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him for lunch.”
    McGee knew the real thing when he saw it, and Rudy was it. The second spook was a thirtysomething youngster dressed in Eurochic and Levi’s who said his name was Tom. Tom had an engaging smile and a laid-back, surfer-dude attitude. But from the way he moved, the way he held himself, the way his eyes took everything in without appearing to even move, McGee understood Tom was a case officer—maybe even one of the few good ones.
Tom unzipped a black canvas briefcase, brought out a sealed brown envelope, and laid it on the table. Then he spoke to McGee in rapid, flawless Arabic. “Inside this envelope is a nondisclosure form. If you understand what I’m telling you, slide the envelope across the desk—don’t lift, just slide—open it, read the form, then sign. After you do, we can tell you why we’ve come to see you.”
“It is my pleasure to do so, sir,” McGee answered in Arabic. Then he dropped a big index finger atop the heavy brown paper, drew the envelope to his side of the table, slit the end with the thick sharp blade of his Emerson folder, read the one-page boilerplate agreement, and signed. They’d wanted to see if he understood Arabic well enough to respond properly. He’d just shown them he did. It also meant the job—whatever it might be—was somewhere in the Middle East.
Well, McGee liked the Middle East, and working for a CIA front company was all right by him. He was thirty-nine, he’d had twenty-two years of Soldiering, and it was time for him to go. Time to make some money for his family. He had an ex-wife and two teenage boys to support, and he was dedicated to them.
Besides, it had been a long ride. He’d begun his Delta selection process just as the Unit was preparing to leave for Somalia. He’d finished his specialized schools—denied area operations, Arab language, State’s VIP protection course, safecracking, and other miscellaneous black arts—just as four of Delta’s Spanish-language specialists left for Colombia to help track down and kill El Doctor, the notorious Medellín drug cartel boss Pablo Escobar.
He’d spent most of 1994 and 1995 commuting between Jordan, where he instructed the Royal Jordanian Army’s elite Black Beret commandos in close-quarters combat and hostage rescue, and Israel, where he trained and then worked with Sayeret Duvdevan, Israel’s Special Forces counterterrorist unit. 5 He’d been posted to Beirut under State Department cover to help protect the ambassador right after the 1998 Africa embassy bombings. McGee’s time as a part of a Mistaravim, or undercover Arab-speaking Israeli unit, had given him the skills necessary to operate in Beirut’s southern suburbs observing Hezbollah, and in the Bekáa Valley, where he spied on Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps personnel headquartered in Baalbek.
McGee’s familiarity with the Middle East—especially Israel and Lebanon—was what the Langley guys were interested in. It was all very straightforward stuff, Rudy said. “We’re talking ‘Espionage 101’: you keep your eyes open and your mouth shut. Nothing more than you did in Lebanon—except this time you’re not reporting to ISA 6 but to us.”
Tom checked McGee’s signature on the nondis, then provided some background. There was, he said derisively, only one Arabic-speaking case officer currently assigned to Tel Aviv. She worked under embassy cover but her Agency affiliation was known to the Palestinians with whom she liaised. Moreover, the fact that she was a woman compromised her ability to work in Gaza even if her status hadn’t been acknowledged. From the way Tom described the situation, McGee understood that things at Tel Aviv station were FUBAR’d.
So, McGee asked, what’s the problem?
The problem? Rudy didn’t mince words. “CIA is effing eyeless in Gaza. The station chief refuses to recruit agents. That’s the problem. Full stop.”
The younger guy had shot Rudy a look. But when McGee pressed him, Tom had gone even