James PATTERSON - Cross Country

One guy got hold of my shirt. He ripped it all the way down the back before I knocked his arm away.

The shirt didn’t matter to me. Nothing did anymore. Once again I wondered why I was still alive. Because they thought I was CIA? Because I had friends in Washington? Or maybe because they finally believed I was a cop?

I made my way to the main gate. Standing there, filthy and barefoot, with no passport to show, I told the double-chinned marine who got in my face that my name was Alex Cross, I was an American police officer, and I had to speak with the ambassador right away.

The marine didn’t want to hear it, not a word.

“I was kidnapped. I’m an American cop,” I told him. “I just witnessed a murder.”

Out of the side of his mouth the marine muttered, “Take a number.”

I WAS GOING more than a little crazy now, but I had to hold my emotions in. I had stories to tell someone, information to give, Adanne’s secrets to share with someone who could make a difference.

I got several minutes of healthy skepticism at the gate before I finally convinced a marine guard to call in my name. The response came back right away: Bring Detective Cross inside. It was almost as if they were expecting me. I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not. Given my recent history, probably not.

The consulate lobby, with its metal detectors and bulletproof glass on all the windows, felt like an urban police station. People were lined up at every desk and window, most of them clearly agitated, waiting to be seen.

All the American accents – and a portrait of Condoleezza Rice presiding over the room-played tricks with my mind about where I was, and exactly how I had gotten here.

Once inside, I was met by a nonmilitary escort in an off-white suit. He was “Mr. Collins,” a Nigerian of some unspecified position here.

Unlike the marine who’d brought me this far, Collins was friendly and animatedly answered a few questions as we walked.

“There’s been at least one rebel attack in Rivers State today,” he explained, gesticulating the whole time. “Much bigger than we’ve seen before. The government won’t admit to it, but the independent media is calling it the beginning of a civil war.”

The populist buzz on the first floor gave way to crisp officiousness and hushed conversations on the second.

I was taken straight to the ambassador’s consular suite, where I waited outside his office for several minutes until a dozen men, black, white, and four who looked Chinese, walked out all at once. Each of them appeared somber and nervous. No one met my gaze, or perhaps no one was in the least interested that I was sitting there barefoot and in rags.

Mr. Collins politely held the door for me, and then he closed it from the outside.

AMBASSADOR ROBERT OWELEEN was tall and willowy, almost too thin, a silver-haired man of maybe sixty. He stood behind his large antique desk flanked by American and Nigerian flags. Two aides stayed where they were, on a small couch in an alcove off to one side.

“Mr. Cross.” He shook my hand, unsmiling. “My God, what happened to you?”

“A lot. I won’t waste your time. I’m here about a man, a killer, known as the Tiger. It’s a matter of Nigerian and American security.”

He swept my words away in the air. “I know why you’re here, Mr. Cross. I’ve been getting all kinds of pressure from Abu Rock about you.”

“Excuse me – Abu Rock?”

“The capital. It seems that the only one who wants you in Nigeria is you. The CIA has actually saved your life here, haven’t they?”

Now I was a little dumbstruck, to add to my general numbness and dizziness about what had happened recently. The American ambassador knew about my presence here? Was someone taking out billboards about me or something?

“We’re sending you home today,” Oweleen continued, with finality in his voice.

I looked at the floor and back at him again, trying to keep it together. “Sir, the man I’m chasing is a mass murderer. He may have government ties here. He’s definitely involved with the police in some mysterious way. If I could just have a chance to reach my CIA contact in Lagos–”

He cut me off. “What exactly do you think your authority is, Mr. Cross? You’re a visitor in this country, nothing more than that. You can take this up with the State Department if you wish. In Washington.”

“He needs to be stopped, sir. Yesterday he murdered a reporter for the Guardian named Adanne Tansi. I saw him kill her. He murdered her entire family. He’s responsible for at least eight deaths in Washington.”

Finally, Oweleen exploded. “Who the hell are you? I never even heard of you until three days ago, and now I’m taking time out for this? Do you have any idea what’s going on here?”

He waved his hand at the plasma TV on the wall. “Turn that up.”

One of the aides pushed a button on a remote – and then I watched the TV in shocked silence and with dread.

THE TV WAS tuned to CNN. A British reporter was speaking over an image of an upscale housing complex – white two-story buildings in neat rows, shot from high above.

The overlay read “Breaking News – Summit Oil Residential Compound, Bonny Island, Nigeria.”

“Never before have families been taken,” the reporter was saying, “and certainly never this number of live hostages. In an e-mail to the international press, People for the Liberation of the Niger Delta now have claimed responsibility for the incident – with these shocking images attached to their message.”

The screen switched to grainy infrared video.

Dozens of people sat along the floor of a dark hallway. Their heads were covered and hands tied, but it was easy to tell there were men, women, and children on the film. Some of them were crying, others moaning piteously.

“Those are British and American citizens,” Ambassador Oweleen informed me. “Every one of them. Consider yourself lucky to get a flight out of here at all.”

“What flight? When?”

He held up a hand, looking back at the TV. “Look at this, will you? Do you see what’s happening?” Armed troops were streaming out of a truck single file.

The British reporter went on: “Government forces have established a perimeter around the entire complex, while economic pressure mounts internationally.

“With more attacks promised, oil-production facilities are shutting down regionwide, approaching an unprecedented seventy percent slowdown, which is considered to be catastrophic.

“Chinese, French, Dutch, and of course US interests in particular are at stake. Under normal trade conditions, Nigeria provides about twenty percent of American oil.”

A phone buzzed on the desk. Ambassador Oweleen picked it up. “Yes?” he said, and then, “Send them in.”

“Sir,” I tried again. “I’m not asking for much. I just need to make one phone call–”

“We’ll get you a shower and some fresh clothes right away. And we’ll take care of any immigration issues. We can get you a new passport right away. But then you’re gone. Forget about your manhunt. As of right now, it’s over.”

I finally snapped at him. “I don’t need a shower! Or fresh clothes. I need you to listen to me. I just witnessed a reporter named Adanne Tansi being murdered at the Kirikiri Prison. She was writing an important story that has relevance to the violence near the oil fields.”

The doors to the office opened, and Oweleen’s eyes shifted right past me. It was as though the moment I raised my voice, I’d lost him. He didn’t even respond to what I’d said.

He spoke directly to the double marine escort waiting there. “We’re all done here. Take Detective Cross downstairs and get him cleaned up for travel back to the US.”