Pavel Kazakov had to suppress a thrill of dread that came over him again. The old feeling had come back—the feeling of impending danger. Every time he had listened, the feeling had saved him. Every time he ignored it, failed to break off his plans, run, and protect himself, he went down in disaster and defeat.

But before he could respond, she reached out to him, took his hands, and placed them on her breasts. Her eyes were demanding, commanding, riveting—and irresistible. She had always been irresistible. This wasn’t loyalty, and certainly not love—this was plain old-fashioned ambition, desire, and a willingness to do anything, and allow anything to be done to her, to get what she wanted.

Of course, he failed to listen to the danger signal. He was helpless to heed it now.

“Well,” he said with a smile as she reached behind her neck to unzip her sweater, “if you put it that way, Major ..

Zuwayy slammed the phone down hard. “Saghf tarak khord!” he cursed. “That bastard! How dare he order me around like a child!” But Kazakov was right about one thing: This was a good opportunity to lash out at someone and prove he wasn’t going to be pushed around. And he would be fully, completely justified in doing so.

He dialed a special secure pager number, then sat and waited. Several minutes later, a call was put through to him: “Speak.”

“This is Ulama al-Khan, Majesty,” Khalid al-Khan, the chief justice of the Egyptian Supreme Court and the leader of the main opposition party, responded. “God be with you.”

“And to you, Ulama,” Zuwayy said. This guy had to be the biggest idiot in all of Egypt and probably all of northern Africa, Zuwayy scoffed to himself. Khan saw himself as an Islamic holy man, a true believer who fancied himself a spiritual master and leader. He was so zealous in his beliefs—and so enamored of himself—that he couldn’t see danger when it was right in front of his face. His ambition would quite possibly drive him into the Presidential Palace—but he had no concept of how to lead a government, except to send out his henchmen in the Egyptian Republican Guards and assassinate a political enemy. He truly believed that God would absolve him of all his sins, no matter how heinous his crimes.

But most times stupidity and ambition made for a pliant coconspirator, and that’s what Zuwayy had in Khan. The Egyptian cleric thought it was in the best interest of all concerned for Egypt to join the Muslim Brotherhood—a loose confederation of Libya, Sudan, and Yemen, with major support in Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon, and with some wealthy supporters in such pro-Western states such as Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, and