“You did what you needed to do.” His eyes crinkled with amusement. “And I don’t think you’re really sorry, are you?”
“No, I mean it.” Souraya smiled at him, but it felt a little sad on her face. “Maybe you would’ve come to find me otherwise.”
Ahmed’s face went serious. “Darling, I would have hunted you down.”
She blushed and tried to change the subject. “We’re at the restaurant, no? Tell me what’s going on with you over lunch.”
He frowned, glancing around the parking lot. “It might be better to tell you in here.”
Souraya shrugged. She liked sitting in the car with him. They’d done that a few times in Joburg, parked somewhere with Nando’s takeout and just sat and talked for hours while the bruises on her face healed. “So just turn up the AC and we can talk about it here.”
Ahmed smiled at her and she knew he’d entered the same memories. The engine purred back to life and cool air threw itself out of the vents, hitting Souraya’s skin in welcome gusts. She unbuckled her seat belt and curled up a little on her side as Ahmed told her about his party, about the pastor and the girl, and Kalu. When he was done, she gave a low whistle.
“Oh, your friend is fucked.”
He gave her a look. “Thanks, love. I’d figured that part out on my own.”
Souraya stroked a hand over his arm. “What are you going to do?”
“I can’t pay him off—he doesn’t care about the money.”
“Yeah. I know the type.”
Ahmed wiped a hand over his face. The sun angled through the tall bougainvillea and streaked through the windshield, bathing both of them in heat. “I got a text from Thursday earlier confirming that the hit is real. I don’t know how to stop this.”
“This pastor has more power than you.”
Souraya didn’t realize she’d said the words out loud until she heard them and saw the answering grimace on Ahmed’s face.
“I hate hearing it that way, but you’re not wrong.” His jaw clenched. “Fuck.”
Her heart wrenched a little. Ahmed looked a little lost and it was so different from the version of him she knew, the one who had all the answers.
“Everyone wants something,” she said. “We just have to figure out what else he wants.”
Ahmed laughed sourly and tried to pull his hand away from hers. “Please. You don’t have to enter this with me.”
Souraya held fast. “Shut up. What’s this pastor’s name?”
“Okinosho. Thomas Okinosho.”
Her eyes widened. “Wait, as in Daddy O?”
Ahmed raised a surprised eyebrow. “How do you know him?”
“Who doesn’t know him?” Souraya tapped her finger against his knuckles. “He’s my friend’s client, the one who flew us in. Ola didn’t even tell me his name at the start.”
Ahmed’s eyes sharpened. “Ola Roberts?”
Alarm rang through Souraya’s skin. “How do you know her name?”
It wasn’t Ola’s birth name, of course; it wasn’t even the name on her passports or deeds, but it was the one she used as a loose mask and there was still no reason why Ahmed should know it.
Souraya pulled her hand out of his. “How do you know her?”
“I don’t.” Ahmed’s voice was careful. “I know a few things about Okinosho. That he has a favorite girl. That she’s trans and Nigerian.”
She stared at him, but his gaze was open and clear.
“They say no matter where in the world she is, he sends his private jet for her. That he’s given her houses from here to London.” A corner of his mouth tugged upward. “There aren’t that many famous Naija escorts with a reputation like that, and Ola Roberts is the only trans one I know.”
Souraya tried to force her hackles down, unclenching her hands and fanning out her fingers. “What, you have an international directory of sex workers?”
Ahmed laughed. “It is my job, you know.”
She smiled despite herself, because he was right. He had blood on his hands and his finger on the darkest pulses on the continent.
“Maybe Ola can help,” she found herself saying. “I could ask her.”
Ahmed raised an eyebrow. “Now why would she want to get involved?”
Souraya shrugged. “Because we were all girls in New Lagos once? Because I asked?”
He didn’t respond, his gaze drifting sideways into nothing. It was easy to read the calculations on his face—if asking a favor from Ola would put him at any disadvantage, running the risk permutations. Souraya didn’t get the hesitation. If Ola was in danger, she would have leapt at any offer for help.
“Who is Kalu to you?” she asked.
Ahmed drew back slightly, just a fraction. Souraya waited. He’d spoken of Kalu during their time in Joburg, always with a fondness that had something edged folded underneath. She’d wondered if they’d been lovers, but somehow, she thought Ahmed would have cared less if that had been the case. Still, it was obvious that there was an old and deep bond there.
