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Hayek shook her head. “I think Mitch needs to make the call. If I or anyone else calls, he’s going to want to renegotiate.”
“I agree.”
“Does Mitch even remember the guy?”
“I don’t know,” Coleman said, “but I could probably talk him through it.”
Kennedy thought about her other problems. “And Wilson?”
“I have two people on him.”
“All right. Brief Mitch and make the call. If anything important comes out of it, call me.”
Rapp didn’t remember Zahir at first. But after Coleman described the man’s shoe-polish-black beard and his snug gray-blue police uniform, he got the visual. The context of their meeting was a little more complicated. The previous night Coleman had explained to Rapp why they were in Afghanistan. Rapp had only a vague recollection of Rickman. When Coleman explained to Rapp how he had threatened the local police commander, Rapp’s eyes got big. “I s
aid that?”
Coleman laughed. “You sure did.”
“Do I speak this way to people very often?”
“When they happen to be,” Coleman said, “scumbags like Zahir, the answer is yes.”
It seemed as if each hour Rapp was learning more about his past, and by association, himself. He had a basic overview of who he was but the details were always a little shocking. It was eerie coming to grips with the stark reality that he had murdered people. There were no oh-my-god-I’m-a-monster type moments. It was more or less, that’s who I am, I need to keep filling in this puzzle and when it’s done I can sit back and judge my actions in their totality, or not. That was the other abnormal thing about this process of getting to know himself again: The second time around you saw things that you might have missed on the first go-round.
“So I threatened to put a five-hundred-K bounty on this guy’s head.”
“Yes . . . and you threatened to stick a Tomahawk missile up his ass as well.” Grinning, Coleman added, “I know it sounds harsh, but it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. He’s a real piece of shit. I think you made that pretty clear to him as well.”
“So I call him back and find out what he has.”
“Yes, but you’re probably going to have to be a bit of a prick. Do you think you’re up to it?”
“I don’t see why not.”
“All right. We have him marked in Jalalabad.” Coleman looked over Hayek’s shoulder at the blinking red light. “Hmm . . .”
“What?” Rapp asked.
“It looks like he’s just a block away from the safe house.” He tapped Hayek on the shoulder. “Everything ready to go?”
“In a second.” All of Rapp’s clothes had been cut off him when he arrived at the hospital, and his personal possessions, such as his phones and fake IDs and credit cards, had been placed in a bag and kept in a storage room. It was just another thing that was overlooked in the chaos. Hayek was now syncing Rapp’s phone via Bluetooth to her laptop, so they could record and monitor the call. When it was ready to go, she plugged in two sets of headphones, handing one to Coleman and keeping the other for herself.
“The number’s already punched in,” she said as she handed Rapp the phone, “just hit Send.”
“You said we have people back at Langley monitoring all of his calls.”
“That’s right.”
“And if they record me threatening to kill him on the phone?”
Coleman jumped in. “We’re not the FBI. We’re supposed to threaten people like Zahir. When we’re done, we’ll make sure all the recordings are erased.”
“Fine.” Rapp hit Send and tried to put himself in the proper mind-set.
CHAPTER 37
JALALABAD, AFGHANISTAN