Chapter Sixteen
February 5, 2011 – 12:40am
The first thing that Jimmy did when he got into his car was plug his cell phone into the car charger to finish charging the battery. He couldn't believe he'd let his phone run down last night. Maybe if he'd had pictures of the bomb, they wouldn't have…
No, no sense in second-guessing myself at this point. I've got a plan, and I think it'll work. I might even manage to not get almost arrested this time, too. Tony's Rule 12 conversation with Gibbs won't go nearly so well if I'm wearing handcuffs…
The drive to the parking lot down the street from the Art Jones Building was just as uneventful as it had been the previous night. Jimmy grabbed his phone, then popped open the trunk and took out his emergency flashlight. Wish I'd remembered this last night. Hell, there's a better one in my kitchen, why didn't I grab that?
But at least he had a flashlight now. He'd also remembered to grab a pair of latex gloves from the first aid kit in his bathroom. At least he wouldn't be leaving fingerprints behind this time.
Jimmy forced himself to slowly walk the three blocks south, then seven blocks west, then three blocks north again. He ducked behind the hedges of the house across the street from the office building and made his way to his hiding place where the two perpendicular lines of hedges met. There he sat and peeked through the branches to see…
Yep, both cars are there. I need to give it until a couple minutes after they leave, then I can go in. I'll have twenty minutes, maybe a half hour even, between when they leave and when they come back. Wait, they came back so they could add something to the bomb. I'd better get in there and wait til they've come and gone again… I should turn off my phone. I don't think anyone will call me, but just in case…
The minutes crawled by slowly. Jimmy figured he must be noticing the cold ground more tonight – it had to be him, because the temperature would be the same as last night, right? He crossed his arms and pulled his knees up, trying to conserve body heat. Now he wished he had last night's hot chocolate that he'd made and hadn't even drunk. Or Tony's coffee. He'd even drink Dr. Mallard's tea, just so long as it was hot…
Finally, Jimmy saw what he was waiting for – movement across the street, from the window next to the employee entrance. He watched as the two men – Carl and the other guy, not that he knew which one was which – stood outside the window talking for a moment. Then one of them left; the other waited until the first was gone before walking to his car and leaving as well.
Exactly ninety seconds later, Jimmy jumped to his feet. He made his way carefully and quietly around the hedges, then sprinted across the street and through the parking lot. As before, he didn't stop running until he'd made it around to the rear of the building, where he couldn't be seen from the street. After a moment to catch his breath and listen for any disturbances, Jimmy came out from hiding and pulled open the window, climbed through, and pulled it mostly closed behind him, just as he'd found it. The difference tonight, other than the lack of hesitation – he knew exactly what to expect, after all – was the pair of latex gloves on his hands.
He had the flashlight tonight, but he left it switched off for now. He'd managed just fine last night with the emergency lights, at least through the call center and the stairwell. Once he entered the bank processing center, however, he turned it on to help him avoid the tables he'd run into before.
Okay, I've got maybe twenty minutes til they're back. Maybe I should take a look at how the thing is set up now, so I can compare it to what it looks like once they've added whatever it was they had to go back for.
It was much easier to get a good look at the document sorter with the flashlight than it had been last night with just the dim emergency lights. It also helped that Jimmy had Googled the model name and number last night at Tony's computer. He couldn't find much – it wasn't like there was a huge demand for online reference manuals for the machine, given its specialized use – but he did at least find a picture of it, with its front access panels removed to show the interior workings. With a vague idea of what the inside was supposed to look like, Jimmy was hoping that he'd be able to identify anything that didn't belong – like a bomb, for example.
Kneeling down in front of the machine, Jimmy removed the first access panel to reveal an interior space crammed with bundles of wires. If it hadn't been for the thin layer of dust covering everything, Jimmy would have despaired of ever being able to understand what was going on in there; but the dust told him that nothing had been touched in here for quite some time. He replaced that panel and moved to the next.
As soon as he pulled it away, Jimmy knew that this was what he'd been looking for. There were still masses of wires, but a lot less dust; and in the center of it all was a large, off-white brick of what could only be a plastic explosive, along with more wires and strange-looking metal pieces.
Nothing that looks like a timer… well, we knew that. Too bad, though… that's the one thing I might have been able to recognize.
Jimmy turned on his phone and, using his flashlight for illumination, took several pictures from different angles. Then he turned off the phone again and replaced the panel, careful to make sure everything looked the same as before. He made his way to his hiding place under the desk of the closest cubicle, making himself comfortable – or as comfortable as possible, anyway – before turning off the flashlight. Now all he had to do was wait…
When the stairwell door slammed open, Jimmy still couldn't help being startled, but he quickly got himself under control again. Closing his eyes to better focus on his other senses, he listened to the men –
"Jesus, Carl! Can't you be careful?"
"What? The alarm's off and there's no one's here. Unless you didn't disarm it –"
"I told you, I know what I'm doing! Besides –"
Jimmy did his best to tune out their argument, focusing more on the sounds of their work to see if he could figure out exactly what was happening on the other side of the cubicle wall. He heard the twin thumps as the two men dropped whatever they were carrying. The way they treated it, it couldn't have been too fragile or volatile – unless they were just that incredibly lucky.
"Okay, can we get it right this time?"
"Hey, it's not my fault if Hayes can't pack the right equipment."
They continued to bicker as one of the men – Carl, presumably – opened a door on squeaky hinges. Muffled thumping and creaking, accompanied by occasional swearing, filtered through the wall.
Wait. What opens like that? Jimmy frowned in the dark. The front panels lift up and away; there aren't any hinges. But what I saw has to be the bomb. So what are they doing now?
He waited impatiently for what seemed like forever, until finally the men were finishing up the job. The squeaky-hinged door was closed again; Jimmy listened carefully to the sound so he'd recognize it again if he heard it. Then he heard the men walk down the hall and go through the door.
He almost came out of hiding then, but resisted the urge. Careful, he admonished himself. You don't want them to hear you moving around up here. Five minutes, give them five minutes to leave, then you can do what you need to and get the hell out of here.
When the allotted time had passed, Jimmy switched on his flashlight again and crawled out from underneath the desk. He studied the sorting machine again as he waited for his phone to turn on.
Okay, let's get some pictures behind that access panel again, to make sure it's the same. Then… I need to figure out what they were just working on. Where is there a door on this thing?
Jimmy carefully lifted the access panel out of the way again and examined the bomb again. There seemed to be more wires in there now, but it was possible he was just imagining that. He aimed his flashlight and took a few more pictures, then closed it up again. He also opened the other panel, just to check, but everything in there was exactly the same and still covered with dust.
He walked carefully around the machine. When he reached the back, he realized that the middle section of the machine opened on top; the hinges were at the rear, so it had to open from the front. He finished his circuit of the sorter and tucked his flashlight under his arm so he could use both hands to lift the top.
The cover lifted on squeaking hinges to reveal several belts, pulleys – and a whole lot more of the plastic explosive.
Holy crap…
When it came right down to it, Jimmy had no idea how much C-4 it would take to blow up both the building and the nearby overpass. What he did know was that the quantity of off-white material jammed into every available space was at least four times more than what he'd seen behind the access panel. Shaking his head, Jimmy pulled out his phone again and took several pictures of this section of the machine, then carefully – very carefully – lowered the lid again.
Wiping the sweat from his forehead with his coat sleeve, Jimmy took one last look, then headed for the door. He didn't have a lot of time, if this was going to work. He hurried down the stairs and out the window, then ran like hell for the parking lot several blocks away where he'd left his car. He didn't even stop to catch his breath; he just jumped into the car and started it, throwing it into gear and tearing out of the parking lot while pulling up his phone's speed dial with one hand.
He waited through the ringing and the sleepy/annoyed greeting at the other end before blurting out, "Abby? It's Jimmy Palmer. I really need your help…"