“Did you know about the virus?” she asked.
“All rumors,” Jack said. “But we knew that the ecoterrorists were trying to improve their game by learning from the big leaguers like al-Libbi.”
The shock was wearing off. Anger crept into her voice. “This morning, at the Federal Building, you made me feel like an idiot.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “But at that point we’d narrowed our suspects down. Tony believed that the mole was in the FBI, and that he was part of the surveillance team. I couldn’t be sure if he was listening to our conversation. If he was, I wanted him thrown off the scent.”
“But—”
“Remember, I tried to talk you out of coming to the Federal Building at all, but there’s no stopping you.”
Mercy’s neck turned pink. “So I’ve just been in the fucking way…”
Jack smiled. “Hardly. You’ve done all the work. You found out about the Monkey Wrench Gang. We didn’t know anything about these people except that they, or at least some of them, wanted to work with al-Libbi, who I knew was inside the country. The only snafu was when you came to see me. It made Copeland panic because he thought I was investigating him. He got Kim involved, and he kidnapped you. That threw a wrench into the works. But everything we learned about who they are we learned from you.”
Mercy looked from Jack to Ted Ozersky and back to Jack. The emotions churning inside her were visible on her face. “You used me.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again. And he was; not sorry for doing whatever needed doing to complete the task. As far as he was concerned, that was the definition of his job. But he had an immense amount of respect for her, and he was genuinely sorry for any pain he caused her.
“The thing to do now,” Ozersky said, saving them both from the tense silence that followed, “is to compare notes. Two people have gone missing. I spent a lot of time on the fringes of the group. You’ve spent a lot of time investigating. Maybe together we can come up with something.”
The next moment was, perhaps, the moment Jack most admired Mercy Bennet. She’d just been humiliated personally and professionally by a man who, from her perspective, had nearly become her lover. But she rebounded almost immediately and plunged into a conversation with Ozersky. He talked about people he’d met on the fringes of Frankie’s circle. She whittled down his list from memory, discarding people she’d investigated and found to be inactive or unenthusiastic when it came to real action. It wasn’t long before they came up with a short list of contacts for both Santiago and Kalmijn that might know their whereabouts.
“Good,” Jack said. “The three of us will follow up on Santiago’s contacts. I’ll call from the car and have Tony Almeida and Nina go after the others.”
“Santiago worked at Earth Café over in Venice,” Ozersky said. “We should start there. It closes any minute.”
They stood up, and Ozersky ran to get his gun and badge. During the interlude, Mercy stared daggers at Jack, but said nothing. Jack already felt like he’d been through hell, and something told him it was only the beginning.
17. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 11 P.M. AND 12 A.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
Of all the times Christopher Henderson had wanted to hit Ryan Chappelle, this was the hardest to resist.
“You authorized this whole goddamned thing without telling me!” Henderson yelled so loud that the thick glass of his office could not completely muffle it.
“Don’t yell at me,” Chappelle shot back. He was exhausted and frustrated from dealing with a frayed and angry presidential staff for the last hour, while at the same time overseeing the security lockdown that kept an entire nation from knowing its president had been exposed to a violent hemorrhagic fever. “I’ll have you working postal routes searching for stray anthrax.”
“This is bullshit!” Henderson continued. “How can I do my job as Director of Field Operations when you have my people running clandestine missions behind my back.”
Chappelle had just informed Henderson of Jack’s operation linking the eco-terrorists to Ayman al-Libbi.
Chappelle sniffed arrogantly. “It was need-to-know. Besides, if you want to blame someone, blame Bauer. He bypassed you. Better yet, blame yourself. Aren’t you one of the reasons he’s here in the first place?”
“So Jack wants to run a secret operation and you give it your stamp of approval? Jack’s job is to think outside the lines. I thought yours was to stick to the rule book.”
Chappelle laughed; it was a thin, unpleasant sound. “You know what I notice? How everyone thinks it’s great to have a loose cannon like Jack Bauer around…right up until the loose cannon rolls over their toes. Sharpton liked Jack, too, and now he’s dead. Don’t be surprised if someday you find yourself regretting that Bauer’s around.”
Jessi sat at her desk, staring at her computer screen. She was supposed to be analyzing downloads from security and traffic cameras within a five-mile radius of two addresses, and running the facial recognition systems to see if any cameras had picked up their movement. But she knew she wasn’t doing a good job. Her focus was gone. No, it wasn’t gone, but it wasn’t here, either. It was with Kelly Sharpton.
“Jessi, are you on it?” Jamey Farrell appeared at her side. “You look lost.”
“Um, no, yeah, I’m good,” she replied. “Sorry. I’m on it now.”
But she didn’t notice the picture sliding by her of the slim man with dark hair leaving his apartment. If she had, it might have saved more than one life.
A clerk was locking the front door of the Earth Café as Jack, Ozersky, and Mercy Bennet jogged up. Jack put his hand on the glass door just before it closed. “Hang on, it’s just after eleven,” he said, pointing at the sign that indicated closing time was eleven-thirty.
The clerk, a dark-haired twenty-something girl with a nose ring and a very flat stomach between her T-shirt and her low-slung men’s trousers, pushed on the door again, a look of panic in her eyes. “We’re closing early. Sorry!” She shoved at the door and Jack relented. He watched her lock the door and then hurry behind the counter and into the back room.
“Slackers?” Ozersky wondered aloud.
“She’s pretty anxious,” Mercy said.
“You guys walk back to the car,” Jack ordered. They all turned around and retreated to the sidewalk. Mercy and Ted continued, but as soon as they were out of sight of the doorway, Jack turned and sprinted toward the rear of the café. There was a small parking lot in back, but it wasn’t well lit. Jack stuck to the shadows and reached the back of the building in no time. He touched the back door gently, feeling it locked. There was a small window above and to the right of the door. Jack hopped up onto a blue Dumpster that stank of coffee grinds and rotting vegetables, balanced himself on the edge, and looked in the window.
The window offered a view of the café’s kitchen. Jack saw the nose-ringed clerk and another employee, a young man with short hair and a goatee, standing with their backs to the kitchen counter. In front of them were two men facing away from Jack. They were small, wiry men with dark skin. They both held guns. They appeared to be asking questions. The two clerks looked terrified.
Jack pulled out his phone and sent a text message to Mercy: “Distraction ASAP.” He jumped down, landing softly, and waited.
A moment later glass shattered at the front of the store. The girl inside screamed and one of the men shouted in Farsi. At that moment, Jack kicked in the door. His kick blew through the bolts, and the door swung open. The men inside were fast. They had turned toward the sound of breaking glass, but when they heard the door crash, they whirled around just as quickly, weapons ready. Jack dropped to one knee as bullets sped over his head. He double-tapped, and one of the men crumpled inward and fell on his face. Bullets from the other man’s pistol chipped the asphalt around Jack, who calmly shifted his muzzle over and double-tapped again. The second man was falling before the two clerks thought to scream again.