The Sam Reilly Collection Volume 2

by Christopher Cartwright

  He nodded his head, but remained silent.

  “In the Saharan desert?” She smiled. It was practiced, and teasing, generally capable of making any man open up to her. “Not a lot of diamonds found in the Sahara, you know.”

  “I know, we didn’t find any,” Sam said.

  “Are you going to tell me anything, or shall we go our own ways.”

  “That depends,” Sam said.

  “On what?”

  “On how much you know about the United Sovereignty of Kongo?”

  “Nothing,” she lied. “Should I have?”

  “They were a small group of people who wanted to overthrow the current dictatorship in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Their leader stems from a modern-day Bundu dia Kongo sect favoring the reviving of the original kingdom of Kongo through secession from Angola, the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Gabon.”

  She projected an appearance of indifference, but her mind immediately raced to her self-professed body guard in Sahara, Adebowale. He had once told her his family, who were leaders in the Bundu dia Kongo movement had been killed when he was just a young boy, and he’d spent his entire life trying to find a means of returning. Adebowale had told her their two lives had been intertwined for centuries since his great ancestor, a Kongo king, had been saved by her great ancestor – and that one day, the great prophecy would come true, and their families would unite Africa with a success never before seen throughout history.

  “So, what’s new?” she asked.

  “This one has the backing of the U.S. Government.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  She walked in silence for a while. Contemplating what Sam had told her. It seemed impossible to her, but so did a lot of other things until forty-eight hours ago.

  Is it possible Nostradamus knew I would meet Sam Reilly?

  She asked. “I thought you guys didn’t take sides anymore in non-elected rebellions and leadership coups. Didn’t you learn your lesson, after Saddam Hussein?”

  Sam smiled, like he’d heard the same argument before. “We don’t. Not publically, anyway. But they have a new leader, and this guy looks to be the real deal. Someone who might just have a chance of stopping the merry-go-round cycle of changing dictatorships, each one more ruthless and dangerous than his predecessor. Current Intelligence Agencies from around the world believe the current dictator is going to send Africa into one of the greatest wars the world has ever seen. In contrast, our person has the chance to bring some real long-term stability to the region. He paid a hundred million dollars in uncut diamonds in exchange for modern weapons to initiate his coup. An American agent confirmed the diamond exchange had taken place, and was just in the process of extracting the diamonds when he went missing.”

  “Who’s the guy?” she asked.

  “What guy?”

  “Who’s the leader of the United Sovereign of Kongo?”

  “We don’t really know.”

  She stared at him, flummoxed. “Your government offered a hundred million dollars worth of weapons to fund a coup, whose leader you don’t even know?”

  “We know about him. I know. It sound ridiculous.”

  “It is ridiculous,” she said, emphatically.

  “The truth is the entire movement is underground. When West Berliners talked about changing government before the wall came down in 1988 they couldn’t do so openly. Instead, they had a series of communication codes, hand gestures, and signs to show what side they’re on. Our agents estimate if the DRC were to have a truly democratic election today, the leader of the USK would win with an approval rating in the high eighties. What’s more, we believe, he has the possibility of uniting a part of Africa that has struggled with rebel wars and famine for many years.”

  She shrugged as though she really didn’t care what happened to the war torn nation. “And so what happened? He lost the diamonds in the desert, and the U.S. government thought to send you to find them again?”

  Sam grinned. “Yeah, you’d be surprised how close you are…”

  “Why go to the trouble? Why not send the dictator they want to support the weapons? It would serve the same purpose? Why the search for diamonds?”

  “Because, as you said, the American government has a policy not to take sides in foreign policy. In this instance, we’re merely selling weapons to a private investor.”

  “That sounds like a pretty weak excuse,” Zara said. “So how did you end up here?”

  “The leader of the USK was siphoning blood diamonds out of the DRC to fund his regime. It was a dangerous game, but he has such a devout following that he was able to take great risks. He was able to access the diamonds, but the problem came when he wanted to get them out of the region. The least guarded, and therefore safest route, ended up being through the Sahara desert.”

  “So what happened?”

  “There was a system. One of his men would travel into the desert, stockpile the diamonds, and then return to camp. Then someone from our side, outside the region would go and retrieve the diamonds.”

  “So what went wrong?”

  “Six months ago, the transporter from the outside – our guy – disappeared.” Sam paused. “Without any means of discovering that his partner was dead, the first guy in the process, kept depositing the diamonds. Stockpiling a fortune. That was over six months ago now.”

  “And you think he’s been throwing them into a waterhole?”

  “Yes. Where else could you put them?”

  “Why not bury them in the sand?”

  “You’ve spent long enough in the desert to realize that people can always track a person in the sand. Especially one that comes out into the desert every week. No, he’s come to a waterhole, dumped his diamonds inside a secure vault and then returned. That way, if questioned he could simply argue he was searching for water and returned. All waterholes are covered in footprints.”

  “So you’re still involved in the military?”

  “No.” Sam laughed. “I’m done with that life. Tom and I are here, purely as treasure hunters, hired by the American government to retrieve some stolen diamonds.”

  “Plausible deniability, if something goes wrong?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Any luck finding them?”

  “No.”

  “Really?”

  “Do you see me carrying a few additional bags of highly overpriced carbon?”

  She looked at him and shook her head. “Where were you going to look next?”

  “We weren’t,” Sam said, emphatically. He pulled out a map from his top pocket. It looked old. Maybe circa 1950s, but relatively little changed in the Sahara during that time. It had been recently laminated to protect it from water. Sam passed the map to her. “We’ve dived all of the waterholes in this region without any luck. We were going to head home tomorrow. That was before we met you, of course.”

  “Have you tried expanding your search grid?” she asked, unsure why she even cared whether the American government received its diamonds to fund a war she knew little about and cared even less for.

  “No. We’re certain it’s in there.”

  “How can you be?”

  “Because someone kept watch on our guy for the past six months leading up to his disappearance. We know exactly where he’s been. We know every single waterhole he’s been to.”

  “You’ve been spying on him?”

  “First of all, it wasn’t us. It was our employer. And secondly – of course they were spying on their own agent. You think they’d entrust a single one of their agents with a hundred million in uncut diamonds without keeping an eye on their investments?”

  “Do you have a map of all the watering spots where you think he’s traveled?”

  Sam nodded and handed it to her.

  Zara shook her head. “Can I have another look at your map?”

  “Sure, but like I said, we’ve dived every one of them now. We must have got it wrong somehow. He must have b
een using a different technique.”

  She stared at it for a minute. “How do I know which ones you’ve visited and which ones you haven’t?”

  “For starters, we’ve visited them all.”

  “All of them?” She gently bit the bottom of her lip as she thought about the region. She’d traveled through the area many times and used every well and every waterhole at some stage, previously. “Are you certain?”

  “Yes. Everyone on that map.”

  “And the waterholes on this map are marked with a small circle?”

  Sam nodded. “A U inside the circle means underground, such as a well, and an O inside the circle means aboveground, such as an oasis.”

  Zara looked at the map again. “What about the ones not marked on this map?”

  “There are no other waterholes in the region. This map has all of them. This is the same map as our agent.”

  Zara grinned. “Then you missed one.”

  “No. We’ve dived every single waterhole on this map.”

  Her eyes glanced at the dozen or so waterholes and then stopped. “You’ve missed one.”

  “No. We’ve tracked his movements through satellite imaging. These are the only places he travels through his round south to north and returned circuits which have matched up with the other seller.”

  She shook her head. “No. You definitely missed one. There’s a secret well dug here. It’s very old, deep, and covered when not in use. Rumor is that the old Berbers built it more than a thousand years ago. Few still use it. And those who know about it try to keep it a secret. But it’s definitely there.”

  “How can you be so certain it still exists?”

  “Because I used it two months ago.”

  She drew an asterisk on the map, approximately ten miles ahead of them. “It’s right here.”

  She watched Sam study the map and grin. “Are we going to pass this spot, the way we’re going?”

  She matched his smile. “You bet we are! In less than twenty-four hours I hope to be filling my water flask at that well.”

  Zara looked at Sam. He looked pleased, but not surprised. Like a person accustomed to getting lucky, or making it when he was all out luck. His grin said life was one big game and he wanted to enjoy every minute of it. It was arrogant and cute at the same time. Of course she was happy to help the man who’d saved her life, twice in the past day. But there was a small part of her, albeit not a very good part of her if she were to be honest, that almost wished he would search the well and discover the diamonds weren’t there – just to see the smug grin fall from his face.

  A moment later she saw how that would look. Because in the distance, she heard the distinct sound of a single engine plane flying low, which meant they were either super lucky and about to be rescued, or General Ngige had a spotter plane in the air, and everything they’d achieved was about to come to nothing.

  Be careful what you wish for…

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The light aircraft’s engine hummed in the sweeping sand-filled expanse of the Erg of Bilma. The volume increasing with every second. Sam searched the bluish-white sky behind the three of them for the first sign of the machine. He wished Tom hadn’t gotten so far ahead. Not that it mattered, Tom could hear as well as he could, and would have already taken action. Sam watched as the tiny aircraft, no more than a four person, single engine plane, broke the horizon of a distant sand dune.

  It was flying at approximately a thousand feet he guessed. Much too low for a charter plane in the process of ferrying passengers in-between oasis towns. That meant it was searching for something – it was looking for them.

  He looked at Zara and yelled, “Hide!”

  Zara slid down the crest of the sand dune. Sam followed her. Each of them shimmied their bodies side to side until they were mostly consumed by the sand. Anything to deceive the pilot and spotters. He looked directly at her. If the pilots spotted anyone it would have been him, and not her. She looked like she blended into the sand.

  Her eyes were wide, but showed no fear. “Do you think this will work?”

  “I doubt it.”

  Sam heard the constant hum of the engine reduce pitch. The pilot had seen something and was taking the aircraft down to get a better look. The aircraft sounded like it was coming in close enough to land, although Sam knew there was no way any pilot could be coaxed to put a plane down in such deep and undulating sand. He took a deep breath and buried his face in the sand – as the aircraft flew mere feet overhead of the sand dune.

  He rolled to his side and saw the plane’s fixed undercarriage was so low he could have almost jumped up and grabbed it. A moment later the engine increased pitch and the aircraft climbed.

  “Damnit!” Sam said as he threw off his backpack and removed the AK-47 he carried slung over his shoulder.

  Sam loaded the 32 round magazine into the bolt and took aim at the aircraft, which was already becoming a tiny dot in the sky. He cursed himself for not preparing to shoot earlier. It would have been an easy shot as the damned aircraft flew overhead at a few feet above his head. Now it climbed rapidly, making it nearly impossible to hit. There was no doubt they’d been spotted. No other reason for the plane to maneuver as it had.

  If there was any doubt in his mind about the pilot’s intentions, they were crushed when the pilot released a thick trail of smoke as he climbed. The bastard was making an arrow into the sky. The aircraft then circled and began descending in a line next to the first one.

  Sam didn’t wait to see what the pilot was trying to write. Either way, it was obvious he was trying to draw a target on their back so that the hoard of pursuers would find them. Sam firmly shoved the butt of the AK-47 into his shoulder. He closed his left eye and lined up the front sight block with the aircraft’s windshield using his right eye.

  His breathing naturally fell into a rhythm.

  Inhaling slowly.

  Exhaling slowly.

  On the first natural respiratory pause – the moment when the diaphragm naturally relaxes and the lungs neither inhaled nor exhaled – Sam squeezed the trigger. He emptied the entire 32 round magazine at the cockpit. The shots went wide and the pilot continued to control the aircraft. It was an impossible shot and he’d missed. The aircraft angled out of its dive and headed toward Zara and him.

  Did the pilot have access to a machine gun?

  It seemed unlikely. Otherwise the pilot would have simply shot them when he first had the chance and claimed the prize all for himself. Sam’s eyes locked onto the pilot’s face. He was still too far to make out any real image, but the eyes looked focused and the aircraft was coming straight at them. His mouth, if that was even what Sam was seeing, appeared fixed in a sinister grin. Zara was already running along the sand dune and so, Sam dived down it – trying to increase the distance between the two of them.

  And then he heard the staccato of shots being fired.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Sam rolled over and took a deep breath in. He looked at the aircraft now past him. It flew level and parallel to the sand dune. It’s right wingtip no more than ten feet from the dune. His shoulder was sore, where he landed, but he felt all right. He touched his face and the back of his head and then looked at his hands. There was no blood. His head was okay. He then ran his hands over his torso, hips and legs. Still no blood. He stood up. His shoulder hurt, but he could move it all right. Nothing that would kill him. He shook his head. Unable to imagine how any pilot would miss a shot like that, and then it struck him exactly how a pilot could miss such a shot.

  “Zara!” He ran diagonally up the sand dune toward her.

  She stood to meet him. “I’m okay.”

  He reached her, wrapping his arms around her. It was half an embrace and a panicked desire to see where she’d been hit. He ran his hands over her shoulders and back. Then withdrew from her and looked at her face.

  “Turn around,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “I need to see if you’ve
been shot.”

  “I haven’t!”

  He walked around her, checking her out. She looked okay.

  She smiled at him. “I’m okay, Sam. But it’s nice to know you care.”

  He grinned suddenly. No longer looking at her. He watched as the aircraft’s right wingtip clipped the side of the sand dune and slid down the steep decline. Sand tore through its prop, and over the wings. It skidded until finally coming to rest four hundred feet away.

  Sam said, “Tom must have fired those shots!” He then picked up his AK-47, loaded another 32 round magazine, and looked at the downed aircraft. “Come on Zara, let’s go.”

  She said, “I hate to burst your bubble, but there’s no way you’re going to be able to repair it, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  He ignored her comment and kept running.

  Sam left deep footprints in the sand dune as he followed the trail the aircraft left when it skidded down the dune. The entire front end of the aircraft was buried in sand. A mangled arm of the propeller raising out from the sand, the only evidence of the engine below. The windshield was mostly buried.

  He lifted the AK-47 and aimed it toward the door.

  “Anyone alive in there?” he shouted.

  No response.

  Zara placed her hand on his shoulder. “He took a big hit when the nose ploughed into the sand. I don’t think we’re going to find him alive.”

  Sam nodded. Hoping she was right. He then spotted Tom running toward them. He waited until Tom arrived. No reason to get shot by a near-dead pilot out of impatience.

  He heard Tom’s heavy breathing approach. “Nice shoot, Tom.”

  “Thanks.” Tom looked at the wrecked aircraft. “What did I miss?”

  “Nothing by the looks of things. We’re trying to work out whether we have a live pilot or not here. Do you want to cover me, and I’ll find out what?”

  Tom raised his weapon and aimed at the door. “Go for it.”

  Sam stepped forward and unlatched the door handle. The sand was keeping the door wedged shut. He dug away a bundle of the sand using his hands only until he could open it a little. “If you’re alive in there, I want you to know, we’re going to get you out of there. But I’d really appreciate not being shot in the process.”