Jack's mind raced with questions. The concise sentence on the paper wrapped around his phone made it clear to him. Roger Hansen's interrogator had inquired about the whereabouts of the three girls and then specifically asked him to go to Paris to help.
Jack wasn't surprised by the girls' whereabouts; he recognized Brian and his daughter, Kim. He couldn't say he'd anticipated the plot's detour to Paris, but he was certainly prepared.
The question was, who the hell was the guy who left the note? At least leave a name!
Jack's mind raced. He'd only known a few CIA agents in recent years. Joe Mason, now retired at the Hunter family's, was the first to be ruled out.
Then there was John Reaser, who was clearly missing. Could he be involved?
Jack shook his head silently. Unless the plot of "Person of Interest" had already begun, this guy was probably still hiding somewhere, recovering from his injuries.
He also privately asked Danny and his patrolman brother, James, to keep an eye out for homeless people on the New York subway.
Of the two CIA agents he met in Mexico, Matt died right in front of him. Michael, after being rescued by him, even visited him once and assigned him a SEAL mission.
Since then, there's been no news of this guy. It's unclear if this is the beginning of the plot of "Burn Notice." If it's him, it's certainly possible. According to the show, after Michael was inexplicably blacklisted by the CIA, he took on a kind of "scavenger" job.
But this guy wouldn't be so unreliable; at least he'd leave his name. Jack read the paper over and over again, but couldn't detect any hidden codes or unnecessary symbols.
The only people left connected to the CIA were Frank the Bald and Mandy Ellis, the SEAL Team B liaison officer.
Mandy was a purely intelligence officer, not an operations agent, so she clearly wouldn't be up to the task. Could it be Frank the Bald?
Jack didn't have Frank's contact information, nor did he know where he lived in Texas. He couldn't come to a conclusion
no matter how much he thought about it. Since he couldn't figure it out, he decided to give up. He'd left his phone number, and everything would be clear once he got to Paris.
—
"Why Paris?" After returning to the Federal Building, Cassel kept asking Jack questions. "Why would they leave your name? There has to be a reason."
"I said I don't know." Jack was getting fed up with this guy.
He had just confirmed with Justin that the IP address of the suspicious visitor logging into Alexis's profile was the same as the IP address linked to the new network monitor on the old farmhouse. The results were in, too: Paris.
Justin had even tracked down the exact location: a hotel under renovation near the Palais Bourbon.
"Roger Hansen worked for the kidnappers. Why did they torture him? Why did they want you to go to Paris alone?"
Jack finally lost his patience as Castle kept asking questions that had no answers. "Cassell, if you keep asking these unanswered questions, I won't take you to Paris."
Castle's eyes lit up when he heard that, and he said happily, "You're going to take me to Paris? Didn't the note say that you could only go alone?"
Jack stopped and glared at this annoying guy fiercely. "You have two choices now. Either shut up and go to Paris with me, or I'll have Beckett handcuff you in the police station until we rescue Alexis."
"OK, I'll go get the passport." Castle raised his foot and was about to turn around and go home.
"No need. I have other channels." Jack pulled him back and whispered.
"The person who tortured Roger Hansen is very likely on our side, but this matter must be kept strictly confidential. We should be able to know his identity when we arrive in Paris. This matter is far from as simple as we thought."
"Jack, the kidnapper called." Jiejie, who was waiting at the door of the combat center, made a phone gesture towards this side.
The call had been made twenty minutes earlier to Sarah's parents. Jack only heard a recording, and even though he'd mastered two languages of Arabic on the system, he still barely understood what was being said.
Arabic has many variations, and the system doesn't distinguish between them, simply categorizing them into Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic based on the written language.
Spoken Arabic, however, has six main regional divisions. The accent on the other end of the line was typical Egyptian Arabic, also a Cairo dialect.
The kidnappers demanded a €15 million ransom over the phone, to be exchanged for the kidnapper in three hours, at an unnamed dock on the lower Seine.
In the conference room, Sarah's parents argued directly with Jubal over the method of delivering the ransom.
Jubal asked them to buy time for the US Embassy to communicate with the French police, but Sarah's father flatly refused.
"No! They made it clear that if the police showed up, my daughter would be dead! We'll pay the 15 million euro ransom they demanded."
"Yes, even if this is just blackmail, at least they sent us photos of our daughters, letting us know they're still alive," Kim's stepfather, Stuart, echoed.
"Did they..." Cassel, who had just entered the meeting room, was taken aback by the staggering ransom figure and asked hesitantly, "Did they mention Alexis?"
Compared to these two super-rich men, his original image of a wealthy man was infinitely more like an ordinary person.
Although this guy had considerable royalties, he had squandered his wealth in his youth. Coupled with two failed marriages, he was not far from bankruptcy before he met his exclusive muse, Beckett.
Forget 15 million euros, even 5 million euros would have been enough to break him. Of course, Cassel's real concern wasn't the ransom amount, but whether his daughter was among the hostages the kidnappers had agreed to release.
"Don't worry. At my husband's insistence, they agreed to release all three girls," Sarah's mother said to Castle, tears welling in her eyes.
Castle excitedly walked over to Sarah's father. "I don't know how I'm supposed to handle this. I owe you something. If Alexis can return safely, I'll sell all my copyrights."
"Don't say that. You don't owe me anything. It's my fault that's implicated our daughter," Sarah's father whispered in a soothing tone, looking apologetically at the other two fathers.
Elsewhere, Jack stopped Jubal from speaking again and posed a question. "If the French police aren't involved, who's going to pay the ransom?"
"My sister-in-law lives in Paris, and her husband will bring the money. Sorry, it's such a large sum, and I need to make a lot of calls, so I'll have to excuse myself for now,"
Sarah's father said, turning to leave.
"Thank you."
"Thank you very much, Mr. Elmasri," the three fathers present, including Brian, thanked him.
Sarah's father turned back and sighed, "Now we can only pray those people keep their word."
——
"Of course, we can't trust the kidnappers to keep their word. This isn't that simple. The reason I stopped you from speaking wasn't because I believed they would release the kidnappers if the ransom was paid, but to buy time."
In the conference room, with only his own people left, Jack expressed his thoughts to Jubal.
(End of Chapter)