“You’re fucking crazy!” the cut guard gurgled, his throat compressed by Jack’s forearm.
“Yeah, so don’t try to reason with me,” Jack said. “Look.” He turned the guard toward the Plexiglas. They could see down the cell block, where prisoners were now appearing in ones and twos. Some were already jumping up on the railings, or running into the cells of other inmates. One deck below, where the bunkhouse slept twenty to a room, a fight had already broken out.
“They’ll be coming this way in a minute. Most won’t touch you, but I bet there’s one or two that’ll take a piece of you before this gets shut down.” Jack saw a glint of fear in the guard’s eye. “So let’s all of us get out of this block before it goes insane.”
Jack passed through the guard station into the next corridor. One more station and he would be in the open. There was another door here, but this one required a code. Jack pointed at it.
“I can’t do it,” the guard insisted.
“You’re going to lose your fingers for sixty thousand a year,” Jack threatened. “It can’t be worth it.”
Alarms sounded farther off. The whole jail was awake now.
Jack held up the razor blade. “Open that door and I’m someone else’s problem.”
That was enough to convince the guard. He punched in the entry code, and the door opened. Jack sealed his arm around the guard’s throat, putting him in a carotid choke. The man gasped and flailed, but Jack held on until he went limp. He laid the unconscious guard gently on the ground.
“Come on!” he ordered. Ramirez followed obediently.
Jack knew he’d never get out of the final layers of security without help. He needed to create more diversions. The more chaotic he could make the jail, the harder it would be for the jailers to stop him.
They passed through the doors and descended two flights of stairs. Below the Staples Center was a miniature city, a maze of storerooms, maintenance rooms, and other rooms. Zapata seemed to know exactly where he was going. They arrived a few minutes later at a door with no markings, but with a small black man wearing a windbreaker that said “Security.”
“I help you gents?” the man said amiably.
“We’re here to talk to see one of the fighters,” Zapata said. He held up a notepad and pointed at the camera hanging from Aguillar’s neck.
The man nodded and let them through.
“How do you do that?” Aguillar whispered. “How did you know that man would just let you in?”
“People like it when their expectations are met,” Zapata replied casually. “This place is out of the way.
That man is bored. He would like to do his job, but he doesn’t want to do real work. He wants to check people who come his way, but he does not want trouble. We met his expectations.”
The room beyond was a storeroom that had been converted into some kind of athletic training area, with mats on the floor and a boxer’s heavy bag hanging from an iron post with a heavy base. On the far side of the room, two fighters were rolling on the ground, but only practicing, while two or three men stood around them giving comments.
Much closer, a man stood by himself, slowly removing cloth wraps from around his hands. He was huge, at least six feet, five inches tall, with shoulders as wide as Zapata and Aguillar standing together. His hair was shaved very close to his head. His ears were swollen and misshapen, and his nose was bent to the left.
“Excuse me,” Zapata said boldly, “are you Mark Kendall?”
The man looked at them. “Yeah. Did I have another interview set up?”
Zapata smiled and shook his head. “No, I’m not a reporter. I am a man with a proposition for you.”
Kendall stopped unwrapping his hands and looked down at Zapata. “Not sure I like the sound of that. What kind of proposition?”
“One that will probably save your daughter’s life.”
The big fighter’s eyes narrowed. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
Zapata spoke softly. “This is what I’m talking about. I want you to kill someone for me. Tomorrow night. You’re going to lose your fight, probably in the second round. When you lose, you’ll be washed up. No one is going to give you another chance. Except me. After the fight, you’ll have an opportunity to kill someone that I want dead. If you do that, I will pay for your daughter’s medical treatments, and she will live a happy and healthy life.”
Zapata delivered his proposal so quietly and casually that it took a second for Kendall’s brain to process it. And when he did, he looked around for cameras, or practical jokers giggling in a corner somewhere. When he saw nothing else that might explain this bizarre little man’s speech, he had no choice but to turn back to him. “What the fuck are you talking about?” he repeated.
“I’m completely serious,” Zapata said.
“Well, this — you little shit, who do you think you are!” Mark yelled at him.
“Calmly, sir. You are getting angry,” Zapata said. The amiable quality of his voice changed, strengthened, demanding more attention. “You’ll get even angrier in a minute. Before you attract too much attention, you need to hear me. This proposal is sincere. I have more than enough money to take care of your daughter, and your wife. You will go to prison, probably for life, but your daughter will be pain-free.”
Kendall looked around again. “This is some god-damned practical joke. You think I’d say yes to something like this? I’m not going to lose!”
“Yes, you will, probably in the second round. Which means you won’t get the big purse, and you won’t have an opportunity to fight for the championship. You probably won’t get any more fights at all.”
“Get the hell out of here!” Kendall yelled loud enough to attract attention from the fighters across the hall.
Zapata nodded. “I’m leaving. But remember, you don’t need to decide now. You don’t even need to decide before the fight. If you win, then I’m wrong and nothing matters. If you lose, then you can make your decision. You’ll have the chance to kill the man I want dead. Here. Take this.” He handed Kendall an envelope. “This will tell you everything you need.”
The anarchist wheeled around, dragging the startled Aguillar in his wake. They passed through the double doors with the security man calling behind them. “Short interview?”
“I got what I wanted,” Zapata said over his shoulder.
Alarms blared in every hallway. At each corner, revolving sirens flashed. The jail was in full-scale riot. An inmate ran shrieking past Jack, pursued by three other inmates intent on exacting some kind of revenge.
“We’re gonna get killed!” Ramirez said, cowering against the wall of the corridor.
Jack grabbed him by the collar of his orange jumpsuit. “Listen. By now they’ll have set up a perimeter inside the jail. They’ll have called for outside help. We only have a few more minutes to get out before the place is sealed and they hold everyone in.”
Bauer had visited the facility often enough to interrogate prisoners. They had reached the last ring of security. Beyond this, there was only the courtyard and then freedom.
A group of inmates had reached this hallway before them. A door burst open and two prisoners appeared, dragging a guard, who struggled against them. One of the inmates raised a hand and stabbed downward with some kind of shiv, jabbing the guard in the chest.
Jack lunged forward, planting his shoulder in the inmate’s chest and throwing him backward. The other one looked at him, dumbfounded, as Jack hit him with an uppercut that doubled him over. Jack grabbed the prisoner by his stringy hair and slammed his head against the wall.
The guard, bleeding from his chest, looked at him in shock. “Th-thanks. ”
“It’s not deep,” Jack said of the wound. “Barricade yourself until the riot team comes.” He shoved the man back into the room. “This way.”
Tony was driving on the 405 Freeway over the Sepulveda Pass, which connected the San Fernando Valley to the west side of Los Angeles. There was traffic in Los Angeles, even at this hour, but it wasn’t bad — just enough to allow him to follow Bashir without being noticed. He kept his eyes on the taillights of Riduan Bashir’s vehicle about three car lengths ahead.
His phone rang. “Jamey, go.”
“He’s very accommodating,” the data analyst told him. “There’s no way he’s worried about surveillance. He’s
