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Nassar nodded, examining the map. “Excellent work, Joel. I was always confident that you were the man for this job, but now I have no doubts at all.”
All true, but something in the back of Nassar’s mind remained suspicious of the man’s success. It was bordering on being too easy. And this suggested two scenarios. First, that Rapp would be aware that his emails to his woman could be accessed and used to locate him, in which case he was already a thousand miles from Juba. Or, second, that those emails were the bait for an elaborate trap.
Of course, Nassar recognized that it was also possible that he was just being paranoid, but it wasn’t something he was willing to bet his life on. Wilson’s life, though, was of less importance. While it would be inconvenient to lose him, he was hardly irreplaceable. And his death at Rapp’s hands would do a great deal to further the narrative Nassar had been crafting.
“I was speaking to the king earlier, and I’ve been recalled to Riyadh on an urgent matter,” he lied. “I tried to explain to His Majesty that I was needed here, but he wouldn’t be deterred. My men and my plane are at your disposal, Joel. I’ll take a commercial flight home and return as soon as I can.”
CHAPTER 45
Juba
South Sudan
THE darkness in the alley went from deep shadow to impenetrable darkness and back again every few feet, but Kent Black kept inching forward. Juba’s electricity was out again, and all he had to work with was a few battery-powered lamps glowing in distant windows.
It wasn’t the safest time to be skulking around town, but the possibility of being jumped by a bunch of drunk rebels wasn’t why he wanted to get the hell out of there. All that mattered was that he got back to the safari camp before Rapp figured out he was gone.
Black came to the mouth of the alley and was able to make out the vague shape of the church’s listing steeple against the stars. It was only another seventy-five yards to the east pedestrian gate, then five minutes inside and then he was out. Easy, right?
One of the men Abdo had sent to watch the place was sitting in an open jeep across the street, but he was dead asleep with an AK clutched to his chest like some kind of security blanket. Based on his age, he’d probably only recently traded up.
The next fifty yards went pretty well. Quiet, good cover, and no more of Abdo’s men. The gods of war had taken pity on him.
Or so he’d thought. When the church’s east wall came into view, he saw a lone figure standing next to the gate. The sheer size of him and the slightly crooked stance acquired when a bullet had crushed his right femur a few years back made him easy to identify. Barnabas Malse.
Black froze. He’d had some training in hand-to-hand combat in the army, but that had been a long time ago. As far as he was concerned, getting any closer than three hundred yards to a target was just plain stupid. If God had wanted people to fight with knives, he wouldn’t have given them sniper rifles.
Skirting the building next to him, Black managed to leave the glow of a distant fire behind. He was wearing tattered fatigues and had smeared his face with dirt in an effort to blend in, but the effect was marginal. With a little backlighting, though, it might get the job done.
He shook out his shoulders to loosen up and then started walking casually toward Malse. The man separated himself from the wall he was leaning against but didn’t make a move for his sidearm.
If there was one thing the African didn’t lack, it was confidence. And that conviction didn’t just come from his freakish bulk and the terror he instilled in everyone for five hundred miles around. He was also in the habit of kidnapping and eating albino children. When Black had first heard the stories, he’d thought they were just a bullshit legend. It turned out that they were true. Malse believed that his unusual diet made
him invincible in battle.
The African said something and Black just pointed to his ear in a way that suggested he couldn’t hear. It wouldn’t register as being unusual. A significant percentage of the rebel population was about half deaf from the constant shooting and explosions.
His heart felt like it was trying to fight its way out of his chest by the time he got within ten feet of the man. Malse still hadn’t recognized him or made a move for his weapon, but he did speak again. Black nodded vigorously at whatever the fuck he’d said, hoping to draw attention away from the knife appearing from his pocket. When he got inside of five feet, he lunged, driving the eight-inch blade into the man’s stomach. Malse looked surprised, but other than that the knife didn’t seem to make much of an impression. He grabbed Black by the front of his fatigues and lifted him off the ground, throwing him into the church’s perimeter wall. The former Ranger managed to keep his head from impacting but still hit hard before dropping gracelessly to the ground. He’d barely managed to get to his knees when Malse grabbed him again—this time with one hand on his throat and the other on his thigh. Black found himself being lifted again but managed to grab hold of the hilt of the knife protruding from Malse’s stomach on the way up. He yanked it sideways, opening a long slit that poured blood down the front of the African’s grimy blue jeans. He still didn’t seem to notice.
This time Black hit the wall upside down and almost seven feet up, impacting the ground a moment later face-first. He saw Malse coming for him again but was too dazed to do anything but lie there wondering if the magic really worked. If all those murdered children really had made him immortal.
A human figured appeared from the shadows behind the African and Black squinted at it, trying to make sense of what was happening. A hand clamped over Malse’s nose and mouth and he was dragged out of sight. After that, there was a quiet crunching sound and then nothing.
Black tried to push himself to his feet, failing the first time and then managing to regain enough equilibrium to succeed on his second try. When he did, the dark figure was standing in front of him, backlit as he had been before. Not Malse. Way too small and straight. Still fuzzy, there was nothing Black could do when the man grabbed him by the hair and dragged him into the same dark alcove he’d dragged the African.
Black fell to his knees and looked down at Malse. His previously good leg was bent sideways at a ninety-degree angle and his head was twisted all the way around backward. Somewhere, there was a witch doctor who owed him a refund.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
The quiet voice sent a surge of adrenaline through Black, bringing him back to full alertness.
“Mitch? What are you doing here?”
A gun appeared and a moment later there was a silencer pressed to Black’s forehead.
“I was about to ask you the same thing.”
A thousand lies passed through his mind, but he knew that every one of them would end with his brains splattered over what was left of Malse.
