was the end of the Eclipse program. All of the members had been cut loose from the Central Intelligence Agency. All of them, that is, but Lydia Ryan.
“Where were these pictures taken?” she asked.
“Cyprus.”
“And you said three days ago?”
“Yes,” replied Nasiri. “The only person missing is you.”
“I have nothing to do with them anymore.”
“But that’s your old team, is it not?” he asked.
“Sure, but all of them were cut loose. You know that.”
“Do I? I’m not so sure anymore. The CIA didn’t cut you loose, did they?”
“That’s different,” Ryan argued.
He leaned back in his chair, unconvinced. “Really? Different how?”
“I was assigned to police that team. They were good, but they were also a bunch of cowboys. People don’t last long at Langley if you don’t follow the rules.”
“Interesting. I seem to remember you breaking a lot of the rules yourself.”
“No,” Ryan admonished him. “What you remember is an imbecile of a CIA station chief and an American ambassador with a Pollyannaish worldview. Everything we did, everything, there was clearance for, especially the things we kept quiet from those two. It’s hard enough doing the work you and I do without having to fight our own people in the process.”
Nasiri shrugged. “I guess I’ll have to take your word for it.”
She looked at him. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“It means, my dear Lydia, that even by your own admission your destabilization team was very skilled. Yet despite that skill, someone chose to shut it down and fire all of its members. All the members, that is, except for you. If I recall correctly, you got promoted. Case officer now, isn’t it?”
Glancing at her watch, Ryan said, “If there’s a point to all of this, Nafi, I suggest you get to it.”
“The point is that your entire CIA destabilization team, minus your ‘policing’ presence, was seen in Cyprus three days ago meeting with two men that my country is very nervous about.”
“These two?” she asked, pointing at one of the photographs. “Who are they?”
“Senior members of the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood.”
Suddenly, it hit her. “Wait a second. You think that the United States is planning to topple Jordan?”
Nasiri raised his hands palms up and tilted his head to the side. “If you were in our position, with governments falling all around you, what would you think?”
“I think a country like Jordan should be confident enough to trust its allies. That’s what I think.”
The Jordanian leaned forward and repeated his original question. “Is Jordan going to be the next Middle Eastern country to be overthrown?”
“There could be any number of reasons for that meeting in Cyprus.”
“Really?” he stated, reaching down and removing two more folders from his briefcase. He held them out over the table and then let them drop. “Would any of those reasons be the same, or different, for why your team was seen in both Egypt and Libya before those governments collapsed?”
She would’ve stressed again that it wasn’t “her team,” but she was too stunned by his remarks to utter the words. The Americans in those photos had not only been let go from the CIA; they had been let go with prejudice along with big black marks in their records. What was this all about?
Lydia Ryan was good at reading people, so whatever intelligence Nafi Nasiri had, she could see he was one hundred percent confident in it. Which meant, by extension, so was his boss, and very likely, the King of Jordan himself. Otherwise, Nafi wouldn’t have been sent here to meet with her like this.
“I don’t know what to say,” she finally offered.
The Jordanian pushed the folders across the table to her. “Tell me you’ll read what’s in these files.”
“Of course, but—”
“And that you’ll get me some answers.”
“Nafi, I can’t make you any promises.”
Nasiri looked at her, his face implacable. Reaching down, he removed a final folder from his briefcase, but he didn’t open it. He didn’t push it across the table, either. He just sat there tapping his index finger on the cover.
“I’m sorry to have to do this,” he finally said.
“Sorry for what?”
“Understand that we take any threat to the survival of the Kingdom of Jordan very seriously.”
There was now another tone in his voice, and she didn’t like it. “What’s in the folder, Nafi?”
The Jordanian lifted the cover, but only high enough so that he could see inside. From where she was sitting, Ryan couldn’t make out a thing.
“Over the winter, we infiltrated a terror cell that has been moving bomb makers,