Michael pulled a ring of keys from his belt and unwrapped a Velcro strip that kept them from jangling. He sorted through them until he found a handcuff key, then used that to free the hands of Biehn’s corpse. Then he pulled a second handgun out of his ankle holster, wiped it down carefully, and then put it in the detective’s cold hand for a moment, moving it around slightly. Then he tossed it forward where it clattered on the floor.
“Easier for us to explain if he came in with a drawn weapon,” Michael said in answer to Mulrooney’s bewildered look. He went on to describe to Mulrooney their version of events: how the insane-looking man had burst into the house brandishing the gun, with the other man right behind him, and how the security team had come in, shooting him down while his accomplice escaped.
“But… won’t the other man tell a different story?”
Michael shrugged. ‘Let the investigators sort it out. The more confusion, the better. Besides, this story will be hard to disprove, since this one already killed one priest. And the other man, whoever he is, was helping a suspected murderer. His position will not be very solid.”
Jack stumbled back to his car, dirty, exhausted, and thoroughly pissed off. He wanted to go back into St. Monica’s with a SWAT team at his back and burn the place down. That security team was a bunch of cowboys who needed to get their asses kicked. But it occurred to Jack that he could not call for backup. He had been the intruder, in the company of a man wanted for murder. He was beginning to realize how far behind the eight ball he’d put himself.
He jumped into his car and drove off, trying to figure out what to do next. His prisoner had been shot and, he was sure, killed. The Cardinal might or might not be able to identify Jack himself, but that hardly mattered. Everyone knew Jack and Biehn had been together. Besides, Jack’s own sense of morality wouldn’t allow him to just walk away from what happened. He had to tell someone.
Jack dialed a number in Langley, Virginia. Someone picked up on the first ring. “Bauer,” he said simply. “Sixteen-twenty-two. Out in the open.”
He heard several clicks as his call was routed through scrambled lines to a caseworker. He’d had to use this line only once before, and that had been in Ankara. He wasn’t sure what would happen when he called from Los Angeles.
“Bauer,” said an unfamiliar voice. “You were in
L.A. Is this now a domestic issue?”
“As domestic as it gets,” Jack said, turning onto the 110 Freeway North. As quickly as he could, Jack relayed the pertinent information. The person on the other end didn’t complain or quote the rule book.
That wasn’t his job. His only job was extraction, as neatly and cleanly as possible. Not because Jack was important, but because the secrecy and reputation of the Agency were.
“Stand by.” There was a click followed by an emotionless hum that lasted from the Sixth Street on-ramp to the 101 Freeway. The voice came back on. “Stand by. We’re gathering information. It sounds like your problem is being solved for you.” This time the dull hum lasted from the 101/110 juncture all the way to Gower. Finally the caseworker returned. “Problem solved.”
“How—”
“The church is reporting that a madman, probably the same one who killed a priest earlier, broke into the Cardinal’s residence, but was killed by security. They are reporting that a second assailant escaped, but there is no description.”
“I’m working with an agency here, Counter Terrorist Unit,” Jack said. “They know I had Biehn in custody.”
Another pause. “We’ll make a call on that. Go to ground and let us take care of that. It’s going to be messy, but we’ll try to make it a quiet mess. There will be follow-up.” Click.
There will be follow-up. That meant trouble, though Jack couldn’t blame them. Although the Agency went to great lengths to protect itself, that didn’t mean its agents got a free pass every time they colored outside the lines.
After a few more minutes of driving, Jack heard his phone ring and he saw Christopher Henderson’s number, but when he answered, it wasn’t Henderson’s voice.
“You are in so fucking deep!” Ryan Chappelle shrieked into the phone. “Do you know the phone call I just got!” Jack held the phone away from his ear until Chappelle had exhausted his rant. In the silence after the mini-storm, he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to reply or not, until Chappelle said, “What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I assume that you’ve heard about St. Monica’s?” he asked.
“Everybody’s heard about it!” Chappelle snapped. “And I’ve got string pullers at Langley calling in chits, telling me to go easy on you. You know I don’t work for them. I don’t have to do any goddamned favors.”
“Listen, there is something odd,” Jack said. He told the story of his visit, and how he’d tried to identify himself as a Federal agent. “Those guys were determined to kill us no matter who we were.”
He could practically hear the veins in Chappelle’s forehead popping through the telephone. “That’s not my case. Maybe that detective was on to something and they wanted him quiet. We don’t investigate murders here, we stop terrorists.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do,” Jack said. “Biehn had information—”
“And instead of extracting it, you chauffeured him around town. And got him killed.”
“No one except us knows it was me. There’s containment here,” Jack said, trying to control his own temper. He didn’t mind getting chewed out once in a while, but this pencil neck who wasn’t even his commanding officer was starting to get under his skin. “I did what I thought necessary to get the information I needed as soon as possible. There have been no major consequences—”
“No major—!” Chappelle sputtered. “A priest in the hospital and three dead men!”
“A pedophile and two trigger-happy security men who were trying to kill me,” Jack retorted. “Biehn, they murdered.”
“Get into this office now. I’m going to decide whether you need to be put into custody or not. If you don’t show up here in the next fifteen minutes, I’m putting out a warrant for your arrest.”
Harry Driscoll could not work, but he could not go home, either. After leaving CTU, he had returned to his desk at Robbery-Homicide. But the work he had to do was unpleasant: to write a report on his transfer of Don Biehn’s custody to Jack Bauer of the CIA, and to accuse Bauer of endangering the case and, further, currently unaccused citizens, in pursuit of an unrelated investigation.
The office lights at Parker Center were all dark. Only the fluorescent lights in the hallway were awake, casting their pale greenish glow down on the beige, speckled tiles on the floor. When it was quiet like this, you could hear the fluorescent tubes buzzing like bees in a glowing hive. The sound made Driscoll feel even more alone.
He had heard about Biehn’s death a few minutes before. By morning, he’d have his captain breathing down his neck for an explanation. He’d be under water and he would have no choice but to describe how he’d turned custody over to Bauer. What would
Bauer say? What was Jack possibly thinking?
As if to answer his question, Jack Bauer called him.