Kill The President's Women (Joe The Magic Man Series Book 2)

by Allan J. Lewis

  “Very funny, Joe.”

  “Sorry, I thought I’d cheer you up, you seemed a bit nervous.”

  “To answer your question Joe, we are here.” Alice paid the cab and walked up the street looking for someone who looked like he was going to midday prayers.

  “What about this old man?” Alice asked Joe telepathically.

  “No, try someone younger. Some of the older men don’t like women talking to them; we need someone who can talk to everybody. Try the young man behind him.”

  Alice asked the young man if there was a coffee shop nearby, and Joe was in his mind with no problem. The young man went into the mosque and Joe could see it through the young man’s eyes. The mosque was half-full and draped in multiple, beautiful colors. Joe, noticing the young man scratching his beard continually, decided to play a little joke on him.

  Masquerading as the young man’s subconscious, he said to him, “I wish I could shave this beard off.”

  The young man stiffened, unsure if those were his thoughts or if someone had spoken. He looked around him and concluded that those had, in actuality, been his own thoughts. He sniggered and said, “My father would disown me if I shaved this off.” He gave his beard another scratch.

  “I should just have a moustache like him over there.” Joe to him and the young briefly looked at another brother who was sporting a sleek moustache. “What would Fareed Azim say if I shaved it off?”Abel continued.

  The young man looked around for Fareed, and his thoughts were: “I really don’t care what Fareed Azim thinks.”

  Joe had got the boy to think he was just having daft thoughts, so he carried on. “I bet Idir is missing Fareed, or did Idir go away with him?”

  The young man’s eyes searched for Idir and found him standing on his own. “No, that’s him over there.”

  Joe now knew, for sure, which of the men was Idir but he wasn’t looking in the direction of the man Joe had inhabited and so it was impossible to make contact. He needed had to get the young man to look at Idir, so he played a little more with the young man’s mind.

  “I wonder if Idir and Fareed are lovers.”

  The young man’s jaw dropped open and he looked intently at Idir, wondering what on earth had made him think of that. “No way would Fareed Azim lower himself to fuck someone like Idir.” He shook his head violently, in an attempt to physically dislodge such vile thoughts, especially in the house of God.

  Joe put another thought in his mind. “I could go ask him if he’s heard from Fareed.”

  Again the young man shook his head at the ridiculous thought, but for some strange reason, he strolled over to Idir and looked at him with a questioning frown on his forehead.

  Idir looked back at him with a slight, polite smile thinking the young man was going to speak to him. The eye contact was all it took for Joe to jump from the young man’s mind into Idir’s.

  Free of Joe’s manipulation, the young man had refrained from saying a word to Idir and just stood there. Abel read Idir thoughts. They were simple: “Who does he think he is, looking down his nose at me like that?”

  “Yeah, you’re every bit as good as him.” Joe said to him. Idir agreed with the thought and so Joe went on. “But he was going to ask something, more than likely he was going to ask if I know where Azim is, and if he has a woman.”

  “If Azim had a woman,” Idir thought, “it would be Abbar he would tell, not me.”

  “Where is Abbar?”

  Idir gave Abbar a stern look as if Abbar had rudely called him, but he heard nothing. In any case, Abbar always ignored him.

  Joe took advantage of the look to jump minds again and he whispered delicately to Abbar. “Idir is lost without Fareed Azim; he thinks he’s got another woman on the side?”

  “Haha,” Abbar laughed at his crazy thoughts, “the only woman Azim has looked at lately is Anna Edmar because she’s got a nice ass. And he knows she wouldn’t even look at him.”

  Joe didn’t have a chance to ask any more as they were called to prayer at that moment. He could have stayed but and Joe, with his Jewish upbringing, thought it was best to leave them to their prayers in private. From his little mind travels, he didn’t think Abbar knew anything, and it was Idir he wanted to find more about. Joe popped back into Alice’s mind and was surprised to find her riding in a cab back to her hotel.

  “Oh yeah, send me in there with all those smelly feet, and then hightail it home.”

  “What a mouth Joe, how did it go?”

  “I’ve managed to make contact with Idir, and I’ll see what I can find out when he’s done praying.”

  “Well that’s a good start. I’ve got to get back to the hotel just in case Campbell and Burrows come calling, although I doubt that. They’ll be helping to look for Yasmina, Jamil and Azim. I bet you’ll find him before the FBI does.”

  “I don’t know about that, this Idir guy is a bit dense. I can’t see Azim telling him anything he would want kept quiet.”

  “He might know somebody that knows where Azim is,” Alice said, a little despondent.

  “Let’s hope so, and if not, I might come back here tonight with that first young man and try someone else.”

  “That sounds like a good idea, Joe. Someone must know where Azim is, he is one of the respected men in this community.”

  “We’ll see what I can find out from Idir first.”

  Joe stayed chatting to Alice until he thought Idir would have finished his prayers, and then he popped back into Idir’s mind. Idir had just come out of the mosque and was walking down the street on his way home.

  Joe picked a moment when Idir’s mind was in between thoughts and whispered, “It’s not the same in the prayer meeting without Fareed.”

  Idir stopped dead in his tracks and looked around. Seeing no one, he assumed it was his mind speaking so he shrugged and moved along. “Yeah, it’s not the same,” he agreed

  “They all want to know where Fareed Azim has gone, as if I am his keeper,” Abel whispered, hoping for some response.

  “Not all of them, just two of them.” Idir answered.

  “Why can’t they leave Fareed alone to go visit his friend for a couple of days, if that’s what he wants?”

  “It’s for a week,” Idir corrected his thoughts. “His friend told me it would be for a week.”

  “Yeah that’s right, he said a week.” Abel didn’t know what to make out of what he was reading in Idir’s thoughts or what to do, so he asked randomly, “How come he told his friend he was going for a week, and told the others he’d only be gone for a couple of days to visit a friend. What friend?”

  “It’s to do with business really, not to visit a friend.”

  “Yes, only you and his friends know that it’s business but Fareed wants them in the mosque to think he is visiting a friend.” Abel was playing with his thoughts, not wanting to frighten him off. “Huh, they think I’m daft in the head but I know more than them.”

  “Yes Idir is no idiot,” he replied, tapping his head with his knuckles. “I know he hasn’t gone far for his business.”

  “It may not be business, maybe Fareed has a mistress?”

  Idir stopped again. Such a thought upset him. “No, Fareed’s a good man, a loving man with good wife and devoted children.” He shook the thought from his head and hurried on.

  “Yes, yes, Fareed is too old to have a mistress, but why tell people he’s going to visit a friend, and not tell us who and where his friend lives, unless he’s got a mistress and he could be keeping her a secret.”

  The planted thought bothered Idir and he began to run it over in his mind. “So maybe that’s why his friend said to tell Fareed to leave the apartment as clean as he had found it.”

  Abel nearly flew into a frenzy with excitement. Fareed was in an apartment somewhere! He just had to probe more. “You don’t borrow a friend’s apartment to do business, but you do if you’re seeing a lady friend.”

  “
Fareed wouldn’t cheat on his wife.” Idir argued back but the doubt had already lodged itself in his mind “His friend just told me to tell him to keep the noise down because of the people in the shop below.”

  “I can’t remember what shop he told me the apartment was above?” Abel said gingerly, hoping for an address.

  “He didn’t tell me, he just gave me the package and told me to tell Fareed to make sure he keeps the noise down and leave the place tidy.”

  “I suppose I could go back to his friend and ask him where Fareed is staying?”

  Idir shook his head and spoke out in a mumble, saying “No, no” over and over. None of the passers-by paid him any attention. Quietly, to himself, Idir added, “I don’t know him; I just went to the café to pick up the keys.”

  “That’s right I went to that café, what’s it called…?”

  “The Casbah Coffee House,” Idir said, thinking he was replying himself and sticking up for Azim. “The keys were in the open envelope and I’m not going back there to check up on him.”

  Idir, without any pressure, was reliving that moment in inconsistent flashes and Abel was only getting bits and pieces that didn’t make much sense to him. Idir was annoyed with himself for thinking bad things about Azim. Abel felt his distress and figured he had gotten enough for the moment. He would get back to Idir’s mind when he fell asleep and get more out of him under hypnosis.

  Abel jumped back into Alice’s mind as she was walking towards the elevator of her hotel.

  “You’re back in your hotel already.”

  “Yes Joe, as you can see. Now, how did it go?” Alice asked, impatiently.

  “I think we might have a lead for Burrows to work on. Fareed Azim has borrowed an apartment above a shop.”

  Alice had just walked in the elevator and was about to push the button for her floor, when her hand froze in shock and excitement. “What, what?”

  Abel told Alice how he had done it and everything he had found out off Idir. He told her all they had to do now was to come up with a plan to explain how they found out that information and hope Campbell and Burrows would believe it.

  Joe came up with a plan, a plan which Alice didn’t particularly like but she couldn’t think of a better one so they went ahead with it, expecting Agent Burrows to pull it to shreds.

  Agent Burrows was at HQ taking phone calls from the agents on the road who were reporting back in to her, when her cell phone buzzed in her pocket. She looked at Alice’s name and decided to take it in one of the side offices.

  “Hi Alice, I’m sorry but I still don’t know if we need you and Joe yet, there’s been no new development. We’re…”

  “Forget that,” Alice interrupted her, “are you sitting down?”

  “No… and we’re very busy here.”

  “Then get your pen and pad out and sit down.” Alice tried to sound panicky; it was part of the plan they came up with.

  “Alice, are you alright? You sound shaken up.”

  Alice had her fingers crossed. She hoped Burrows would believe her shit story. “You’re not going to like this, but Joe has gone and worked some of his magic in that mosque you were talking about where Fareed Azim worships.”

  Burrows wasn’t sure she heard right. “He’s what?”

  “You’re not going to believe this, because I can’t either.” Alice gave a little sob.

  “What is it Alice? You’re freaking me out. You don’t even sound like yourself.” Burrows was worried because Alice’s voice sounded croaky, as if she had been crying.

  “I’m okay, it’s just… Joe has somehow put me in a trance, so he could get a message to you and it’s upset me a bit.”

  “You’re still not making much sense. I thought you said Joe’s up here in Washington. He’s put you in a trance too?”

  “Let me try and explain it the best I can.” Alice was trying her best to sound scared and pretend to not know what had just happened to her. “One minute I was watching TV wide awake, and the next minute I woke up in the bedroom lying on the bed. Joe had put me to sleep so he could contact me in my dreams.”

  A cold shiver went through Burrows. “Jesus Christ Alice, are you alright? No wonder you sound scared. And how…?” Burrows stopped, unsure if she really wanted to know how.

  “I’m alright now, but I have this blank space in my head. But Joe had told me when I was under his spell not to be scared, that he just wanted me to phone you straight away with the news.”

  It was only just starting to sink in what Alice was trying to say. “Are you telling me that Joe has penetrated the mosque and found something out?”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. He knew he shouldn’t have, that the FBI would give him…”

  Burrows only half-understood what had happened and couldn’t wait for the explanation, so she cut Alice off from her ramblings to hear the information. “How did he do it, and what did he find out?”

  “Okay,” Alice said in her shaky voice, “it’s best if you let me say it without asking questions until I’ve finished.”

  “Yeah, go ahead.”

  “Well Joe wanted to find out if anyone knew where Fareed Azim was hiding and he knew none of them in the mosque would tell the police. So he pretended to bump into one of the Muslim brothers and got into his head. The first three whose minds he jumped into didn’t know a thing, but the fourth, a man called Idir, was shifty. Joe knew he was hiding something.”

  “Idir is Azim’s errand boy,” Burrows said, shocked and excited at the possibility. She remembered she had promised not to interrupt and added, “Sorry, carry on.”

  “Joe was able to find out that Fareed Azim has borrowed an empty apartment for a week.” Alice knew Burrows was dying to ask where but she kept quiet so Alice kept up the act of being scared. “Idir doesn’t know the address, but it’s above a shop that is open.”

  “Hang on Alice, I’ve got to tell this to the boss.”

  Alice could hear Burrows yelling, “Sir, sir” and she guessed she was trying to get Frank Brubaker’s attention. Alice heard an excited Burrows relate the story she heard from her. Then Burrows came back on the phone.

  “Great work Alice, we’re going to get people looking at all empty apartments above the shops in Washington.”

  “Something else you might want to get them to take a look at is the Casbah Coffee House. That’s where Azim sent Idir to pick up the keys from his friend so this friend must be the owner of that apartment, and would know exactly where Fareed Azim is.”

  “Fucking hell, Alice! Have you got any more gems?”

  “No, just that. I’ve got to lay down and try to get over the shock of being hypnotized. I need to get my head around what just happened and then perhaps I can explain it better.”

  “Okay, Alice. Please, stay safe. And stay in touch.”

  Alice heard the phone go dead and she sighed deeply. It had worked! She had expected Burrows to ask loads of questions, find holes in their story, and then get mad at her for trying to deceive her. Apparently, the need for good news trumped everything else.

  Abel had stayed in Alice’s mind and had listened to the whole conversation. He guessed the FBI was ready to work on the information more than ask how it had come by. For now, at least.

  Burrows called Alice back soon after, and told her as nicely as possible, that Joe shouldn’t have gone up to the mosque without permission because it could have blown their work. But, in the end, they were pleased with what Joe had found out, and asked Alice to say a big thank you to Joe.

  Alice asked Burrows if they wanted Joe to visit Idir tonight to see if he could find out any more. “Yes,” Burrows replied, “every little detail helps.”

  Abel got into Idir’s dreams that night and found that there wasn’t much more than he already knew. After double-checking to make sure, he smiled to himself for it meant he now had plenty of time to go visit his dream girl, Jean.

  *

 
; Now that Jean had finished reading the book about King Henry VIII, Abel knew he should be taking Jean on another adventure, but he decided to drag it out one night longer, especially since it was obvious that Jean didn’t want to say good bye to the handsome Captain Morgan.

  After tasting more than one middle-aged man and the youthful Captain Morgan, Joe realized Jean still wanted one more “older” man: Evan Evans and it was up to him to make it happen.

  Jean lay on the deck of the ship, her head was spinning violently and through her squinted eyes, she could see men looking down on her and hear Steve-e-Joe’s voice calling her as if from some far distance.

  “Jean, are you okay? Speak to me.” Steve-e-Joe was tapping her face.

  One of the ship’s crew said, “Leave her sleep it off lad, and I’ll clean her up later.”

  “My wife is not drunk,” Steve-e-Joe replied indignantly.

  Jean’s head was beginning to clear, and she heard the strong voice of Sergeant Jones. “Get out of my way, let me through,” he said. He gently raised Jean’s head off the deck and made her sit up. “What happened?” Sergeant Jones asked.

  “She fainted and nearly fell off the gantry,” Steve-e-Joe replied, and with the help of the sergeant, got Jean on her feet.

  “What you lot gawking at?” Sergeant Jones snapped at the men.

  The ship’s captain stepped forward. He said, “You can’t blame my men for gawking. When that young man carried his wife on board and she dropped on down by there, her skirt went right up and we all saw what he had for supper on his wedding night.”

  Jean heard the whole crew roar in vulgar laughter. “I’m afraid of the water so I guess I fainted.” Jean tried to ignore the smutty remarks and explain, but it made the crew laugh louder.

  “Okay you lot, get back to work!” the captain of the ship bellowed, “You all seen what you can’t have, now get back to work and get that cargo off. First mate, you go find the rest of the crew and sober them up; we sail on the morning tide.” The captain turned back to Sergeant Jones and the archers and yelled gruffly at them, “You men would do well to get below and get out of our way.” He looked at Jean and spoke in a softer tone. “Down below deck is no place for a young lass like you, you know? The hull is swarming with rats, lass. We’ve got rats down there as big as bloody cats.”