Jack swallowed, desperately trying to think.
An idea nagged at him. He let it nag, the beginnings of a dread realization beginning to form.
The gun at his hip. He felt it there.
You’re just going to let me leave, with me knowing you’re behind a bomb about to explode in Mumbai?
On Munna’s face was an odd, uneasy expression. He reached for the drink in front of him and brought it to his lips, and Jack saw the gesture for what it was: an attempt to hide duplicity. He knew that in an ocean of wrongness there was something extra wrong here...
Jack felt himself go cold, and all of a sudden he knew — he knew exactly why Munna wanted him to leave, and time slowed down. Music pounded, but for Jack it faded into the background. He was watching. His face stayed the same, but he was watching: he saw sweat glistening on Munna’s forehead, Munna’s chubby fingers stroking the hair of the girl at his side, the young strung-out girl. He saw the bodyguards, the telltale bulges in their tailored jackets, their watchful eyes, their itchy fingers.
Okay. The bodyguard who stood to the right of Munna was left-handed. He was wearing a gun beneath his right armpit, but he’d need to take a step away from Munna and the girl in order to draw and fire.
In a firefight, he would draw second. Mentally, Jack designated him Costello.
The music throbbed.
From the way he was sniffing, the guy standing to the left of Munna had recently snorted cocaine. Even so, he was right-handed. He could draw and fire across Munna and the girl with ease.
In a firefight he would draw first. Jack designated him Abbott.
And Munna? Well, Munna was sitting, so his draw would be impeded. What’s more, Jack knew that Munna’s sidearm was a gold-plated Desert Eagle, and gold-plated Desert Eagles were notoriously heavy and inaccurate. He’d have been better off carrying a wok.
In a firefight, Munna would draw a dismal third.
He had men stationed in the adjacent booths, through which you had to pass if you wanted to get in or out. No doubt the music was also loud in those booths, but they’d hear the shots and come running. Four more men, two on either side. He’d seen drinks, lots of drinks, and if one of the close protection was doing bumps it was safe to say those guys were coked up to the gunnels too.
So — seven altogether. Not great odds. But Jack had faced worse.
Actually, no. Maybe he hadn’t faced worse.
“So what are you waiting for, the great Jack Morgan?” jeered Munna, inviting him to the door of the booth with a ring-adorned hand. “Get out of here. Go find your so-called bomb.”
And you’re trying to piss me off now, aren’t you?
“I know where the bomb is,” said Jack.
Munna raised his eyebrows, as though amused by a flight of fancy. “Oh? Do tell.”
Chapter 108
The boy had run away when a mob attacked his family during the riots of 1992. Upon returning some hours later, he had found the charred remains of his father, mother, and two sisters.
A day later, members of an Islamic charity had found him lying alongside his family’s remains. He had passed out from shock, hunger, and dehydration.
The head of the charity had been the principal of an Islamic seminary, and the boy had been placed in it along with countless other orphans. He had learned all aspects of the faith, as well as English, science, and mathematics. The result was that he could eventually gain admission to a medical college in Saharanpur. Saharanpur was also home to Darul Uloom Deoband, India’s biggest and most influential center of Islamic learning.
During his second year of medical college, the boy had begun to pray five times each day at the mosque. One of the people he had prayed with had carried out some surveillance work for Pakistan’s ISI in India. The man would later become head of the Indian Mujahideen.
The boy had gradually shunned his friends at college and had begun to spend most of his time lecturing on the perceived wrongs inflicted upon the Muslim community in places such as Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Kashmir.
The process of radicalization had begun.
His name was Abdul Zafar.
Chapter 109
“HEY,” SAID MUBEEN at the door. “What are you doing?”
Dr. Zafar had been kneeling by a gurney in the storage room and, startled, he swung around. As he did so, Mubeen saw some kind of attachment to the gurneys. Wires. A stopwatch device.
And in an instant Mubeen knew where the Indian Mujahideen had planted their bomb. It was there in front of him, in the science lab of Private India.
Chapter 110
“Am I right?” asked Jack. “Is it at Private?”
“I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Munna. As though bored.
“Sure I’m right. That’s why you were so keen for me to leave. An ‘international target in Mumbai’? It’s Private, isn’t it?”
Munna looked at him, apparently deciding that he might as well reveal all. “It’s really rather clever,” he said. “Your man Mubeen has helped set up the bomb himself. Tell me — after the various autopsies he’s been performing, are there now a number of gurneys in his lab?”
Jack had no idea. Munna looked delighted. “No, of course not. I don’t suppose the great Jack Morgan concerns himself with what goes on in the lab. Oh, by the way, you have until nine and it’s currently three minutes to nine. I think you’d better make a call, don’t you?”
“Sure,” said Jack, reaching for his phone. “Good idea.” With one hand he threw his cell phone at Costello, with the other he drew his gun on Abbott.
Abbott hadn’t cleared leather when Jack’s first bullet took out his eye, spraying lumpy brain matter on the red flock wallpaper behind. Dropping to one knee, Jack whipped around, felt the air above his head shudder as Costello loosed off a wild shot, and with a two-handed grip made his reply. Costello dropped, hands at his throat, blood spurting through his fingers.
Munna lurched forward in his seat and reached behind for the waistband of his trousers, but Jack sidestepped, leaned, and kicked him once in the jaw, then planted the same foot on his chest, temporarily stopping him from moving.
The doors. They swung open at the same time, front and back. Jack put a bullet through one, swiveled at the waist, took aim and fired at the second, where a goon had just arrived and died, a look of surprise on his face and a flower of blood at his chest. Dazed, Munna was struggling beneath Jack’s foot, so Jack kicked him again. His Colt fired again, and another guard died.
Two guards left, but the booth was clear and they were staying out of sight for the time being, which gave Jack a second to regroup. He pulled Abbott’s unfired Glock from his lifeless fingers, pumped a couple of bullets at the wood surround of the door, and was rewarded with a shriek of pain from the other side.
Then came a shot and he felt the searing pain almost as soon as he heard it — a pain in his thigh, and he dropped to his knee, yelling in agony.
Chapter 111
Everything fell into place for Mubeen. He remembered the night when he had picked up the first two bodies from Cooper Hospital. He’d wondered then why he was retrieving them from there instead of JJ Hospital. Zafar must have ensured that Private India — related autopsies were assigned to him alone.
He’d insisted on being present during the autopsies.