leaned closer to the camera. “Go on,” he commanded.
Jack nodded. “These currency trades appear to be coming from many sources, but Tobias’s secure files indicate that the bulk of the trades are coming through one financial institution — Ungar, Geneva, LLC.”
“My analysts detected that pattern, too, Agent Bauer, but”—Hershel Berkovic shook his head dismissively—
“you must remember: Ungar, Geneva, is one of the largest currency trading businesses in Europe—”
“No,” Richard Walsh interrupted. “I think Jack’s on to something. There could me more going on here than some fanatical religious assault. Someone could have an ulterior motive. Someone could be pulling the strings.”
“We need to look at Soren Ungar,” Jack advised. “The CEO of Ungar, Geneva, LLC. He also owns Rogan Pharmaceuticals and who knows what else. Tobias gave up his name, right before the Albino took his own life.”
“Excuse me, Agent Bauer?” said Hershel Berkovic, raising an eyebrow. “That man behind you in the chair?
He took his own life?”
“Suicide capsule,” Jack replied flatly. “An autopsy will show poisoning as the cause of death.”
Suppressing a smile, Henderson tapped the keys on his laptop, pulled up CTU’s file on Soren Ungar, and scanned it. “Ungar sounds like our man, all right. He’s rabidly anti-American. He’s been talking down the dollar for at least two years now. He funds the Foundation for a Greater Europe, a kind of crackpot Eurocentric think- tank.”
“Hersh,” Richard Walsh commanded from L.A., “I want you to take a hard look at all of Soren Ungar’s recent and future activities.”
On the screen from Langley, the bald man nodded.
“Ted,” Walsh continued, “I want you to locate the other six trucks, pronto.”
“I’m on it,” Dr. Guilling replied at the table across from Henderson.
“What about me?” Jack asked.
Henderson jumped in before Walsh could — after all, Jack was now under
Jack looked around the apartment. “First I’m going to search this place a little while longer, see what turns up. I should be back by two-thirty.”
“Okay. See you then,” Henderson said, sitting back in his chair.
Jack’s attitude could be grating at times, but Henderson wasn’t about to hold it against him. Seminars in “manag-ing up” were for pukes and analysts anyway. Bauer was a field man, the best Henderson had ever seen. Judging from the leads he’d uncovered already, Henderson could see nothing but an upside to letting Jack Bauer do what Jack Bauer did best.
Dubic closed the phone and tucked it into his black leather sport coat. Blond and of Eastern European descent, he was easily the palest man in the brightly lit basement. Across the room, the tangle of brown-skinned men were all focused on one individual — Ibrahim Noor.
The cult leader had traded his holy man’s robes for urban street clothes. With his muscular arms laid bare, prison tattoos and scars visible, Noor’s physical presence was even more intimidating. Worse still, the man’s mood was foul. He’d been closely monitoring the progress of his Warriors. After some initial successes, things were suddenly going awry.
Teams had failed to take out several critical targets, and the loss of the Hawk and his crew was a particularly harsh blow. Even worse, this all came on the heels of an equipment failure that threatened to halt the final, devastating strike before it was even launched.
Dubic sighed, ran a hand over the rough yellow stubble on his jawline.
Squaring his narrow shoulders, Dubic crossed the basement, careful to avoid the fresh blood that stained the concrete floor. Noor was looming over Dr. Kabbibi, arguing about a damaged aerosol dispenser.
“I can install the dispenser myself,” Kabbibi argued. “It is unwise to bring a stranger into the plan this late in the game.”
“I have no choice,” Noor replied, his deep voice booming in the cavernous space. “Someone must operate the device, too.”
Kabbibi had no reply to that.
Dubic said nothing, either. He wasn’t one of Noor’s addled followers, and he wasn’t going to be anywhere near that dispenser when the device did its work.
Once a Serbian Black Dog, Dubic was now a gun for hire, the key word being
Dubic cared little about the politics involved in this operation. He was in it for the money. Lots and lots of money.
Bringing down the holier-than-thou Americans was merely a happy by-product.
Just then, Noor spied Dubic. “You have news?”
“Good news,” Dubic said. “Our operative is on the way to Newark International in a chartered plane — with the device. I’m going to the airport now to pick them up.”
“Why the delay?” Noor demanded.
“Ungar told me the part came from NATO military stores. Difficult to replace, though he managed to do it.”
“Take the Hummer,” said Noor. “I’ll send someone with you.”
Dubic nodded. “How about Tanner?” He looked around for the muscular, charismatic black man with the shaved head, but failed to see him.
“Tanner’s not here,” said Noor. “I sent him to Manhattan to pick up your friend, the Albino.”
Dubic glanced around the basement for a second choice, but Montel Tanner was about the only man he’d ever liked in this group. The remaining pool consisted of twitchy felons and adolescent gang members — sociopathic personalities all.
“I’ll go myself,” he said. “It’s better that way.”
Dubic snatched the Hummer’s keys from one of Noor’s wild-eyed lieutenants. He could feel the crazy cultist staring daggers in his back as he walked to the hole cut into the basement wall, and entered the dimly lit sewer. The tunnel was dark and damp and nearly a block long.
The stench was overpowering, and though Dubic was not particularly tall, he had to crouch to prevent brushing his blond crew cut against the filth-covered ceiling. Water trickled along the floor. In the shadows, Dubic could hear rats scurrying.
Relieved to be out of the horrid pit, Dubic emerged in another brightly lit basement a few moments later. More of Noor’s brown-skinned followers clustered around a moderately sized tanker truck that was parked in the back of the interior space, away from the makeshift laboratory.
Dubic thought about the vehicle’s deadly contents and shuddered.
He climbed into the shiny black Hummer and gunned the engine. He drove up the ramp, and the door opened automatically. As he swerved off Crampton Street toward Howard Boulevard, Dubic pulled the cell phone out of his pocket and tossed it onto the dash.
When he reached the highway, he’d contact the Albino.
But first he had to get this monster American vehicle through these littered ghetto streets.
