Dictator

49

‘Again!’ Carver’s command echoed around the cavernous interior of the barn.

From above him came the sound of Zalika Stratten’s tired, frustrated voice: ‘Oh for heaven’s sake, what now?’

‘You were blundering around like a herd of elephants up there. The idea, in case you hadn’t noticed, is to do this without anyone being able to hear you.’

Zalika’s face appeared, leaning over the railing that surrounded the crude platform that represented the Gushungos’ master bedroom in Hong Kong.

‘Are you suggesting I’m fat?’

‘Not at all,’ Carver replied, deadpan. ‘Just clumsy and heavy-footed.’

‘Oh!’ Her voice went up an octave in sheer outrage. ‘I’ll kill you for that, Samuel Carver!’

‘Not yet, you won’t. We’ve got a job to do. So, one more time, from the top.’

Zalika stomped very deliberately across the planking, down the stairs and out of the barn. When she got outside, she walked precisely thirty-two metres, then stopped, stood still and waited.

In the barn, Carver started talking apparent gibberish: ‘Bla-blah, yadda-yadda, waffle-waffle, now.’

Both he and Zalika were wearing miniature earpieces linked to their mobile phones. When she heard the word ‘now’ she started walking at a steady pace, came back in through the barn door and made her way – very, very quietly – up the stairs.

It was Wednesday afternoon. She’d been doing this for most of the last twenty-four hours, repeating the same apparently simple routine until it was grooved so deep that she could do the whole thing almost without thinking, as if she were operating purely by muscle memory. Carver had rounded up a handful of Klerk’s staff to act as bodyguards and maids. They had no idea why they were getting involved in this strange game of make-believe, but it made a fun break from their daily routine. Every so often Carver used one or two of the staff to throw in variations. What if there was someone in the hall when Zalika walked in? What if she were interrupted when trying to get into the safe? What if she had to fight or talk her way out?

Carver was no longer surprised by the range of Zalika’s abilities. The previous day, they’d sparred a little on a large judo mat, working on kicks, punches, blocks and throws. They’d gone at it hard, working up a sweat. When he’d complimented her on being able to keep up with him, she’d pulled a stray strand of hair off her face and, in between gasps for air, panted, ‘Are you kidding? I’m a Stratten. I had my first self-defence class when I was six.’

When he’d commented on her amazing ability to come up with an almost infinite number of excuses, explanations and charming little deceits, she giggled and said, ‘I’m a girl. I’ve been doing that all my life!’

Even in his guise as the tough taskmaster, Carver couldn’t stop himself laughing. He could feel the two of them getting closer, heading towards a destination they both knew was inevitable. Just a few more run-throughs and he would be certain of her. Then they could relax and have some fun.

Zalika went through the operation again, and again, and then, after one more run-through, which was perfect, just as the previous half-dozen had in fact been, Carver said, ‘That’ll do it. Thanks, everyone.’ And then, so that only Zalika could hear, ‘You’re ready. And you’re going to be good. Bloody good.’

She smirked cheekily. ‘But darling, I always am…’

They wandered back to the house together, and when Carver put his arm round her, Zalika nestled closer to him, moulding herself to his body.

Klerk watched them from the French windows to his drawing room as they ambled across the lawn.

‘Hey, you two,’ he called out, ‘come over here. I’ve got some things that might interest you.’

Klerk ushered the two of them into the room and then handed Carver a sealed aluminium flask, roughly the size and shape of a packet of Pringles. The contents, however, were a lot less savoury.

‘This is the recipe you asked for,’ Klerk said. ‘Flown in on my personal jet today. It was a rush-job, to put it mildly. But my boys are good. They say they got it right and I trust them. You can too. So now will you tell me what you’re going to do with it?’

‘Of course.’

Carver spelled out the key elements of his plan; the finer points of detail could wait till he and Zalika were in Hong Kong. At the end, Klerk nodded his assent.

‘The timing is the key to it,’ he said. ‘Hong Kong is six hours ahead of Malemba. What time do you expect the job to be completed?’

‘Around eleven-thirty on Sunday.’

‘So that’s about sun-up in Malemba: perfect. Most of the cops and soldiers will still be nursing the sore heads they got on Saturday night. I’m meeting Patrick Tshonga in South Africa tomorrow. I’ll fill him in on what you’ve got planned. He’s got senior police and military commanders loyal to him. They will make sure their men are rested and sober. Keep me posted over the next few days on any developments. I want to know exactly what you’ve got planned. When the job is completed, you will text OK, just that, to a number I will provide. That will be the go-signal. By breakfast time the country will be under new management.’

‘I just hope Justus and his kids are alive to see it.’

‘I’ve done something about that,’ said Klerk. ‘I put the head of security for my southern Africa operations, Sonny Parkes, on to it. He made a few calls, called in some favours and tracked them down to the remand cells at Buweku jail. Then he organized a lawyer for the family and some food – they don’t get fed in the jails now, you know. He’s a good man, Parkes, a man you can trust.’ Klerk handed Carver a business card for one of his corporations with Parkes’s name printed on it. ‘His contact details are all on that. If you call him, he’ll keep you posted on any developments. I have something else for you, too.’

A large, plain brown envelope was lying on a side-table. Klerk picked it up and pulled out a folder of documents.

‘These are the contracts making you a five per cent shareholder in the Kamativi Mining Corporation. I’ve given you a non-executive directorship, too. You never know, one day you might want to settle down, find yourself a good woman and start earning a respectable living. I think you’d be a damn good businessman, Sam, if you ever put your mind to it.’

‘Do you have a wife in mind for me, too?’

Klerk grinned. ‘Ach, Sam, I’m not that crazy. You’ll make your own choice on that score. Though I might make one suggestion…’

Klerk pointedly looked across the room at his niece.

‘Wendell, stop that!’ Zalika Stratten’s indignation was mixed with laughter. She touched Carver’s arm and said, ‘Forgive my uncle, Sam. He has a terrible sense of humour.’

‘Maybe I do,’ rumbled Klerk, ‘but the only men I’ve ever seen you with have been gutless, namby-pamby playboys. Not one of them has had the balls to stand up to you. But this man has your measure, young lady. And you know it.’

‘Oh, don’t be silly,’ said Zalika, trying to cover her embarrassment.

Carver had never seen her flustered before. Suddenly she seemed softer, more vulnerable and, yes, more desirable. He wondered what she would be like as a wife, the mother of his children, and then had to suppress a laugh of his own. Klerk liked to portray himself as a simple, straightforward, hard-nosed businessman, but he was a cunning old bastard… and a sentimental one, too.

‘Now be off with you,’ Zalika was saying to her uncle. ‘You’ve got to be on a BA flight to Jo’burg. You know how Brianna hates to be late. And they won’t hold the plane for ever. Not even for you.’

Klerk kissed his niece goodbye, shook Carver’s hand, wished them both luck and left.

‘Fancy a swim?’ asked Zalika, when she and Carver were alone.

‘I don’t have any swimming trunks.’

‘Why would you need them?’

The pool at Campden Hall had a glazed roof, which retracted at the touch of a button, and walls whose glass panels slid away until the two swimmers were entirely open to the warm spring evening. The sky was still light and would be for a few hours to come, and the only noise to be heard was birdsong and the gentle whisper of wind through the trees.

Zalika dived into the water leaving barely a ripple on the surface, swam a length of fast front-crawl, performed the most outrageously sexy racing turn Carver had ever seen in his life – a tumbling, sparkling flicker of tanned wet legs and ass – and then returned to the end where he was still standing, watching her.

She rested her arms on the side of the pool. ‘Aren’t you going to join me?’

‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Underwater combat is my specialist skill.’

‘You’ll have to catch me first.’

Carver was faster – just – and stronger, but she was elusive and agile. He was out of breath by the time he caught her, from the laughter as much as the exercise. But catch her he did, and hold her and kiss her with a pent-up passion whose intensity overwhelmed them both.

They stumbled in a tangle of intertwined limbs from the pool back to the house, Zalika clutching a towel to her gleaming wet body and squealing with laughter as they tried to get upstairs without being spotted by the staff. They stood for a while, wrapped in each other’s arms beneath a steaming shower, and then tumbled into bed. And it seemed to Carver as though he was fighting Zalika as much as loving her. He wasn’t sure whether this was just a hangover from his initial refusal to take the job she had so carefully researched, or a deeper, more intrinsic part of her personality. But she seemed compelled to resist him – wrestling as much as caressing him, fighting to be on top and raking her nails down his back – testing him to the very limit before she could finally relax into ecstasy and accept her own surrender.