It was a slick CIA app overlaying Google Maps. The purpose was to allow a single operator to perform a pretty functional tail of someone with an enabled tracker on their car. Not only could Rapp stay well behind, but the program suggested opportunities to disengage and then re-intercept later. Admittedly risky, but the traffic was light at this time of night and Singh was a pro. At the first sign of a tail, he’d either bolt or head back home.

Rapp accelerated until his cell’s screen flashed green—a confirmation that he’d achieved the speed necessary to rejoin the highway in the same relative position to his target. Now all he had to do was hope that there were no overzealous cops around looking to pass out tickets to speeding Porsches.

Another half an hour and a couple more complicated detours led him to an industrial area at the edge of town. The dot on his phone stopped and almost immediately went dark as the unit attached to Singh’s bumper switched into battery saver mode. Rapp turned up a side street three blocks to the north and parked out of range of security lights bolted to the buildings around him.

The absence of the Glock 19 under his arm made him feel a little naked as he stepped out of the car. Getting a weapon into Saudi Arabia without CIA support was virtually impossible and acquiring one in-country was overly risky. He actually had a safe house in Riyadh that no one knew about, but once he retrieved the gun hidden beneath the floorboards, it would be blown forever. Better to save that for a rainy day even if it would likely lead to a little more improvisation than he’d normally tolerate. For the time being, anonymity was more valuable than firepower.

He pulled up the collar on his light jacket and walked up the middle of the street where the darkness was the deepest. A half-moon hung to the east, but barely provided enough illumination to keep him from tripping over the cracks in the asphalt. After a few minutes at a casual pace, he spotted Singh’s car parked inside a chain-link fence that surrounded a partially built warehouse. Maybe he wasn’t such a pro after all. Rule number one when contracting for an intelligence agency: don’t agree to predawn meetings at construction sites.

The cameras mounted to the fence all appeared to have been deactivated—something that didn’t happen in Saudi Arabia without the government’s blessing. Whatever was going to happen there, someone powerful didn’t want any record of it.