Silent Night - By Tom Barber Page 0,62

looked up at him, surprised. Not at his statement, but by his accent.

‘MI6?’

Archer shook his head. ‘NYPD.’

‘How the hell did you end up here?’

‘I could ask you the same thing.’

‘Here are the concrete facts,’ Shepherd said. ‘We have a recorded message on Paul Bleeker’s phone which you left several hours ago. I think you know about a certain virus and you were planning to do something with it.’

Jacobs didn’t speak. He also didn’t ask what virus.

‘What if we let your partners know this is happening?’ Archer asked. ‘A good lawyer might get you off the hook. That’s a very distant might. But do you think all your clients will still want to do business with a suspected terrorist?’

‘Go ahead. Once I get out of here, I’ll sue each one of you for everything you have.’

‘From the sounds of it, you need the money.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘We know all about your little gambling problem. How much do you owe this time?’

Jacobs shook his head. But his demeanour had changed slightly. He studied the table in front of him. Archer had struck a nerve.

‘Have they threatened you?’

Silence.

‘Have they threatened your son?’

Jacobs kept his eyes on the wooden desk but the look on his face answered Archer’s questions. He may have been a good lawyer but Archer could see why he wouldn’t be good at the card table. He wasn’t exactly hard to read.

‘If you work with us, we can help you,’ Shepherd said. ‘We can bring the boy in and put him in protective custody. Something tells me the men you owe aren’t the type who follow the rules . You help us out, we can make that all go away.’

Pause.

‘No. You can’t.’

‘A man was killed in Central Park last night. He was gassed with a small dose of the virus we think you’re involved with. Two other viral bombs were left across the city this morning. Paul Bleeker arranged it. If you work with us, we can secure the remaining sample of this virus before anyone else is killed.’

Jacobs looked up at Shepherd. He seemed genuinely surprised.

‘Wait a minute. Bleeker already had the virus?’

‘Yes, he did.’

‘Where is he?’

‘The morgue.’

Jacobs dropped his head. ‘That son of a bitch.’

‘What was your deal?’ Archer asked.

Shepherd suddenly rose from his chair, and walked out, closing the door. Jacobs and Archer were left alone.

‘What was your deal?’ Archer asked again. ‘How did you end up in this?’

Jacobs didn’t reply.

A few moments later, the door opened, and Shepherd reappeared, something in his hand. He closed the door and moved back to his chair. He slid a photograph across the table towards Jacobs. It was a shot from the morgue of the groundsman from the Park, Luis Cesar, taken from above the steel tray he was laid on.

‘This is the man who died in Central Park,’ Shepherd said, as Jacobs looked down. ‘He had a wife and five children. He drowned in his own blood.’

Pause.

‘Right now, you can help us. I’m sure your lawyer will be the best of the best. He’ll wrestle these charges down to something manageable. Two years in a private facility, maybe less. Maybe you’ll never see a prison cell. But if you don’t start working with us, hundreds, maybe thousands more people could die like this man.’

Silence.

‘Talk to us!’ Archer said. ‘Cut the shit. We don’t have time for this!’

Just then, the door burst open and a lawyer walked in, a briefcase in his hand.

‘Not another word, Mr Jacobs,’ he said, moving forward and placing the briefcase on the desktop in a smooth motion.

Archer and Shepherd looked over at the English lawyer, who’d seemed on the verge of speaking. Then he looked up at his lawyer and nodded.

He wasn’t going to be talking any time soon.

At Kearny Medical in New Jersey, Bobby Rourke was looking through the glass at the body of the dead doctor inside the sealed lab. He’d finally stopped twitching, blood and pieces of lung tissue surrounding him, some of it sprayed on the glass. He’d watched the man’s death with fascination.

The virus sure as hell worked.

Behind him, the lift dinged and opened. He looked over his shoulder and saw Finn walk out, heading towards him. As he approached, Sway noticed his friend wearing the protective suit minus the helmet and saw the dead body inside the lab.

‘Why didn’t you just shoot him?’

‘I wanted to do a test. ’

Finn looked at the six canisters sitting on the desktop in the lab. He pointed.

‘OK, genius, so how do we get