Short Fuse: Elite Operators, Book 2 (2 page)

Chapter Two

Warren swore under his breath as the fifth and final pen ran out of ink, leaving a blank imprint of his signature at the bottom of the piece of paper. He clenched it in his fist and closed his eyes, resisting the urge to rip the form into shreds, yank the pen off its chain tether, snap it in two and shove the whole lot down the shirtfront of the bored-looking Latadi police officer who had refused to slide a pen under the Plexiglas screen, gesturing instead to the battered ledge lining the opposite wall.

Breathe through it
, he counseled himself, recalling the advice of the psych geek he’d been ordered to see after racking up one too many references to “excessive force” in his personnel file. He took a deep breath and reminded himself that although dragging that officer out from behind his desk and pocketing every pen in his drawer would be satisfying, it would not resolve the situation. He’d spent the last two hours in August Town’s sweltering, stuffy, disorganized police station, and all that stood between him and his departure was his signature on his statement about the incident on the flight.

The signature for which he needed just one functioning
fokken
pen.

With the form clutched in one hand he crossed back to the window and knocked sharply. The officer raised one palm as he continued to type on his computer, his index finger finding one key, then another, then another, with such agonizing slowness that Warren had to grip the seam of his jeans to keep from smashing his fist into the Plexiglas.

When the officer finally deigned to look up at him, he raised the paper and spoke through clenched teeth.

“I need a pen. None of the ones along the wall have any ink.”

The officer shook his head. “
Je ne comprends pas.
”

“A pen.” Warren mimicked writing in the air, ruing the decision to take Latin instead of French. “I need a pen to sign the form.”

“
Votre nom
.” The officer mirrored his gesture.

Warren smoothed the form on the edge of the desk, trying to pull his temper into check. He could easily ask for a pen in Afrikaans, in Zulu, in Tswana, he could even make an attempt at Portuguese. But no, he had to come halfway up the continent to a country colonized by the goddamn
French
.

“Okay. We’ll let technology sort this out for us.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and unlocked the screen, congratulating himself on the decision to use a translation app instead of—what had the HR report called it?—“intimidation tactics”. The officer’s gaze wandered back to his computer and Warren held up his hand to hold his attention, loath to have to sit through another round of typing.

The app wouldn’t load. He had no signal.

“Dammit,” he muttered, anger rising afresh as he slapped the form against the Plexiglas. “I need a pen to sign, to write my name here. Can I please just borrow a pen?”

“
Le monsieur a besoin d’un stylo
,” Nicola called from the doorway. Daylight spilled in behind her, illuminating every variation on copper and gold in her fiery-red hair, framing her lusciously curved body and shading her heart-shaped face until she looked like an avenging, French-speaking angel descended from on high.

The officer’s face lit up with comprehension. He slid a pen across the desk, Warren wrote so fast he barely managed a W, a C and two squiggles, then stuffed the paper through the gap in the window and turned to his savior.

“Language barrier?”

“And a critical failure of office supplies. Sorry to make you wait.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s my fault you had to file a report at all.”

“It’s those traders’ fault,” he corrected. “I did what any decent man would.”

Her smile sparkled all the way into her bright blue eyes. “I’m not sure most men would’ve gagged them with cocktail napkins.”

“I thought about using their socks, but I needed something for their feet, so I—”

She laughed, reminding him of the little birds that sang to each other every morning in the tree outside his kitchen in Cape Town. “It was just an observation, not a criticism of your technique.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, you’ll sleep better than they will tonight. No matter how basic the accommodation is out at Hambani, it’ll feel like the Ritz compared to the cells those two are in.”

Her expression darkened. “Do you think they can bribe their way out?”

“Out of the legal proceedings, yes, but not out of deportation and a ban. The Latadi border officials are working hard to be seen as legitimate, and if those traders’ company wants to get any other personnel into the country they’ll let these two be the sacrificial lambs. This time tomorrow they’ll be on a plane back to Johannesburg, I promise.”

Her posture eased. “Good. Anyway, I got your briefcase from the luggage attendant, like you said, and picked up the rental car. It’s parked outside. Are you ready to hit the road?”

He nodded, shifting back into professional mode. Having a beautiful journey companion was an unexpected bonus, but it didn’t make the task at hand any easier. On the contrary, when he was told he’d be meeting the American CSR emissary in August Town he had imagined a middle-aged woman in cargo pants and hiking boots, sufficiently travel-hardened to spare him the burden of small talk, waiting irritably in the arrivals area with a sign bearing his name.

Now he faced a four-hour drive alongside a charming redhead. He supposed he’d have to be polite.

“Let’s see what old
bakkie
your bosses decided to bestow upon us,” he muttered, following her to the door. The police station was near the center of August Town’s main street and the midafternoon heat and noise rolled over him like a wave as soon as he stepped outside.

July was winter in South Africa, full of wet, windy days at his home on the Cape and crisp, cold Highveld mornings like the one he’d woken up to only hours ago in his sister’s house. But seasons were an unfamiliar concept this close to the equator, and one Latadi day looked very much like the next, week after week, month after month. High, unrelenting sun slicing through humid air, the heat only occasionally relieved by a dramatic afternoon thunderstorm. He pulled off his jacket as they circled the building toward the parking lot, suspecting he wouldn’t need it again until he was on the flight home.

Whenever that might be.

Nicola stopped beside a twenty-year-old white Toyota Land Cruiser with Zambian plates and tossed him the keys.

“I’ve already stalled this thing three times. Stick shifts aren’t my forte—can I leave the driving up to you?”

“No problem.” He opened the back door, unzipped his duffel bag and dug around until he found his sunglasses. Then he spun the combination lock on the metal case Nicola had retrieved for him until it popped open. Only when he picked up the Glock stored inside and relief eased the tension in his shoulders did he realize how intensely he’d disliked being separated from his weapon, which after all these years was as much a part of him as his ten fingers. He slid home the magazine, shoved the gun in its concealed-carry holster at the small of his back and walked around to the driver’s side.

Nicola watched him warily, paused outside the open passenger-side door. “Is that loaded?”

“No, I figured if we get carjacked I can throw it. Get in.”

“Funny,” she muttered, climbing up beside him. He stashed the gun in the well in front of the gearbox and turned the key in the ignition, carefully listening to the transmission as he drove down the main street in the direction of the highway.

“This car’s a piece of shit,” he diagnosed after a mile or two. “But the suspension feels pretty solid, so we’ll live.”

Nicola was unfolding a map, evidently conscious that GPS software would be unreliable in this part of the world. “I thought the engine would’ve been the main concern.”

As if on cue the Land Cruiser lurched to one side with a resounding
clank
, and she braced herself against the dashboard as the front-right end dipped dramatically. Warren downshifted, easing the car up and out, spinning the wheel to keep the back tire on the unbroken asphalt.

“Pothole,” he explained once they were back on level ground. “An engine you can rig to run long enough to get help, but if you thud into one of those and break your axle in the middle of nowhere, you’re screwed.”

“And we wouldn’t want to be screwed, now would we?”

He took his eyes off the road just long enough to catch her smile, though he was sure he couldn’t have read it correctly. He could imagine her being scared of him—most women were—but not flirting with him. Maybe that was her nervous smile. No way had he seen what he thought he’d seen.

He opted for a safe reply. “Have you been to Africa before?”

“Of course.”

And how often have you left the luxury hotel in Johannesburg where the Board holds its meetings?
“Where, exactly?”

She pivoted in her seat, chin lifted and arms folded. “So you’re aware, I’ve been working onsite for most of my career. I’ve been to more remote, less sophisticated mines than Hambani, and I’ve been in situations much more dangerous than the ones around here. I’m not some squeamish princess descending from my ivory tower for the first time. You don’t have to worry about protecting me.”

He stared straight ahead as the road out of town joined the highway. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been called out so succinctly—or enjoyed it so much.

He already liked Nicola a lot. That could be a problem.

“I didn’t mean to imply otherwise,” he replied carefully. “Just making conversation.”

They continued in silence for several minutes. The noisy, cramped streets of August Town had so quickly given way to vast green expanses it was hard to imagine they were only a few miles outside the city. There were few other cars on the road, and the rolling, unspoiled hills were occasionally peppered with small herds of goats. The scene was so pastoral, so peaceful, it was hard to imagine gunfire thundering across the landscape or waves of people pouring down the road trying to escape the smoldering city.

“It’s hard to believe this country was at war until a few months ago,” Nicola commented eerily, looking out the window.

“The northern Kibangu party and the southern Matsulu party co-ruled without conflict for fifty years.” He shot her a sidelong glance. “Then Garraway discovered a gold vein in the middle of the country and suddenly the two halves were at war.”

“Relations between the Kibangus and Matsulus had been growing increasingly volatile for a decade. They would’ve found something to fight about eventually.”

“But gold is what they did fight about.”

“And gold is what’s keeping the peace today. The vein in Hambani is keeping Latadi’s whole economy afloat. Neither side wants to risk all that foreign investment.”

“The reigning Kibangu party doesn’t want to lose Garraway’s subsidies,” he corrected. “I wouldn’t be so sure the Matsulus are quite so committed to national stability.”

“Are you about to lecture me on my employer’s practices? Because unless you’re working for free, from where I’m sitting you look pretty complicit.”

He tightened his grip on the steering wheel. He thought of the silent disappointment with which the major had watched him in the suspension hearing, the decisive way he’d closed the manila folder, the resignation in his expression as the meeting adjourned.
The report is written and filed
, he’d concluded wearily.
You’re well aware of my thoughts on your inability to control your temper, and I’m not inclined to repeat them.

“Sometimes personal financial necessity trumps macro ideology.”

“I know.” Her tone was gentle and conciliatory. “That’s why I went to work for a mining company instead of an NGO when I graduated from college. And although the salary was the initial incentive, every year I become more convinced it was the right decision. I can’t stop the mining industry, but I can try to improve it from within. Where and how Garraway opens a mine isn’t my concern as long as it’s safe for the workers and the community around it is better off as a result.”

“Fair enough,” he murmured, turning over her response in his mind. He didn’t completely agree, but he admired her conviction, her professionalism and her moral compass, as much as they were all apparent. “What will you do at Hambani? It’s a relatively new site so I would’ve thought the safety standards would already be up to code.”

“It should be just implementation and consistency checks, and devising a strategy for community improvements. Garraway allots money for social impact projects, so I’ll make recommendations as to what might be most appropriate—building a new school, staffing an existing one, improving water infrastructure. But since they reported a minor explosion onsite last week, I’m a little concerned that safety violations may occupy more time than I’d like. I assume that’s why they’ve brought you in?”

He nodded. “I guess it spooked the manager, who thinks it was a corporate sabotage attempt. They want me to evaluate the security procedures and tighten everything up.”

Warren caught the sudden furrow of her brow, the sharpening of her gaze. He kept his eyes fixed on the asphalt stretching before them, passed an overloaded pickup more quickly than was necessary as he waited for her response. Had she put it together? Had she spotted his resemblance to the CEO of a world-famous diamond-mining company? Had she realized who his father was?

“Why is the South African police force letting you take on a private contract?”

He exhaled heavily, then shook his head at his own relief. Since when did he care what some corporate drone thought of him?

Since the individual in question had perfect porcelain skin and clever blue eyes and filled the car’s musty interior with the scents of peaches and nectarines, apparently.

“I’m not exactly on active duty right now. I guess you could say my status as an employee is under review.”

“Let me guess. They don’t know you’re here?”

“My commander is looking the other way.”

“I suppose he forgot to ask you to hand in your badge, too,” she replied coolly.