Cross Country

pushed me into the wall and pinned my wrist. I didn’t struggle with him. For one thing, my shoulder was howling with pain. When he reached for the cell phone, I just opened my hand and let him take it.
    Game over, all right
.
    I was going home
.
    Whether I wanted to or not.
    Honestly, I had mixed feelings.

Chapter 121
    I LEFT THE consulate pretty much the way I’d left Kirikiri —
as a captive
. This time, of the American government. I wondered if I could possibly get away again. And did I really want to?
    One of the marine escorts drove, while the other sat in back with me. Worse, they had handcuffed me to him. I guess they’d decided I wanted to do this the hard way.
    The main gates to the consulate were closed as we drove toward them.
No one was waiting to get in anymore
.
    The demonstrators had swollen in number, though. They were lined along the fence, holding on to it like they would jail bars, cursing against all things American, as well as the life that fate had dealt them.
    Once we were through the main gates, the crowd closed in around us.
    Bodies pressed against the car windows, palms slapped on the glass, and fists beat the roof. I could see anger and fear in their eyes, the frustration of lifetimes of injustice and misery.
    “What do these people want?” the young marine in back with me asked. His name tag said Owens. “Those hostages in the Delta are Americans and Brits. They’re probably going to die.”
    “What do they want?” the marine at the wheel said. “They want us not to be here.”
    And nobody wants me here,
I was thinking,
not even the Americans
.
Nobody wants to hear the truth either.

Chapter 122
    THE ROADWAYS TO Murtala were even more crowded and bustling than the last time I’d been here — if that was possible. We parked at the very same air base Adanne and I had used to go to Sudan. We had to take a shuttle from there.
    The bus was jammed with American families presumably headed home or at least out of Nigeria. Everyone was talking nonstop about the terrifying hostage drama in the Delta. No one had been freed yet, and everybody was afraid the hostages would be killed soon.
    The surprise to me was how little attention anyone gave to two men handcuffed together. I guess these people had other things on their minds besides me and my marine guard.
    The terminal at the airport was overflowing, noisy, and as chaotic as the scene of a bombing. We burrowed our way in to a security office to arrange a walk-through to the plane. Apparently the handcuffs weren’t coming off until I was buckled in tight and pointed toward home.
    The waiting area was packed, like everywhere else, with all eyes turned toward a single TV. It was tuned to an African channel.
    The female reporter had a Yoruban accent, just like Adanne’s, and it was the strangest thing, but that’s what finally put me over the edge. Tears started to roll down my cheeks, and I began to shake as if I had a fever.
    “You okay, man?” the marine cuffed to me asked. He seemed like a good man, actually. He was just doing a job, and doing it well.
    “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I’m fine.”
    Still, I wasn’t the only one crying in the room. With good reason. Nigerian troops had moved in on the Bonny Island complex in what was supposed to be a “rescue mission.” Instead, all thirty-four hostages were now dead. Open fighting had broken out all through the Delta region. Riots were reported in at least two other states in the south.
    The images of the slaughtered hostages were shocking by American news standards. The hostages were lying on the floor of the corridor, adults and children both. The bodies were slumped and fallen, draped over one another, with bloodstained clothes, and hoods still over their heads.
    One woman near me let out a piercing scream. Her family was still down in the Delta. Everyone else was quietly fixated on the screen.
    “Governors’ offices in Rivers, Delta, and Bayelsa states have issued warnings,” the reporter went on. “Local citizens are urged to avoid all but the most necessary travel for at least the next twenty-four hours. Full curfew is in effect. Violators will be arrested, or possibly shot.”
    The marine cuffed to me, Owens, spoke. “Your plane is boarding. Let’s go, Detective Cross. Hell, I wish I could go with you. I’m from DC myself. I’d like to go home. I miss it. You have no idea.”
    I took a number from Owens and promised to call his mother when I got back.
    A few