“Okay,” was all she said.
“Ter, you know, what I’m wor— when I’m involved in something like this, I—”
“I know, Jack. It’s important. I’ll see you when you get home.”
18. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 1 P.M. AND 2 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
Ryan Chappelle was feeling more like himself. That is to say, he was feeling peevish and unhappy. Of course, at this particular moment he had two reasons to be unhappy. The first was that someone had given him a barbiturate overdose. The second was that Jack Bauer, of all people, had saved him.
It did not occur to Chappelle to admire Bauer for the sacrifices he’d made in the last few weeks. Not a day went by without some field agent somewhere surrendering his blood or his family time for the sake of his country. The possibility that Bauer might give more than others was, in Chappelle’s opinion, overshadowed by the man’s willingness (he would say eagerness) to flout policy and procedure.
As for the fact that Bauer had been instrumental in getting close to Zapata, well, as far as Chappelle was concerned, that proved his own good use of resources.
Chappelle considered Zapata his personal nemesis. Chappelle despised terrorists. He considered them evil and immoral, villains willing to kill and maim the innocent to achieve their ends. But at least they had an end goal, abhorrent as it was. Zapata was not immoral, he was amoral. He had no end in mind; he simply worked toward the deconstruction of the world as it was. Anarchy. Without leaders. Preposterous. The man had to be destroyed.
“You wanted to see me?”
Chris Henderson entered the office where Chappelle had made himself comfortable.
Chappelle motioned for him to sit down. When Henderson had settled in, he said, “This Internal Affairs investigation is heating up.”
A look of disgust crossed Henderson’s face. “It’s all anyone’s talking about.”
“From what I’ve read, it looks like Jack Bauer’s the one who’s been doing the talking. About you.”
The scowl on Henderson’s face deepened, his frown lines becoming sinkholes. “I assume Jack said what he thought, even though he’s wrong.”
Chappelle nodded. “Being wrong never occurs to him. The man’s a hard-headed smart ass. Frankly, I’d love to see him brought down a notch or two.” Henderson hesitated. “Is this what you called me in to talk about?”
The Regional Director seemed not to have heard him. “Between you and me, I’ve been tempted to pack his parachute myself, if you know what I mean, then let him jump out of the plane and just see what happens. But something always holds me back. Maybe it’s my own sense of right and wrong, but no, now that I think of it, it’s not that.”
“I’ll bite. What is it?” Henderson asked.
Chappelle leaned forward. “It’s that as much as he’s a rule-breaking pain in the ass, Bauer does what he does to get the job done. He doesn’t do things to stop the job from getting done.”
“Is there a point here?”
“Yes,” Chappelle said. “You know how much I dislike Bauer, and that’s even though I admit he tries to help the mission. Do you have any idea how miserable I’d make someone who was actually trying to stop the mission?”
Henderson’s mouth went dry. He tried to smile. “Pretty miserable, I’ll bet.”
“Pretty goddamned miserable,” Chappelle agreed. His eyes did not waver from Henderson’s face. Like a snake, he did not blink. “If I found out that someone tried to sabotage the Zapata mission just to save their own skin from the Internal Affairs investigation, especially if they did something to me as part of their sabotage, I’m going to personally see to it that person is crucified.”
“What the hell are you implying with—”
“That’s all,” Chappelle said.
Sergei’s address was easy enough to find — a small Craftsman just north of Main Street, on the border between Santa Monica and Venice. The neighborhood was straight middle class, and except for the brown, untended grass, the Ukrainian’s house blended in perfectly well.
Jack climbed the three steps to the porch and pushed the old metal doorbell. There was a slightly rusty screen door that opened outward, but he left it closed and waited. After a moment, the inner door was opened by a small man who barely reached Jack’s shoulder. He studied Jack with bright, aggressive eyes, and Jack had that same, cautionary feeling one gets while being sniffed by a guard dog.
“Malenkiy, let him in!” someone ordered from inside.
Jack pulled open the metal screen door as Malenkiy stepped back. Jack walked into a house that looked like it had been decorated by a couple of college boys, with haphazard furniture and cheap prints on the walls. The hardwood floor was badly scratched in places.
Sergei was sitting on a brown faux leather couch. He had the same sharp eyes as Malenkiy, and they wore the same hawklike nose and thin brown hair, but Sergei was much bigger, taller and broader than Jack. He was reading the newspaper. Jack noticed that Malenkiy remained behind him and off-angle, ready for trouble.
The drug dealer folded the paper and stood up. “Mr. Felix Studhalter,” he said in a gentle accent, offering his hand. Jack shook it firmly. “We do not know each other. I must search you.”
“I’m carrying,” Jack said. “I’m sure your guy is, too.”
Sergei nodded. “I am not concerned about guns.”
Jack understood. He’d re-equipped himself with a SigSauer, which he carried in a pancake holster at his hip. He popped it out and laid it on the edge of the couch, then slipped off his jacket and pulled up the long-sleeved T- shirt until his chest was visible. He turned around slowly. He was not wearing a wire.
“Good,” Sergei said pleasantly. “Now we can do business. Why, again, have you hurried up our deal? Something about St. Louis?”
“Oklahoma City,” Jack corrected. “Like I said, the sooner the deal is done, the more I make.”
“Who is in Oklahoma?” Sergei asked.
Jack shook his head. “I make money because I know them and you don’t.”
Sergei sighed. “We are all middlemen. So, this is how it works. You and me and Malenkiy are going to our little warehouse. We are going alone, and you are bringing cash. For cash, you get crystal meth and the truck it comes in—”
“Do I know the truck is clean?”
“Your grandmother could sell it to a policeman,” Sergei assured him.
“And what makes you think that, all by myself, I’m going to go somewhere with the two of you with a bag full of cash?”
Sergei grinned. “Because it is the only way you will get the deal.”
Jack made a show of hesitating, assessing Sergei and his miniature. The truth, of course, was that this arrangement was fine with him. Tucked into the compartment under the back area of his SUV was a briefcase full of cash courtesy of CTU. Jack was perfectly content to hand it over and drive away with the meth, which he’d deliver to Smiley Lopez in return for information. LAPD and the FBI could sort out the gang-bangers and the drug dealers. He had a global anarchist to catch.
Gabriel “Pan” Panatello hung up the phone, having just received the most unusual phone call of his life. He was the owner of Don’t-Shoot-the-Messengers, a messenger company (and a name) he’d inherited from his jerk brother-in-law a few years back. He’d taken it partly because his wife nagged him to do it, and partly because the messenger service was a convenient front for his small-time drug deals and transportation business. The thievery wasn’t much more profitable than the actual delivery, but at least it wasn’t boring pencil-neck work. Pan got to keep his hand in the pot even though, as far as his wife, Tapia, knew, he’d gone legit. Plus, it allowed him to give work to some of his pals from Folsom, and that made him feel like a hero.
