limousine’s siren sang its high Oo-oo, Oo-oo. The traffic ahead cleared, and the Mercedes surged to fill the empty pavement.

  Two minutes later, the limousine turned from 535 to Route 65, the main highway through central Riyadh. The Nissan had vanished. Wells relaxed as best he could, took in the city around him. Riyadh was flat, unapologetically ugly, and in the middle of a Shanghai-size construction boom. With oil at one hundred dollars a barrel, Abdullah was expanding universities and hospitals and building a skyscraper complex for banks and a stock exchange. Inevitably, the new development was called the King Abdullah Financial District. Abdullah was a more democratic monarch than his predecessors, but his modesty had limits. He shared the Saud family fetish for spreading his name far and wide.

  —

  After carving through the downtown traffic, the Mercedes turned west onto an eight-lane highway that Saudis called the Mecca Road. The city’s sprawl seemed endless, an infinite loop of concrete towers, asphalt roads, and dirt lots. Beige and black and brown blurred together, as if Riyadh’s builders wanted the city to reflect the monochrome desert that surrounded it.

  The limousine left the highway and turned south down Prince Turki Road, a six-lane boulevard. An oversize complex of buildings loomed to the left, with signs announcing “King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre” in English and Arabic.

  “Best hospital in Saudi Arabia. World-class.” Ghaith spoke the last two words in English, with relish. “We’re almost there.”

  The Mercedes turned right, into a crowded residential neighborhood, a mix of blocky apartment buildings and new houses. Then left, right, and left again, before squealing through an open gate watched by two guards. It stopped outside a three-story mansion.

  “Twenty minutes exactly. Well done, Khalid.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “This is the small residence?” Wells said.

  “Only one thousand square meters.” Ten thousand square feet. Ghaith stepped out, and Wells followed him into a foyer that had more marble than most churches. A gold-leaf chandelier hung overhead. The Saudis didn’t consider subtlety a virtue.

  Ghaith pointed down a corridor. “Kitchen’s that way. There’s a chef if you’re hungry. Halal only, I’m afraid. Though I do believe there’s a liquor cabinet in the closet of the master bathroom.”

  “I won’t ask how you know.”

  “Also an indoor pool at the back of the house, an exercise room.”

  “Who stays here, Colonel?”

  “Mostly Western doctors working at the hospital.”

  “Of course.” Abdullah would hardly mind spending a few million dollars on mansions to entice the best specialists to come to Riyadh to treat him and his family.

  “I’ll be back at eight to pick you up, but my men will wait in front. If I can be of service, please call. Is there anything else you need, Mr. Wells?”

  Wells thought of the mysterious Nissan. “Wouldn’t mind a pistol. If you have one to spare.”

  “I assure you you’re safe here. These are some of the King’s best men.”

  “No doubt. But I prefer to look after myself.”

  “Al-Hamdu lillah.” Praise be to God. “I’ll see you this evening, Mr. Wells.”

  —

  Wells forced himself onto a treadmill for an hour, flipping on CNN International to see what he’d missed on the flight from Rome. Laura Frommer, the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had announced her support for the President. The CIA offered a convincing case at our hearings, Frommer said at a press conference. And the Iranians can defuse this crisis very simply. Open your nuclear facilities, let us speak to your scientists. You say you aren’t trying to build a bomb, but this uranium ingot tells a different story.

  The American government had found its line: If war comes, it’s Iran’s fault, for refusing to open up. The argument had traction. Polls showed that sixty-three percent of Americans favored military action, up eleven percent since the missile attack that downed United 49. If Duberman was behind the missile, it had worked even better than he expected. Wells briefly wondered if he should have gone to Mumbai instead of coming here. But he had no leads in India. And he and Shafer and Duto were far better off staying off the agency’s radar. That would be impossible in Mumbai.

  Exhaustion overcame Wells as he stepped off the treadmill. He found his way to the master bedroom, set his phone for 7 p.m., pulled the shades. And slept.

  He woke not to the beeping of his alarm but amplified Arabic voices in the distance. He didn’t have the usual traveler’s dislocation when his eyes snapped open. He knew exactly what he was hearing. The Maghrib, the sunset call to prayer, the fourth of the day. Wells felt an oddly urgent need to pray outside, launch his devotions into the setting sun, nothing but desert between him and Mecca.

  He found a prayer rug in the bedroom’s cavernous closet, made his way to the mansion’s flat roof. The wind yanked the sleep from him and he prayed vigorously, purposefully. By the time he finished, the sun had nearly disappeared. He felt calmer and stronger than he had in weeks.

  He stood, turned to go inside—

  And saw the white Nissan from the airport rolling past the mansion’s back gate. The scratch in the driver’s door left no doubt.

  Wells didn’t panic. Whoever was inside wouldn’t try to storm the mansion. Far easier to attack as the Mercedes left the grounds, a natural choke point, or on the road to the Ministry of Defense.

  He would shower, get ready for his meeting. When Ghaith returned, they’d talk.

  As he was showering, his phone buzzed. He stepped out unwillingly, grabbed for it. Kowalski. “I don’t know if this qualifies as good news or bad, but the Russian says he’ll meet you. No surprise, you come to him. Fly into Volgograd.”

  “It’s not back to Stalingrad?”

  “Nor Putingrad. Yet.”

  “When?”

  “He can do it as soon as tomorrow. If I were you, I’d get there before he changes his mind.”

  “What about the visa?”

  “Get to any Russian embassy or consulate, he’ll arrange it.”

  Buvchenko proving the power of his connections. Wells wondered if he could leave Riyadh tonight after his meeting with Nawwaf. A direct flight to Russia would be impossible, but Saudia or Turkish Airlines surely had overnight service to Istanbul. From there he could get the visa, be in Volgograd by the next night. He wished he could ask the Saudis for a private jet, but had pushed Abdullah’s generosity too far already.

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That you had a question for him, one you had to ask in person.”

  “That’s all?”

  “And that you would pay a lot of money for the right answer. He likes money. As do we all.”

  “Thank you, Pierre.”

  “Don’t thank me until you get out.”

  —

  Ghaith arrived as Well
s was raiding the refrigerator, which was disappointingly empty.

  “No chef?”

  “Didn’t want to bother him. I saw the Nissan again, Colonel. From the airport.”

  “You’re sure?” His tone surprised Wells. More annoyed than nervous.

  “I was on the roof. For the Maghrib.”

  “It’s ours.”

  Wells’s turn to be surprised. “You said—”

  “I lied. I didn’t want to worry you. I didn’t think you’d make it. There’s one other undercover car, too.”

  Wells crossed the kitchen in two big strides, put himself face-to-face with Ghaith, close enough to smell the sugary coffee on the colonel’s breath. He had six inches and fifty pounds on the Saudi.

  “You didn’t want to worry me?”

  “An error. I apologize.” Ghaith pulled his phone from his pocket. “I’m married to one of His Majesty’s grandnieces. Check for yourself. If you’re concerned whether you can trust me.”

  “If Abdullah sent you for me, then I trust you. I don’t doubt your loyalty, Colonel—”

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s your judgment I’m not sure about. You have anything else to tell me, now’s the time. A specific threat, whatever.”

  Ghaith shook his head. “Nothing like that.”

  “Then why all this? Four cars. How many men?”

  “Eight. Plus the guards at the house.”

  “Eight agents. For what?”

  “Word about your arrival has spread.”

  “In one day? Did someone email the whole country? John Wells is in town. Huntin’ season.”

  “I told no one. Several of His Majesty’s secretaries know. His brother. General Nawwaf, too.”

  “Nawwaf must be reliable or he wouldn’t be running your missiles.”

  “He’s reliable. But I don’t know everyone on his staff. The wrong person hears. A ten-second call to AQAP.” Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

  “And you were planning to tell me when? When you dropped me back at the airport?”

  “I am sorry.” Ghaith’s embarrassment seemed genuine.

  “I’d like that pistol now. Don’t tell me you don’t have a spare somewhere in that Mercedes.”