by Ron McGee
He held out the key, returning it. Ryan hadn’t known about a hidden key, and he didn’t think his parents did, either. But it seemed like Lawrence was telling the truth.
Kasey stepped forward. “Are you involved with the Emergency Rescue Committee?”
Lawrence looked at the three of them, surprised. “You know about the ERC?”
“Oh yeah. We’re all a part of it,” Danny said. “Practically.”
“We know there’s been trouble recently.” Ryan didn’t completely trust this guy yet. His parents and the other ERC members said the group might be compromised, so he had to be cautious. But maybe he could find out something useful if he got Lawrence to talk. “You said you called the emergency number. Why’d you do that?”
Ryan was surprised to see Lawrence’s eyes suddenly moisten. The young man was overwhelmed.
“Someone’s taken her,” he said. “I came home, and she was gone. They’ve taken Nadia.”
CHAPTER
07
NEW YORK,
USA
Seated in the brownstone’s living room, Lawrence explained that he and Nadia had been sentenced to death in their home country of Lovanda in central Africa. They would have been executed if not for Declan Quinn and the ERC. With help from a group of locals, Declan and his associates orchestrated a jailbreak and managed to smuggle Lawrence and Nadia out of Lovanda and onto an ocean freighter that eventually brought them to America.
“Wait a minute,” Ryan interrupted. “How old were you when this happened?”
“It was five years ago. I was barely eighteen.”
Kasey couldn’t believe it, either. “You were teenagers and sentenced to death? What did you do?”
“We made the wrong people mad,” Lawrence said. He was a bundle of nerves, biting his thumbnail as his knee bounced involuntarily. “We were young and stupid. Thought we were invincible.”
“Did you kill someone?” Danny asked.
“No. We made music.” Lawrence looked away, lost in some distant memory. “We were just kids. We thought we could change the world with our songs. But some things can’t be changed.”
Before coming into the living room, Danny had retrieved his computer from downstairs. His fingers flew over the keys. He spun the laptop around so they could all see. “Anbo and Delilah—this is you?”
Lawrence barely glanced at the monitor. “Not anymore.”
“This video’s got over a million hits,” Danny said, hitting play. “You two were popular.”
It was a concert video recorded with a cell phone. The sound quality wasn’t great, but Ryan could still feel the rage behind the performance. A rapper wearing long dreadlocks and a tie-dyed T-shirt captivated the crowd. Pacing the small stage with furious energy, he rapped of growing up so poor that he had to dig through trash to find things to sell to support his family.
Ryan looked from the video to the restless young man with the close-cropped hair in disbelief. This guy radiated anxiety, like he was gonna jump out of his skin at any moment. But Ryan recognized the high forehead and deep-set eyes shared by the rapper in the video. The man sitting next to them was the same passionate firebrand who had performed on a stage for a cheering audience.
Kasey obviously felt the same. “You were a rapper?”
“I was a poet, but nobody cared. When I put my words to a beat, to music, they started listening.” In the video, the crowd roared its approval. A woman’s voice, commanding and haunting, suddenly rose above the noise. The cell phone video jiggled around and found the singer onstage. Lawrence appeared pained as he confirmed, “That’s her. That’s Delilah.”
Delilah—or Nadia, as she was now known—was tall and striking. She wore flowing robes of gold and white. The crowd hushed as she sang about rising up against the corruption that surrounded them.
“Enough.” Lawrence leaned forward and hit the space bar, stopping the video. “This foolishness cost us everything before. And now they’ve found us again.”
“Who? Who took her?” Ryan asked.
Lawrence rubbed his eyes as he told them how he was coming home from his job as a bank teller when he noticed a strange man watching their apartment. The man was concealed in the shadows, but Lawrence managed to duck out of sight before he got spotted. He snuck around back and entered their apartment. Inside, he realized that he was already too late. There was an overturned table and chair, but Nadia was gone.
“She was recording songs,” Lawrence finished. “That could be how they tracked us down. If she put the songs online, someone might have recognized her voice. I warned her not to.”
“I don’t think it’s Nadia’s fault,” Ryan assured him. “Other people the ERC saved have also gone missing. Somehow, their new identities are being discovered.”
Danny’s phone buzzed and he glanced down, reading a text. “It’s my mom. We’re supposed to be at my place already.”
Kasey stood up. “I have to get home, too.”
Ryan looked to Lawrence. “You can stay here tonight. My mom and dad are in Chicago, but I’ll call and tell them what’s going on. They’ll know what to do.”
“And we’ll help them,” Danny said, stuffing his laptop in his backpack. “We’ll find Nadia.”
But Lawrence still seemed defeated. “You don’t know these people. We embarrassed them when we disappeared. They’ll never forget that. They won’t stop until we’re both dead.”
Ryan put a hand on his shoulder. “I promise you, we’ll do everything we can to help.”
“I just hope it’s not already too late.”
Ryan wished there was something more encouraging he could say. But in his heart, he worried Lawrence was right.
CHAPTER
08
NEW YORK,
USA
Danny’s home was always filled with noise. His sisters, Analyn and Lilibeth, were four-year-old twins who couldn’t be more different. Analyn was into the whole princess thing and pressed Ryan into duty as Prince Charming in her elaborate make-believe adventures. Lilibeth was sportier, kicking a soccer ball around the apartment or begging Ryan to play catch with her. A typical big brother, Danny couldn’t be bothered with the girls’ games, so they clung to Ryan whenever he visited.
The Santiagos lived in a three-bedroom apartment on the sixth floor of an older building. The rooms were small and jam-packed with furniture and knickknacks. With either music or the television playing at all times, there was never a dull moment.
Ryan loved it.
Growing up an only child, he had often imagined what it would be like to come from a big family. He got along great with his mom and dad, but it was sometimes quiet with just the three of them. Plus, one or the other was often traveling, which left only two. Being around Danny’s boisterous, close-knit family made him realize how different life might have been.
“Dinner!” Mrs. Santiago shouted from the kitchen.
“We’re not done!” Analyn yelled back, spinning around so her princess costume flared out. “Ryan still has to slay the dragon!”
“I’m gonna do the slaying if you don’t wash your hands and sit at that table in one minute!”
Analyn turned to Ryan, who held a sword made from an old paper towel roll. “Can we finish after dinner?”
“Sure,” Ryan said. “But next time, you have to be the dragon.”
“I love being the dragon!” Analyn hurried off as Danny entered the living room.
“You don’t have to play with her,” he said. “Just tell her to get lost.”
“It’s fun.” Ryan lunged forward and stabbed the pretend sword into Danny’s stomach. “Got ya!”
Danny grinned. “Careful. In your hands, that thing’s probably a lethal weapon.”
Ryan called out to Analyn. “It’s safe to come out, Princess Starbright. I killed the grumpy dragon with the wild hair!”
“Hysterical,” Danny said.
As they approached the dinner table, he whispered to Ryan. “I’ve been doing some di
gging into everything Lawrence told us. I think I found some really good leads we can check out tomorrow.”
“We can’t do anything until we hear from Mom or Dad.” Ryan had spoken briefly to his father about meeting Lawrence and told him that Nadia had been taken. Dad was in a rush and couldn’t talk, but promised they’d figure out what to do and call back as soon as possible.
Danny was impatient, though. “But wait’ll you hear what all I found—”
“Sit, Ryan,” Mrs. Santiago said, coming out of the kitchen with a steaming dish. “Daniel, get the pinakbet—it’s on the counter.”
“Got it.” Danny disappeared into the kitchen.
Mrs. Santiago placed the dish on the table. “I hope you like adobo.”
“I love it,” Ryan assured her, breathing in the wonderful aroma of the garlic-and-soy-sauce-flavored pork dish, a Filipino staple. The twins and Mr. Santiago, a cheerful man with a booming voice, joined them. Everyone talked at once as they took their seats.
The food was delicious. It was the kind of normal family dinner Ryan usually enjoyed at Danny’s house. But his mind was elsewhere: worried about his parents in Chicago; unsure how to help Lawrence and Nadia; curious to hear the information Danny had uncovered.
When Mr. Santiago asked why his parents were away, Ryan told him the cover story Mom gave him about a last-minute work conference. The lie came easily, almost without even thinking about it. He hated being dishonest, but it was necessary to protect the ERC.
After dinner, Ryan and Danny cleaned up and did the dishes. As soon as they were done, the boys retreated to Danny’s room and closed the door. Finally having privacy, Danny updated Ryan on what he’d found.
“Anbo and Delilah were a big deal before they got arrested. Their other songs are like the one we heard. Superpolitical, all about what’s wrong with their country.”
“We learned about Lovanda when I lived in Africa,” Ryan said. “It was a British colony for a long time, right?”
“Yeah. And then there was this civil war that went on for years. Now it’s supposedly a democracy, but the same party’s been in power for over twenty years. The government controls everything—TV, music, the internet. Anybody who speaks out against them gets thrown in jail or executed.”
“So Anbo and Delilah knew how dangerous it was performing those songs.”
“That’s why they could only do pop-up concerts. No warning. They’d just get up wherever they could and start rapping these intense revolutionary songs. People loved them. The concerts were getting bigger and bigger.”
Ryan could tell Danny was captivated by the idea. “I bet the government didn’t like that.”
“No,” Danny agreed. “But there was one woman in particular who was seriously pissed.”
Danny brought up a photo of an African woman. Her braided hair was pulled back, and she wore blue designer eyeglasses, pearl earrings, and a luxurious gown. Ryan thought her smile seemed really fake.
“Evelyn Buku,” Danny said. “But everyone calls her Madame Buku. She’s the richest woman in Lovanda. She owns a company called Sekhmet Technologies. The government in Lovanda is actually pretty poor. The real power is in the hands of a few business owners—and Madame Buku is the most powerful of them all.”
“Lawrence said they made the wrong people mad,” Ryan recalled.
“Yeah, they wrote songs about her. Called her the evil stepmother, like in Cinderella.”
“You think she’s responsible for taking Nadia?”
Danny nodded. “From everything I read, she’s the one who got them arrested. She had her own private security force go after them, then bribed the judges to make sure they got the death penalty. She was furious when they escaped.”
Ryan followed his logic. “She must have heard one of the songs Nadia released and redoubled her efforts to find them. If this woman’s that rich, she could afford to track Lawrence and Nadia down if she really wanted to.”
“Exactly! She even said in a few interviews that she’s determined to see Anbo and Delilah returned to Lovanda to pay for their crimes.”
“So if we could somehow figure out who sold her the information, we might also figure out who the leak inside the ERC is, right?”
“Maybe so.” Danny perked up. “Hey, you said ‘we.’ As in you and me, working as a team? Doing the whole Batman and Robin thing?”
“We’re not Batman and Robin,” Ryan said.
“Lone Ranger and Tonto?”
Ryan shook his head and smiled. “So what else do we know about this Madame Buku?”
CHAPTER
09
NEW YORK,
USA
The next morning, Ryan woke to the buzz of his cell phone. He grabbed it, but the Caller ID read “Blocked.”
“Hello?”
“Hey, bud. It’s Dad.”
“What’s this number?” Ryan asked, sitting up in his sleeping bag and rubbing his eyes.
“We’re not sure how safe our communications are. Mom and I picked up a couple of burner phones.” His father sounded strained and tired. “The police found the man we were searching for. He’d been killed.”
“Oh my god,” Ryan said, as Danny turned over in his bed and opened his eyes. “Do they know who did it?”
“They don’t have a clue. Unfortunately, there’s not much more we can do here. We’ll fly back today. We should be home by early afternoon.”
“But we need to find Nadia. Tonight could be too late.”
Danny threw back the comforter, swinging his legs around. “Tell them about Madame Buku and her plane.”
“Dad, Danny and I have some ideas—”
“We already talked to Tasha,” Dad interrupted. “She’ll get Lawrence somewhere safe, then look for Nadia.”
“What about us? We can help.”
“Ryan, a man was killed here last night. You and your friends have to stay out of this. What were you doing at the brownstone last night, anyway?”
Ryan hesitated. “Just forgot a book I needed for school.”
“You’re out on winter break.” Ryan could have kicked himself. Clearly, he wasn’t nearly as good at lying to his parents as they were at lying to him. “We can talk about it when we get home. Just lay low until then, okay?”
“Yeah, I got it.” They said good-bye, and Ryan ended the call, frustrated.
Danny could tell they were being shut out again. “So what are we supposed to do? Just sit here and act like everything’s fine?”
“That’s what they want us to do.”
“But what about Madame Buku’s private jet? You didn’t even get to tell them about that.” Last night, Danny had found an online registration for a Boeing 727 that Madame Buku used for her travels around the world. Tracking the tail numbers that identified the plane, Danny discovered its current flight plan on the FAA’s public database. Right now, the jet was parked at Fairfax Executive Airport, a private airfield in New Jersey, less than an hour from Manhattan. That couldn’t be a coincidence.
“Dad said Tasha’s gonna help Lawrence. I’ll call and we can tell her what we found.” Ryan didn’t use Tasha’s real name in his contacts list just in case he ever lost his phone, but he’d given her an alias that was easy to remember: Miss Crabby.
As Ryan dialed, Danny hopped out of bed and threw on a T-shirt and jeans. “Just make sure she knows the information came from us. We have to get full credit so they take us seriously next time.”
The call went straight to voice mail. Remembering his father’s fear that the phones might be tapped, Ryan kept his message vague. “Hey, it’s Ryan and Danny. Call us back as soon as you can. It’s important.” He disconnected, then looked to Danny. “You know, she could be over at my house right now getting him.”
“Then what are we doing here?” Danny grabbed Ryan’s clothes and tossed them at him. “Let’s go.”
Five minutes later they were headed out, but Mrs. Santiago intercepted them at the door, insisting they have breakfast. Danny promised
his mom they’d stop for a bagel but said they had to hurry to the basketball courts at Chelsea Piers for a pickup game with friends.
“Basketball? Instead of sitting in front of a computer screen all day?” She couldn’t have been more thrilled and turned to Ryan, smiling. “You’re such a good influence!”
“Bye, nanay!” Danny hustled out, assuring his mom they’d check in later.
As the door closed behind them, Ryan turned to Danny, impressed. “How do you do that? My parents always catch me when I lie to them.”
Danny shrugged. “Just tell them what they want to hear. Works every time.”
It was ten blocks from Danny’s building to Ryan’s brownstone. They ran the whole way. By the time they turned the corner onto 62nd Street, Danny was winded and wheezing. The boys suddenly stopped dead in their tracks.
Up ahead, a police car was parked in the middle of the street, lights flashing. A few people were gathered at the curb in front of the Quinns’ brownstone talking with a uniformed cop.
“Lawrence,” Ryan muttered, then started forward.
Danny grabbed his arm. “Wait. If you go up there, they’re gonna ask you all kinds of questions. Questions you might not want to answer.”
“We have to find out what happened.”
“I know. But let me go check first and see what’s going on. Nobody on this block knows me.”
Ryan agreed, seeing Danny’s point. “I’ll try Tasha again.”
Danny attempted to look casual, making his way across the street to the people gathered on the sidewalk.
Ryan took out his phone and dialed. If the same people who took Nadia had Lawrence now, there wasn’t much time. They’d either be dead or taken back to Lovanda quickly.
“What?” Tasha’s brusque answer caught Ryan off guard.
“Hey—I left a message for you earlier.”
“I’ve been busy. What do you want?” Tasha’s impatience irritated Ryan.
