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.
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.”
“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.”
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.
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
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 top 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.