“Whomever we choose,” he said with a disturbing closed-lip smile.

Like Sarah Beth Yarnell, she thought and imagined the girl outside playing on a playground and then erupting into flames.

“She is certainly very high on the list,” he said. “Since our other efforts to reach her have so far failed.” Her blood ran cold at the words, but there was no more malice than ususal in Victor’s gaze. “We have multiple operations underway, but then we are more than capable of keeping more than one ball in the air. The girl is a nuisance but also a threat to the damage we plan to do to the faithful with our new weapon. She must be dealt with, and if your ongoing efforts continue to bear no fruit, alternatives must be found. The use of our weapon on the girl would easily bring success where you failed, but it might also limit our ability to use it for our primary objective. Our attack with this weapon will shake the faith of many, will show God as having turned His back on America and its people. Those who believe will question; those who don’t will scoff at the notion of a loving God. Souls will belong to our master. The girl puts that important operation at risk, but using our weapon on her may jeopardize it as much or more. So you see my dilemma?”

Maria felt her mouth go dry. Perhaps she was here to meet her end after all?

“Is it a satellite?” she asked, trying to appear calm, then trotting to catch up with him as he turned and continued to stroll.

“No,” he said, offering no other insights.

He led her to what looked like an Army command field tent pitched inside the warehouse. Black electrical wiring and colored data cables snaked across the floor and disappeared underneath the fabric panels, presumably powering workstations and lights. She followed him inside through the pinned-back door flap and found it configured like a tactical operations center with multiple computer workstations, flat-screen monitors mounted to vertical racks made from bolted-together aluminum poles. A large rectangular table sat in the middle of the tent, its surface covered with a half-dozen enlarged satellite pictures. Even from a distance, she could see that the imagery had been annotated in red and black pen, with names, perhaps, or times—she couldn’t tell. The locations were all cities, but the only one she recognized with certainty was Chicago.

“Leave us,” Victor said, dismissing the handful of people in the tent like she imagined one might shoo away noisy children disrupting the grown-up table at a family dinner.

Not that I’d know anything about family dinners . . .

Before leaving, they hid their work with thin plastic tarps. Victor walked to the opposite side of the now-covered war-gaming table, steepled his fingers, and looked at her expectantly.

“So you’re planning an attack?” she said.

He nodded.