Rashid had wondered if Aleem would lead the Shahid in prayers, but Marwan explained that the man had already left the city. It was important that he see to what was coming next. As usual, what that was, Marwan wasn’t disposed to say.

When they got the third and final crate into the apartment, they closed the door and Rashid made sure the drapes were drawn as tight as possible. The odor in the kitchen was terrible. There was a plate of rotting food on the table, which Nasiri picked up and tossed into the garbage. He then pulled out some glasses and put on a pot of water for tea.

Rashid closed the blinds in the living room while the goons caught their breath and then set to work opening up the crates. The plan had worked perfectly. They hadn’t seen any neighbors and even if one or two had been watching, it would have looked as if Mohammed Nasiri had purchased a three-piece bedroom set, as that’s what was spray-painted on the side of the crates, and was having it delivered. Sure it was late at night, but with America’s 24/7 culture, most of his immigrant neighbors wouldn’t know to think anything of it.

Rashid arranged three chairs in the living room, just as he had diagrammed it for Marwan. They then tightly duct-taped the two cops and their detective colleague to them. The detective, whom he had shot at the mosque, had begun bleeding again.

Rashid checked their vests and dismissed the goons to join Nasiri in the kitchen for tea. He was almost finished.

After powering up the cell phone detonators, he adjusted their clothing to cover up the vests and then hid the camera ball between a couple of Nasiri’s books in the corner of the room.

Satisfied that everything was exactly how he wanted it, Rashid joined the men for a fast cup of tea. Marwan would want them back as quickly as possible.

They gathered up the crating material and Rashid made sure to wipe down everything he touched so as not to leave any fingerprints. The other men didn’t have to worry. Very soon, they wouldn’t even have fingers.

As Nasiri and the goons threw the garbage in the back of the truck and climbed in, Rashid pulled down the door and checked his watch. It was after midnight. Wednesday had passed into Thursday. The day of the attack had come and now it was only hours away.

Rashid climbed back into truck and started it up. As he drove off down the alley, he had no idea that Harvath and Casey had been watching him the entire time.

CHAPTER 68

As the truck exited the alley and disappeared from view, Harvath motioned to Casey and they stepped away from the Dumpster they’d been hiding behind.

“What do you think?” she asked.

Harvath looked up at the apartment. All of the lights had been turned out and the curtains were still drawn. “I think that they’ve got something very bad in those crates.”

“That’s what I’m thinking too. Whatever they’re planning, it’s big and they’ve got a lot of it.”

“Let’s go take a look.”

She put her hand on Harvath’s shoulder and said, “Wait a second. Shouldn’t we be sure there’s nobody else up there?”

“Trust me,” he replied. “There’s nobody else up there.”

“How do you know?”

Harvath started down the alley. “Because if they had more men, they would have gotten those crates up into the apartment a lot faster.”

Despite his confidence that the apartment was empty, Casey noticed that Harvath was still very careful about how he moved. He avoided motion lights and stayed close to large objects that could function as cover and concealment.

It had been hot and humid ever since they had landed in Chicago. There wasn’t any breeze and the alley was thick with the odor of overripe garbage. Casey was sweating. Her shirt clung to her back as she followed him.

Their target was a four-story brick building with a wooden set of fire stairs behind it. A section of chain-link fencing with a broken gate separated the property from the alley.

They walked down the narrow gangway and were about to mount the stairs when Cooper’s voice came over their earpieces. “Two new trucks just pulled up to the loading dock.”

“What are they doing?” Harvath whispered.

“Bunch of Middle Eastern guys have come out of the store and are now loading cardboard boxes.”

That place was like a clown car. Just when you thought it was empty, more of them crawled out, Harvath thought.

“Do you want us to follow them?” she asked.

“Only if you see someone matching Jarrah’s description. Other than that, hold your position and write down the license numbers, descriptions of the trucks, and anyone you see getting in.”

“Roger that,” said Cooper.

Looking at Casey, Harvath asked, “Ready?”

She adjusted the laptop bag she was carrying and flashed him the thumbs-up.

Harvath opened his messenger-style bag the rest of the way and wrapped his hand around the grip of his suppressed MP7 and led the way up the stairs.

Though the weapon was extremely compact, it was difficult to conceal beneath casual, summer clothing so they carried their MP7s in bags that wouldn’t look out of place in an urban environment. Beneath their shirts, each also carried a Glock 19 in a paddle holster.

All of the apartments they passed were dark. When they reached the third-floor landing, they could hear a television through an open window somewhere off in the distance, but nothing from inside the apartment itself.

They stepped carefully on the landing, just in case Harvath had been wrong about the unit being empty and a warped board gave them away. He moved to the door and pressed his ear against it while Casey covered him. He still heard nothing from inside.

He checked the door frame for any alarms or trip devices and when he didn’t find any, he tried the knob. The door was locked.

Harvath removed one of the lockpick guns that had been included with their gear and went to work. When the dead bolt slid back, he returned the device to his pocket, removed his MP7 completely from his messenger bag, and stood back so that Casey could grip the doorknob.

He took a deep breath, then nodded, and Casey quietly pulled the door open. Harvath swept into the kitchen searching for hostile targets. Despite the drapes on the window being drawn, a certain amount of ambient light from the buildings on the other side of the alley illuminated the room. It also smelled like someone had forgotten to take out the garbage.

With Casey behind him, he moved past a card table to the other side of the small kitchen. Across a narrow hallway, he could see through an open door into a bedroom. Next to that was a closed door, which he assumed led to the bathroom. To see any further, he needed to stick his head into the hallway, but suddenly the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

Harvath hated hallways. They had a bad habit of funneling the gunfire of even the worst shooter right at you. But that wasn’t it; not completely at least.

His sixth sense was trying to tell him something. Someone else was in the apartment. He could feel it now. He didn’t know if they were in the bedroom closet, behind the closed door to the bathroom, or at the end of the hallway where he couldn’t see. Wherever it was, there was danger in this apartment and his body was tensing up in anticipation of engaging it.

He signaled Casey that he would cover the hallway while she crossed to clear the bedroom. When he was ready, he nodded and swung out into the hallway, and that’s when he saw it.

In the eerie half-light of the living room was the outline of a hooded figure sitting in a chair. Harvath lit up the scene with a flash from his weapon light and saw that it wasn’t just one figure, but three.

He held his position as Casey quickly exited the bedroom and cleared the bathroom, which was jammed with the shipping crates they had seen being carried upstairs.