Chapter 4, Plan B
"Michelle-"
"Jack, I guess you heard."
"Yeah, where are you?"
"In my car—on my way to the airport. I need to be alone for a couple of days."
"You won't be there tomorrow." Jack felt his temperature rise.
"I can't. It's just so hard. About what I said before Jack—Tony signed those papers because he didn't have a choice. Somewhere underneath it all, he's still a good guy and he didn't want me to suffer anymore. I have to respect that. CTU has already given me a couple of days off. I'll be somewhere in the Caribbean—letting loose and going from corner to corner, shopping. Somehow, I'll be O.K."
Jack smiled inwardly—he had understood what Michelle was telling him—but still looked pissed for good measure. "Call me when you get to the Caribbean. Let me know you're O.K."
Michelle laughed. "I don't need you to go all big brother on me."
"I've always been big brother to you Michelle and it's not going to stop. So call me when you arrive at the airport. I want a report on the weather."
"Yes, sir."
Jack hung up the phone, looked at both Bill and Hammond and left.
Previously, Michelle was being uncuffed and led into a car. Using the video equipment that had been used to show her to Tony, they let Michelle see that they still had someone watching Tony. If Michelle didn't cooperate, they said, they would kill him.
So Michelle had insisted that she had to talk to Jack personally otherwise he would know that something was wrong. She had and was thankful to that higher power that Jack had picked up on her cues, giving her a chance to call back in a couple of hours. That, hopefully, would prevent them from killing her, as she knew they were going to do regardless of what had been promised to Tony. She had seen their faces after all.
Jack walked over to Audrey. "I'm taking off. Tony just signed a confession."
"Jack-"
"Michelle's leaving the country. She's not even going to be in town for when they kill him. I need a drink."
"Jack-"
"Call me tonight when you get off." He kissed her on the cheek and left CTU.
As soon as he was home, Jack called Chloe who was preparing to leave herself.
"Hello?"
"Pretend I'm one of your girlfriends," he ordered.
"Rachael. How are you?"
"Not good. I suppose you heard about Tony?"
"Yeah, it's been a long day."
"Michelle's been kidnapped. I have some equipment at my place. I need you here—they both need you."
"I don't know. As I said before, it's been a long day and I'm exhausted."
"Chloe-"
She waited for a moment and counted to ten. "If you're sure that you can't get a hold of anyone else, I'll come over and you can tell me everything. But Rachael, you have to try to get a hold of some other people between the time we hang up the phone and I get there. I truly am exhausted."
"You're a lifesaver Chloe."
Chloe smiled. "What are friends for?" She hung up and sighed at Edgar. "One of my friends just got into a fight with her husband. Today'll seem like a day in the park compared to this."
She received a couple of laughs and left.
Jack started doing what he could while he waited for Chloe. He hated to involve her in this but at the moment she was the only one he knew who could help him help Michelle and Tony.