With her right hand she shoved the heavy pistol to the side of her waistband and quickly undid the snap on her Levis. “Is it also true your imams believe the greatest insult the United States inflicted on the country of the Two Holy Places was sending female soldiers there?”

She flicked the zipper down and used the pistol to lever back a corner of denim and some panty, revealing a raised whorl and purple dent of scar tissue. The entry wound was located in the whiter skin and freckles west of her belly button.

“Kalashnikov round, from an Iraqi Republican Guard. He got me low and to the right. I got him higher, center mass. And so ended one of my several dramas in the sand dunes. Remember Desert Storm? Back when we were defending your backward medieval kingdom?” Elastic snapped, the zipper hissed back up; Nina deftly buttoned her jeans and jammed the Colt back in place. “Yeah, I been to Saudi. Back then, when we traveled off base, we had to wear the Halloween costume. You know, that black bedsheet you make your women wear?”

She released her hold on his hair. Rashid leaned back and unfocused his eyes, turning his vision inward. To Nina it looked like he was searching for his desert trance. But she noted that, while his eyes toiled to achieve calm, the BBs of sweat on his forehead were growing to the size of gumdrops.

“Rashid, let’s be candid here. You’re not the warrior type. You’re a money guy. There’s no percentage in you playing it tough. I’d check my jihad contract if I were you. Somewhere in the fine print I think it says guys like you don’t get the paradise bonus if you, ah…”-she curled her fingers, pointed her index finger between his eyes, and let her thumb fall like a hammer-“…get yourself killed by a chick in cut-offs.”

She stepped back and gave him a moment to think. Then she said, “We know you raise money through a network of businesses in the upper Midwest. DEA has you as a major smuggler of meth precursor from Canada. You’re also into identity theft and forged documents. We know you disburse funds to Al Qaeda cells. Is there anything you’d like to tell me about something coming south across the Canadian border?”