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They went down a flight of stairs and through another locked door into a quiet and darkened cell block. At the very end of the passage the deputy unlocked a cell and before he opened the door Rapp said, "I can take it from here."
The deputy hesitated. "I have to put cuffs on him. It's the rules."
Rapp smiled confidently. "Don't worry about the cuffs. I can handle him."
The deputy didn't move. "I could get in big trouble."
Rapp shoed him away. "Don't worry about it. Go back upstairs. I can take it from here."
The deputy studied the face of the man standing in front of him. He'd already noticed the bulge of the weapon slung under the guy's right arm and the thin scar on the side of his face. He was athletic and in his mid-thirties. This guy was Mitch Rapp, not some lawyer from the Justice Department.
The deputy relented and left. He knew what to do. Brian Jones was twenty-two years old and had worked at the jail for not yet a year, but in that short time he'd learned to hate the hotshot Feds who came and went almost as much as the loudmouthed animals they housed behind the thick steel bars. Jones walked back upstairs and went into the security room where he monitored the prisoners via their new digital camera system. A short while later the man claiming he wasn't Rapp came upstairs with the prisoner. He had the man by the scruff of his orange jumpsuit. The prisoner looked scared, and if that was in fact Mitch Rapp, he was absolutely right to be scared.
Jones watched on the monitors as al-Adel was put in the backseat of the sedan and Rapp got in with him. The big jerk, Deputy U.S. Marshal Joe Stewart, talked to the other man for a second and then they shook hands and the tall guy from the FBI got in the car and started backing up. Fairfax County Deputy Sheriff Brian Jones punched the button to raise the garage door and as soon as the sedan was clear he closed it. A second later his entire video surveillance system crashed and his monitors went black.
Deputy Jones didn't move and didn't dare touch a thing. He just held his breath hoping the system would reboot itself. Five seconds passed, then ten, then twenty, and then finally the cameras started coming back online. Jones wiped the sweat from his brow and sighed in relief. The system had been installed around the time Jones had started, and it had never malfunctioned like that before. The timing of the crash made him a little suspicious, so he logged into the system and began checking the archives. Everything was stored digitally.
Roughly five minutes of surveillance footage was gone. Erased from the server.Lawyer, my ass, he thought to himself.Just who in the hell did they think they were coming into his jail and pulling this shit? Jones grabbed his wallet and found the card. He had been planning to call the man anyway. The Mouth of the South was famous. He'd passed his cards around the detention center telling deputies that he was going to be looking to hire out a lot of off-duty security for the trial. Fifty bucks an hour for sitting around and reading paperback novels on his days off sounded pretty good.
Jones bet the Mouth of the South had no idea his client had just gone for a ride with the CIA. He thought about how nice it would be to make fifty bucks an hour. If he let the Mouth know what was going on, he'd have the inside track on that off-duty job for sure. Jones was already counting the money he'd make as he dialed the number.
* * *
Seventy-Eight
VIRGINIA
They left the jail, took U.S. 50 west and cut off on Highway 28 north. McMahon drove close to eighty mph the entire way. When they hit the Hirst Brault Expressway by Dulles they passed a State Trooper on the side of the road who started to pull out. McMahon hit his emergency lights that were concealed in the front grill and back window, and never slowed. The only thing Rapp had told him was that they were going to a place that didn't exist, that McMahon could never talk about to anyone.
Dr. Akram had always told Rapp that the threat of torture was often more persuasive than actual torture itself, and based on what he'd seen so far with al-Adel that theory was likely to hold true. Rapp had consulted briefly with Akram on how to proceed and he had given Rapp a protocol to follow. Don't let al-Adel sense that you are desperate, was his first piece of advice. Make him believe that you are a patient, fair, and in control person who knows far more about him and his operation than he could possibly imagine. Let the threat of torture hang ominously in the back of his mind. Make him feel that he is insignificant.
The only part of this plan that was difficult for Rapp was not laying a hand on him. McMahon had been right in his assessment that al-Adel had an infuriatingly smug air about him. In the twenty-some minutes that Rapp had been in the company of the Saudi-born immigrant, he had asked for his lawyer approximately once every minute. Each time the ludicrous request was made in the Saudi's arrogant tone, Rapp had been forced to resist the urge to break the man's nose. He knew that if they had to resort to torture, there were more subtle ways to hurt him, equally unpleasant, and even more important, fully deniable.
No physical marks could be left. If things didn't work out, and this second bomb was nothing more than a paranoid delusion, they would need to hand al-Adel back over to the Justice Department, and if there were obvious signs of torture, there would be an investigation. Physical abuse was very hard to prove if there were no marks. It would be Rapp's word against an Islamic radical fundamentalist who was involved in a plot to detonate a nuclear warhead in Washington, D.C. The public would undoubtedly believe Rapp was capable of such brutality, but everybody with the exception of the press and a handful of lefties and activists would be more than willing to side with him against the terrorist. Even if they left marks on al-Adel, the majority of Americans wou
ld probably give Rapp a pass considering what they were up against, but for now Rapp was willing to heed Akram's advice.
So Rapp sat in the backseat with the Saudi immigrant and spoke to him in his native tongue. He told him things that he knew would shock him. Rapp talked to him about his family, and even went so far as to say he had spoken to his father.
Al-Adel was unable to conceal his surprise at this. "You are lying to me."
Rapp shook his head. "I talked to him only an hour ago. Earlier in the day I placed a call to the crown prince and asked that your family be brought in for questioning. Even the women."
The look on al-Adel's face was one of both shock and disbelief.
Rapp said, "The crown prince and I have done a lot of business over the years."
"What kind of business?" asked a skeptical al-Adel.
"The business of eliminating threats, Ahmed. The crown prince profits from his business dealings with America. The eradication of people like you helps him ensure those dealings continue. He sees you Wahhabis for what you are a bunch of backward religious fruitcakes who are embarrassed to admit you're wrong. Zealots who want to live in the past."
"I do not believe you. You do not know the crown prince."
"Think about it, Ahmed. The crown prince and the Saudi royal family have billions of dollars invested in the American economy. If you and your little band of whack jobs succeed in setting off a nuclear weapon in Washington, D.C.," Rapp paused when he saw a glimmer of recognition in the man's eye. "Yes, Ahmed, I know there's another bomb, and part of me hopes your friends succeed."
Al-Adel was caught off guard and showed it. "I do not know what you are talking about."
Rapp studied him intensely. He reached out and put his arm around the Saudi immigrant. Al-Adel closed his eyes tightly as Rapp whispered in his ear. "Yes, I really hope they succeed. Do you know why?"
