From that moment on, all his plans had fallen apart. The police detective had...

Copeland shuddered, reliving the moment when she’d fallen into his precious and deadly stack of glass vials. Now Copeland needed the vaccine for himself. He could not be sure if he or Frankie had been exposed to one or both strains. The detective undoubtedly had.

“And she has no idea,” he murmured, his words slurred ever so slightly by the maracuja. “No idea at all. She could kill thousands.”

“So what?”

Copeland sat up, his heart skipping a beat.

“Relax, it’s me,” said Frankie Michaelmas.

She was standing in the doorway to his back rooms as calmly as though nothing had happened. He stood up and walked over to her in a maracuja haze and hugged her. He kissed her, and was too frantic and drugged to notice that her lips offered no warmth or passion.

“Don’t say so what,” he said at last, “don’t say so what. You know what. I don’t even know which strain she was exposed to. Maybe in less than a day, she could be infecting people, spreading the disease all across the city. We have to warn someone.”

Frankie shrugged, dislodged herself from his arms, and sat down in a chair.

“You do have doses of the vaccine, right?” Frankie asked almost lazily.

“Of course I do. But I have to make more now. For you and me.”

“Which strain do you think?” she asked.

Copeland shook his head. “No way of knowing. We have time, if we hurry. I’ll call the others. They’ll help.”

Frankie nodded. “I’ll call them. Tell me who.”

Copeland paused. Secrecy had been part of his protection, both for himself and his virus. Few members of his gang knew all the other members, and as a safeguard against abuse, he had not told those willing to use the virus where the vaccine was hidden. That way, no one was eager to play fast and loose with the virus itself.

“Okay,” he said uncertainly. He went over to a bookshelf to collect the contact information for his colleagues.

“Good. But don’t warn anyone else. It’s a disease. There’s a cure. Spread the disease and tell them where to go find the cure. Best way to get our way.”

So brutal, he thought, though he felt a delicious tremor in his stomach. “We have to warn them,” he said again. “And we have to find a way out. We have to take the antivirus ourselves and then get out. She saw my face. She knows you’re involved. And that Federal agent. I can’t believe the Feds got on our tail so fast. They’ll find us eventually.”

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Frankie nodded. “That’s true. But you know that we know people that can help us with that. People with a lot of experience hiding from the government.”

The impact of her words reached Copeland even through his drug-induced stupor. He put down the book containing his contacts and bristled. It suddenly occurred to him that he absolutely should not tell Frankie where to find the vaccine. “Absolutely not.”

“They’re your contacts,” she pointed out. She reached forward to the coffee table and hefted a heavy piece of jade. Copeland had told her a dozen times the story of how he had discovered it during one of his hikes into the wilderness. She’d always liked its weight and its jagged edges. “You’re the one who wanted to learn from them.”

“Their philosophy! How they achieved their ends!” he spat. “We’re not going through this again. They are cold-blooded killers. Their goals are petty. We are trying to—”

“—save the planet,” she said like a teenager mocking her father. “Well, your reward is going to be a jail cell when they catch you. But those people can get us out of the country.”

Copeland shook his head. “I haven’t spoken with them in months. I have no way to contact them.”

“I do.”

Copeland’s eyes narrowed. He forced himself to pierce the tranquilizer’s veil to focus on her. “You? How did you— you have been speaking with them?”

She said yes without the slightest bit of remorse.

“They want to kill people. They’ll do nothing with the vaccine,” Copeland said firmly, trying to recover from his shock. “Absolutely not.”

He walked over to the telephone. “We have to call someone. Warn them about the police officer. They can get her into a sterile room before she becomes contagious.” He picked up the telephone.

Frankie Michaelmas stood up, hefted the heavy piece of jade, and brought it crashing down on the back of Copeland’s skull. She had always wondered how many blows it would take to kill him, and now she was determined to find out.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 4 P.M. AND 5 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

4:00 P.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles

Ryan Chappelle burst into Christopher Henderson’s office, red-faced and puffed up, looking like a small dog taking up space.

“Bauer.” Chappelle said the word as though it left a bad taste in his mouth.

“Not here,” Henderson said. “What’s wrong?”

“This is,” the Director said, holding up a mini-disc as though the very fact that he was holding it proved his point.

Henderson received the disc, opened his CD tray, and laid it down with deliberate smoothness. The video program fired up, and in minutes Henderson was watching color footage of Jack Bauer hunched down next to an overturned police van. His face wasn’t clear—the video was slightly unfocused, and Jack’s face was turned partly away—but Henderson recognized the slouch of Bauer’s shoulders and the straw-blond hair. He was talking to a man in a blue shirt— Henderson knew it was Kasim Turkel, who seemed to be handcuffed and lying on the ground. Every once in a while Bauer jabbed at the man’s leg and he twitched.

Henderson knew what was coming, but he wasn’t going to make it easy. “So?” he said dumbly.

“So, we’ve got video of a CTU agent torturing a man in public!”

Henderson wished he could have built a wall between himself and Chappelle’s invective. “You know Jack. He had a reason—”

“I’m sure Bauer had his reasons. I’m also sure I won’t like them. And I’m even more sure that if this ends up on the evening news, it’ll be a public relations disaster!”

“Suppress it. Where’d we get it?”

Chappelle paced back and forth, unable to contain his energy. He could be as cold as ice sometimes, but Bauer always seemed to bring out the worst in him. “That’s the kicker. A protestor. Check that, a rioter took video footage of him. Probably one of the same people who vandalized the police wagon. And the guy wants to sell it to us for half a million dollars. Otherwise he’s going to CNN.”

Henderson rubbed his temples. Video was unforgiving. Context didn’t matter. The public would see a Federal agent abusing a suspect, and no one would pay attention to the fact that the suspect was a terrorist putting lives at risk, and the interrogator was a man with hours left in which to save lives. “So we buy it off him, or we scare him out of the deal.”

“Maybe,” Chappelle said. “Because the other choice is that I cut this off at the knees by bringing Jack Bauer up on charges.”

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4:08 P.M. PST Brentwood

Mercy Bennet had followed Smith, on foot, from the Federal Building out of West Los Angeles and into Santa Monica. He seemed to think he’d lost her in the crowd when she had hesitated, looking at Jack Bauer, and she did nothing to dissuade him from that belief. Tailing him on foot seemed ridiculous in this day and age—he should have been followed by two or three teams on foot and in cars, switching drivers and clothing. But with no radio or telephone, Mercy could not call for backup.

So she resorted to cloak-and-dagger movements, staying as far back as possible without losing him, staying behind parked cars, street signs, and other obstacles as often as possible. Copeland seemed to be taking a zigzagging path, one block north then one block west, over and over. Twice she thought she’d lost him, only to follow the pattern and pick him up again. Losing him temporarily had probably helped her more than anything, since it reduced her chances of being seen.

His path led eventually into an upscale neighborhood of Santa Monica above Montana Boulevard. Once he was there, he seemed to relax. His pace had slowed considerably and, though she was too far back to say for sure, she had the impression that his shoulders lost some of their tension. He was on his home turf.

He ended his run at a well-landscaped brick house around Fourteenth Street, the kind of house she would never afford on a government salary. She watched him enter the house, then she made her last dash, reaching a large oak tree planted along the parkway of the house across the street, and partly shielded by a parked Chevy Tahoe. She sat there for a minute catching her breath, trying to decide what to do next, when a Toyota Prius drove into Smith’s driveway. Mercy nearly cursed aloud when she saw Frankie Michaelmas get out of the car and hurry inside. A few minutes later, Frankie had reappeared carrying several small cases. She made a second trip for more cases, then got in the car and drove away. Mercy resisted an irrational urge to jump onto the hood of the car and keep it from moving by force of will. But in the end she did not think Frankie was her target. She focused on Smith.

She sat across the street for a few more minutes, recovering some of her strength and considering her next move, when a middle-aged woman with a round face, wearing a chic bandana on her bald head, came by, walking her dog. Both the woman and the dog moved with tired steps.

“Excuse me,” Mercy said, “I don’t want to bother you, but do you have a cell phone?”

The woman studied Mercy with a sharp eye. “Why?”

“I’m a police officer. I’ve lost my badge and my radio during a foot pursuit, and I need to call my department. It’s an emergency.”

“You don’t have a badge?”

Mercy shook her head.

The woman assessed her shrewdly. Mercy could almost imagine what she was thinking: her story was unlikely... but who would claim to be a police officer in need of a cell phone who was not, in fact, just that?

“How can I believe you?”

“There’s no harm either way,” Mercy pointed out. “You can stand here while I make the call.”

The woman considered again, shrugged, and handed over a small silver flip phone. Mercy dialed 911. This time she was connected—the riots, she guessed, were finally calming down, thanks to police presence and protestor exhaustion— and she identified herself. The emergency dispatcher

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contacted West Bureau for her. She was connected to Sandy Waldman. She rolled her eyes. Waldman, a twenty-year veteran, had been one of the many who’d mocked her ecoterrorist theory.

“Sandy, I need help,” she said.

“You and half the goddamned city,” Waldman replied. She could picture him sitting at his desk with his feet up, his veteran’s belly rolling over the top of his belt buckle.

“I’m code five on Fourteenth Street in Santa Monica,” she said, using the department’s code for “on a stakeout” to affirm the dog walker’s generosity. “I need units to roll here ASAP code two.”

“Ooh, police talk,” Waldman joked. “You’re lucky. We’ve been code thirteen for the last couple of hours, but now we’re getting back to code fourteen.” Mercy hated Waldman in that moment, but she was glad to hear the department was standing down from major disaster activity caused by the riot. “I’ll roll a couple of slick tops to you now.”

“Thanks. Can you also run an address for me?” She recited the address of the brick house.

“Stand by.”

“What do you want with that house?” asked the woman with the bandana.

Mercy understood intuitively that she’d lost her hair to chemotherapy. “It’s police business, ma’am.”

“But that’s Bernie Copeland’s house. Is he okay?”

“You know him?”

“Well, he’s a neighbor,” the woman said as though all neighbors should know one another. “He travels quite a bit. South America most of the time, I think, but I see him outside sometimes when I walk Honeybear.” She tugged affectionately at her dog’s leash.

“Ever notice anything unusual about him?”

“Not until now,” the woman replied dubiously. “May I have my phone back?”

“Almost.”

Sandy Waldman came back on the line with the name of Bernard Copeland and a list of interesting items, only a few of which Mercy absorbed in that moment, because just then two unmarked police cars rolled up, one of them passing the house and pulling to a stop three doors down, the other stopping short. The cops inside were uniformed.

“Tell me what you want them to do and I’ll radio it to them,” Waldman said. For a jerk, he was a pretty efficient cop, she decided.

“Approach when they see me move, one goes to the back and the other goes in with me. He’s inside.”

“Ten-four.” A moment later, one of the unmarked cars rolled away to go around the block. Mercy knew he’d keep in contact with the other via radio.

“Thank you, ma’am,” Mercy said, handing back the phone. She walked down two doors, forcing herself to remain calm and steady, then made a hard left turn and crossed the street at a fast pace. The cop on this street put the radio to his mouth, then hung it up and exited quickly, hurrying up beside her and nodding. Together they strode up the steps to the door, and the officer kicked it in with one stomp of his boot.

Mercy let him enter first, since he was armed, but she knew almost immediately that there would be no gunfire.

Seldom Seen Smith, a.k.a. Bernard Copeland, was lying on his living room floor in a pool of blood.

“Radio for an ambulance!” she shouted. Mercy rushed forward while the uniformed officer began to clear the house while simultaneously making the call. Mercy heard the other officer enter from the back.

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She knelt beside Smith, who was facedown. The back of his skull looked like hamburger meat mixed with clumps of hair. He was breathing, but barely.

“Copeland!” she said to him. “Copeland, can you hear me?” He didn’t answer. “Smith!” she yelled. “Seldom Seen Smith!”

His eyelids fluttered and then stopped at half mast. “Smith!” she repeated. “This is the police. An ambulance is on its way.”

She moved into his line of sight. His eyes focused on her for a moment and his breathing quickened. His mouth worked noiselessly.

“Take it easy,” she said. It seemed unsafe to move him, even though the pool of blood near his lips made his breathing wet and raspy. “We’re getting you help.” She knew without asking that Frankie Michaelmas had done this to him.

His mouth worked harder, and this time he succeeded in making small, moist, guttural sounds. He spoke words rather than sentences. “You,” he rasped. Then, “Infected.” Mercy didn’t know what he meant, but a sudden weight pressed against her stomach when he managed to add, “Hours. Only.”

His mouth worked desperately again. He closed his eyes and they remained closed; he coughed, spraying droplets of blood onto her knees. Copeland gathered himself and managed a few more words. No, one long word. “An...ti... dote.” Then he coughed again and pushed out another fearful word. “Gone.”

One uniformed cop walked back into the room. “All clear—” But Mercy held up her hand. Copeland continued slowly. “She...use... it. Terror. Vander. Bilt. Anti. Dote. She...use... it. Terror.” The sounds ebbed until they were only weak rasps. Copeland opened his eyes. His right hand moved along the floor, sliding until it reached the edge of the pool of blood. Reaching clear hardwood, his dragging fingers drew dark red lines. His hand stopped, then he drew three numbers—13, 48, 57. His hand stopped moving and his eyes closed. His lips quivered and, weak and thin as the meowings of a kitten, he spoke another phrase. Mercy couldn’t quite make it out. It sounded like a foreign name. “Uma,” like the actress, then something about a “ghetto.” Then he stopped making sounds altogether.

4:20 P.M. PST Century Plaza Hotel, West Los Angeles

Mitch Rasher walked into the President’s suite at the Century Plaza. “We’re back on,” he said.

Barnes looked up from the security briefing he’d been reading. “What about the riots?”

“It’s going to look bad on the evening news,” Rasher warned him, “but the streets are getting back to normal now. By the time you have your meeting tonight, they’ll have everything cleared up.”

“And security is tight up there? Nothing’s been leaked?”

“No, sir. Tight as a drum. Shall I confirm with the other side?”

Barnes considered. He’d been looking forward to this meeting. He always enjoyed cutting through the red tape and slicing right to the heart of the matter. The riots, had they continued, would have made a meeting impossible and given the protestors a victory, though they’d never have known it. But, if Rasher felt the riots had burned themselves out, well...

“Let’s do it,” Barnes commanded.

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4:22 P.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles

Jack walked into CTU headquarters just shy of four-thirty. His entire body ached; the rush dialysis had taken more out of him than he cared to admit, and he felt as if that police wagon had landed on top of him. But he had no intention of slowing down.

He walked through CTU’s main floor and up to Henderson’s office, his face scratched from the struggle with the police, his eyes red from OC spray, and his shirt torn. He ignored the stares from the analysts as he reached the top of the operation chief ’s office.

“Is there any word on Kim?” he asked without saying hello.

Henderson shook his head. “National Health Services hasn’t called.”

Jack gritted his teeth. The virus, he told himself. The vaccine.

Tony Almeida and Nina Myers were already in Henderson’s office, along with Jessi Bandison.

“Okay, are we on top of Farrigian?” Jack asked. He had called ahead to tell them what he’d learned from Turkel.

Henderson replied. “He turned up dead. We found him in his warehouse with a bullet in his brain.”

Jack didn’t waste a moment’s grief over a small fish eaten by a bigger one. “Inventory?”

The Chief of Field Operations shrugged. “We have people looking, but no one knows for sure.”

“So we know it’s explosive. But a bomb? A rocket?” Jack thought aloud. “A stationary bomb would be difficult. I can’t imagine him getting it into a location, and a roadside bomb would make a lot of noise, but what would his target be? You have all these world leaders traveling separately.”

“It’s ETIM,” Nina said. “They want China. The Chinese Premier is here to make his case to the G8.”

“It’s going to be hard to figure out his plan if we don’t know the weapon,” Jack said, his tone edged in frustration. “Turkel seemed to think it was tonight. Do we have the G8 itinerary?”

Jessi Bandison called the schedule up on Henderson’s computer screen. A timetable appeared showing the whereabouts of the principals in the G8 at any given time during the summit. All eight heads of state would be attending a function at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

“But the Chinese Premier won’t be there,” Henderson pointed out. He jabbed his finger at a box on the screen that stated the Premier’s location for that evening: in his suite at a separate hotel. “Al-Libbi wouldn’t attack then, like we said.”

Jack studied the schedule. Something was bothering him. “Why is he staying indoors?”

“What do you mean?”

Bauer ran his finger along the column for every other day and night. “His schedule is packed. He has events every day and every evening, especially evenings. The only blank spots are for sleep and some time during each day, but no rest at all the other evenings. Only this one.”

Tony saw where Jack was going. “You think he has a rendezvous planned?” Jack was already sliding the screen over to President Barnes.

“Well, look who else doesn’t have anything planned in that slot.” He smiled at the others. “I’d say these two have a meeting of their own scheduled. We just need to find out where it is. Let’s go over the facts we know and see how they fit.”

Each member gave a quick summary of recent discoveries. Tony reported that Dyson had died without recovering

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enough for serious questioning, and had mumbled only nonsense before he died. Jack cursed at that, but said nothing else. He repeated the information he’d pulled out of Kasim Turkel. Nina’s information surprised them all.

“Nurmamet Tuman is former Chinese intelligence. That’s about all I could get from my contact at the consulate, and even getting that was like pulling teeth,” she said. “My assumption is that he was Uygur trained to spy on other Uygurs, but my guy didn’t say any of that.”

“Maybe he was turned,” Jack mused. “Pretending to spy when his heart was still with his homeland.”

Nina nodded. “I thought the same thing, but they weren’t having any of it. It’s hard to have a conversation when they don’t even acknowledge that the separatists exist. There’s one other thing.” She paused. “When I was leaving Tuman’s house, the Secret Service arrived. They wouldn’t tell me why they were there. They seemed to know Tuman already.”

“You think they’re meeting at Tuman’s house? That wouldn’t make sense,” Tony pointed out. “Too public, too small, too insecure.”

Jack turned to Henderson. “We need to give them our information. Even if they won’t tell us what’s going on, they can at least change their plans; maybe that’ll stop al-Libbi.”

Henderson nodded in approval. Sometimes the best way to thwart a terrorist plan was the simplest: change a date, a time, a route. Denial of information was a primary part of counterintelligence, and counterintelligence was a foundational tool in any anti-terrorist organization. “I’ll ask Chappelle. But he might be in a mood.”

Jessi was standing back from the conversation, but she had continued to study the screen. “You know who else’s schedule matches up,” she said. “President Novartov from Russia. Remember, the contact I made was Russian, and the information on the Tuman connection was Russian.”

4:29 P.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles

Jessi knew what they were going to ask the minute they spoke up. Henderson put the phone in her hand, and she dialed the number. A moment later she was listening to Anastasia Odolova’s melodramatic voice say, “My Jessi, what can I do for you now?”

Jessi felt extremely self-conscious with four experienced field agents all staring at her. “Anastasia, thanks again for helping before. If you have a minute, I could use a little more guidance.”

There was a pause, during which the analyst was sure she could feel Odolova smiling on the other end of the line. “First things first, Jessi. Call me Anna. Now, what else can I do for you?”

Jessi looked at Bauer and the others, who were studying her closely. Bauer, especially, made her nervous. The intensity in his eyes, in his movements, always shocked her in contrast to his boyish good looks. She knew how good he was at his job, but she hoped that he never had to turn that steely focus on her. “I’m digging into this Marcus Lee situation,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “Everywhere I look, Russia keeps popping up. I thought you might be able to tell me a little more about what Tuman, or Lee, or whatever he’s called, might be up to.”

“Well, I always have an idea or two in my head,” Odolova replied. “But theories are sometimes misunderstood. It might be best if I were to tell you in person.”

Not me, Jessi thought immediately. I’m no field agent. “I could send someone to meet you.”

“No, no,” Odolova said gently, but firmly. “You are Kelly’s friend. I’m happy to meet with you, but no one else. And, if my idea is correct, we should meet soon. I can be at

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the Cat & Fiddle on Sunset in thirty minutes. I’ll be wearing white.” With these final words, the Russian’s voice had quickened to a short, terse tone, informing Jessi that this was her only offer.

“Okay,” she said weakly. Odolova hung up.

Jessi relayed the conversation to the group.

“She’s not a field agent,” Tony said, voicing her thoughts.

“She should go,” Jack insisted. “We’re missing pieces here, and if this Odolova woman can give us some, we need them. Come on.”

He grabbed Jessi by the wrist and started to guide her to the stairs when the phone rang. Henderson picked it up and said it was for Bauer.

Jessi was relieved. Now she would have time to a phone call of her own before they left.

4:33 P.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles

“Bauer,” Jack said.

“Agent Bauer, this is Ken Diebold with National Health Services. You sent us over a blood sample to examine.”

Jack’s attention narrowed suddenly to a laserlike focus. “Yes. What can you tell me?”

“The blood sample contains a virus...a sort of virus we haven’t seen before. Are you familiar with Ebola or Mar-burg?”

Jack felt as though a hand had clenched around his heart. “Yes.”

“They are hemorrhagic fevers. So is this one. We don’t know much about it, yet, but we’re using Marburg as a model. This subject is the second case we’re studying.”

“Wait,” Bauer said. “My colleagues should hear this.” He switched to the speakerphone and motioned for Nina to close the door.

Diebold continued. “If our information is accurate, this subject will be contagious about twenty-four hours after exposure, and will die a few hours after that.” Diebold paused. “I have some knowledge of your agency’s activities, Agent Bauer. Do you have the subject in custody? Do you know when he was exposed?”

Jack felt the hand try to tear his heart from his chest. “Yes,” he said quietly. He checked his watch. “About eight hours ago.”

“He needs to be isolated immediately,” Diebold said. “He’s no danger to anyone yet, but we expect lesions to appear on the skin. Once they break open, the patient is contagious and the virus can spread.”

“Isn’t there anything—?”

“A virus is a difficult thing to kill,” the NHS doctor replied. “There is no cure for Marburg.”

“You said this was the second case...?” Henderson asked.

“The other was reported to us from Brazil, from an area called Minas Gerais. We’re guessing that’s where the virus originates. Was your subject recently there?”

“No,” Jack said. But he was distracted. Tony Almeida’s eyes had widened at the doctor’s words.

“Agent Bauer,” Diebold said. “It’s imperative that we get your subject quarantined as soon as possible. If this virus is half as contagious as Marburg, it could take out half the population of Los Angeles in a matter of days.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Jack said. He hung up. “What?” he said to Tony.

Almeida frowned thoughtfully. “That’s the second time I’ve heard someone mention that place. Minas Gerais, or something like that? Dyson talked about it this morning,

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right before he tried to kill me. He was talking about coffee. I didn’t think there was any kind of connection.”

Jack felt frustrated anger boil up inside him. His daughter was dying and didn’t even know it, and Almeida was forgetting important information. “Did he say anything else?” he said evenly.

Tony saw the fire in Bauer’s eyes and countered it with cool professionalism. “Not unless you count the babbling he did right before he died. He saw me and mumbled something about a joke I made about monkeys earlier today. He talked about gangs of monkeys.”

Jack’s eyes lit up. Monkey Wrench Gang. He turned to Henderson. “We have to find Mercy Bennet right away.”

4:45 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

The ocean breeze blew across the southern face of the Santa Monica Mountains, cooling Nurmamet Tuman’s grounds, which had turned gold-green in the late afternoon sunlight. Tuman stepped out of the house to enjoy the breeze, leaving behind the two Secret Service agents who were stationed in his living room.

Out in the backyard, his “gardener” was moving equipment and clipping the hedges. He was butchering them, of course, because that’s what Ayman al-Libbi was: a butcher.

Tuman had been anxious ever since the female Federal agent had come to his door. He’d managed to hide his anxiety from her, of that he was sure. He had spent a lifetime concealing his thoughts and desires, even in the face of the most startling surprises. But although he could hide his fear from the woman, he could not hide it from himself. If one division of the government had concerns, they would eventually share it with the Secret Service, and Tuman’s carefully scripted plans could all be exposed in one fell swoop.

And, adding to his nervousness, the People’s Consulate had called him. Oh, they had no idea of his plans, of course. They were as blind as bats. But they had called him, concerned about the inquiries of the American government. What, they wanted to know, was “Marcus Lee” doing to attract so much attention?

Tuman approached al-Libbi and said for the benefit of any Secret Service ears that might be listening: “You’re wrecking my morning glories. Please stop hacking them up!”

Al-Libbi turned toward him, a light sheen of sweat on his face, his dark eyes gleaming in the sun. He actually seemed to be enjoying this work. He nodded, tipped his cap, and went back to work.

“We have to call it off,” Tuman whispered.

The terrorist stopped his attack on the hedge. “What?”

“First the Federal agent. Now my own consulate is calling me. I don’t like it.”

Al-Libbi jabbed the head of the clippers into the grass and rested his hands on the two extended handles. “For a man who worked as a double agent inside China for twenty years, you are very jumpy.”

“I listen to my instincts,” Tuman replied. “I convinced them for years that I had left my ethnic loyalties behind, that I was a party member first, a Uygur second. I could always sense when someone didn’t believe me and I have that sense now. Someone out there knows that I’ve helped ETIM, and sooner or later that person is going to tell them!”

“Don’t worry about them,” al-Libbi said. He leaned over the handles of his clippers. “Listen, my friend, it is too late to stop this.”

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“It is not too late,” Tuman insisted. “We’ll refund your money.”

“Really?” al-Libbi replied in his perfect American tones. “Did you really think I was going through all this for two million dollars?” He smiled. “I took this job because it will put me back where I belong.”

“At the top of the most wanted list?”

The small smile widened across his face. “Two lists: most wanted by Western governments, most wanted by Middle Eastern employers.”

“It can’t happen now.” Tuman stepped around so that his body blocked any view from the living room. A small semiautomatic had appeared in his hand.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 5 P.M. AND 6 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

5:00 P.M. PST UCLA Medical Center

Mercy drove away from UCLA Medical Center in her borrowed Crown Vic, her arm still stinging and stiff where they’d drawn the blood. As soon as the coroner and more officers had arrived at the house on Fourteenth Street, Mercy had evacuated herself to the hospital. Few of the words Copeland had spoken made sense to her, but the word virus rattling out of his bloody mouth nearly stopped her heart. She remembered the way he and his gang had reacted when she crashed into those vials in the other house. They hadn’t run from her, they’d run from the accident. She had inadvertently released some kind of virus. She’d stopped by UCLA and asked them to run some tests. They could find nothing

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wrong with her immediately and released her, promising to call her as soon as they had any information.

She had to get back to her desk and regroup. Her original case had been the investigation of Gordon Gleed’s death. Her intuition now told her that Copeland wasn’t responsible for his murder, at least not directly. Frankie Michaelmas had done it. She seemed to have a fetish for bludgeoning people to death, and, following her practice of instant impressions, Mercy sensed that Michaelmas was far more violent in her heart than Copeland was. Frankie was her target, but Frankie had proved elusive.

Mercy stepped on the accelerator.

5:04 P.M. Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

Ayman al-Libbi smiled at the gun as though it might have been a bouquet of flowers or a borrowed book. “Are you going to shoot me?” he said calmly. “That will expose you as much as any rocket attack.”

“I’m a hero,” said Tuman, who had thought of this option long ago. “I stopped a wanted terrorist who had somehow slipped past the Federal agents.”

“You waved me through the door,” al-Libbi said. “You told them I was all right. Don’t you think they’ll ask about that?”

Tuman continued to spin his story. “You killed the agents first. I managed to get you while you were focused on them.”

The terrorist nodded appreciatively. “So you’ll kill them and frame me after I’m dead. It’s a good story. It will work. And here’s your opportunity.” Al-Libbi’s eyes lifted up to look over Tuman’s shoulder.

Tuman didn’t go for the bluff. Not really. But his eyes flicked to their corners for just a fraction of a second. That was all the time al-Libbi needed. His left hand grabbed the gun while his right hand struck at Tuman’s face, the fingers stabbing into his eyes. Before the Uygur could even squeal, al-Libbi was holding the gun. But he couldn’t use it without alerting the guards inside. As Tuman staggered back, holding his eyes, the terrorist pocketed the gun and picked up clippers. They stabbed like a snake’s head. The first blow sliced the Uygur’s hands, which were covering his face. Tuman recoiled from them instinctively, exposing his throat. The killer stabbed again.

Al-Libbi left Nurmamet Tuman gurgling on the grass, his throat frothing blood, and walked calmly inside to deal with the Secret Service agents.

5:09 P.M. Cat & Fiddle Pub, Los Angeles

Jack’s agency SUV rolled up to a parking space a block from the Cat & Fiddle.

“Wait,” he said, pressing his hand over Jessi’s forearm. His eyes flicked from the rearview mirror to the side view and back. He watched cars roll past them.

“What?” Jessi asked. She was already nervous. Bauer’s silent company during their drive had raised her tension even more.

The red Camaro Jack was watching rolled past with a single driver inside. He’d seen it twice during their drive, or at least he’d seen two Camaros that looked the same. Camaros were popular with a certain type, but Jack didn’t like seeing two of them. The first time he’d seen them there’d been a driver and a passenger. Classic surveillance procedures involved two or more automobiles that alternated the pursuit.

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Either Jack had seen two very similar vehicles, or he was being followed by a team that had cycled through too quickly.

“Nothing,” he said at last. “I’ll go in first. Wait a few minutes, then come in. You’ll do fine.”

He waited for her to nod, then exited the car and hurried up to the Cat & Fiddle’s door. Inside it was dark and cool, and would have been smoke-filled in the days when California allowed smoking. The Cat & Fiddle had a blue-collar feel that appealed to its upscale crowd. Jack hunched his shoulders a bit as he entered, being someone who’d had a hard day at the office. He didn’t bother to look around, even though he caught a flash of white at the bar. There would be time for that. He knew immediately which booth he wanted—a corner table with a view of all the ins and outs, and near the emergency exit, but it was taken by a man in a blue T-shirt. There were many other empty booths, so he took one in the corner near the bar. ESPN was playing on both televisions. A waitress in her forties gave him a menu, but he ordered a beer and watched MLS soccer. Watching television gave him an excuse to keep his chin up and his eyes looking out across the room. He saw the woman in white now, and he decided it was safe to stare for a while. He couldn’t see her face, but he could see the Japanese tattoo on the small of her back where it peeked over the top of her low-slung white skirt. She was blond, with narrow shoulders and long arms. It would have been a giveaway if he didn’t stare at her.

Jack forced his mind into the present. This had to happen before the next thing, like firing a weapon: first load, then acquire, then fire, then assess. The virus was in Kim. They had no cure, but someone did, and he was going to find them. The way to find them was to focus on this...

Jessi walked in. She turned a few heads as she walked to the bar. One of those heads belonged to the man in a blue T-shirt and a buzz cut. He went right back to sipping his beer, but his eyes had lingered on Jessi a little too long, and Jack knew that Anastasia Odolova had a babysitter.

5:25 P.M. Cat & Fiddle Pub, Los Angeles

Odolova’s appearance matched her voice. Her limbs were long, lean, and toned, and she moved them in slow, dramatic flourishes when she spoke, as though she were used to holding something like a cigarette in her hand. Her face was angular and pretty, framed by straight blond hair. Oddly, she wore heavy black mascara under her blue eyes. Set against the stark white of her outfit and skin, the heavy eye makeup looked disturbing and hypnotic.

“You’re Jessi, of course,” Anna said. “What will you drink?”

“Nothing, thanks,” Jessi said.

Anna leaned forward, catching Jessi with her mesmerizing eyes. “Of course you will, my Jessi. What else are we here for?”

Right. Appearances, Jessi thought. “Newcastle, please,” she said to the passing bartender.

“You know what you like, don’t you?” Odolova said, seeming genuinely pleased. “Now, what is it I can help you with?” Her voice was breezy, nothing that stood out.

Jessi did not have her skill, and did not pretend to. “Is Novartov having a classified meeting with us and the Chinese tonight? Is that Tuman’s target?” she asked softly.

Odolova flicked her wrist as though tapping away the ashes of an imaginary cigarette. “See, you can tell a lot about a person from the way they order a drink. You, for instance, are very straightforward. Strong. You’d make a good Russian.” She smiled lightly, and continued. “Obviously, I can’t discuss

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scheduling matters with you. But you may be on the right

track. Would you like to know more about Nurmamet Tuman?”

“Sure,” Jessi said.

Odolova spoke in long, dramatic sentences, but the story she told was this: Nurmamet Tuman had been a Chinese espionage agent for more than twenty years. Although he was an ethnic Uygur, he had lost his parents and been taken to an orphanage, where he was indoctrinated first as a Maoist and then as a member of the newer, more “progressive” Communist Party. He had climbed the ranks of the People’s Army and proved to be adept at intelligence. But during a purge a few years earlier, superiors who disliked and mistrusted his Uygur heritage retired him. He was dumped in the United States with a new name and a faked dossier, where he started and ran a small software company. The Chinese government kept in contact, and even used him now and then, but for all intents and purposes he was in exile.

What Beijing did not know was that Marcus Lee had never stopped being Nurmamet Tuman, never stopped being a Uygur. Even while deep inside Chinese intelligence, he continued to work secretly for the independence of Eastern Turkistan. The Russians were sure that he had saved ETIM members from capture at least twice in his career. Once he was in the United States, he had a much easier time strengthening his contacts with ETIM until he became their largest backer. His native Uygur loyalties were bolstered by bitterness over his removal from the espionage community.

“But why attack here?” Jessi asked. “Why not do it in China?”

“The security is too tight,” Odolova answered. “Besides, ETIM is frustrated that they do not get more attention from the West. China controls the flow of information, especially in the rural provinces. ETIM commits terrorist attacks in Urumchi to draw attention, but no one ever hears about them. If they make an attack in Los Angeles, the whole world will start paying attention.”

“How do you know so much?” Jessi asked, unable to disguise her naïveté. “You’re so far ahead of us. How do you know?”

“It is not so impressive,” Odolova said in a way that indicated how impressive it really was. “In fact, we learned much of our information because of a minor arms dealer in Los Angeles. Some Russian-made RPG–29s were stolen, and we tracked them to this arms dealer, assuming he had bought them, when, in fact, they’d been stolen by ETIM and delivered to this arms dealer for safekeeping.”

“Farrigian,” Jessi said matter-of-factly.

Odolova smiled warmly. “You see, you are good at this after all. It was the missing RPGs that made us look more closely at ETIM, and that led us to Tuman.”

“Do you have any proof of this?”

“None whatsoever.”

Jessi’s heart sank. She knew Chappelle would want evidence before moving against a Chinese national. “I thought—”

“This is not always a business of hard facts.”

“Why do the Chinese trust him? They’re telling us he’s clean.”

The Russian cast the thought aside. “No one likes to be wrong.” When Jessi continued to look puzzled, she added, “They believe their own propaganda. They have no reason to think ETIM can do harm if half of them don’t believe the separatists exist. They don’t want to believe one of their own is a traitor.”

Odolova smiled at her as though waiting. Then, after an uncomfortable pause, she drained her own drink with a flourish and said, “Now I think it’s time for you to buy a drink for me.”

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“Oh,” Jessi said. “Would you like another one of—”

The Russian agent laughed. “I mean it’s your turn to share information.”

Jessi felt her cheeks burn as she blushed. “Infor—? I don’t know if I have any...”

Odolova’s face hardened. The dark mascara, which before had appeared hypnotic, became ugly and severe. “The RPG–29s. Who has them? Where are they?”

“Oh,” Jessi said, realizing she actually did know that information, and only too late deciding that she shouldn’t have revealed it. “I...I don’t know that I’m allowed to—”

Her counterpart brushed blond wisps away from her forehead. “I’m not running a charity service, Jessi. I gave you information because I expect something in return.”

Suddenly there was weight and pressure behind Jessi. She glanced over her shoulder to find a man in a blue T-shirt standing very close, his hard stomach pressed against her elbow.

“Let’s go for a drive and talk some more,” Anastasia said pleasantly; but it was not a request.

The man put his heavy hand on Jessi’s arm. Then things happened very quickly. As the man squeezed her arm, Jessi heard a dull thud and a loud pop. The man’s eyes flew very wide, and then he crumpled straight down like a building falling in on itself. And suddenly Jack Bauer was standing there.

5:45 P.M. PST Cat & Fiddle Pub, Los Angeles

Jack had listened to bits and pieces of the conversation, though he missed most of it. Odolova was skilled at sounding natural while keeping her voice low. When the Russian babysitter made his move, Jack made his. He slid up behind him and dropped him as soon as he laid hands on Bandison.

The Russian man was still on the ground, sobbing and holding his broken knee.

“We’re done talking,” Jack said to Odolova. He took Jessi by the same arm the Russian had grabbed. His grip was gentler but still firm as he guided the analyst away from the bar and past the patrons wondering what had happened to the man on the ground. Jack and Jessi walked outside into the twilight of Sunset Boulevard.

Jack carried a borrowed phone, and it rang now. He leaned back into the alcove that led into the bar, but away from the door in case the Russians followed. “Bauer.”

“Jack.”

It was Mercy Bennet. “Where are you? Are you safe?” he asked.

“Well, there are degrees of safe,” she said with a morose tone. “CTU contacted me and gave me this number. It’s been quite a day.”

“The Monkey Wrench Gang,” Jack said. “Smith. All those things you said. They’re all true.”

Mercy laughed bitterly. “I’ve been waiting for someone to say that to me. It’s just a little too late.” She told him quickly how she’d tracked Smith, whose real name was Copeland, and watched him die; she also told him that before he had died he’d told her she’d been exposed to a virus. “I got checked out at UCLA, but they haven’t gotten back to me yet.”

Jack felt a great weight settle on his shoulders. “Are you sure he said that?”

“Pretty damned sure.”

“Mercy—” the weight that settled on him was guilt; guilt that he hadn’t told her earlier what he was really doing; guilt that he had turned her into an unwitting victim in the

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war on terror. He still couldn’t tell her the truth, not quite yet. But she did have a right to know her own fate. “Mercy, the virus is deadly. It’s a hemorrhagic fever.”

The line fell silent. Finally, Mercy said, “Hemorrhagic... you mean like Ebola?”

“Yes.”

“Shit. Jack, I’m driving around. Am I...am I contagious?” That was Mercy Bennet. She’d just been handed her death sentence and she was worried about its effect on others.

“Probably not yet,” he said hoarsely. “My daughter has it, too. She was exposed by Copeland’s people. The doctors tell me she’s not contagious yet, so you probably have hours left.”

“I’m not going to the hospital yet.” She relayed Copeland’s final words to Jack. “I don’t know what he meant by ‘terror’ but I know who ‘she’ is. It’s Frankie Michaelmas. I get the feeling that girl makes Copeland look like a saint.”

A chill ran down Jack’s spine. He knew what Copeland had meant by terror. He had known all along. But still he couldn’t tell Mercy. Not while he still needed her.

“You should get to a hospital. Keep yourself safe,” he said. “Contact National Health—”

“Screw that,” Mercy said. “If I’m not contagious yet, I’m going to get that little bitch.”

“Mercy, there’s more here—”

“I’m going up to the Vanderbilt Complex. That’s what Copeland was talking about. I think she’s going to be there.”

“Mercy, wait, let me tell you—”

But Bennet had dropped the line.

“We have to go,” Jack told Jessi. “This whole thing is hitting the fan in the next couple of hours. Come on.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 6 P.M. AND 7 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

6:00 P.M. PST Cat & Fiddle Pub, Los Angeles

Jack half ran down Sunset Boulevard to reach the SUV with Jessi Bandison in tow. He had just reached the tail end of the big car when he saw the red Camaro parked across the street, the driver barely visible in the shadowy twilight, his body held steady and angled toward them.

“Down!” Jack grabbed Jessi and pulled her to the ground as something hissed lightning-fast through the air over their heads. He dragged her behind the SUV. Plunk, plunk plunk! Rounds sank into the SUV. One passed right through the sheet metal over his head. Jack stayed behind the rear wheel, which offered more cover, and shoved Jessi toward the front. “Stay by that tire. Behind the engine block!”

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More dull thuds, but now from another angle, up the street instead of across. They were in a crossfire.

Jack drew his weapon, a double-stacked .45 Springfield, borrowed, like the phone. He stayed low and leaned around the tire, but the angle was bad, and all he could see was street. Cars zoomed by, oblivious. The snipers were equipped with silencers, and none of the cars realized they were driving through a gunfight. Jack slid to the tail end of the car and leaned around, switching the Springfield to his left hand and squeezing off four rounds. Unlike the snipers’ weapons, his .45 wasn’t silenced. The sharp report made Jessi shriek. The Camaro’s side window shattered. Jack rolled back behind the SUV and switched hands again, taking a kneeling position, looking to acquire the other sniper. But there was nothing to see except Sunset Boulevard, with dozens of buildings to hide in, parked cars, and cars moving along the street. A bullet chipped the concrete beside him, and he pressed himself tighter against the SUV.

More rounds hit the SUV from the other angle. The car was turning into a bullet sponge. But the angle of impact was changing. The shooter in the Camaro had relocated, improving his position. Jack fired two rounds into the air, just to make noise. Someone would call the police. If he could hold off the shooters until backup arrived, he’d have a chance. The gunfire brought shouts of alarm and screams from somewhere on the street.

Movement. Someone dashed from a building to a vehicle half a block up from the SUV, and Jack had his second shooter. But the first shooter put rounds into the SUV over his head, shattering the rear window, so Jack rolled in his direction and fired over the top of the car parked behind his. Commuters drove by, their startled faces flashing like subliminals in Jack’s eyes. He could not be worried about them now. The shooter from the Camaro stumbled and fell, but Jack wasn’t sure he’d actually hit him.

How do you know you’ve hit your target? the words of an old tactical firearms instructor came back to him.

When he goes down?

He might have fallen, he might be faking. There’s only one way to know. Front sight, trigger pull, follow through. Make sure your sights are on the target. That’s where the round will go.

Jack was sure his sights hadn’t been on target. The man was still operating.

Sirens in the distance. That was good. But his slide had just locked back. He dropped the magazine out and popped in his second and last. Fifteen rounds left. Jessi made herself as small as possible as Jack moved closer to her position. The shooter up the street moved and Jack fired, shattering glass and ripping through a public trash can. A man walking out of a store yelled something and dived back inside.

These weren’t eco-terrorists. They were operators working in tandem—one drawing Jack’s fire, the other improving his position. It was a good plan. It was going to work. And the sirens were too far away.

The shooter up the street popped up, taking aim. Jack fired to keep the enemy’s head down; he had no cover or concealment from that angle; his only cover was to shoot. At the same time, car tires squealed to a stop on the street a few feet away. If there was a third shooter, Jack thought, this was going to get really difficult. But the shooter pivoted, sighting the newcomer, his rounds turning the windshield into a spider web. The driver jumped out of the car and fired at the shooter. Panicked, the shooter changed angles, and there he was in Jack’s sights. Jack dropped him and his gun went into slide lock again. With grim determination he thumbed the slide release and felt it snap back. Now it was a nice blunt object.

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Twilight had turned to gloom but the streetlights hadn’t come on yet. Jack couldn’t see the driver’s face, but he saw his body swivel in the other direction. There was a hiss and a snap, and the driver cried out, his gun hand dropping. He fell away behind his car. Jack heard footsteps running onto the street. The shooter from the Camaro was closing in on the newcomer. Jack rolled around to the back of the SUV. He bolted into the street in time to see the shooter reach the new car, a silenced Beretta in his hands. The shooter saw him and tried to turn, but Jack was too fast. He grabbed the Beretta in one hand, holding it off his body, and punched the muzzle of his empty Springfield into the shooter’s face. He recoiled and punched his throat. The man dropped.

Without pausing Jack dropped the Springfield, tapped and racked the Beretta, and dropped to one knee, scanning the street. There was no movement. Cars had stopped passing by. The sirens were close enough to hurt his ears.

He looked up from his kneeling position to see the driver standing over him. “Hey,” said Kelly Sharpton.

6:15 P.M. PST Bauer Residence

“I’m going to kill him.”

Teri Bauer slammed the phone back into its cradle. It was her fifth call to Jack in the last half hour. Like all the others, it had gone straight to voice mail.

Kim sat at the kitchen table, one hand absentmindedly tracing the seams where the wooden leaves of the table met. She looked pale, and concern for her fueled Teri’s anger.

“He did it on purpose,” Teri said out loud. “He took you this morning, but he was on a case.”

“Mom,” Kim said in a tired teenage voice. “Something came up. The first thing he did when that trouble started was

get me out of there.”

“And make you sit in a basement for three hours!”

Teri paced the length of the kitchen. The magic of the prior month had worn off. Her fear had been that it would vanish immediately; that Jack would dive right into some crisis. Instead, it had faded like a tan. She’d watched Jack’s attention turn slowly but steadily away from her and toward... whatever it was out there that called him. Teri had worried lately that it was another woman, and the thought had not completely left her. But it didn’t seem possible—Jack was driven by some desire that had nothing to do with sex.

It had nothing to do with disloyalty of any kind. She was furious Jack for leaving Kim, but she knew he loved her. Ultimately, though, Teri was beginning to sense that his deepest loyalty lay with his country. Or maybe it wasn’t even his country. It was his mission.

“Are you all right?” Teri asked.

Kim was holding her head in her hands now. “Yeah. Just tired, I guess. I feel hot. I think I’ll go lie down.”

6:18 P.M. PST Cat & Fiddle Pub, Los Angeles

One of the shooters was dead. The other wouldn’t be eating solid food for a long time, and he was currently gagging uncontrollably thanks to his swollen throat where Jack had punched him.

Jessi Bandison hugged Kelly Sharpton, who winced visibly. His right arm was covered in blood. “Are you—?” she started.

“Not too bad,” he said. He rolled up his shirtsleeve. The

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round had slid along the inside of his arm, plowing a furrow from his wrist to his elbow, but never fully penetrating.

He looked a little older than Jack remembered him from his short stint at CTU. There was weight in his face and gray in his hair. Jack had worked well enough with Sharpton, though they were never friends and didn’t see eye to eye politically; still, he’d drawn fire when Jack needed it, and Jack felt grateful. “She called you,” he said.

Sharpton nodded. “Odolova was my contact from way back.”

“I was nervous about doing fieldwork,” Jessi said. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

Jack waved her off. The end counted far more than the means, and they were all alive.

Black and white patrol cars materialized out of the gloom. Sharpton, no longer commissioned, put his gun away. Jack held up his badge, and after a moment or two of explanation, the uniformed officers lowered their weapons and began to cordon off the block. LAPD radioed for paramedics. The surviving shooter was choking to death. “I need him alive,” Jack said. “I’ve got questions.”

“You want to fill me in?” Sharpton asked.

Jack shook his head. “You’re a civilian.”

“A civilian who saved your ass!” Sharpton said amusedly.

Jack nodded. “And for that you have the thanks of a grateful nation.”

“That and a dollar . . .” Sharpton sighed without finishing the sentence.

“Jessi,” Jack said, turning to the analyst, “make sure these uniforms keep a close watch on that one. I want him taken back to CTU for interrogation. Don’t let them give you any crap about medical attention. Go tell them.”

He turned away, ignoring her look of panic, and dialed headquarters on his borrowed phone. A moment later he was talking to the head of field operations, Henderson’s voice echoed by the speakerphone he was using.

“They took a shot at us,” Jack said, describing the attack in brief. “I guess al-Libbi’s got some friends in town.” He explained what Odolova had told them about the RPG–29s, and her oblique confirmation of an event happening that evening.

He summed up: “Russia, the U.S., and China are having a secret meeting tonight around seven. Al-Libbi almost definitely wants to attack it.”

Henderson replied, “RPG–29s are tank killers. He’s got to be going after the presidential limo. It’d take a tank round to do any real damage to that thing. But there’s no way the meeting is at Marcus Lee’s house. The Secret Service wouldn’t have picked it even if he wasn’t Chinese intelligence. So why were they there?”

Jack told him about his conversation with Mercy Bennet. “The Vanderbilt Complex.”

“That makes sense,” Nina Myers broke in, her voice softer and more distant from the microphone. “I was up there. Lee’s house looks right down on the place. That’s got to be why the Secret Service was staking it out.”

“Tell them what’s going on,” Jack said.

“Stand by,” Henderson said. The line dulled and Jack knew he was on hold.

“Never a dull moment for you,” Sharpton said during the interlude.

“That’s because I didn’t retire.”

The line came alive again. “Jack,” Henderson said, “the Secret Service tells us everything is under control at the Lee house. They checked with their men up there and all’s well.”

It’s not right, Jack thought. Ayman al-Libbi with high-powered rocket-propelled grenades, eco-terrorists with killer viruses, and the heads of three of the world’s most powerful

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countries all meeting together. “I don’t care what the Secret Service says. We need to be up there.”

“Bauer.” Jack recognized the angry nasal voice immediately. Chappelle. “We’ve already discussed options internally. I’ve passed along word to the President himself. This meeting is important, and the Secret Service has guaranteed security. We need to stand down.”

Jack banged the phone against his forehead in frustration. “What we need to do,” he said at last, “is send someone up there to have a look. I’m going. Are you sending me any backup?”

Ryan Chappelle’s voice rose an octave. “Bauer, you’re coming in. Right now. You’ve got problems you don’t even know about—”

“What was that?” Jack said, shaking the phone. “You’re breaking up.”

“Bauer! Report back here immediate—”

“Bad connection. It’s a borrowed phone, sorry!” Bauer yelled. He hung up.

Sharpton shook his head, but his eyes were smiling. “I see a lot has changed,” he said sarcastically.

Bauer ignored that. He was already thinking of the fastest route to the Vanderbilt Complex. If al-Libbi was there, stopping him alone was going to be difficult. He stopped and looked at Sharpton. “How retired are you?”

6:30 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

It had been easy, really. Disguised as the gardener, al-Libbi had had several hours to listen to the Secret Service communications. He’d heard how they responded to communications through their ear pieces and quickly memorized their call signs. And he had always, always been good at voices.

So each time they called in, he gave the call sign in a voice that approximated the man who had possessed the ear bud. Possessed it, that is, before al-Libbi had cut his throat and dumped his body into a closet.

It was almost time. The terrorist ignored the dead bodies and hefted several large, long boxes one at a time out of the truck and carried them into the backyard. A tall screen of bamboo marked the borders of Lee’s house, and hid part of the Vanderbilt Complex from view. Al-Libbi stacked his boxes there, then picked up the shears he’d used to kill Tuman and clipped a hole in the bamboo hedge. Once it was clear, he had a clear line of sight to the Vanderbilt Complex below. In fact, his sightline was clear straight to the reception hall at the heart of the building. The RPG–29s’ five-hundredmeter range would be more than enough to do the job.

Al-Libbi’s cell phone rang. Anyone who had his number was important enough to speak to, but he was surprised to see this particular number on his screen. “I thought we were done with our dealings,” he said by way of hello.

“There’s been a change in management,” said Frankie Michaelmas. “I’m in charge now, and yeah, I want to make a deal.”

6:36 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

If Stan Chupnik was nervous, he didn’t show it. Hell, he didn’t even feel it.

He started and finished his wardrobe slowly and fastidiously. His pants were pressed and the pleat stood up nice and straight. His shirt was wrinkle-free and as white as bone. He had shaved twice for the occasion.

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After more than ten minutes of primping, Stan stood before the dressing mirror nailed to the door of the men’s locker room and sized himself up. His bow tie was a little crooked, so he plucked it loose and began to retie it. No clipons. That was the sort of detail that differentiated the Vanderbilt from pretty much everywhere else.

Stan had worked as a waiter at the Vanderbilt—or “the Van” as the employees called it—ever since it had been constructed, and had served at every important shindig the complex had hosted. Of course, the real money was made waiting tables across the plaza at the Almandine, the five-star restaurant where dinner for four ran about four hundred dollars. That was Stan’s bread and butter. But exclusive events at the Reception Hall allowed Stan to breathe the same air as celebrities and world leaders. As far as he was concerned, that was worth the loss of a few hundred dollars in tips now and then. That was certainly true of tonight.

“Did they hassle you?” Daniel Schuman was saying to one of the other waiters in the locker room. “They asked me about a thousand questions. I take that back, they asked me the same four or five questions about a thousand times.”

One of the guys on the catering staff said, “What kind of questions?”

Daniel tugged at his bow tie, trying to even it out. “All about Arabs. I’ve been to Jerusalem a couple of times, and each time I go I try to make a side visit, you know? Damascus, Iran, places like that.”

“Jesus,” said the other waiter, “you’re asking for trouble.”

“Yeah, well, those bastards gave me some. I almost didn’t get to do this gig. They’d have given it to Lopez. Can you believe that? Lopez!”

Stan chimed in. “Well, it’s all your fault. What do you think they’re going to do, the world like it is now?”

“Oh, and I suppose you’ve never traveled anywhere?” Schuman retorted.

“All over the place, baby,” said Stan smugly. “But not places that raise eyebrows. I’m a big Costa Rica fan. Brazil, Peru. I love it down there.”

“You surf down there?” Schuman asked.

“Some, but mostly I do hikes up in the jungle.”

“I did that once,” the other waiter said. “Eco-tourist stuff.”

“That’s right,” Stan agreed with a hint of pride. “I’m an eco-tourist.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 7 P.M. AND 8 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

7:00 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

The sun was little more than a line of orange fire along the rim of the world. To the east the world was dark, but over the Santa Monica Mountains the sky looked bloody.

Jack parked several doors down from the Marcus Lee address. He and Sharpton, both rearmed, slipped out of the car quietly and padded along the street lined with the demimansions that were so in vogue. Streetlights had come on, and Jack skirted the pools of light until he reached the correct address—a tall white house at the end of the lane, removed from the others.

The porch light was on, as were several lights inside, but the place was quiet. The Secret Service said they had been checking in with the agents there on a regular basis, but Jack refused to believe it. If he was wrong, Chappelle could (and would) throw the book at him.

7:07 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

President Barnes walked into the Reception Hall with a conscious and confident stride. The hall was empty except for the priceless art on the wall, a dining table with two chairs, and the Premier of China.

Xu Boxiong. The name was as inscrutable as the man, as far as Barnes was concerned. Xu stood there, at the far side of the table, his arms straight down at his sides, his round face composed into a warm but unreadable expression, neither friendly nor otherwise. Though Xu was in his sixties, his hair was jet black and thick. The Chinese leader wore a pair of Coke-bottle glasses, though Mitch Rasher had told Barnes that Xu’s eyesight was perfect. He wore the glasses like curtains over the windows to his soul.

It occurred to Barnes that, in all his political career, this was the first time he’d met a Communist.

Barnes crossed the distance between them, extended his hand, and said, “Mr. Premier, it’s a pleasure to meet you at last.”

Xu smiled and tipped his upper body. “The pleasure is mine, Mr. President,” he said in gently accented English.

And, as if the greeting had broken a spell, others flooded into the room. Four security agents, two from each country, stationed themselves at either of the two exits. Waiters entered bearing the favorite drinks of each leader. Barnes raised his glass to Xu, who did likewise. They sipped together.

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“It is a shame Mr. Novartov could not join us,” Xu said. “Something to do with the flu. But perhaps in some way, better. We can speak more directly.”

Barnes nodded, not ready to enter the deeper discussion yet. “Would you like to sit down, or shall we admire the art?”

“I have often heard of the Vanderbilt collection,” Xu replied, his small eyes scanning the room. “Perhaps a circuit around the room?”

Barnes nodded and motioned with his arm. Xu stepped forward, and together they walked the perimeter of the room, stopping at each portrait to admire it or, in Barnes’s case, to pretend to admire it. He wasn’t much for fine art. He passed a picture of a bearded man that evoked strength but did nothing for him, and a picture of a young man in red that he vaguely remembered as being painted by Raphael. Both he and Xu stopped, as if by some unspoken signal, before a tall portrait of Louis XIV, the Sun King.

“Now there,” said Xu thoughtfully, “was a ruler.”

“Not a member of the party, though,” Barnes pointed out.

Xu turned to him and gave the slightest nod. “None of us, unfortunately, is perfect. But I was speaking of his leadership, not his politics. I aspire to be this sort of leader, and I am curious if you, too, have such aspirations, Mr. President.”

“One can hope”—Barnes decided to take the initiative— “that your leadership will include accommodating the wishes of the nations that wish to invite you into the Group of Eight.”

Xu sipped his drink. “What accommodations would those be?”

“Human rights,” the American President said simply. “We need movement on human rights to stop the kind of scene we had out here today.”

The Chinese leader turned to face Barnes fully, and lowered his drink so that nothing stood between the other man and him. “It is interesting to us that the U.S. is so concerned about human rights in China when it maintains detention camps around the globe.”

Barnes was ready for this, of course. Politics aside, human rights was an issue close to his heart, and one that had pained him during his entire presidency. He had stuck his integrity in his back pocket countless times, but never at the expense of those who suffered under injustice.

“Sir,” he said firmly, “if we are to have any sort of dialogue whatsoever, you will never again compare our detention of terrorists and murderers to the incarceration of those who simply disagree with you.”

Xu did not respond immediately. He studied Barnes, the eyes behind the Coke-bottle glasses slowly traveling across the American’s face. The statement, Barnes knew, had been calculated. Those closest to him knew of his famous temper, and he suspected Xu was testing him. If this was how they were going to play, Barnes thought, it was going to be a long night.

7:24 P.M. PST Outside the Vanderbilt Complex

Mercy didn’t stop her car until the bumper was touching the agent’s knees. She got out as the man in the dark suit came around to the front of her car, his hand held up, palm out.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said, “but the museum is closed this evening for a private affair.”

“I know. I called,” she said, holding up the badge she’d reacquired. “Detective Bennet. I need to talk to whoever is in charge.”

The agent kept his hand upheld and turned to mutter into his microphone. After listening, he nodded and turned back

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to Mercy. “They got your call up the hill, ma’am. I’ll take you up there, but you’ll have to leave the car. This way.”

The agent motioned her toward the white stucco building, the station for the tram. Several more agents were there; they checked Mercy’s ID again, and then allowed her onto the tram.

“Hurry, please,” Mercy said. “This is urgent.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the agent said. The tram hummed up the hill to the Vanderbilt Complex, but it moved with interminable slowness. Mercy was sure she could have walked it faster. At last they came to the top, where the tram ended next to a set of acre-wide, shallow steps made of travertine that led up to the massive double doors of the Vanderbilt. Two more agents were trotting down the steps. One in the lead held his hand out to Mercy, who shook it quickly.

“Adam Carter, Agent in Charge,” said the man. “What’s this all about?”

“I told you over the phone,” she said. “There’s a—”

“—plot against the President, yes, you said that. What is this about a virus?”

Mercy repeated what she had relayed on the drive over. “There’s an eco-terrorist group that is trying to make a statement. They have some kind of virus like Ebola and I think they are going to try to release it here, tonight.”

“Do you have any idea who’s delivering it, or how?” Carter asked earnestly. “Because frankly, I’m totally willing to believe you if the President’s safety is even slightly compromised, but I need more information.”

“I’m not sure how,” Mercy admitted, “but I got the information directly from the man who plotted the whole thing.”

Agent Carter frowned, and Mercy realized how odd her statement had sounded. “And where is he now, ma’am?”

She groaned inwardly. “He’s dead.”

“Well, if he’s dead—”

“Agent Carter, please don’t be an ass,” she said impatiently. “The virus is real. You can check with the L.A. office of the Counter Terrorist Unit. They know about it.”

Carter nodded. “I’m really not trying to be uncooperative, ma’am,” he said. “You’re a detective and we take local law enforcement’s warnings seriously. But we’ve had calls already from CTU. They warned us about the house up on the hill, and our agents confirm that everything’s fine.” He pointed up the slope to the right of the complex, where the silhouette of a house stood out from the hilltop. She wondered what the house had to do with anything, and if Jack Bauer was there. Carter continued. “But you’re not giving me anything to go on. I’m not sure that I can evacuate the President on a rumor, especially when our agents are in complete control of the environment.”

“Can I at least come in?” she asked. “I don’t need to see the President, but I’ve been around one or two of these ecoterrorists, and I might recognize someone.”

Carter hesitated. She watched him oscillate between his desire to keep her out, thus eliminating a variable, and letting her in to thoroughly explore any hint of danger to his protectee. Finally, he nodded.

7:27 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

The street was as quiet as any street in any affluent neighborhood. Jack parked his car well away from the white house at the end of the lane and he and Sharpton got out. Jack saw no option but the straightforward approach. If the Secret Service caught them sneaking in, it would cause more trouble than it was worth. So he strode up the circular driveway with Sharpton in tow, expecting at any moment to be

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stopped by an agent stepping around a corner. But none came.

Jack’s internal alarms would have gone off even without the security failure. There was a gardener’s truck in the driveway. The trucks themselves were common enough in affluent neighborhoods, but it was rare to see a gardener at work after sunset. Jack drew his SIG-sauer, recovered from the riots, and held it low at his side. Sharpton took his cue and did the same.

7:29 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

Mercy was impressed by his demeanor. Carter was calm and professional, neither overreacting to her dire prediction nor ignoring her vague warnings. Of course, she wanted to shout at the top of her lungs that the President should be evacuated immediately, but she could not blame the Agent in Charge for his discretion. She’d given him almost nothing to go on.

She had to find something, she knew. She was desperate for some means of convincing the Secret Service that she was right. Mercy found herself doing something she never thought she would. She thought, What would Jack do? What would Bauer do when confronted with a plot he knew to be real but without the evidence to prove it?

He’d find another way to move the President to safety, she thought. And he’d do it without regard for himself or his reputation. And in that moment Mercy formed her plan. When she was close enough, she was going to draw her own weapon and fire. The Secret Service would take her down, she knew, but they would also evacuate the President, remove him immediately from the premises to some secure, controllable haven. He’d be safe. Copeland’s plot would be foiled.

She steeled her resolve as they marched up the wide, shallow travertine steps and through the great double doors. The foyer of the Vanderbilt was more than two stories tall, with several hallways leading in different directions, with signs promising displays from ancient Greece, the Renaissance, and the Impressionist era. One especially magnificent hallway directly across from the doors led straight to the Main Gallery, a central room housing the finest of the complex’s works of art. Two agents were stationed there, as well. Carter waved to them and they let Mercy pass. Art hung on the hallway walls, but Mercy noticed none of it in her eagerness to reach the gallery. The hallway ended at a T-intersection, with short hallways to either side and an archway in front, leading to another magnificent room. Four agents guarded this door, and two of them were Chinese. Beyond, she saw a table set in exquisite fashion, with two empty chairs, almost as though the dining set were an exhibit itself, the vacant chairs offering some statement about the emptiness of modern life.

“This is as far as I can take you,” Carter said. “If there’s anything more you can tell me, tell it now.”

Mercy glanced around, but what she was looking for would not be found in art. She needed evidence, and she had none. At the far end of the gallery she saw two men strolling casually from masterpiece to masterpiece. She became hyper-conscious of her pistol’s bulk against her left ribs. She would have to do it. She’d have to.

Three figures in white coats suddenly burst out of the hallway to her left, carrying silver trays topped with silver covers. Yet another Secret Service agent was with them. That agent gave a thumbs-up sign to the agents at the door. Even so, the door wardens stopped each waiter briefly, lifted the covers, and examined their contents, then waved them past.

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“Detective?” Carter asked. He rested a hand gently on her forearm.

Mercy barely heard him. Something about the waiters bothered her. She studied their backs, trying to put her finger on the problem. The waiters strode almost lock-step across the floor and laid their trays on the table. With long, graceful motions, they placed precious porcelain dishes full of food onto the table.

Not all the waiters, Mercy thought. Just that one. Her eyes narrowed as she focused on a waiter with dark hair. She’d seen his back before. She’d seen it. And as he turned, his eyes fell on Mercy. In a split second his look of confidence turned to one of sheer terror, a look Mercy had seen on his face before—when she’d crashed into the vials of virus.

“Him!” Mercy yelled. “That’s him!”

7:35 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

Stan felt like someone had kicked him in the liver. Seeing the LAPD detective standing there knocked the wind out of his lungs. She shouldn’t be here. She couldn’t be here. How could she have figured it out?

Her shout broke the spell, and Stan knew what he had to do. He bolted. But he didn’t run for the exit. He ran straight to the nearest masterpiece, the portrait of Louis XIV that was taller than he was. With all his might, Stan grabbed the frame and yanked the picture off the wall. He knew the picture frame was bolted to the wall. He knew that, even bracing his feet against the wall, he would most likely fail to pull it entirely free. He also knew that it didn’t matter. He didn’t care about the picture, nor did he need to pull it entirely free. He just needed to trigger the security measures.

7:36 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

Jack moved through the foyer of the Mountaingate house. He and Sharpton had spared a few moments to clear the large front yard, and Jack had made short work kicking in the door. The house was dark except for a pale light from the kitchen shed by fluorescents built under the cabinets. Jack motioned for Sharpton to go upstairs. He cleared the kitchen and the garage quietly, not really expecting anyone to be there. If the Vanderbilt Complex was the target, then the backyard would be the best position. But Jack didn’t want anyone behind him when he reached the back of the house. He moved toward the living room.

7:37 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

Alarms shrieked the moment the waiter grabbed the painting. The sirens were so loud that even the best-trained agents flinched for a moment. The Secret Service agents in the room were already moving, two of them going after the waiter and two of them covering President Barnes, dragging him toward the exit. Agent in Charge Carter moved forward, his weapon already in his hand, when he realized something unexpected was happening. A sheet of thick Plexiglas was dropping down from the top of the arched entrance to the Main Gallery.

“What the hell is this!” he shouted. The Plexiglas barrier was halfway down. He dropped underneath it and rolled into the gallery, scanning the room past his gun sights, seeing several Chinese agents eyeing him over the barrels of their own weapons.

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It all happened fast after that. The two Secret Service agents reached the waiter and laid hands on him. He struggled for a moment, raising his hand. For a heart-stopping moment Carter thought he was holding a detonator. That was impossible; their security sweeps would never have missed anything explosive.

He was right. The waiter held only a palm-sized glass vial. He hurled it to the ground at the feet of the two world leaders. Security agents instinctively threw their bodies over the bodies of Barnes and Xu, but it didn’t matter. The glass vial shattered, and for a fraction of a second everyone flinched. But nothing dramatic happened. Glass shards sprayed, and a tiny puff of white gas drifted up in the air and dissipated quickly. The Plexiglas shields closed down on the floor with a soft but definitive click. There was a split second of pure silence.

The next second was complete pandemonium. The two agents put the waiter facedown on the ground. The other two agents, handling Barnes, reached the Plexiglas barricade on the far side of the room and kicked at it angrily. Agent Carter leveled his pistol at the shield, then, thinking of the ricochet, lowered the muzzle. The Chinese agents were screaming in Mandarin.

Outside the gallery, Mercy, along with a crowd of other agents and staff, looked on in sheer amazement. The room must have been sealed airtight because they could hear nothing that Carter or the others were saying, but they could see them moving frantically. A moment later Carter spoke into his radio, and an agent near Mercy responded.

“Yes, sir,” the agent said. “We’ll get the glass lifted immediately.”

“No!” Mercy yelled. The agent scowled at her. “Let me talk to him.”

The agent consulted with Carter, then pulled the bud from his ear. Mercy leaned in close to him, located the speaker, and grabbed the agent’s hand like it was a microphone. “Carter, it’s Detective Bennet. If I’m right, that entire room is now contaminated with the virus. You can’t open the doors.”

“Bullshit,” Carter said. He had approached the Plexiglas near her and stood there, his face red with anger. “This is the President of the United States in here and I’ll blow the side of the goddamned building away to get him out, virus or no virus!”

“Then you risk spreading the thing all over the city,” Mercy said.

President Barnes appeared at Carter’s side. It was a surreal moment for Mercy—an LAPD cop suddenly finding herself talking to the leader of the free world through a sheet of Plexiglas. He looked exactly as he did on television, except that his face was turning pink and a vein had started to pulse in his forehead.

“What the hell is this?” he demanded. “Who are you?”

Carter listed her credentials succinctly.

“There’s a virus, sir,” Mercy said.

Barnes blanched. “Are you sure—?” he started to ask, but discarded the question. Of course she was sure. She wouldn’t be there if she weren’t sure. “How bad?”

“Fatal,” she replied. “But not for a few hours at least. And I think there’s an antidote. But if we open these doors it will spread—”

Barnes was nothing if not decisive. He turned to Carter. “Get rid of anyone nonessential. Seal off the whole complex. Get National Health Services on the line, tell them to prepare some kind of contained transportation for all of us to a safer location. Keep these doors sealed until we know the entire building is evacuated.”

“But, sir—” Carter protested.

One of the other Secret Service agents shouted something

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to Carter, who turned to see the man holding up a small device. As Carter’s had earlier, Mercy’s heart stopped for a moment as she thought bomb, but a second later it was revealed to be a portable DVD player.

“The guy who did this is a political activist, not an outright murderer,” Mercy said to Carter. “I’m guessing there’s a message there for you.”

Carter activated the DVD player, and an image came on the screen. Mercy could just see it between Carter and President Barnes, and Carter’s mike carried the message to her ears.

The image was little more than a silhouette, but Mercy recognized it as Copeland. “Hello,” he said in a gentrified voice. “You can call me Seldom Seen Smith and, if you’re watching this, Mr. President, you’ve just been infected with a deadly virus. You have approximately twelve hours to live.”

Carter glanced at Mercy with a damn-you-were-right look on his face.

The DVD continued. “Our purpose here is simple. To save the rain forests of the Amazon. Your first question, of course, will be to wonder what the connection is between our cause and your infection. Let me assure you that the connection is very direct. The virus that is now replicating in your system is called Cat’s Claw. It exists naturally in the Amazon. Of course, I have to confess, I’ve done a little tinkering with the virus. In its natural state, it kills human beings in about twenty-four hours. The strain that I have developed for you kills in half that time. I discovered it by lucky accident, but rest assured that loggers and developers will stumble upon it and carry it back to civilization soon enough. More importantly, there is an antidote...and the antidote also grows naturally in the Amazon. To date, I am the only person who knows from what plant the vaccine can be synthesized, and how to do it.

“My proposition to you is very simple. Go on television right now and announce that the rain forests must be secured immediately, and that all development and logging must halt. I will give you the antidote, and you will live.

“If you don’t, you’ll never hear from me again, and you will die. I would like you to note that I have gone to a great deal of trouble to keep the virus contained. Your location is isolated. The security system acts as a sort of quarantine zone. I have no wish to kill people unnecessarily. But you are destroying the planet, and I have to stop you. So if it comes down to it, I will spread the virus into the population, forcing them to preserve the Amazon until they can discover the vaccine for themselves. I expect my associate to be released unharmed. He knows how to contact me.”

The screen went blank.

7:41 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

The moment the alarms sounded from the complex below, Jack shifted from his slow and steady pace to a sprint. He was through the living room in a flash. He opened the sliding glass doors to the backyard as quickly and quietly as he could, and then he was out onto the patio of the backyard.

If there were lights in the backyard, they’d been killed. A line of tall shrubs along the perimeter shielded the yard from the city lights below, so the yard was almost completely in shadow. Jack crouched down, waiting for his eyes to adjust, scanning the deep pools of darkness along the edge of the yard. Finally he saw what he was looking for—a hunched

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figure almost invisible against the tree line. Jack didn’t bother with warnings. He leveled the SigSauer and exhaled as he squeezed off three rounds. Noise and fire shattered the silence and darkness, mixed with a startled cry of surprise and pain. Jack fired again. This muzzle flash left an afterimage seared on to his eyes, an image of Ayman al-Libbi on one knee, his face contorted in pain, an RPG pointing straight at Jack.

Jack dived to the side as he heard the familiar hiss and whistle of the launching rocket. The rocket-propelled grenade smoked across the short distance and exploded into the house behind Jack. The CTU agent felt himself lifted off the ground by tongues of fire and glass fragments glittering like a starburst as the sharp, short thunder of the ordinance enveloped him. He landed in the grass, barely keeping his hands on the SigSauer. Jack forced himself up to his knees, shaking his head and ignoring the roaring echo in his ears. Something in the house was on fire, casting uneven light out onto the yard. It was enough to see by. Jack raised his weapon one-handed and found Ayman al-Libbi on the far side of his sights. Before he could squeeze the trigger, someone body-slammed him from the side and Jack went over, landing heavily in the grass. This time he lost the SigSauer completely. The person on top of him was unskilled, but an animal, throwing violent knees into his body and tearing at his face. Jack caught the assailant’s arm, hooked his leg around the man’s leg, and bucked his hips, rolling over and ending on top. Without looking he threw a head butt downward and felt the hard bone of his forehead smash through lips and teeth. He raised his head back and slammed his elbow down onto the same spot. Only then did he look and see Muhammad Abbas’s face, now all blood and pulp.

Jack’s eyes were intent on Abbas but his senses were alert, aware of his surroundings. The movement was three-quarters behind him but he saw it nearly in time, rolling away as the shovel swung at his head. The shovel head glanced off his skull, making his head ring again. There were two accomplices with al-Libbi. Where the hell was Sharpton?

Jack rolled in the semi-darkness, groping for his weapon, but then he heard someone else tap and rack the SigSauer and he knew his attackers had found it first.

“Stop,” said a male voice. Abbas. Jack looked up. Abbas was on his feet, half his face illuminated by a half-dozen small fires burning in the damaged house. Beside him, holding the shovel, was a short girl with curly blond hair. She was holding Jack’s pistol in her hands. She didn’t hold it well, but her hands were steady and her eyes were clear and determined. She had cleared and racked the weapon. She could certainly pull the trigger.

Al-Libbi shouted in Arabic from across the yard. He sounded as if he was in pain. Abbas stepped behind the girl, out of her line of fire. “I’m going to check on him. Kill this one.” He ran into the shadows.

The girl stepped forward. One shot rang out and Jack flinched, but at the same time he knew that the girl had not fired. A hole erupted in the girl’s shoulder and she screamed, dropping the weapon. Sharpton, it had to be. Jack lunged forward, grabbing his SigSauer. He grabbed her by the hair and shoved her down onto the ground, making her eat grass as he turned to reacquire the terrorists. He saw them, two shadows moving in and out of the darkness. Jack fired, tracking them, but the shadows kept moving until they reached the corner of the house.

The girl. Sharpton. Al-Libbi. Jack had three elements to

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prioritize. Jumping to his feet, he stepped toward the girl’s feet and stomped hard on her ankle, hearing it crack. She screamed, and he knew she wouldn’t be going anywhere fast. Jack ran across the yard, parallel to the house, and saw Sharpton on the ground, his body lying across the threshold. His clothing was shredded on his body and his skin had been half flayed from his bones. His arms were stretched out, the gun lying under his right hand. He ran past Sharpton and reached the corner of the house. Firelight illuminated the corner, and Jack knew he’d be visible. He leaned around the corner quickly, then pulled his head back as someone discharged rounds from a pistol. Two of them tore chunks of wood from the frame of the house. Jack kept his body on the safe side and stuck his gun around the corner, firing several rounds. Then he dropped low and sprinted down the side of the house. He zigzagged forward, but no more shots came. Jack reached the front end of the house where an open gate led to the front yard. Jack hoped for more gunfire; if al-Libbi and Abbas stood and fought, it gave him a better chance of getting them. But the front of the house was quiet. Jack ran to the sidewalk. Lights were on in the houses down the block, and a few people stumbled out with cell phones in their hands and shocked looks on their faces. Jack saw the lights of a car hurrying away, but it was too dark to catch the make or license plate.

7:49 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

The last of the food servers and administrative staff for the Vanderbilt had been evacuated. Ambulance sirens approached, and Mercy heard Secret Service agents confirm that National Health Services personnel were en route.

Inside the sealed Main Gallery, the Chinese security officers were shouting into cell phones and radios. Agent in Charge Carter was alternately talking and listening on his radio incessantly, while the other two Secret Service agents kept the waiter pinned down and peppered him with questions. But the waiter had sealed his mouth and refused to speak, smiling smugly as though the questioning was all part of the plan.

Mercy knew something had been happening for the last few minutes. A sound rolled through the Vanderbilt Complex, a muffled roar like distant thunder that resounded off the mountain canyons around them. Half the agents in the complex had suddenly rushed off, weapons drawn.

Surprisingly, the two calmest men in the entire complex were President Barnes and Xu Boxiong. Mercy, who had never been so close to real power, watched them intently. They seemed to find their focus in the midst of the crisis; their answers to questions succinct, their decisions made quickly and surely. Mercy had no idea what sort of man the Premier of Communist China was, nor did she really know much about Barnes, but this, she decided, was leadership: the ability, in fact the desire, to make decisions when decisions needed to be made.

Suddenly President Barnes was standing in front of her, his eyes studying her through the glass. He spoke to her through a radio. “Who are these people? If we capitulate to their requests, will they give up the vaccine?”

“That’s—that’s a problem, sir,” she stammered “The man who organized this is already dead. Murdered by one of his people.”

Barnes scowled. “Are you telling me there’s no one to negotiate with?”

“Yes, sir.”

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7:52 P.M. PST Mountaingate Drive, Los Angeles

Jack hung up the phone after a thirty-second conversation with Henderson telling him that al-Libbi was at large, that the explosions were caused by a stray RPG, that he had one suspect in custody, and that he needed an ambulance immediately. He ran through the house to the back patio. The blond girl was curled up in a ball, bleeding from her shoulder and holding her ankle.

Bauer knelt down beside Sharpton. The former agent had rolled onto his side, his chest heaving. The skin on his neck and one side of his face was seared. One of his eyes was closed. The other looked up at Jack.

“Kelly,” Jack said, “hang on. You’re going to be okay.”

Sharpton coughed. “Lie—liar.”

“Thanks,” Jack said. “You got her for me.”

Sharpton nodded as his good eye closed. “That’s ...two times.” He never spoke again.

Jack paused, though he did not have a moment to spare. Sharpton had been a good man. Then he walked over to the girl, who looked up at him. Her eyes were moist, but she wasn’t crying. “You broke my fucking ankle!” she spat at him.

He knelt down and checked her shoulder. Sharpton’s round had passed through her shoulder blade and exited the hollow of her clavicle. Her shoulder was probably shattered, but she was going to live.

Jack’s phone rang. He answered and heard Mercy’s voice. “Jack, they told me there’s something going on up the hill from here. I have a feeling you know about it.”

“You could say that. You talked about a girl before,” Jack said. “I think I have her.”

Mercy paused. “I’d like to talk to her again,” she said ominously. “There’s an emergency down here. The Presi

dent and the Chinese leader have been exposed to the virus.” Jack swore under his breath. “Jack, you there?” “Yeah,” he said. “We need to get this girl into an interroga

tion room. We have to find a vaccine for this virus right now. If we don’t, by morning people are going to start dying.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 8 P.M. AND 9 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

8:00 P.M. PST Bauer Residence

Teri sat on the edge of her daughter’s bed and laid a cool wet

washcloth over her forehead. “Does that help?”

“It’s better,” Kim said. “I hate being sick.”

“I know, honey, I’m sorry. I called the Tashmans but they weren’t home. As soon as they get here I’m going to go out and get you something from the pharmacy.”

“You can go now, Mom,” Kim said drowsily. “I’m—”

“You’re not okay, honey. And if your father were here like he’s supposed to be, I wouldn’t have to wait.”

“You sound like you hate him.” Kim’s words sounded both pouty and honest in the way only a teenager could speak them. Teri realized just how much of her anger she’d allowed to show. She had to fix it.

“I don’t hate him, honey. I don’t. But I get frustrated when he’s gone so much. Sometimes I worry that he’d rather— well, sometimes I just wish he had more time to spend at home.”

8:03 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

All President Barnes could think was, If I can get through this, I can get through anything.

He exerted every effort to sit through the crisis in complete calm. He could feel the eyes of Xu Boxiong on him at all times. Xu, who must also be exerting enormous self-discipline, seemed eager to take Barnes’s measure. Through a sheer act of will, Barnes remained cool, delivering orders in measured tones, even nibbling at the hors d’oeuvres that had been trapped in the room with them.

It wasn’t easy. Barnes had seen video of Ebola victims as the disease ravaged them. He did not want to die that way. And even if he didn’t die in body, his political death was surely imminent. How had his security people allowed this to happen? Where were all his goddamned counterterrorist teams?

As if on cue, Carter approached him and said, “Sir, Ryan Chappelle has just arrived. He’s the Regional Director for the Counter Terrorist Unit.”

“I remember him,” Barnes said. He stood up and walked over to the transparent shield. On the other side stood a short, balding, ferret-faced man holding a radio to his ear. Next to him stood Mitch Rasher, his closest advisor. Just having Rasher on the premises made Barnes feel better.

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“Mr. President, I’m sorry,” Chappelle said.

“Don’t be sorry, just fix it,” Barnes replied. “First, tell me what the hell is going on.”

“I have some answers for you, sir,” Chappelle replied, “but it’s not a complete picture yet. What we know is that there were actually two terrorist plots in the works. Our agents stopped terrorists from firing rocket-propelled grenades into this building. But at the same time, an eco-terrorist group managed to—”

“I know what they managed,” said Barnes irritably. “Why didn’t your people know about this?”

Chappelle fidgeted and Barnes knew instantly that Chappelle was uncomfortable speaking truth to power. “Well, sir, we had people on the case. Unfortunately, we didn’t learn about this meeting until the last minute.”

Barnes looked at Rasher through the glass and frowned deeply. The meeting had been Rasher’s idea. The secrecy had been his idea, too. Rasher, an entirely political animal, believed the stories of Xu’s daunting negotiating skills and hadn’t wanted to expose his man to any public scrutiny if he failed to win concessions from China. Secret negotiations were only valuable if they remained secret.

“The press?” Barnes asked.

Mitch Rasher, on his own radio, said, “Controlled. No one’s come up the hill but our people, and we’re putting the word out that there was an attempted robbery up here. The Vanderbilt is going along with it.”

“That’s something then,” Barnes allowed. “Is NHS here? Do they have a vaccine?”

“ETA is five more minutes,” Rasher said.

“But,” the CTU man said, “but frankly, sir, we already had NHS investigating other exposures. They don’t have a vaccine yet.”

“So you think this idiot on the DVD was telling the truth?”

Suddenly a blond man pushed his way through the crowd of staffers and security people and began talking to Chappelle. He looked like hell—his shirt was torn, the side of his face was turning purple, and there were streaks of what must have been blood on his sleeves and pants. Barnes couldn’t hear him through the radio, but it was clear from Chappelle’s expression that he didn’t like the newcomer.

8:09 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

“. . . what the hell do you mean he got away?” Chappelle snapped. “How could you let him get away?”

Jack glared at Chappelle. “If you hadn’t refused the backup I needed at Lee’s house, he wouldn’t have gotten away. Not to mention the fact that if I had listened to you, I wouldn’t have gone up to that house in the first place, and you’d be standing in the middle of a bomb site rather than a quarantine zone!”

Chappelle opened his mouth, then shut it, realizing that everyone around them, including the President, was listening to their argument. Jack saw the wheels turning in the director’s head: he had screwed up the call on Marcus Lee, but at the same time, he would never take the political heat. Lee had been cleared by the Secret Service, and they had been stationed at the residence. That snafu would be blamed on them. Thanks to Jack Bauer and Nina Myers, CTU had been the only Federal agency with any clue to what Lee was up to.

Jack glanced at Mercy to make sure she was all right. She nodded, reading his thoughts. They had a lot of talking to do; he knew that. But it would have to wait a little longer.

“Well,” Chappelle said at last, “we need to find al-Libbi.”

“Forget about the terrorist!” Barnes demanded. “Find me

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the vaccine. According to the message, we’ve got less than ten hours.”

Jack looked at the Secret Service man next to the President. “Bring me that waiter.”

The other two quarantined agents brought him over and slammed him up against the Plexiglas. Someone held a radio to his ear.

“Your name is Stan,” Jack said.

“You have to let me go,” said Stan. “If you don’t, you won’t hear from him.”

“Him? You mean Bernard Copeland?” The waiter reacted physically to the name, his facing draining of color. Jack continued. “We won’t hear from him anyway, Stan,” Jack said. “He was murdered this afternoon. By one of your people.”

The edges of Stan’s mouth sank into a deep frown. “You—you’re lying.”

“I think Frankie did it,” Jack stated, looking at Mercy as though waiting for a second opinion. “She seems like the type.”

It was the oldest trick in the interrogator’s handbook, to act like one knew more than one did. Of course, in this case Jack was almost certain he was right.

The reaction on Stan’s face proved it. “Oh shit,” he muttered. “Oh my god. She’s crazy.”

“Stan,” Jack said in the tone of a reproachful parent. “I want to remind you what this means. You’ve been exposed to the virus like everyone else in there. The guy you were counting on to vaccinate you is dead. Your life span can now be measured in single digits. Tell us what you know.”

Stan talked. But in the end, what he had to say was interesting without containing anything vital. Stan’s role in the ecoterrorist plot was no different from the role of true believers in any organization. He’d been recruited for his zeal and been sold on a dangerous role, but never been told the deepest secrets of the group. But he did confirm Jack and Mercy’s suspicions about Frankie Michaelmas. “She’s a nutcase,” Stan said. “The rest of us wanted to find some way to get the world’s attention, but she wanted to find some way to hurt people. She’s the one that got the idea of trying to contact real terrorist groups. She said no one would really take us seriously until we defended the Amazon the way Hamas defends Palestine.”

“And look how that’s worked out,” Mercy murmured.

The waiter could feel the anger on both sides of the Plexiglas rise, and all of it was currently directed at him. “Copeland didn’t go for it. None of us did,” Stan said defensively. “I got the feeling Frankie was contacting them on her own, ’cause she kept coming to us with new ways to organize. We broke into small cells, and almost no one knew everything that was going on except Bernie. Bernie liked the part. He was really paranoid about people knowing what we were doing, especially the Federal government.”

“Let’s get to the important part, Stan,” Jack said. “Who else in your group has the vaccine, or knows where to get it?”

Stan shook his head. “Man, if I knew, I’d tell you. I don’t want to die of this stuff. I know there are some others, but I don’t know them. But I’ll bet Frankie knows.”

Jack turned to Mercy. “I’m going to go talk to her. You want to come along?”

8:18 P.M. PST 405 Freeway

Ayman al-Libbi sat in the passenger seat of Muhammad Abbas’s rented Chrysler 300C, bleeding on the brand-new leather seats. The bullet had blown some of the flesh off his left side, but the round itself must have glanced off his ribs.

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He was sure at least one of them was broken. But he did not think he was dying.

“Drive a little faster,” he said, as cool as ever. “The other cars move faster than you do.”

Abbas obeyed. “The safe house is fifteen minutes from here. You can make it?”

The terrorist nodded. “I can make it. How could I do otherwise? This whole affair has just become so much more interesting.” He patted the pocket of his jacket, which contained two small glass vials.

8:20 P.M. PST Los Angeles

“How are you feeling?” Jack asked as he headed down the freeway away from the Vanderbilt Complex and back to CTU.

“I’m fine right now,” Mercy said. “I don’t feel anything. Except pissed off. I feel really pissed off.”

Jack took one hand off the wheel and put it over her hand. “We’re going to find this vaccine. You’re going to live,” he said.

She put her hand over his. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Besides, there are more important people than me to worry about. Like your daughter. How is she?”

Jack gritted his teeth. “I’ll call soon. I get the feeling Copeland kept his promises. If he really didn’t give her the weaponized version of the virus, then she’s got hours left.”

“You’ve got to be exhausted,” Mercy said. “I know I am.”

“No time to be tired,” he said, switching freeways and heading east. After a moment, he said, “You need to promise me something. According to the workup we got from NHS, you become contagious once you see lesions that open up. You’ve got to—”

“I’ll do what I have to,” Mercy said. “But as long as I’m not a danger to anyone, I’m staying on this case.”

Jack smiled. “I always did like your attitude.”

“You just like girls who can kick ass like that girl from Alias.” There was another short silence. They both watched the blurred, impersonal lights of Los Angeles flow by on either side. Finally, Mercy said, “So what’s it been? Mid-life crisis that you’ve chickened out of? I had block-away potential, but now that I’m up close you’re not interested? What?”

Jack was glad to be driving so he could focus on the freeway. “You said you didn’t want it,” he said evasively. “You said—”

“I know about me and what I want,” Mercy interrupted. “We’re talking about you, now. I just want to know where it came from. I’m a detective, remember? I want answers. Was it just guy stuff, the need to have another woman? If it was, just tell me, ’cause I’m one of the cool chicks. I get that. I won’t be part of it, but I get it.”

Jack had to laugh in spite of himself. She really was one of the most centered people he’d ever met. “It wasn’t just an itch I have to scratch,” he said. “I promise. And I promise I’ll tell you, but right now I want to focus on this.”

These last words were spoken as they pulled up at CTU’s Los Angeles headquarters.

CTU was a whirlwind of activity. Although the attack on the President and the firefight up at Mountaingate Drive had been hidden from the public and the media, the intelligence community was in an uproar. CTU was screaming at the CIA for its shoddy information on Marcus Lee. The CIA was screaming at the Chinese for not disclosing more. Everyone was screaming at National Health Services to provide more information on this unknown virus that had suddenly become the single most important issue in the entire world.

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Jack blew through it all like a torpedo cutting through a whirlpool. Nina Myers shouted to him that his prisoner was in holding room two, and Jack was there in no time.

Frankie Michaelmas was sitting in a bare metal chair designed to do nothing for her comfort. Her shoulder had been heavily bandaged and her ankle was wrapped in a brace. Her face was pale from loss of blood, but a medic whispered to Jack that she was stable and coherent.

As Jack walked in, Frankie smiled at him. “You’re the guy who broke my ankle. Did you get Ayman?”

Jack didn’t bother to answer.

“You didn’t get him,” Frankie concluded. “You’d have a different look on your face if you did.”

“You’re going to tell me who else knows how to create the vaccine,” Jack said. He checked his watch. “You’re going to tell me that in the next three minutes.”

Frankie shook her head, her blond curls matted to her forehead. “That’s my leverage, man. You think I don’t know the shit I’m in? I’m not giving away my only card.”

“You don’t have leverage,” Jack said. “You’re involved in a plot to kill the President of the United States. You’ve aided and abetted wanted terrorists. You’re going to be put in a hole. The only thing you might negotiate is how far down we drop you.”

Frankie looked at him, and Jack had to admit that she was cool. Whether it was desperation or pure fortitude he didn’t know yet, but she played the game with force. “How’s your daughter?”

Jack felt animal rage leap inside him, but he didn’t let it show.

“The joke of it is that Bernie never would have let her die. He figured if he exposed her, then you’d have her checked out by someone and they’d know the virus was real. He was going to send you the vaccine no matter what. Fucking wimp.”

“You don’t have that weakness,” Jack said.

She put aside the compliment. “He liked to pretend there were lines you didn’t cross. But that’s bullshit, right?” She wasn’t looking for confirmation. Jack could see that whatever lines there might be, she’d crossed them long ago. “You do what you do to get what you need, and that’s it. That’s why the terrorists are so effective. No boundaries. That’s what I kept telling him, but he wouldn’t listen.”

“Someone else knows how to make the vaccine. Tell me who it is.”

“Amnesty. A plane ticket to anywhere I want. Five hundred thousand dollars.”

“Life in prison instead of the death penalty,” Jack offered, neither knowing nor caring if he could actually deliver.

“Amnesty. A plane ticket. Money,” she repeated.

Jack checked his watch. “Just over a minute.”

“I’ve read up on all this interrogation stuff,” Frankie said. “I know what you guys can do, but you don’t have time. Hell, you look more sleep deprived than I do. What are you going to do, make me stand up for the next ten hours? Okay, then the President will die. You don’t have time for any of that psychological shit you guys do.”

Jack nodded. “You’re right.”

He punched her hard right on her bandaged shoulder. Frankie screamed in agony. He waited for her to stop screaming. As her cries turned to sobs, she started to say, “What the—? What the—?” and he kicked her broken ankle. She screamed again.

As soon as he thought she could hear again, Jack leaned in close. “No boundaries, Frankie. No lines I haven’t crossed. Wait till I start working on the healthy parts of you.”

He sat back. “Before he died, Copeland scrawled three numbers on the floor. Thirteen. Forty-eight. Fifty-seven. Tell me what they mean.”

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Frankie sobbed and glared at him.

Jack continued calmly. “He also tried to say something. A name like Uma and the word ’ghetto.’ Tell me what that means. Tell me what the numbers mean.”

Frankie grinned almost maniacally through her pain. “He was always so goddamned corny.”

“Tell me.”

“Amnesty. A plane ticket. Mon—”

Jack leaned forward and rested his hand on her shattered shoulder. He could feel bones and meat move unstably beneath the bandages. She gasped wordlessly and shuddered uncontrollably. Jack leaned in again, but this time he noticed something at the edge of her bandages. He’d thought it was a laceration of some kind, but it wasn’t. It was purple, like a bruise, but raised and spotted like a weird rash. Or a lesion.

Oh shit, Jack thought. He backed away. Frankie’s shuddering did not stop. She doubled over and dry-heaved. Jack took another step backward. The lesion on Frankie’s shoulder split open and bloody pus trickled out. At the same time, Frankie heaved again, and this time blood poured out of her mouth like water from a faucet.

She coughed. “The fast strain,” she sputtered.

“Jack!” came over a hidden loudspeaker.

He didn’t need to be told. He was already halfway out. Jack slammed the door behind him and checked his arms and hands. No blood. Was the virus airborne from inside a human body?

Jack hurried around to the observation room where he found several CTU agents, including Nina, Tony, and Christopher Henderson, along with Mercy Bennet, watching Frankie decompose. That was the word for it. Her skin seemed to simply split open as though invisible claws had torn at her shoulders and neck. She vomited blood two or three more times.

“Get NHS here immediately,” Henderson ordered. “Get plastic over that door.”

Jack looked at Mercy and knew what she was thinking. This was going to happen to her. And he felt a hand squeeze his heart when he knew that the same thing would happen to Kim if he failed.

8:31 P.M. PST West Los Angeles

Ayman al-Libbi lay on the couch of the safe apartment. Despite the best efforts of the U.S. government, he had maintained a few friendships in America over the years— maintained them mostly because he did not ask favors of them. Until now. But now was a critical moment for him, a make-or-break moment as they said in the United States. So he had called in a very old debt from years ago in Jordan, and now he and Abbas were settled into a condominium that could not possibly appear on even the longest security watch list.

Abbas brought him a cup of tea. Ayman nodded. What would he have done all these years without Muhammad? Tonight was only one of a dozen times over the years that Ay-man had survived because Muhammad was at his side. His devotion was absolute.

As he placed the tea on the coffee table, Muhammad slid his eyes over Ayman’s face and body. It was not the first time Ayman had noticed this, nor was it the first time he wondered if the source of Muhammad’s devotion was something more than mere friendship. Such things were abhorred in fundamentalist Islam, of course, but one heard whispers of it. Many young men who had spent their youth studying in a madrassa had experienced the subtle approach, the too-long

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lingering look of another youth who could not or would not give voice to his urges. Ayman, who had long ago turned secular and cynical, now recognized such urges as the inevitable result of the separation of the sexes.

Ayman waited until Muhammad’s eyes had slid off his body, then he said, “I’m going to call them.”

Muhammad stopped, halfway into the seat across from the couch. “Are you sure? It’s almost as risky as dealing with the Americans.”

“This is a time for risks,” Ayman said. He propped himself up as Muhammad handed him the phone. Ayman entered a long distance number he thought he’d never use again.

A gruff voice answered, and the terrorist said in Arabic, “This is Ayman al-Libbi. Let me speak to him.”

There was a pause.

“Not too long,” Muhammad warned. “The Americans will hear.”

Another voice got on the line, a voice Ayman had not heard in many years. It was a powerful voice in the Iranian Ministry of Defense. “This is not Ayman al-Libbi speaking,” the man said. “Ayman al-Libbi is a dead man.”

“Inshallah,” al-Libbi said, falling back on the religious expressions of his youth, “you will find it in your heart to breathe life back into me.”

“You are an infidel now,” the Iranian said.

“I am an infidel who holds the life of the President of the United States in his hands.”

“You are a fool to say these things on the telephone.”

“We are two fools then, because you will listen.” Quickly, Ayman summed up his situation. “I have the Cat’s Claw virus. I have the Dragon’s Blood vaccine. I can save or destroy the American President. I can deliver the virus and the vaccine to you. In return, I need support here in Los Angeles.

I know you have people here, even if the Americans don’t know it.”

“Do others know how to create the vaccine?” asked the Iranian man.

“Three others.”

There was a long pause. “You have our interest. But we must consider this. Wait for our call.”

8:53 P.M. PST CTU Headquarters, Los Angeles

Ten fewer minutes that Kim had to live. Ten fewer minutes that the leaders of two of the great powers had to live. Ten minutes closer to the violent, hemorrhagic death for Mercy Bennet.

Jack forced such thoughts from his mind as he stood in CTU’s conference room with Mercy Bennet. CTU staff had covered the door to the holding room, sealing in the gruesome scene, and NHS would arrive any minute. In the meantime, CTU had been locked down in case the virus had some spread outside the room. Jack didn’t think how he’d caught the virus, but he’d voluntarily locked himself into the conference room. Mercy, without explaining herself to anyone, had joined him.

“We need to figure out what those clues mean,” Jack said. “Copeland may have been insane, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew what he was doing when he left them.”

Mercy nodded, her face settling into a calm, distant look as her detective’s mind began sorting through facts. “He was trying to help. He didn’t want the virus spread randomly. Whatever those clues mean, they have something to do with stopping the virus.”

Jack wrote them down on the dry erase board. “Thirteen, forty-eight, fifty-seven. Is there anything in common?”

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Mercy considered. “They’re not prime numbers. There’s no even spacing between them. They’re all double digits.” She wasn’t forming a theory, just listing observations.

Jack rubbed his temples. He felt himself starting to wear down, but he’d been here before. His will was strong even when his body was not. “Frankie said something. Something about Copeland being ‘corny.’ ”

“He was,” Mercy said. “That whole Monkey Wrench Gang thing is corny. So is Seldom Seen Smith...”

They looked at each other. Jack voiced their mutual thoughts. “Is there a connection? You did all the research on this Monkey Wrench thing. Is there a connection between those numbers and that whole story?”

“Not that I know of,” Mercy admitted. “But that doesn’t mean it’s not there. I bet it’s worth searching Copeland’s house again.”

Jack nodded. “We need to go there right now.”

“But CTU’s locked down.”

Jack gave her a look of disappointment. As though a little thing like a lockdown was going to stop him . . .

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 9 P.M. AND 10 P.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME

9:00 P.M. PST Vanderbilt Complex

President Barnes watched his Chinese counterpart closely as Xu, in turn, watched the doctors and technicians from National Health Services at work. From the moment they’d arrived, the NHS personnel had been hard at work constructing an airlock made of plastic tenting over one of the two Plexiglas barricades. Now, as the airlocks were finished, four doctors dressed in full biohazard gear entered and the barricade slid up to allow them entry.

The four doctors trod cumbersomely over to the two world leaders and immediately started to draw blood.

“Mr. President, my name is Dr. Diebold. I am going to draw a blood sample to confirm whether or not you’ve been

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exposed.” The doctor spoke through a microphone built into his squarish plastic headgear.

Barnes nodded. “How much do you know about this virus already?” he asked.

Barnes could see the doctor’s frown through the clear plastic face screen. “Enough to know what it can do, sir. Not enough to stop it. Not yet.”

Barnes turned to Xu and flashed a smile as the other doctor drew blood from the Chinese leader. “Quite an evening, eh?” he said breezily.

“Astounding,” Xu said, his eyes like thin pencil lines behind his glasses. “I am surprised the terrorists could strike so close.”

Barnes, who had been briefed on all the recent events, was ready for that one. “I’m surprised, too. Of course, if a man can work for Chinese intelligence for years as a double agent without being noticed, I suppose anything can happen.”

The American President smiled at the Coke-bottle eyes as the Chinese leader’s face, for once, became readable. Barnes knew he would hear no more about this.

9:10 P.M. PST Santa Monica

Getting out of CTU had not been difficult. The unit had a lockdown mode for security crises, and avoiding that would have taken some doing. But a hastily slapped-together quarantine was no problem for Jack.

Jack followed Mercy’s directions to the house on Fourteenth Street. Jack expected to find squad cars in front and police tape girdling the house. Instead he found that the entire house had been tented, and the houses on either side of Copeland’s had been evacuated.

“NHS is taking this seriously,” he said.

They got out and walked up to the front of the house, where a uniformed officer and a harried-looking man in a burgundy sweater holding a clipboard met them.

“I’m sorry, the house is off-limits,” he said. “Nothing to worry about, just some asbestos cleanup, but the city—”

Jack showed his identification. “We know what’s going on. We need to get in.”

The man stepped back, shaking his head. “I’m from NHS. If you know what’s going on, you don’t want to go in there.”

Mercy started past him. “I’m the one who made the first call. I don’t think there’s contamination inside. He didn’t keep the virus here. Even if there is, I don’t care.”

“Why don’t you care?” the NHS man said.

“Because I’ve already been exposed. Now you’re wasting my time.”

The man’s reaction was visceral. He recoiled from Mercy as she walked up to the door. She turned to Jack. “You want to stay out here just in case?”

Jack considered. Mercy knew more about Copeland than she did. If there was evidence to be found, she was better suited to find it. And he’d be no good to anyone if he infected himself. He hefted his cell phone, indicated he would wait for her call. “Go,” he said.

9:13 P.M. PST Bernard Copeland’s Residence

The front of Copeland’s house included an airlock similar to the one she’d seen at the Vanderbilt Complex. She entered it and then strode into the house.

It was dark. She felt around the walls until she found the light switch and turned it on. The house was very much as

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she’d left it, except that Copeland’s body had been removed and only the bloodstains marked where he had lain.

There was a certain symmetry to Copeland’s death, and to Frankie’s, she thought. Copeland wanted to be a terrorist for a decent cause, and had been murdered by a more pragmatic, if cold-blooded, killer who understood that terrorism was inherently indecent. Frankie, in turn, had been destroyed by the very weapon she tried to usurp for terrorist purposes. Maybe there really was justice in the universe. But no, there would be no justice unless they uncovered Copeland’s secrets and replicated the vaccine, which meant justice relied, as it did so often, on the determination and stubbornness of fallible mortals like her.

Mercy thought justice ought to choose better champions.