Lords of Corruption

by Kyle Mills

  "Hi. I'm Josh Hagarty. I'm here to meet with Mr. Trent."

  "No one told me," the man said, his accented English barely decipherable.

  Josh shrugged disinterestedly, trying to emulate the attitude of the wealthy whites he'd seen in Africa.

  "He not here."

  "I know he's not here," Josh said, affecting irritation and hoping it would mask the fear eating away at him. "He called me from the road. He's on his way."

  Josh was counting on the fact that the guard had no real authority or big-picture knowledge of the workings of NewAfrica. His job was to dissuade the local riffraff from looting the place. Nothing more, nothing less.

  Apparently he saw it the same way, because a moment later Josh found himself strolling through the open gate, trying to shake the feeling that he was breaking into prison instead of out.

  The maid who answered the front door was even less inquisitive, taking Josh at his word that Trent was on his way and that Josh had been instructed to wait in his office. After he declined her offer of coffee, she wandered off. When her footsteps had completely faded, Josh pushed the office door closed and hurried to the filing cabinets lined up against the wall. He ignored the standard ones and went straight for the safe-like units in the corner. The laser-cut key he'd taken off Trent's body slid easily into the lock, and Josh tried to turn it. Nothing. He tried again with the same result.

  Just as panic was starting to set in, he noticed that blood had dried in a few of the indentations on the key. Using a paper clip, he gently dug it out, trying not to replay what it had felt like to root around in the blood-and-sweat-dampened pockets of a corpse.

  This time when he turned the key, a green light flashed and the drawer slid open.

  After a quick overview of the files, he knew he'd found the records that Flannary had told him about -- the ones that never made it back to the United States. There were payments from Mtiti for ambiguously defined services, profits from the sale of food aid, statements from foreign banks, and documents for countless offshore corporations and partnerships.

  He began pulling out the most incriminating of them, creating a neat stack on the floor.

  Every once in a while footsteps would become audible in the hallway and he'd have to slam the cabinet closed and take a seat in front of Trent's desk. But other than the maid, who was very concerned about his fluid intake, no one seemed to even know he was there.

  Josh had been at it for almost twenty minutes when the sound of a powerful engine reached him from the front of the house. He froze, listening to it grow in volume, and then went into panicked motion when it was overpowered by the screech of tires.

  Shouts and running feet in the entryway were already audible when he picked up the nearly foot-tall stack of documents and looked desperately around the room. There was nowhere to run. He dumped the papers into the trash can by Trent's desk as someone in the hallway began shouting what sounded like orders. It took a couple of seconds for him to place the voice, but when he did, he started moving even faster.

  Mtiti.

  Josh closed the cabinet drawer and locked it, dropping to the floor behind the desk just as the office door burst open. He squeezed past the chair and crammed himself into the small space once occupied by Stephen Trent's legs, listening to Mtiti's men fan out into the room. He could hear his own jerky breathing, too loud in the confined space he was contorted into. Adrenaline was causing him to shake, and he tried to keep from banging audibly into the polished wood surrounding him. The chair was pulled back, replaced by the lower half of a fatigue-clad soldier. Josh's breath caught in his chest as the man started to crouch, but a face never appeared. Instead two hands began removing the drawers and stacking them on Trent's blotter.

  The center drawer was locked, and after a brief discussion, a pistol appeared. Josh covered his face just as a bullet tore through the lock, sending wooden shrapnel into his sweat-soaked forearm. A couple of kicks from a military boot and the drawer was free.

  Mtiti's orders were partially drowned out by the scraping of metal on the as the file cabinets were dragged toward the hallway. Josh remained completely still, concentrating on keeping his breathing as even as possible. It was all he could do to control his panic, to fight off a feeling of claustrophobia he'd never experienced before, to quell the urge to break and run.

  Then it was over. The sound of voices and dragging furniture became distant as Mtiti and his men made their way to the front door. Five minutes later, the engine outside roared to life again and then faded away.

  He didn't move, thankful that he hadn't taken up the maid's offer of coffee. Caffeine and a full bladder would not have served him well in this particular situation. Finally, as the silence continued to stretch out, he dared a look at his watch.

  Eight thirty-two.

  He leaned forward and took a quick peek over the desk. The room had been almost entirely emptied: file cabinets, bookshelves, desk drawers. Even the liquor cabinet and in/out box were gone.

  The door was open, but no one was in the hallway, so Josh stood and dabbed sweat from his face. He was trying to regain enough composure to walk casually out of there when he froze, staring down in amazement.

  The trash can was still there. And still full of the papers he'd put in it.

  Chapter 43.

  Aleksei Fedorov's phone rang, and he snatched it from his pocket. "Stephen! Where have you been?"

  "This isn't Stephen."

  Fedorov stopped pacing at the sound of Umboto Mtiti's voice. Around him, everything in the warehouse was still. The blood had run from JB Flannary's body into a drain in the floor, and for the last hour the soft drip of it had been the only thing moving the cold air. Josh Hagarty's sister had stopped struggling after seeing what had happened to the others and now just stared blankly at the bodies of Robert Page and Flannary's young assistant, still slouched in their chairs.

  It was an atmosphere that Fedorov always found calming. Dead bodies represented problems permanently solved: a continuation of his power and a warning to anyone who might decide to try to move in on him.

  But there were still people unaccounted for, and Mtiti's voice on the other end of the line wasn't the one he'd hoped to hear.

  "Excellency. I'm honored by your call."

  "But not expecting it, I see. Can I assume that you've lost Stephen Trent?"

  Fedorov tried to calculate the most beneficial spin, but there was no way to be sure what Mtiti knew. He was an animal, but not one to be underestimated when playing on his home field.

  "My understanding is that they went to retrieve Annika Gritdal so that we can resolve this . . . problem."

  "That was twenty hours ago, Aleksei. Twenty hours. I want to know where they are, and I want to know now."

  "They took some of your people along, didn't they, Excellency? Have you contacted them?"

  Mtiti's voice came back loud enough to distort over the marginal connection. "If I could contact them, would I be calling you?"

  "No," Fedorov said, unaccustomed to being yelled at but managing to keep his anger hidden. "I suppose you wouldn't."

  The area that Annika had chosen to hide in was beyond Mtiti's reach -- a rebel-controlled black hole to his government. At this point, it seemed likely that Trent's motorcade had been attacked. But with what outcome? Certainly Mtiti's men were dead, but would the rebels kill Trent and Hagarty? It seemed that there would be better uses for two white men.

  "Then what's happened?" Mtiti demanded.

  "I can't be expected to know what goes on in your country hour by hour, Mr. President. I'm thousands of miles away."

  "Are you suggesting that I don't have control? That I'm weak --"

  "I'm suggesting nothing," Fedorov interrupted, letting some of his anger and frustration creep into his voice, "other than the possibility that something has happened to our people and --"

  "I wonder."

  "What?"

  "I'm starting to question your commitment to our charitable activit
ies, Aleksei. Suddenly every employee you send is less competent than the last. And the one man you have who has proven to be even somewhat reliable has suddenly disappeared. I have to wonder if your priorities have changed."

  The wording was careful, implying that Mtiti thought someone might be listening that NewAfrica's real purpose had been discovered and Fedorov was now working with the American authorities.

  "This has been a very profitable situation for both of us, Mr. President. I wouldn't do anything to jeopardize that."

  There was a brief silence. "In the interests of my people, I am shutting down all of NewAfrica's projects and nationalizing all of its interests in my country --"

  "You can't do that!" Fedorov shouted. "We've spent years building this business. I've done --"

  "Then perhaps you would be willing to show me that you're taking our relationship seriously?"

  Fedorov pulled out his pistol and aimed it at Hagarty's sister, the only living thing left in the room. She came out of her stupor and began trying to scream through her gag as his finger hovered over the trigger. For everything her pissant brother had done, for everything his bullshit had cost, she deserved to die. She deserved the worst he could dream up. . . .

  His finger relaxed, and he reluctantly tucked the gun back into his waistband. Not yet.

  "What did you have in mind?"

  "I think I could be persuaded to let NewAfrica continue its work if you were to come here personally and oversee the efforts to fix the problems you've caused."

  Fedorov began pacing again. His African operations had become so profitable that he'd dedicated virtually all his resources to them. There was no denying that he was now completely dependent on Mtiti for the flow of money that kept him stronger than his enemies. If Mtiti were to throw New-Africa out of his country, USAID and the UN would pull the contracts NewAfrica was managing, and the profits from drugs, weapons, and the resale of food aid would cease. His power would disintegrate almost overnight.

  "Aleksei?"

  The only option was to stall. In Africa he would be entirely at the mercy of Mtiti's wild mood swings and paranoia. At some point the risk might be necessary, but the situation hadn't degenerated that far yet.

  "Thank you for the invitation, Excellency. Of course I'd be honored to come."

  "And when can I expect you?"

  When hell freezes over.

  "Let me look into travel arrangements, and I'll get back to you."

  Chapter 44.

  "There was no way I could have just walked out with them," Josh said. "There were people everywhere, and I didn't know if the guards were still there."

  It was hard to see Annika's face in the darkness created by the blanket he'd thrown over them, but when he moved to dislodge the vehicle's jack from his back, a flash of light illuminated an uncertain expression.

  "I guess what I'm trying to tell you is that I'm sorry, Annika."

  "For what?"

  "I appreciate the sentiment, but come on. For a million things."

  "Oh, I know. I meant which one of those things in particular?"

  He was shocked when he saw the dim outline of her mouth turn up for a moment.

  Even pissed off, she continued to be the most amazing person he'd ever met. Her ability to maneuver through a country that would stop at nothing to kill them was not only fascinating to watch but also the reason he was still breathing. She'd managed to find a Yvimbo store owner who was willing to hide them and who had sent his children to watch Trent's neighborhood for the arrival of the truck that picked up the trash. And now their new accomplice was cheerfully tailing that truck in Trent's Land Cruiser.

  "Soldiers," the man said in Yvimbo. It was one of ten or so words Josh understood, and he peeked out from beneath the blanket, glimpsing a rusting Jeep as it passed. Mtiti's men gave their vehicle a quick look and continued on.

  Josh had used white house paint to cover the NewAfrica logo on the Land Cruiser's door and then spent a sweaty two hours kicking dents in it and dousing it with mud. So far the impromptu camouflage job was working.

  "I should have gone back," he said, retreating back beneath the blanket. "When there weren't any guards, I should have gone back for the papers."

  "I'm grateful you made it out at all, Josh."

  He wanted to believe she was right, but the truth was that he'd made the decision based entirely on fear. Once he'd escaped through the front gate, nothing was going to get him to go back.

  "Let's see if you still feel the same way after spending the day digging around in an African garbage dump," he said, trying to lighten the mood and failing miserably.

  She rolled on top of him, creating a quiet sucking sound as their sweaty bodies stuck together. "I'm sorry, too."

  "For what?" he said, trying not to show his surprise at the sudden collapse of the distance that had seemed to grow between them since their escape from her village.

  "I've been unfair to you."

  "Are you kidding? I --"

  "Let me finish. I've judged you because I believed that everything you were doing was to save yourself. And I believe it's intentions, and not so much actions, that define US.

  "Annika, you have to under--"

  "You're not letting me finish!"

  "Sorry."

  "I let myself forget that you could have sat by your pool and left the project to Gideon while you waited for a plane to take you home. There was no reason for you to get involved in this when JB asked you. But you did."

  "And now a lot of people are dead. Including us, maybe."

  "Yes, maybe. But when you're finally judged, I think you won't have as much explaining to do."

  "The pearly gates? I don't think so. I'm alive now, and I'd like to keep it that way."

  "Best to not put all your chickens in one basket."

  "Eggs."

  "What?"

  Despite the heat, he wrapped his arms around her. It felt good to have her back. "Never mind."

  They drove for another hour, her sleeping with her face buried in his neck and him thinking of home, of Laura, and of the old woman with dirt in her eyes.

  "We here!" the man driving suddenly announced.

  Annika's head jerked up and the blanket slid from them, letting in the blinding midmorning sun. Josh pushed himself up on his elbows and squinted through the windows, perplexed by what he saw. The garbage truck -- actually just an open dump truck -- was there, but instead of a lonely, rotting landfill, he saw a dusty plain crowded with people.

  As usual, Annika seemed neither surprised nor particularly concerned. She flopped over the seat and got out through the back door, poking her head back in a moment later. "Are you coming?"

  "Where the hell are we?"

  She held out a hand and he took it, following her out into the heat as the crowd waited for the garbage truck to be unloaded. The man who had chauffeured them there came around the car and held out a hand. "I wish you luck."

  Josh shook off his confusion long enough to reach out and take it. "You really saved us, man. I can't tell you how grateful we are."

  He obviously didn't understand, but his eyes widened when Josh proffered the ring he'd taken from Stephen Trent's finger. To his surprise, the man just shook his head and started walking back toward the city.

  "It's a market," Annika said, tugging him toward what he estimated to be at least a hundred people. "What wealthy people throw away still has value to the poor."

  He didn't move. "I thought nobody'd be here, Annika. What are the chances nobody here knows Mtiti's looking for us?"

  "Pretty small," she said, pulling harder on his arm. "But there's no point in worrying about things that we can't control."

  * * * *

  Most of the people there were focused on the men throwing garbage bags from the truck, but he and Annika were receiving an increasing amount of attention as she barged through the crowd with him in tow.

  "You go that way," she said pointing to the right. "I'll look over here."
/>   "We should stay together," he said nervously.

  "No, it's better if we find what we're looking for quickly and leave here."

  He watched reluctantly as the bemused Africans moved aside to let her examine and occasionally rifle through the neat rows of refuse on display.

  He did the same, pushing his way down the line of people negotiating unintelligibly for things that even his family wouldn't have thought twice about throwing away.

  Paper was pretty common, but he seemed to be the only person interested in that particular class of rubbish. Most of it was shredded -- valuable perhaps to get a cooking fire going, but not for much else. After ten minutes of wrestling with the mob, the closest he'd come to finding what he was looking for was a stack of old recipes written in Dutch.

  He was nearly to the end of the row when angry shouts became audible to his left. A few people who weren't having much luck shopping perked up at the possibility of a fight over a broken lamp or leaking car battery, but he ignored the noise and continued his search. A moment later a man standing on the bumper of the garbage truck started pointing at him and then in the direction of the yelling.

  Annika.

  He shoved his way desperately through the people but slowed when he got closer, crouching slightly to try to stay as hidden as his skin tone would allow. The crowd seemed inclined to help him, and people moved quietly out of his way as he pressed forward.

  He stopped about five feet from the edge of a large circle that had opened in the crowd. Annika was at the center of it, arguing loudly with yet another well-armed child. He was probably fifteen, wearing a typical uniform of tattered fatigue pants and a dirty T-shirt that read, "Don't Worry, Be Happy." The machine gun in his hands was aimed at Annika, but when he spoke he seemed to be addressing the crowd undoubtedly explaining that she was wanted by the government and listing whatever charges Mtiti had manufactured.

  Josh maneuvered until he was directly behind the boy, but he wasn't certain what to do. What he was sure of, though, was that the more Annika protested, the madder the kid got. He seemed to want the people around him to do something -- grab her? Kill her? Call Mtiti? There was no way to know. So far everyone seemed content to just watch. It wouldn't last, though. Eventually something was going to give.