by John Whitman
“By… the Pope,” Boorstein reminded him.
“Not my Pope,” Gelson said.
Boorstein shrugged. “Look, none of your fans are going to care about a theological debate. Just don’t say or do anything crazy. Okay?”
Gelson shrugged. “No promises.”
17. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10 A.M. AND 11 A.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
10:00 A.M. PST Mid-Wilshire Area, Los Angeles
“You know, I came across an honest-to-god coincidence once,” Harry Driscoll said as he and Jack Bauer drove back to Jack’s car. “When I got out of the academy, I moved into apartment 432 at 1812 Delaware Avenue, and I got a new phone number. Swear to god the phone number was 432–1812.”
“No kidding,” Jack said.
“No kidding,” Harry repeated. “But in twenty years of detective work, that’s the only goddamned coincidence I ever came across. There are no coincidences. Ever.”
“St. Monica’s,” Jack said, cutting to the chase.
“Saint friggin’ Monica’s,” the fireplug of a detective replied. “Why is it you go there twice in one night. The priest that I arrest, who works there, gets shot. And now the guy who rented the car that shot me up, who seems to have disappeared, runs a business that takes care of the place.” Harry shook his head in disbelief. “You keep chasing this C–4 all over the city, and we keep ending up back at St. Monica’s every time.”
“I’m with you,” Jack said, “but where’s the next step? At least, where is it as far as the terrorists are concerned? You’ve absolutely got a criminal investigation to chase down, with child molestation and priests who should probably be castrated. But what about the plastic explosives? There’s no connection for me, as far as I can tell.”
Driscoll said, “You know the connection. Biehn said that whoever kidnapped him also knew about the terrorist, Yasin’s his name, right?” Jack nodded. “So the kidnapper takes Biehn, who was shadowing Collins. Same kidnapper has knowledge of some terrorist thing connected with Yasin. You got to figure that the same terrorist tried to kill me when I went after Collins.”
“We need that autopsy,” Jack said.
10:05 A.M. PST Santa Monica
We need our own forensics team, Nina thought. Add it to the list.
Not that Santa Monica PD’s team was bad. But even if they did everything by the book, there would be bureaucracy. Information would have to flow up the chain at the local PD, then back down through the Federal agencies. And by that time it might be too late.
These guys hadn’t even treated her like a colleague. The fire truck and black-and-white that arrived together on the scene had first treated her like an accident victim, then the cops had briefly put handcuffs on her when they realized a bomb had gone off, and then they had ignored her when someone checked her credentials through the State Department.
Now one of the forensics techs, a tall, ugly man with lanky black hair and pockmarks, approached her with a quizzical look on his face. “Ma’am, a question?”
“Fire away,” she said. “What have you guys got?”
“Well,” he said, then stopped. He furrowed his brow, creating deep lines above his pockmarked cheeks. Finally, he asked, “Was the victim… was she holding anything when the bomb went off?”
Nina tried to think back. At first her memory was fuzzy, but then she recalled Christie dropping her handgun. Her right hand had been empty. Her left arm had been in a sling. “No. Not unless she was hiding something in the sling on her arm. Why?”
The tech’s quizzical look deepened. “Well, only because the explosion… well, the explosion looks like it happened right where she was standing. Was she wearing a bomb?”
Nina shook her head. “I guess she might have been. I didn’t see anything big on her. But my brain is pretty banged up.”
“Okay, thanks,” the tech said, but he left looking even more perplexed.
Nina took out her cell phone, thankful that it still worked, and dialed the number for Jack Bauer. He answered quickly. “It’s Nina Myers,” she said.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m headed back to CTU. Are you there?”
“Santa Monica. I’ve got news for you. I went to see Diana Christie to talk to her about her and Farrigian.”
“What did she say.”
“She blew up.” Nina described her brief, explosive encounter with the NTSB investigator. She was gratified when Bauer said, “It sounds like Ramin. You may have been right. Are we running a background check on her?”
“I’ll do it. But you know this thing is getting crazier, right? Yesterday she was the one pushing for an investigation. Then last night she sends us on a wild-goose chase. Today she blows up.”
Jack agreed. “This whole thing is convoluted. Someone set it up that way.”
“Yasin?”
“Has to be. But there’s someone else. Someone on the front line who can move around without arousing suspicion. And they planned so that we’ve spent the last twelve hours running after everything but their target.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I’m done playing. I’m going to go ask some people some hard questions. Starting with that weasel of an arms dealer.”
10:12 A.M. PST Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles
Gary Khalid lifted his demitasse with a trembling hand. He couldn’t get it to stop shaking. Anyone watching would have laid the blame on the four triple espressos he had drunk. But it wasn’t so. Khalid was excited and terrified and ready to get out of the country. He dared not return home. Considering the fact that the priest’s body was in the hands of the authorities, it was only a matter of time before the police uncovered their carefully laid plan. And eventually, Yasin had assured him, they would reexamine the history of Ghulam Meraj Khalid.
10:13 A.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles
“I already gave you the best example I can, sir,” Chappelle said. He was disciplined enough to keep the fatigue and annoyance out of his voice. If they thought redundancy and tedium could wear him down, they had seriously underestimated Ryan Chappelle. “But let me do so again. Right now I have agents spread thin all over Los Angeles, running from place to place because I don’t have manpower to chase down several leads at once…”
10:14 A.M. PST Mid-Wilshire Area, Los Angeles
Jack sped back to Farrigian’s warehouse with a grim look on his face. He was sick of being bounced around. He was going to ask questions and keep asking until he got answers.
10:15 A.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles
“…drafted other agencies into our pursuit of terrorists,” Chappelle said into the video monitors.
“Isn’t that positive?” a Congresswoman asked. “Multiagency involvement means greater pooling of knowledge, doesn’t it?”
“And a greater chance of leaks, or worse, ma’am,” Chappelle said. “And different agencies have different agendas, and different command structures. Even if the people themselves are good, we won’t know what kinds of bureaucracies they’ll have to deal with.”
10:16 A.M. PST Los Angeles Department of Coroner Forensic Sciences Lab
Harry Driscoll felt his bones start to ache. He was getting too old for this sort of work. Pulling allnighters and getting shot at, that was a young man’s work. But this next job, at least, was specially designed for an old veteran like him.
He walked into the coroner’s office to find Patricia Siegman waiting for him. “I know I promised you noon, Detective, but we’re doing the best we—”
“Step into my office, please,” he said, and half dragged her into the men’s room before she could resist.
“Look and listen,” he said. He was short enough for them to see eye to eye, but he was twice as broad. “I’m with LAPD but I’m doing work with a government unit. They believe terrorists are going to make some kind of attack today. Now. But they don’t know what. I think this guy was involved somehow, I don’t know exactly. I think this autopsy could give us an answer, so I need you
to move some other stiff off the table and put my guy on it or people may die and it’ll be your fault.”
10:18 A.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles
“…terrorists are out there,” Chappelle concluded with just the right hint of righteous indignation. “You all believe that, or this meeting would never have been called. We don’t know where they are exactly, but I do know we have the resources to root them out, if we commit those resources to action. If not, they will hide in convenient places, waiting for convenient moments, and then they will strike.”
10:19 A.M. PST Playa del Rey
Yasin had moved, as was his habit these days. He’d spent a short time in the San Fernando Valley, and now he was headed toward the suburbs near the airport. He doubted the authorities had any idea of his location, but even with the simple changes he’d made to his appearance, someone might recognize him. It was better to be unpredictable.
He was impressed with how well this more elaborate plan was working. ’93 had been simple, but ineffective. Yes, there had been headlines, but they had succeeded only in angering the Americans, not terrorizing them. This plan had required much more subtlety, much more planning, but so far it had worked. Yasin was not blind to the fact that Federal agents were scouring the city, but he had foreseen that possibility, and, through Michael, he had set up intricate avenues and mazes to lead them here and there. So far, so good. Allah was willing.
10:20 A.M. PST Farrigian’s Warehouse, West Los Angeles
Jack drove into the parking lot of Farrigian’s Warehouse and walked in the front door, SigSauer in hand. He’d been here only ten hours earlier, but it seemed like a lifetime. He walked over to the little office and opened the door without knocking.
Farrigian was inside. He squealed when he saw Jack Bauer, but there was nowhere to run. Jack grabbed the front of his shirt, gathering up cloth and chest hairs into a tight fist, and dragged the petty criminal across the desk, scattering papers. He slammed Farrigian down onto the floor as invoices fluttered around them. Jack put his knee into Farrigian’s chest and his gun against his cheek.
“What the f—?” Farrigian gagged.
A guy dressed in jeans, work boots, and a T-shirt came around the corner, attracted by the noise. “Hey Andre, everything okay?” He pulled up short when Jack, kneeling, brought the Sig around to the height of his groin.
“Everything is okay,” Jack stated. “Got that?”
“Sure thing, boss. Holy shit!” the worker said, melting away.
“All right,” Jack said, pressing his knee harder into Farrigian’s sternum. “I’m sick of all this crap. You sold a package of C–4 to a bunch of Arab terrorists, right?”
Farrigian shook his head no as vigorously as he could with the gun jammed back into his cheek.
Jack had had enough. He had never been a huge advocate of torture, mostly because he himself had been an operator with Delta, and the possibility of capture and torture were very real and very unclean to him. But he’d been run around like a dog in heat all night, and he was done.
He used the Sig’s sights to cut a red streak along Farrigian’s forehead.
10:26 A.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles
Senator Armand moved on to the next topic. “You must be aware, Director, that your methods are being called into question this morning. What can justify the fact that an operative escorted a suspect in a murder investigation around Los Angeles and apparently let him attack and nearly murder someone?”
Nothing can justify it, Chappelle wanted to shout. He’s a thug and I don’t want him on my team!
But he’d already painted himself into that corner once. If Bauer wasn’t going to be a pain in his neck, Chappelle would at least put him to good use. “This was the same operative this committee praised earlier for stopping Castaic Dam. I have spoken with him”—that was true—“and he’s assured me that his actions were based on urgent needs and time constraints.”
Chappelle couldn’t believe he was sitting here defending that moron Jack Bauer. But if Bauer’s actions could ensure his funding, he’d take it. “Bauer is out there now, working loose ends of this case. But I can assure you he is doing everything possible to stay within the letter of the law.”
10:29 A.M. PST Farrigian’s Warehouse, West Los Angeles
“Oh, ahhh!” Farrigian howled. “Oh god, it’s the truth! I didn’t sell the stuff to Arabs.”
“They had it,” Jack spat. “How’d they get it?”
“How the fuck should — ow! I don’t know. Not from me. I bought from Arabs. I bought from them!”
Bought from Arabs, Jack thought. From Yasin? Had Yasin arranged this from the other end?
“Names,” Jack demanded.
“I don’t know. I’ll give you all the shipping information, but I can tell you it was nothing. Some joke of a gangster in Cairo named Farouk. Middleman like me.”
Jack held back a curse. Farouk was where he’d started. Farouk had led him to Ramin. He already knew that Farouk knew almost nothing. He couldn’t go in circles.
“You sold to someone. Give me those names. And don’t say the bikers,” he warned, gouging another hole in Farrigian’s forehead.
“Aah! I did sell to them. I was told to. But some I sold to this other guy who was in charge. I don’t know his name, I swear I don’t!” he added in a panic as Jack aimed the sights at a fresh spot. “He was American. He never let me see him, but he talked like an American. He only wanted a little for himself. The rest he said to sell to Dog and Dean.”
“How did he know them?” Jack asked.
“Don’t know. They weren’t the same type, that’s for sure. And they didn’t know my guy at all. They kept talking about Mark or Mike or something, but that definitely wasn’t the guy who arranged the whole thing.”
“What was he going to do with it?”
“Are you kidding me?”
Jack wasn’t kidding. He cut another red line across the arms dealer’s forehead. But he doubted Farrigian could answer his question. The mastermind behind the C–4 had gone to great lengths to keep the authorities busy with other problems. There was no way he would tell his master plan to the likes of this.
“What did you to do Diana Christie?” Jack asked.
“I didn’t do anything. I didn’t even meet her. I made you guys when you came last time. I didn’t trust you, but you weren’t my problem, you were Dean’s, so I sent you to him. Guys want to pay me to keep my mouth shut, they pay me, right? Otherwise it’s the law of the jungle. When she came back, the boss man was here to meet her, not me. Did they kill her?”
“Eventually,” Jack said. “Oh, man, look, none of this is my thing. I just buy and sell, you know?” Jack asked how much C–4 the mysterious leader had kept for himself. Jamey Farrell would have been pleased when Farrigian said, “About ten pounds.”
10:40 A.M. PST Culver City
Marwan al-Hassan had one more act to perform before leaving for the Unity Conference, a sort of purification ritual. Slowly, carefully, he slid his left arm out of its sling. Then he began to unwrap the bandage that covered his arm. It took several minutes, and every movement was painful, but he forced himself to continue until the bandage was gone. His forearm looked sickly and pale, but under long sleeves it would not be noticeable. There would be pain, but the pain was a small price to pay for the glory that was to come.
10:59 A.M. West Los Angeles
Jack’s phone rang. “Harry, what’s happening? Are you at the coroner’s office?”
“Yeah, and you need to get down here. Now.”
“They did the autopsy?”
“Yeah, but you need to see this to believe it.”
18. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 11 A.M. AND 12 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
11:00 A.M. PST Four Seasons Hotel, Los Angeles
Security for the Unity Conference was subtle but efficient. Guests passed through two sets of metal detectors in the lobby and took a specially designated elevator to the to
p floor, where Swiss Guards dressed in elegant black suits politely relieved all guests of their unnecessary bags and coats. As they did, a hidden camera snapped a high-resolution photo of their faces and a computer matched it against a predetermined guest list. Guards surreptitiously passed swatches of chemically treated cloth over some part of each guest, and the swatches were casually passed back to a coatroom that had been turned into a laboratory. The swatches were examined — one that turned black indicated the presence of explosive agents.
The man who called himself Abdul al-Hassan passed casually through all this security, even patiently allowing the Swiss Guards to probe his arm sling. The only moment of trouble he had was walking through the second metal detector, which, unbeknownst to him, was set at a higher sensitivity. The detector made no sound, but a single light went off on the far side of the metal frame, and a young man in Armani smoothly gestured for al-Hassan to step to the side.
“Do you have any metal on you, sir?” he asked in lightly accented English.
“Metal?” al-Hassan said. “No. The other detector didn’t—”
The young man smiled. “They are temperamental sometimes.” He held up a metal wand. “May I?” Before al-Hassan could respond, he began to wave the handheld detector over the attendee. The wand hummed steadily until the guard passed it over alHassan’s arm.
“Ah,” he said. “I broke my arm. There is a metal plate in there.”
The guard nodded. He gently fingered the cloth sling again, and then waved al-Hassan through.
“Can you believe the security here?” said a woman who appeared suddenly beside him.
Marwan al-Hassan knew immediately that this was a Jew. Only his training kept the look of disdain off his face. “Necessary, I suppose.” He turned away from her.
“Well, no need to be rude, Mr. al-Hassan,” the woman said. “Are you saying you don’t remember me?”
Marwan looked at her calmly, but he felt his heart pound against the side of his neck. Could he be undone so quickly? “I’m sorry?” “Amy Weiss.” The woman laughed. “I interviewed you on Thursday about the conference.” “Ah, of course,” he said apologetically. “I’m so sorry. The last few days have been very hectic.”
