Logan needed her phone.
He woke Park. Her eyes popped open at the same moment she swung her legs out of bed and pulled a pistol from under her pillow. In one smooth motion, she was standing with a pistol in her waistband, fully-clothed and ready to go. Damn, Logan thought. This woman is growing on me.
She smiled and said, in Korean, “Good morning.”
He kissed her. “Korean?”
“You need to practice,” she said. “Your pronunciation is terrible.”
He walked down the hallway and knocked on Sydney’s door. Sydney shouted back. “Down in sixty seconds.”
Juliette was already awake. That was everybody. Living with spies was a whole world of difference from college. A house full of agents could grow from sleeping to operating in under three minutes.
Park headed for the bathroom. Logan padded down the stairs to where Verlay was still watching out of the window. How to get her phone?
He remembered something Titus taught him. “How do you take something from a secret agent, Logan?” Titus had asked.
Logan ran through several different disarming techniques, lockpicking techniques, and persuasion methods. Titus just shook his head. “Here, give me your belt, I’ll show you.”
Logan pulled the belt out of his pants and handed it to Titus. Titus shook the belt at him. “You ask him for it. Agents are always expecting subterfuge and intrigue. Sometimes, just be blunt.”
He told Verlay, “Everybody’s up. If you want to use the bathroom before we move, you’re good to go.”
Verlay stood up and stretched. “Thanks.” She started to walk towards the first-floor bathroom.
He said, “Oh, hey, almost forgot. African Union uses a specific phone case. I’ll put yours on.”
He held his hands up, ready to catch her phone.
Verlay said, “Good call.” She tossed her phone underhand to him and headed to the bathroom.
Okay, that was easy. Now, he just needed to get in her phone. He pressed the button to light it up. She used a pattern code—he needed to swipe a certain pattern to open the phone. The screen would log failed attempts. She’d know if he tried to open her phone if he messed up even once.
She turned the corner and disappeared down the hall for the bathroom. He slid over to the window, where the light was better. He held the phone flat with the screen up and looked across the top. If he could get the angle just right, this might work. He tilted the phone slightly until the screen caught the light. He finally found the angle he was looking for. The light bounced off the phone’s screen, revealing smudges where Juliette’s finger traced a pattern. Tiny bits of oil on her fingers marked the screen; swiping the same pattern over and over left tell-tale streaks.
He traced the pattern with his thumb, unlocking her phone. This was a work phone, so it didn’t populate with many apps. He opened the text messaging app first. There were several text messages to generic numbers. They were probably all dummy numbers that either went to the same place or they went nowhere. She texted numbers marked in French as “Mom” or “Brother” or “Henri from Work”.
Logan scrolled through them. They were generic messages too. It was all part of the act; if she got caught, she would need her cover to be tight. It would be incredibly strange for someone to have a phone with no text messages in it. Logan scrolled through some more of them. Finally, he got to messages sent to a French phone number. The number was labeled “Dog Walker”. These texts were sent yesterday and early in the morning while Juliette was on watch.
DOG WALKER: Do you need your dog walked today?
JULIETTE: In-country now. Brought the dog with me.
DOG WALKER: That’s a long flight. Is he good on planes?
JULIETTE: Time flew by.
JULIETTE: Going to walk him myself today.
DOG WALKER: Sounds good. I have yoga today anyway.
That was obviously a code. The exchange was too stilted to be one of the fake conversations to keep up her cover. Those were relaxed and conversational. This had the feeling of every word being chosen very carefully. Who is the dog in the code? What does it mean to walk the dog? The part about planes seemed pretty obviously about him flying the plane.
He heard her walking back down the hallway. He put her phone down on the chair. She walked in and looked at it.
“What happened to the phone case?” She asked.
Logan replied, “I realized I left them upstairs.”
He would have to assume that he was the dog and walking him was killing him. Juliette Verlay was going to kill him today.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The dew glittered on the cotton-like tiny diamonds on puffs of brown smoke. The sun began to burn away the morning mist, and the sky shone blue as painted water. A gentle breeze tussled the cotton bolls, causing them to roll like waves. The air smelled heavy with water as if rain might come later in the day.
The day progressed smoothly for a while. Park, Sydney, Juliette, and Logan climbed into the jeep with the bad second gear. Park drove again. Her steely calm and quick driving skills would be useful. Park behind the wheel of a car was almost as good as Logan in the cockpit.
They bumped along for a while, transferring from one dirt road to the next. Sometimes, they skidded onto a gravel road. Sydney’s phone was connected to satellite GPS. They were headed to a village called Bontemps. “Good Times” in French.
Logan wasn’t sure how they would know when they found the village in the middle of all the untamed wilderness and gravel, but it quickly became obvious. The trees suddenly opened up. The forest ended at the edge of someone’s field. Cotton lined this field; it was the familiar white cotton they were used to. The field looked like an ocean of clouds. The farmhouse was similar in style and vintage as the safe house where they were holed up.
They drove passed the farm and immediately passed another one. This farm was larger and the rows of white cotton were doubled. To Logan’s surprise, they approached a field of corn. It was smaller than the cotton fields. The farms were now getting progressively smaller. The town must not be far off. These postage stamp farms were drier and dustier with a variety of different crops. Most had just enough vegetable plants to sustain a family. Some plants looked like just leafy shrubs growing up out of the ground. Logan wondered what the product they provided was.
“That’s peanuts.” Sydney pointed out, “That’s potatoes. And I think the big leaves are yams.”
Logan smiled at her.
“I grew up in the South,” she replied.
“Of Denmark?”
They both laughed.
Eventually, they reached a small village. There seemed to be no design to the village except that the biggest homes were on the outskirts. At the edge of the village were large homes that would fit right in any suburb in the United States. The roads leading to them were paved. Past those, the houses got closer and closer together. They would still fit in with homes in the United States, but they looked like homes in rural areas. A few of them looked a lot like trailers.
A group of kids played soccer in a hard-packed field between a group of houses and a restaurant. Logan pointed over at them. Park drove up to the edge of their soccer field. A skinny kid with no shirt jogged over. He studied the Jeep up and down then he smiled and said in French, “You’re the Army?”
Juliette leaned forward. She spoke in French. That was, after all, why they brought her. “We’re with the African Union. We’re looking for anyone who knows about Menelaus.”
The boy’s brow darkened. His lips drooped, and he shook his head. “Oh no. I don’t know. Leave me alone.”
He turned to run but Juliette shouted after him. “Wait.” She pulled out twenty-five West African Francs, a currency Benin shared with a few other countries. She held out the bill.
The kid stopped and eyed the money like a thirsty man watches a glass of water.
Logan said to the kid, “We just need a name. Somebody who’s worked for him. No one has to know it was you.”
“Give me the money first,” the soccer player responded.
Juliette looked at Logan. Logan nodded.
She held the money out. The kid scooted forward, snatched the money, and then scurried back.
He said, “There’s a man at the market, Jean-Marie. He sells fuel but you can buy opium too. He gets it from the Spartans.”
“Thanks,” Juliette said.
The boy shoved the money in the pocket of his shorts and ran back to his game.
Park put the jeep in first gear and pulled away.
The market was a series of permanent and improvised structures along a series of dirt roads. Some of them were brick or wood buildings that stood there all the time. Others were booths like a street fair. Vendors planted broomsticks like flagpoles and hung sheets over them, so when they sat down, they could be protected from the harsh sun. Some of them displayed their crops spread out on blankets.
Park and Juliette stayed with the jeep. Sydney and Logan walked through the market on foot. The whole market stank of fish. It overpowered the smell of anything else. Flies buzzed past every vendor butchering a fish or cutting sweet vegetables. They fanned the flies away constantly.
The whole time, children on bicycles or skipping along through the market, shouted out whatever their parents came to sell. It was a slow day for the market, but still, there were people at every stall. Everywhere Logan turned, he bumped into someone who seemed in a hurry to get somewhere else.
They found a man selling diesel and gasoline. He was sitting on a 55-gallon drum of diesel fuel, surrounded by other drums of diesel and gasoline. His siphon was draped over one of the barrels. Customers would come to him with a container, and he’d fill it up for a price. Logan and Sydney watched him for a little while. The price seemed to change depending on how he felt or how pretty the woman buying it was. This seemed to be common knowledge though because Logan watched as a few men sent their wives to buy their fuel.
Sydney chuckled and said to Logan, “His wandering eyes are costing him hundreds.”
Logan nodded. “Some men just can’t help themselves.”
Sydney looked sideways at him. “Like how you helped yourself to Park?”
“She’s useful,” Logan responded, defensively.
“And hot,” Sydney added.
“Hot? I suppose,” Logan agreed.
They watched the fuel man work for a little while longer, looking for any sign that he was selling opium. They needed to be sure they had the right guy before they moved on him.
Sydney said, “Y’all shared a bed. Plenty of empty beds in the farmhouse though.”
Logan replied, “Nothing happened. I like the warmth of her.”
“I think you like her,” Sydney said.
Logan allowed himself just a moment, to be honest with himself. “I do. She saved my life.”
A slightly hunched man walked up to the fuel vendor. He was one of the few men without a woman’s help. He didn’t have a gas can. Sydney tapped Logan on the leg, but he was already watching. The fuel man and his customer talked for a minute or so.
The fuel man looked around for a minute then hopped off his 55-gallon drum. He popped the lid open on the drum and reached inside. He came out with a brown cube like a piece of caramel wrapped in brown paper.
He handed it to the customer who handed him francs. The customer wandered away, and the fuel man hopped back onto the drum.
“Got him,” Sydney said.
Sydney grabbed Logan’s hand, lacing her fingers between his. Good call. They were the only white people at this market and maybe in all of northern Benin. There were a few white people descended from French colonists but most of them had a certain look about them. Sydney and Logan were going to have to do this as American tourists, and tourists of different genders didn’t travel together unless they were a couple.
Sydney and Logan walked hand in hand.
Logan pretended to be nervous. In broken and stuttering French, he said, “Ummm, umm I heard that you have, like, you know, stuff.”
The fuel man smiled and nodded. He gave them a knowing, suspicious look, but he decided to continue with the nervous tourists anyway. In French, he said, “I have many things. What do you think you need?”
“You know,” Logan said. “We heard you have opium.” He whispered the word.
The fuel man’s mouth dropped open like a bad actor. He slapped his knee. “You are talking about illegal drugs, yes? I am an honest businessman.”
Sydney groaned. “C’mon, man. Help us out.”
The fuel man grinned like a Cheshire cat. “I am a law-abiding citizen. I have diesel, leaded, and unleaded. Not every African is a drug dealer, you colonizer.”
Logan groaned. Okay, they were going to have to do this differently.
He reached in his hand and pulled out 500 West African Francs. The fuel man’s eyes widened when he saw the money.
Logan said, “I guess I’ll just take all this money back to America with me.”
The fuel seller hopped off his drum. “Hold on. Hold on. I think we may have had a misunderstanding.”
Logan pulled out a handful of francs. The way the fuel seller’s eyes widened said it was the first time he’d ever seen that much money. It was a stack of 100 franc notes. It was about $20 American, but it was a fortune in Benin. Hopefully, it was enough to make a man turn on his supplier.
Logan said, “I don’t need a name. I don’t need you to betray anybody or anything. I just need to know where you go to pick up the opium.”
The fuel seller shook his head, while never taking his eyes off the money. “I can’t tell you that. They’ll kill me.”
“Have you ever been to America? Help us out, and I’ll sponsor you to move there.”
The seller’s eyes narrowed. “And the money too?”
Logan agreed. “And the money too.”
“Okay, I will draw a map for my American friends.”
* * *
The opium site wasn’t a dead drop, which Logan feared. It was an actual house where they processed and sold the opium. The house was known as the Syssitia, which was a dining club in Ancient Sparta. This Menelaus character was very committed to his theme.
Park drove the jeep. They parked it a half-mile away from the Syssitia and went the rest of the way on foot. Park and Juliette stayed with the car in case they needed to make a quick getaway. Sydney and Logan went together. They debated whether or not they should bring the AK-47s. Sydney was in favor of them, but Logan thought they would be too obvious. They agreed to take pistols instead. They carried Tokarev TT-33s, an outdated Soviet pistol that the Benin army used. They’d be lucky if the damn things didn’t jam.
The Syssitia was a pretty nondescript house in the middle of a forest of oil palm trees. The house was a long two-story Antebellum mansion. Abandoned by an American who thought he would make his fortune in the palm oil business. A couple of trucks were parked in front along with two dirt bikes.
Sydney asked Logan. “What’s the play?”
Logan responded, “The straight sell has been working for us. What do you say we just knock on the front door?”
Sydney laughed. “And say what? ‘Hello, we’d like to see the manager of this international drug cartel?’”
Logan nodded. “That’ll work. Let’s go with that.”
He started jogging towards the front door.
Sydney ran after him.
They walked onto the front porch. A camera on the porch focused on them. There was a doorbell with a camera, and a speaker as well. Logan lifted his fist to knock. Before he could knock, a deep voice through the doorbell speaker said, “Qu’est-ce que vous voulez?” What do you want?
Logan replied, “We’d like to see Menelaus. Is he in?”
The voice responded, in French, “You have sixty seconds or we’ll shoot.”
He heard guns cocking through the doorbell microphone. Logan looked at Sydney and mouthed “sorry”.
Sydney rolled her eyes
. “The AKs sure would be nice right about now. I bet they’ve got AKs.”
Logan nodded. “True. Let’s go take them.”
Sydney and Logan pressed themselves against the wall to either side of a window. They both pulled their pistols. The pistol sure felt inadequate in Logan’s hands compared to a powerful automatic rifle. It appeared, he’d slightly miscalculated the need for firepower but he was going to make it work.
He poked his gun hand towards the window. As soon as he did, a staccato burst of bullets tore through the window. The rhythmless booming of automatic gunfire shattered the window, spraying shards of plate glass onto the porch.
Sydney nodded and said, “Yep. They’ve definitely got AKs.”
“Thank you, Sydney. Thank you very much.”
Sydney bent down, making sure to stay clear of the window, and picked up a pretty large shard of glass. She held it out in front of her, angling it like a mirror. In the reflection against the blue sky, she saw three scrawny men holding AK-47s. They wore crimson tactical pants and gold tactical vests: the colors of Spartan warriors. This Menelaus was obsessed with metaphor.
One of them crouched beside a couch, ready to duck behind it if they returned any fire. He was in a low ready shooting position with perfect form. One of them lay prone with his rifle pointed at the door.
The third one stood at the top of a long staircase. They were positioned perfectly to disappear as soon as anyone tried to enter and then continue returning fire. Their uniforms were immaculate, nicer than the Beninese military that loaned them the jeep. Their AK-47s looked to be newer too. All of that drug money made Menelaus into a king with his own army.
Sydney flashed a series of hand signals to Logan that amounted to: if I can get the guy on the stairs, if you can get the two on the floor.
Logan agreed. She flashed her fingers again. Three…two…one.
Clean Cut Kid (A Logan Connor Thriller Book 1) Page 11