In the Company of Killers Bryan Christy (good books to read for beginners .txt) 📖

moldy cubbyhole office on South Broad Street. “When a client tells me his story, I ask myself, What is the opposite of this? And even though I am that one-in-a-million lawyer blessed with clients who never lie to him—so that I know they are all innocent, and the government is always a gang of jackbooted thugs—when I receive my answer, I say to myself, Now, Saul, what is the opposite of this opposite? And I ask myself this question again and again, Jack, until I see the fucking truth.”

Klay applied the old lawyer’s technique to the facts as he knew them. His assignment had been to help Hungry prosecute Ras Botha and to get her files on Ncube.

“I’m not here to help you,” Klay said.

“I understand that, Tom.”

“Get up.” He seized her arm. “We have to go.”

“Wait.” She pulled her arm away from him. A text had arrived on her phone. She read it, and Klay watched the blood drain from her face. She looked up at him. “Tenchant is hacking into our computers.”

He felt a cold spike shoot up the back of his neck.

There was a knock at the door.

Hungry looked down at her phone a second time, then at Klay. “What have you done?”

THERE’S ALWAYS A WHO

Pretoria, South Africa

The hotel room door burst open. Three black men wearing tactical gear rushed Klay, driving him backwards onto the bed.

They spun him around, pushed him facedown, and flex-cuffed him. Then they jerked him to his feet. A skinny white photographer began snapping photographs. Click. Click. The photographer shouted from behind his lens, “Are you Tom Klay?” Click. Click. “Are you Tom Klay, the CIA agent?”

Hungry drew herself up and declared, “I am Advocate Hungry Khoza, special prosecutor empowered by the Office of the Public Protector—”

One of the men seized her by the arm, turned her around, and began to cuff her.

“You have no authority here,” Hungry barked.

“Restraints won’t be necessary.” A fourth commando entered dressed in tactical clothes but without a vest or mask. He stood in front of Hungry and spoke with a slight impediment. “Our special prosecutor will surely obey the laws of the state.” He began straightening Hungry’s collar. She slapped his hands away.

He took a step back to address her. “By the power of the president, Advocate Hungry Khoza, I arrest you on the charge of treason.”

The photographer was still shooting.

Hungry and Klay were led down a set of stairs and out the hotel’s rear emergency exit, where four black Chevrolet Suburbans waited. They put Hungry in the back seat of the first vehicle. Klay was sandwiched between two men in the back seat of the third. The vehicles sped off.

No one spoke. Klay used the time to run more opposites in his mind:

He had been sent to help Hungry Khoza’s corruption investigation.

He had been sent to hurt Hungry’s corruption investigation.

He would never intentionally harm her.

What was the opposite of that?

Unwittingly.

How?

Out him as a CIA agent.

If Hungry was shown to be in bed with the CIA, her case against Ncube would go away. She would be ruined. He would be ruined. Krieger, Botha, and the Agency would be safe.

Hungry Khoza had been in bed with the CIA . . .

CLICK. CLICK. CLICK.

In his mind, he ran more data:

Eady and Barrow had sent him.

The Agency was partnering with Krieger in some kind of investment fund.

Botha was in with the CIA. But Botha’s behavior didn’t add up. He claimed to have arranged medical care for Klay in Kenya. He had warned Klay about Krieger. Botha had helped him.

And Tenchant. What the fuck was Tenchant doing?

•   •   •

The SUVs stopped in front of Hungry’s building. He watched as Hungry was taken out of the first vehicle. Then his door opened and he was pulled out. They cut his zip-cuffs and led him and Hungry through the garage and up the metal stairs to the Wild Dogs’ office. Over the stench of grease and motor oil was another smell: gunpowder.

The big steel door was wide open. Klay put his hand on Hungry’s shoulder. “Let me go first.”

She jerked away and led them forward. Klay saw movement beyond the doorway. There were too many people inside the office and not enough urgency. Urgency meant life.

Two men holding automatic weapons stepped out of her way. Hungry crossed the threshold into the office and paused. Klay looked over her shoulder. The blood was everywhere. It spattered the walls. It ran like thick paint down the whiteboard. Miss Edna was at her desk, her chin on her chest, the back of her head on the wall. Minnie lay crumpled on the floor in front of her. Across the room, Sehlalo lay beneath the whiteboard. Hungry rushed to him.

Klay knelt beside Hungry and put his arm around her shoulders. She seemed not to know he was there.

“Hungry,” he said.

She responded as if he had electrocuted her. “GET—AWAY—FROM—ME,” she hissed.

Across the room Tenchant’s blue jacket hung on the back of his chair. Klay crossed the room and picked it up. Tenchant’s wallet was in the pocket. The dozen or so armed commandos ignored him as they went about their work. He glanced inside Hungry’s office. Her desk lay on its side, legs out stiff, like a dead cow. Its drawers and papers lay strewn across the room. The bookshelves had been stripped. Two men and a woman were still at it. They stuffed armfuls of files into black garbage bags, and yanked cables from the devices.

A bloody smear ran down the hallway toward the bathroom. Two men in tactical gear were talking outside the bathroom door. The blood trail ran between their boots and disappeared inside. As Klay started down the hall, the men stepped toward him and shook their heads, their weapons nosing up.

“Stay in the main room, please,” a voice said from behind him. Klay turned. This man was medium height, lean, with a bush-creased face and sandy hair. He was dressed in the same black tactical gear, including a pistol