by Todd Moss
“That’s why you need a guide. That’s why our good friend Mariana Leibowitz called me and asked me to help this important man, this Judd Ryker. That’s why you need me. Any friend of Mariana’s is a—”
“I thought I was coming here to help you, Bola.”
“True, my friend. We will help each other.”
Judd gestured toward Isabella. “Bola, this is my colleague from the Justice Department, Special Agent Isabella Espinosa. Isabella, this is Judge Bola Akinola from the Nigerian Crime and Corruption Task Force.”
Bola shook Isabella’s hand politely. “Pleasure to meet a fellow law enforcement officer,” he said.
“It’s a great honor to meet you, Judge,” she said.
“You two don’t know each other?” Judd asked.
“I know about Judge Akinola’s anticorruption work,” she said. “I know from my FBI colleagues that he built the CCTF and it’s doing valuable work.”
“Mariana didn’t give me many details,” Judd interjected. “What have you gotten yourself into?”
“Ahhh, Mariana. She is a good one.”
“She’s worried about you,” Judd said. “She said your life is in danger.”
Bola laughed aloud and shook his head. “Ahhh, Mariana. People are getting nervous, eh. I’m getting too close to make people comfortable.” Bola faced Isabella. “But that is our job, no? To make the criminals uncomfortable?”
“Judge, we have authorization to provide you with immediate political asylum and transportation out of the country.”
“Go to America?” Bola scowled. “Now?”
“Yes, sir,” Isabella said. “You only have to make the formal request for political asylum and you’ll be with us on the plane back to Washington.”
“Just say the word, Bola,” Judd said.
“Leave for the U.S.A.? Now? That is impossible,” Bola said, shaking his head. “There is too much to do. I still have work here. I’m about to release my final report on who is behind the pirates. Perhaps one day I will need to escape. And I will need your help. But that day is not today, my friend.”
“So, why are you here at the consulate?” Judd asked.
“Mariana said you need my help. Perhaps you are here for the basketball player, eh?”
“How do you know about that?” Judd hurriedly shut the door.
“Nigeria is my country. I know about the politicians, the criminals, the celebrities. I know the chiefs in the villages, the confidence artists on the streets, the boys in the swamps, the Ogas in the palaces.”
“What’s an Oga?” Judd asked.
“Oga is a big man, a boss.”
“I see.”
“Nigeria is full of many Ogas,” Bola said. “That’s why you need me.”
Judd looked at Isabella, who raised her eyebrows in agreement.
“Tell me how I can help you, my friend,” Bola said.
He took a deep breath. “Yes, you’re right. We’re here to try to rescue Tunde Babatunde. He was taken—”
“Yesterday morning. From the Third Mainland Bridge. I, too, was attacked there yesterday. But I escaped.”
“I need him back. I need Babatunde free by tomorrow.”
“You’re in quite a hurry, my friend.”
“Yes, I am.”
“Just like Mariana,” he smiled. “She’s always rushing, this way and that.”
“That’s how we are. But I need Tunde Babatunde back by tomorrow. Can you do it?”
“How much?” Bola asked.
“How much what?”
“How much can you pay? That’s how we get him back.”
“The United States doesn’t pay ransom. It’s our strict policy. It’s not the American way. We need another way to get him back. If this kidnapping gang is well known, maybe we’ll get lucky and they’re already under surveillance. What does the Nigerian intelligence service know? The President’s national security advisor? The head of the police?”
Bola smiled reassuringly. “I will handle this the Nigerian way.”
The judge pulled out a phone and turned his back to the Americans. He mumbled in a local language. He grunted, laughed, mumbled some more, then hung up. “It’s done. Now we wait.”
“Done? What do you mean?” Judd was aghast.
“Babatunde will be free. I’ll have him for you tomorrow morning. The exact time and location will need to be confirmed. But as you wish, you’ll get him tomorrow.”
“How did that happen?” Judd’s eyes narrowed. “What did you just do?”
“You want Tunde Babatunde back. I will get him back.”
“But how?”
Bola took a deep breath. “Is it not better that you do not know, my friend?”
“How did you have the phone number of the kidnappers? I mean, how did you even know whom to call?”
Bola only smiled back.
“What are we supposed to tell Washington?” Judd asked.
“You will tell them you got their basketball player back.” Bola put his hand on his heart. “And you did not pay any ransom.”
Judd ran through all the inevitable questions he would face from Landon Parker.
“You don’t know anything else,” Bola said. “Because I’m not telling you.”
“That’s right,” Isabella said. “If we will get Babatunde back tomorrow, you can tell the truth,” she shrugged. “You don’t know how.”
“Don’t you think it’s suspicious that we arrive in Lagos, meet with a judge, and voilà, Babatunde is free?” Judd asked. “Is anyone in Washington possibly going to believe that’s the whole story—that you can resolve a kidnapping with a simple phone call?”
Isabella shrugged again.
“Are you even certain it was a kidnapping, my friend?” Bola asked softly.
“Yes!” Judd insisted. “He was taken from his car on the bridge by gunmen. You know this.”
“I know that sometimes things are not what they seem. Is this problem a kidnapping or a misunderstanding?”
“What?” Judd winced.
“If there is no kidnapping, then there can be no ransom. Am I not correct?”
“I don’t understand, Bola.”
“Nigeria, my friend,” Bola said, planting a fatherly hand on Judd’s shoulder. “Nothing here is what it appears. You Americans come with your satellites and your drones, but you don’t know the people. That’s my job. To clean up Nigeria, I need to know the people, their relationships, their history, especially their obligations.”
“Obligations? I don’t understand.”
“Precisely, my friend. That’s why you have come here. That’s why I can pick up the phone and solve your problem. That’s why you need me. And when I come to America and don’t understand your system, then I will need you.”
“I still don’t get it.”
“Once we get Tunde Babatunde back tomorrow, you can go back home. Quickly and victorious.”
“I like the sound of that,” Isabella said.
Judd’s mind was racing with questions that he knew were better not to ask. Questions where the answers would only make things . . . more complicated.
“So now we wait,” Bola said. “What would you like to do today?”
A new idea flashed in his head. “What about advance fee fraud?” Judd asked. “Can you solve a problem with the 419ers?”
“Ahhh, the Yahooze Boys. What do you want to know?” Bola asked.
“Judd, what are you doing?” Isabella looked nervous.
“Another case. A missing American. We think he disappeared in London after getting entangled with a 419 ring. While we wait for Babatunde to be released, can you help me?”
“I don’t think we want to ask the kind judge for another favor, Judd,” Isabella said.
“Who is he?” Bola asked.
“A young bond trader named Jason Saunders. I don’t know if he was a random victim or if he was . . . on the shadow list.”
“Judd, please!” Isabella barked. “Don’t waste the judge’s time with rumors.”
“I can connect you to the Yahooze Boys,” Bola said nonchalantly.
“I really don’t think that’s necessary,” Isabella insisted, gripping Judd’s arm. “We need to get back to Washington ASAP.”
“Bola can fix problems with a phone call,” Judd replied, shaking off Isabella’s grip. “As long as we got a free day.”
“It’s very okay, my friend,” Bola said, standing between them and taking each of their hands in his. “Special Agent Espinosa, I will do this, too. For a friend. I will connect you to the Yahooze Boys who run the 419. Yes. I will introduce you to the Coyote.”
33
ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA
THURSDAY, 7:48 A.M. MOSCOW STANDARD TIME (12:48 A.M. EST)
Motherfucker, Jessica thought. The Deputy Director of the CIA was really messing with her this time.
She sat at a musty café on a dank side street off Nevsky Prospekt drinking bitter watery coffee and reading the morning Izvestia newspaper. The coffee was supposed to help wake her up after the sleepless last leg of her trip. A little caffeine to keep her sharp after the long flights and identity changes at stopovers in Paris and Dubai and Istanbul. But this coffee was dishwater.
She lifted the cup to force down another gulp, casting her eyes toward the alley and the back door to the nightclub. The Kitty Kat Klub was closed at this hour, but there were three beefy men in cheap suits standing stiffly at the door, trying to stay out of a light rain. She noted multiple security cameras monitoring the door and at the entrance to the dead-end alley. Motherfucker.
Her mission was to convince the Bear that she was Queen Sheba—a superefficient contract assassin who was a creation of U.S. intelligence—and receive her next target. She had flown all this way, gone through all this effort, in order to discover the Bear’s next move. Was his network expanding into lethal new businesses? Were they merely a criminal enterprise or was he connected into the FSB, the Russian security service? Into the Kremlin? What was the Bear’s game?
Jessica was under strict orders not to kill the Bear. But first she had to find him.
A few hours earlier Jessica had landed at the St. Petersburg airport under cover as a United Nations official. Jessica had to admit that was a nice touch from the CIA station in Turkey. The UN passport ensured that a young black woman could enter Russia without too much hassle. She had already ditched that identity, along with any potential tails from Russian intelligence, by changing taxis and sneaking out through the back of the city’s early-morning meat market. Now she was casing the nightclub, downstairs from where the CIA believed the Bear ran his operation. She just needed to get inside and upstairs.
This wasn’t how Jessica normally operated. For a sensitive mission like this, she would have insisted on her own team constructing everything from scratch. Purple Cell should have originated the backstory, created her persona, run surveillance on the targets, determined her infiltration routes, mapped the risk contingencies, and simulated the exfiltration plans. It should have been her operation from start to finish.
Instead the Deputy Director had forced her into some half-baked story about a Russian-speaking Somali contract killer. The whole plan rested on the Bear believing Jessica’s identity that she barely believed herself. Her proof would be her demeanor, her confidence, and one special little gift. It was anything but a normal operation. Motherfucker.
A shiny jet-black Land Rover pulled up to the club and one of the guards opened the back door. A pale bald man in a snug dark suit got out and quickly disappeared inside. She downed the coffee, threw a hundred-ruble note on the table, and strode across the street.
“Pardon me, is this the way to the Church on Spilled Blood?” she asked in flawless Russian to the tallest of the security men at the back door to the Kitty Kat Klub.
“Spilled Blood? Why would a pretty girl like you want to go to a place like that?” he asked, looking her up and down.
“It is beautiful, no?”
“The church is beautiful, but why would a girl like you go there when there are so many more”—he paused—“exciting things to do in Saint Petersburg?”
“Like what?” Jessica straightened her shoulders and playfully tilted her head to the side. “Where can I find some real fun?” she said innocently, taking another step toward them.
“You are in the wrong part of the city,” another said brusquely. “You are lost.”
“Lost?” she asked, moving closer.
The third, shorter man flanked to one side, the three goons now surrounding her in a tight circle.
“How did we ever find an African princess who speaks beautiful Russian?” the first one said. “Are you a student in Moscow?”
“Not a student,” she said.
“A dancer?”
Jessica was close enough she could smell cigarettes on his breath. “Not a dancer.” She held out her palms. “Can’t you tell what I am from these?”
The thug winced in confusion. “A girl . . .”
Jessica slowly closed her hands into two tight fists.
One, she thought, looking out of the corner of her eye at the security camera trained on them. She counted two, using her peripheral vision to space the three men and judge the exact location and height of each. She sucked in a deep breath . . . three.
Her right fist collided with a bone-cracking snap on the chin of the tall man in front. As she drew back her right hand, she twirled and unleashed a sharp left, crushing the soft trachea of the second thug. As he grabbed his throat in agony and doubled over, Jessica released a back kick to the groin of the third man. A fierce uppercut to his nose sent the short one sprawling flat on his back. She spun and swept the leg of goon number two, then knocked him out cold with a quick snap punch to head.
She squared herself and faced the tallest goon, who was still dazed and trying to regain his balance. She snatched his wrist and violently twisted, spinning him around and dislocating his shoulder with a pop. Jessica grabbed the back of his head and held it up to the camera. A drip of blood oozed from his nostril.
A few seconds later the door buzzed and clicked open.
She released the man and surveyed the damage. Three down. Time to go to work.
“Not a girl. Not a princess,” Jessica told them. “I’m the queen.”
And then she stepped inside.
34
LAGOS, NIGERIA
THURSDAY, 5:52 A.M. WEST AFRICA TIME (12:52 A.M. EST)
The sign out front was a nice touch. Innocent Chop House.
Kayode had come up with the name himself. Mama Oyafemi always made the most delicious home-cooked goat pepper soup and fried the sweetest plantains. It was only natural that her restaurant would provide the perfect front for his growing operation. The Innocent Chop House would deliver a secret cover and a tasty lunch.
Right now, however, it was nearly 6:00 a.m. and Kayode was thinking about . . . dinner. He had just finished a long overnight shift and he was famished.
Kayode loosened the belt around his jeans and walked into the main café. “Mama, I wan chop,” he said to the woman sitting on a stool in the corner, huddling over a steaming cup of tea.
“Why do you still talk like that?” Mama Oyafemi scolded.
“I’m sorry. It’s been a long night. What are you serving, Mama?”
“Ewa and agege is the special. It’s almost ready.”
“Beans and bread? I don’t want breakfast,” he pretended to whine. “What do you have for your five-to-nines?”
Kayode was right. Many enterprising Nigerians had a day job plus another side business, something to supplement their income by selling, hustling, scrapping�
��anything to get by during the off-hours: the five-to-nines.
“It’s almost six o’clock, eh?” she countered. “You are too late.”
“Please, Mama. I am working extra now. I need fuel.”
The two of them bantered playfully back and forth in their usual way until she agreed to reheat a bowl of edikaikong, a hearty crayfish-and-meat soup, left over from the previous night’s shift.
“Thank you, Mama,” he said.
“Come back in ten minutes,” she commanded.
Kayode returned through the back door into the hub of his operation, which he called Wall Street. His inspiration was the climax scene from his favorite movie, Eddie Murphy’s Trading Places. Kayode had watched the film years ago on a TV powered by a car battery at a friend’s house in Ikeja and he remembered howling with laughter at Murphy’s cunning Billy Ray Valentine, a homeless black man who turns the tables on two greedy old rich white men, out-tricking the tricksters. He swapped the stolen intelligence with a false plant about orange juice futures! Ha! He had roared in laughter as they fell into the trap! And then, the big climax, Billy Ray took the old men for everything they had! It was one of the moments that led Kayode to become a Yahooze Boy in the first place.
In reality, Kayode’s Wall Street was two forty-foot shipping containers connected end to end. He’d procured them, with a sizable discount, through one of the neighborhood boys who worked security at the Lagos port. Kayode had customized the inside into an efficient workspace, each long wall lined with computer terminals. This allowed Kayode to pace the center aisle and keep a close eye on his troops. A station at the far end of the container held the latest laser printer for special projects. Electric cables were tacked along the ceiling, connected both to the local grid and to a giant diesel generator chained to the exterior and guarded 24/7 by a rotation of Kayode’s cousins. Lately the generator had been running nearly full-time.
At this early hour, each of the two dozen computer stations was occupied by young men and women, mainly teens plus a few veterans in their early twenties.
Kayode spied Femi, his youngest recruit at just fourteen, who was already showing great promise. He wandered over and read over Femi’s shoulder.
