The Night Ranger Page 16
Scott Thompson. Resting in nothing like peace. Wells would have to leave him here. Before he did, he leaned close, examined the body. Two shots in the chest, close range. They didn’t look like AK rounds to Wells, though he couldn’t be sure. He looked away, saw a glint in the wall. A metal ring. A chain hung from it.
He clamped down on the acid rising in his throat and checked the rest of the hut. Three more empty rings in the walls. The other hostages, gone. Why had Scott been killed and left? Had he fought the kidnappers? Was his death a message to James Thompson? Wells wished he had a forensic team helping him. Instead he had a headlamp and Wilfred. Who called to him now, urgently.
“John.”
Wells stepped outside. The sun hit him, and before he could stop himself his stomach clenched viciously. Bile coursed through his throat and into his mouth, and he vomited a thin brown muck that the dirt swallowed instantly.
He groped in his pack for a bottle of water. He gulped until his cheeks were full, swished, spat. And again. Rinse and repeat. Anything to hide the angry sour taste. He poured a second bottle over his face and hands, hoping the lukewarm liquid would wash away the stink. As he tilted up his head, he couldn’t help but see the vultures dirtying the sky. Death and its minions were everywhere in this camp.
“Listen,” Wilfred said.
In the distance, to the north: The hive-of-bees buzz of a dirt bike engine revving high. And a second, meshing with the first.
“Coming this way,” Wilfred said. “If we had the Cruiser—”
“We don’t.”
“What then?”
“We kill them.”
“Mzungu. That some sickness. Don’t even know them, what they want—”
“We kill them. Unless you’d rather they kill us.”
10
SOUTHWESTERN SOMALIA
After the man in the black T-shirt made his three-word speech—You’re mine now—Gwen and Hailey and Owen were led into the Range Rover and blindfolded and driven through the silent African night. Gwen felt like she was in a plane that had suddenly spiraled into a dive. She was terrified, but also helpless, and that helplessness distanced her from the insanity that her reality had become. She felt almost as if she were starring in a movie of her life: Taken 2: Africa. Or would that be Taken 2 Africa? Anyway, she wished someone could tell her whether it would have a Lifetime-style happy ending or be more of a downer.
It had been a downer for Scott, for sure. She didn’t want to believe he’d been in on the kidnapping. Maybe he’d had another reason to ask about Suggs. Maybe he was confused, or scared to have a gun pointed at him.
But he hadn’t sounded scared to Gwen. He’d sounded pissed.
Then he’d died.
Gwen had never seen anyone die before. She’d hardly been to any funerals even. Her parents and grandparents were still alive. Two of her mom’s friends had died of cancer, which seemed nasty. You looked bad, then you looked better and everybody got excited and took you out to dinner. Then it came back and your hair fell out and you went into the hospital and turned yellow and died. That was two funerals. And one of her high school classmates had died in a drunk-driving accident. So Gwen wasn’t unfamiliar with the concept of mortality. But she had always had a difficult time believing that death would ever come to her or her immediate family. Especially not since her sister pulled through that car accident. Death was something that happened to other people. People who weren’t as lucky or beautiful or American as she was.
She wanted to believe Scott would be waiting at the next hut. But she couldn’t escape the reality of what she’d seen, the You shot me shock in Scott’s eyes before they glazed over like a shower door closing. No, Scott wouldn’t be apologizing. He had seen his plan, whatever it was, going bad, and he had lost his temper and spouted off. Just like he had a hundred times at frat parties and football games and wherever else he thought he was cool enough to get away with being a jerk. Which was everywhere. Only this time he hadn’t gotten a beer poured over his head. He hadn’t gotten into a slappy sloppy fight that stopped before anybody got hurt. He’d gotten himself killed. He’d learned the hard way that in Africa death wasn’t shy around the young. It didn’t just hang out at nursing homes. It slipped the bouncer a twenty and came to dance at the club.
Yep, Scott was finally the tough guy he’d always pretended to be. Part of Gwen wanted to congratulate him. And ask, by the way, what have you gotten us into? But he wouldn’t be around to answer that question either.
—
They drove awhile. At least an hour. At one point, a prop plane passed overhead. The Range Rover abruptly stopped. They waited in silence for several minutes, then drove on. No explanation.
When they stopped again, Gwen heard men nearby. Her door opened. She was shouldered out of the truck and guided along a rough path. She was still blindfolded and cuffed, and once she stumbled and nearly fell, but a firm hand held her. The path flattened. For a few seconds, Gwen caught the rank odor of raw sewage. Then the stink was gone. Not much later she felt a squeeze on her shoulder. She stopped walking and someone uncuffed her hands and lifted off her blindfold. She found herself with Hailey and Owen in the center of a bush settlement, fifteen or twenty mud-brick huts. No lights. If the place had a generator, it wasn’t running.
Wizard and another man led them to a hut nearby, shined a flashlight inside. Three blankets lay on the ground, along with two pairs of sweat suits. No chains or handcuffs.
“A guard will be outside,” Wizard said. “You need the toilet, you tell him. You go one at a time. You two”—he waved the flashlight at Gwen and Hailey—“wear those”—he pointed at the sweat suits—“when you’re outside. My men are Muslim, and some will be happier if you stay covered. As for food, whatever we eat you’ll eat.”
“We’re not locked in?” Owen said.
“This is Somalia. Believe me, you’re safer with me than anywhere else. We’ll protect you.”
Like you protected Scott, Gwen wanted to say. But she couldn’t see any upside in making this man mad.
“Sir?” Hailey said. “Mr. Wizard? Can we ask you one more question?”
“If it’s not trouble.”
“Are you from the Shabaab?”
Wizard said something to the man with him and they both laughed. “You would like me to be Shabaab? You would feel better?”
“I meant no disrespect.”
“I’m not al-Shabaab. I took you for money. I want to get it and send you back where you belong. But I could sell you to them if you wish. Lots of people want to meet you. Maybe you see all of Somalia. Would you like that?”
“No, sir.”
“Tomorrow morning we take pictures. And email addresses and phone numbers to reach your families.” He handed Owen the flashlight, closed the door, a tin sheet with a half-dozen holes punched for air. They sat in silence as his footsteps faded.
Hailey spoke first. “It makes sense now, the last place.”
Gwen couldn’t see how anything made sense. She lay down and closed her eyes and exhaled softly, all the sadness in the world in that puff of air. Hailey seemed to understand. She took Gwen’s hand in her own. Her palm was warm and sweaty and sweet.
“How do you mean?” Owen said.
“I mean, the Joker’s mask, getting chained up, it felt like overkill. You know, the hoods were awful. But why didn’t they just beat us? It was all this other stuff instead. Like they knew they couldn’t hurt us physically, so they were looking for other ways to scare us. They knew they were going to set us free and they wanted to impress us.”
Gwen hadn’t felt that way at the time, but she saw the truth of what Hailey said. “Scott wanted us to have a crazy story to tell when we got back to Dadaab,” she said.
“Whereas this guy is the real thing,” Owen said. “Doesn’t waste time on making threats. Doesn’t need to. We just watched him
kill our friend. Somebody he thinks was our friend, anyway.”
“Our ex-friend,” Hailey said. Gwen felt the jittery laughter rising in her and didn’t fight it, because what better way to describe Scott? Ex-friend, ex-boyfriend, ex-human. Hailey squeezed her hand and the giggles passed.
“Bet he thought it was a big prank,” Hailey said.
“A dumb hazing stunt that went too far,” Owen said.
Then Gwen put the last piece together. “But it wasn’t his idea. James.”
“What about James?” Owen said.
“He did this.”
“You think the CEO of WorldCares set us up to get kidnapped?”
“She’s right,” Hailey said. “Think it through. Scott wouldn’t have given himself to Suggs without a guarantee he could get out. He wasn’t that crazy. And doesn’t James have that book coming out? We disappear for a couple weeks, come back, we’re all telling this story.”
“We got kidnapped for his book?” Gwen said.
They lay in silence, contemplating James Thompson.
—
“Before, we were protected, even if we didn’t know it,” Owen said a few minutes later. “No more.”
“Maybe James set this up, too,” Hailey said.
“And got his nephew killed? No, they were going to end it. Bring us back to Dadaab. Until this Wizard guy heard about us.”
“How? If the Kenyan police didn’t?”
“I’ll bet he knows what’s going on around here better than the cops. Yeah, they heard, came for us, took out Suggs and the Joker, now we’re here.”
“Now we’re here,” Hailey said.
“What I’m wondering, he said lots of people are looking for us.”
“No,” Gwen said. “He said lots of people want to meet us.”
“You’re right,” Owen said, drawing out the word like he couldn’t believe it. “What I’m wondering, what did he mean by that?”
“Hopefully, some SEALs who will helicopter in, come get us,” Gwen said. She could almost see them, wraparound sunglasses and tight T-shirts. “That would be ideal. I’d be glad to thank them. However they liked.”
“Try not to go back to being idiot Gwen,” Hailey said.
Gwen felt a flush spread up her neck. She was amazed that she had the energy in this place to care about a casual insult. But she did. She didn’t want to go back to being idiot Gwen.
“Maybe,” Owen said. “Maybe our families have made so much noise that the Army, the CIA, they’re on the hunt. I don’t know how fast that could happen. What I’m worried about is, these guys took us out of Kenya. What if somebody grabs us from them, brings us another hundred miles into Somalia? And what if the next group is Shabaab, and they don’t want to ransom us, they want to hold us forever for the publicity?”
“That Wizard guy looks like he can handle himself,” Hailey said.
“Suggs and the Joker thought so, too.”
“We can’t do anything about it anyway,” Gwen said.
“Maybe.”
“You think—”
“I think even if there’s a real risk, we see a chance to grab one of those Range Rovers we’ve got to go for it.”
“Try to escape? From an armed camp in Somalia?”
“If we see a chance. That’s all I’m saying. Doing nothing isn’t always the safest.”
“We don’t know the roads,” Gwen said. “We don’t know if there are any roads. These guys will shoot us if we make trouble. Wizard already proved it.”
“I’ll bet we’re no more than fifty miles from Kenya. Less. We weren’t in the cars that long.” Owen turned the flashlight on both of them and then on himself. He looked tired, worn, his skin stretched tight over his face. Gwen wondered how much weight they’d all lost. “Say I’m wrong, there’s no chance that anyone else is going to take us. We’re still stuck here. We got kidnapped barely a week ago and none of us is holding up that great. You want this to go a month? Six months?”
“Our families—”
“They can spend every dime they have, every dime these guys ask for, and there’s no guarantees anybody’s going to let us go. Some of these kidnappings go on for years. Promise me this. When they let us go to the toilet, get food, whatever, we’ll all do some recon.”
“Recon.”
“Figure out where they keep their weapons—”
“I know what it means, Owen.”
“If phones work here, Kenyan or Somali. Do they have dogs? Motorbikes? Stuff like that.”
Gwen couldn’t listen anymore. Like they could possibly get out of here on their own. She couldn’t bear the thought of being held for years, either. She closed her eyes, squeezed Hailey’s hand, tried to dream of soldiers in helicopters flying low over the dusty red plains.
—
She woke to find Wizard nudging her foot with his own. This morning he wore sunglasses to go with his black T-shirt and boots. “Picture time.” He was so young, yet he spoke with absolute command. She propped herself against the wall. He produced a cell phone and snapped pictures of her and Hailey and Owen. They gave him their email addresses and parents’ phone numbers and he left.
“You think there’s an Internet connection around here?” Hailey said.
“Let’s hope,” Owen said. “He emails from this camp, I’ll bet the CIA can trace it in about ten seconds.”
“He’s too smart for that,” Gwen said.
“He’s a kid playing at being a soldier. Probably can’t even read.”
“Scott talked down to him, too,” Hailey said. Owen had no answer for that.
Gwen’s bladder was uncomfortably full. She didn’t want to leave the hut, but she pulled on the sweat suit. It was cheap and scratchy. She would have sold her soul for a hot shower and a pair of brand-new undies and Lulu yoga pants.
The guard slumped on the chair outside was maybe seventeen. “Toilet,” Gwen said. “Latrine.” He pointed left. Gwen shielded her eyes, walked into the rising sun. The sky was mostly blue but the air heavy and moist, an unsettling combination. The camp felt dingy and temporary. Gwen didn’t see anyone older than twenty-five. Maybe Owen was right. If the Shabaab attacked, how could these guys defend them?
Something else bugged her, too. Women. There weren’t any. Maybe they were hiding somewhere, but Gwen didn’t see any high walls and all the huts looked the same. Maybe the ones with wives had sent them to Dadaab. Maybe they raided the local villages when they wanted women. Or maybe they just did without. And got horny. A couple soldiers stared at her like she was walking around in a bikini, not a sweat suit. Not that they said a word, but she didn’t feel great about being one of two women in a camp filled with armed men. Nothing to do with the fact that they were African, either. At least, she didn’t think so. Black, white, whatever, groups of guys this age could get ugly, sometimes without much warning.
She wondered again if Owen was right. At least she ought to try to work out the camp layout, like he’d suggested. Recon. It sounded good. A serious word. A professional word. She left the main camp area, walked to the latrines, three sheds of trash wood and burlap.
Up close, the smell overwhelmed her, sun-baked excrement and urine, eye-burning, throat-gagging. She recognized the odor from the night before. So they’d brought her along this path. Gwen decided to go past the sheds, see if she could find where the vehicles were kept. If anyone caught her, she would say she’d decided not to use the toilets, the smell had been too much. She double-checked to be sure no one was watching her and trotted past the sheds, away from the main camp. The path narrowed and curved around a low hill. A hundred yards on, a man sat on a lawn chair at the top of the hill. A floppy hat protected him from the sun. A rifle and binoculars were slung over the chair. As she watched, the man stood, shielded his eyes, took the binoculars and carefully surveyed the horizon from north to south.
She didn’t notice the man beside the shed until she was a step away. He wore a torn T-shirt and green cargo pants with a big oil stain down one leg. Gwen hoped it was an oil stain, anyway. He was broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted, with meaty hands and thick shoulders. All the weight training in the world couldn’t build muscles like his, but half the men in Africa seemed to have been born with them.
He raised a hand in a gesture that obviously meant stop. Gwen stopped, wished she hadn’t. She waved her hand in front of her nose like she was a nineteenth-century heroine with the vapors. “I couldn’t take the smell, you know, it’s so stinky—” She was jabbering now, hoping to drown him in a stream of English he didn’t understand. “I should probably get back to my hut, I have decorating to do—”
She stepped past him. He reached for her arm, pulled her close. She couldn’t help herself, she screamed—
—
Ten minutes later, she sat cross-legged in a half-built hut on the western edge of the compound. Today’s life lesson: She wasn’t cut out to be a secret agent. Her scream had brought men running. After some shouting and pointing, they’d led her back to the camp and the hut she shared with Owen and Hailey. Then they’d dragged her out again without explanation and dumped her here. This side of the camp was even more run-down than the eastern half. Two scrawny goats nosed at a pile of trash outside her hut. The hut next to this one seemed to have been converted into a repair shop for the dirt bikes these guys liked. At least two bikes were in the hut, and she’d seen a scrawny boy on his back, tinkering with an exhaust pipe. Now an engine turned over, came briefly to life, and stalled out. Even without knowing Swahili, she understood the curses that followed.