By Order of the President (Presidential Agent 1)

Chief Inspector Kramer nodded.

“Sir,” Britton said. “If I’m held much later than eight in the morning and this is going to take longer than that . . .”

“You’re not going back undercover, period,” the commissioner said.

“Sir, I’m the best chance we have to learn anything at the mosque,” Britton argued.

“What’s the other guy’s name who’s in there with you?”

“Parker, sir. He’s a good man, but he hasn’t been under long enough for them to trust him.”

“Maybe they will start to trust him, once they figure out you’ve been in there,” Kellogg said. “And this way, you get to stay alive. I want you available until this thing goes down.”

“But, sir . . .”

“That’s it, Detective Britton,” Kellogg said, flatly. “That’s what’s going to happen.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And this way, when Hall and I go see the mayor and he turns to me and asks what I’m doing about this I can truthfully tell him we think we know who the guys who stole that airplane are, that we’ve rounded up the mullahs and pulled you out to interrogate them. Okay?”

“Yes, sir,” Britton said.

“And we might as well start on getting a judge to authorize wiretaps on the mosque and every phone that looks promising. That’ll take some time, but we should do it.”

“Commissioner, we—Homeland Security and the Secret Service—have blanket authority to tap in a terrorist situation like this. All we have to do is report it to a federal judge later,” Castillo said.

“I didn’t know that,” Kellogg said, surprised. “You can authorize that?”

“As a supervisory special agent, sure.”

“If you were to ask for the help of the Philadelphia Department to help you put in your taps, I’d be happy to oblige.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Kellogg studied Castillo. “So you’re a Green Beret major. ”

“Yes, sir, I am.”

“And a supervisory special agent of the Secret Service? You told me you had the credentials, but . . .”

“It’s on the up-and-up,” Castillo said. “I was sworn in.”

“How do you keep who you really are straight?”

“With difficulty, sir,” Castillo said and glanced at Betty Schneider.

She shook her head.

“When I talked to Matt Hall earlier, Castillo,” Commissioner Kellogg said, “he said he was going to come as quietly as he can. What did he mean by that?”

“Usually, Commissioner, when he goes to a city where the Secret Service has an office they’ll send people—usually four to six, in a couple of GMC Yukon XLs—to back up his personal security detail. That attracts a lot of attention. If he said he’s coming quietly, he doesn’t want that attention. I don’t know this, but what I think is that they called the Philadelphia office and told them to send a car—not a Yukon—to meet the plane. They may not have told—probably didn’t tell—Philadelphia that the secretary is coming.”

“What’s his personal detail?”

“Two Secret Service guys. This morning, I know it will be Joel Isaacson—who is more than a bodyguard and who is usually with the secretary. And almost certainly his partner, Tom McGuire, who is also more than a bodyguard.”

“Are you going to the airport to meet him? With Sergeant Schneider?”