Chapter Thirty #2
Westcott had studied history, and it was obvious to him that Africa had been dealt a bad hand by the colonial powers who had completely disregarded the ethnic, linguistic, and cultural boundaries of the African people when they had drawn the borders during the Berlin Conference of 1884.
In dividing the continent the way they had, the fourteen countries that had attended the conference, the United States being one of them, had forced rival groups into the same states and split unified people into different ones.
In Westcott’s opinion, this had planted the seeds for many of the current internal conflicts.
While he didn’t have the power to rewrite history, he did have the influence and the means to do something about the current leadership in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a country he deeply cared about.
Not just because of its mineral wealth and strategic potential, but because his Nailah had been born there.
The DRC was where Hearts United was the most needed.
The country could still be saved, but only if its future were guided by the right hands.
His hands.
The country’s enormous population growth, if not controlled, would lead to an even worse humanitarian crisis.
The numbers were terrifying. As of this moment, the population explosion had no infrastructure to support it, and the country’s institutions were gutted by corruption and fear.
If he didn’t intervene, there was a chance the DRC would never recover.
I can’t let that happen.
In order for the DRC to rise, he would have to break it first. The old guard needed to be removed, surgically and one by one. Like he’d done in Aruba. There, too, Mia Hernandez had excelled.
But there were many others who needed to be shown the door.
And if he was to trust Mpassi, this part of the plan was coming along nicely. In their place, Westcott would install leaders loyal not to foreign interests or their own clans, but to a vision. His vision. Nailah’s vision.
Just like I’ve done in Senegal and Kenya.
There had been resistance there too. But resistance had a way of vanishing when roads were paved, when lights came on, when fresh water was readily available, and when jobs returned.
While there was still a lot of work to do in these two countries, Westcott, through Hearts United, had brought much-needed political stability to these regions.
Hearts United had poured a lot of money into Senegal’s growing energy sector and had sponsored a multitude of vocational youth programs that had helped thousands of young men and women.
And, of course, Westcott had also backed the right people to run the show. The soft coup hadn’t been perfect, but it had wielded positive results.
As for Kenya, Westcott had solicited private equity firms to invest in Nairobi’s booming start-up ecosystem.
It hadn’t been easy, and it had taken a few more years than he had hoped, but ultimately, his plan had worked, and everyone involved had benefited from it.
Though he’d always refused to take credit for it, Westcott knew it was because of him that Nairobi had earned the nickname of Silicon Savannah.
But he hadn’t stopped there; he had teamed up with Doctors Without Borders and funded its intervention in Garissa County, a large-scale operation focused on the communities in and around the Dagahaley refugee camp, a location that had been affected by severe flooding.
Hearts United had financed all needed medical care and the distribution of hygiene kits to displaced families.
Westcott had also traveled to the Dadaab refugee complex to personally supervise the construction of two hundred communal latrines as well as a medically assisted therapy clinic, which offered methadone and buprenorphine treatments, mental health services, and social-reintegration support to drug addicts.
These initiatives had earned him favors not only with Doctors Without Borders but with the Kenyan government too.
Favors he had already called in to appropriate large mineral-rich swaths of land, which would help Hearts United finance its other initiatives, like the one in the DRC.
Now, Westcott’s eyes were on the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
And the clock was ticking. He would do anything in his power to restore the dignity of the Congolese people.
And if that meant silencing critics, bypassing democratic delays, and sending highly skilled operatives like Mia Hernandez to get the job done, then so be it.
“Sir,” Mpassi said, pulling Westcott out of his reverie. “What do you want to do about Istanbul?”
“You really don’t think these two operatives are a threat?” Westcott asked.
“I’m not worried about them. As I said, I believe we mitigated the fallout. We flushed them out with the arrest warrant. And with what they’ve done at the airport, I can guarantee you the police will be looking for them.”
“But they’re still out there,” Westcott said.
“They are, yes, but we must think strategically here. If we pursue these two further, we increase our profile. And right now, they have nothing. They may be good, lucky, or both for all I care, but they’re in the wind now.”
“And what about your contacts outside of law enforcement?” Westcott asked. “Do you know anyone in Istanbul that could help? Discreetly?”
“Not directly, but there’s a broker I’ve done business with in the past who could potentially reach out to his own contacts. Using him would keep Hearts United out of the picture.”
“Then do it, Charles,” Westcott said. “Now, tell me about the warrant. Can it be traced back to us?”
“My team is scrubbing the origin request from the Turkish systems as we speak.”
Westcott studied Mpassi and thought he detected a tell that his man wasn’t being totally transparent. “I feel like there’s a ‘but,’” he said.
Mpassi shifted in his seat. “But . . . if someone with enough juice digs deep enough, they might find fingerprints we missed.”
Westcott didn’t answer right away. He appreciated the honesty, but didn’t care that he had to probe to get it.
He reached for his coffee mug, took a sip, and let the silence stretch, his way of showing Mpassi he wasn’t pleased.
If there was one thing Westcott despised, it was uncertainty.
And these two operatives and that arrest warrant represented just that.
“I don’t like loose ends, Charles,” he said finally.
Mpassi swallowed hard. “And neither do I,” he said. “Our two biggest threats are gone. Hobb and that treacherous bitch, Sofie Bergmann, are both dead.”
Westcott nodded slowly, absorbing it all.
Sofie had shown so much promise. It was too bad she hadn’t been able to see past the few unpleasantries Westcott needed to do to bring order to the DRC.
Maybe he had brought her into his circle of trust too soon.
Mpassi had warned him about that, but he hadn’t listened.
He sighed. He wouldn’t repeat the same mistake twice.
As for Istanbul, this cloak-and-dagger stuff was Mpassi’s area of expertise, not Westcott’s. Then he remembered a discussion he once had with Mpassi about an elite group that specialized in tracking and eliminating problems.
“Are you still in touch with your contact in the United States? The one who handled the kind of problem we’re facing in Turkey?”
Mpassi shook his head. “Her name was Laura Newman.”
“Was? What happened?”
“She’s dead. Her husband too,” Mpassi replied. “No one really knows what truly happened. The official police report said it was a murder–suicide. They found Laura’s body in the Potomac, shot in the neck.”
“And her husband’s?”
“In the woods, behind the rifle that killed his wife.”
“He killed her?” Westcott asked.
“Again, that’s what’s written in the police report. Apparently, he shot himself after killing his wife. But I don’t believe it. Someone took them out.”
“A competitor?”
Mpassi shrugged. “Who knows?”
“That’s too bad. You told me she was running one of the best freelance assets there was.”
Mpassi nodded. “She did. Elias. That was the asset’s moniker. Nobody knows who he, or she for that matter, is. And Elias hasn’t reappeared since.”
“Maybe Elias is the one who killed Laura and her husband,” Westcott said, thinking out loud.
“Could be, but it doesn’t matter, because I have no way of contacting Elias. Laura was Elias’s handler. She controlled everything.”
Westcott sighed.
“Fine,” he said. “Apart from the broker, let’s not spend any more resources actively chasing these two ghosts. But I want you to upload their data and behavior patterns to our systems. If they surface again, I want to know.”
“Understood,” Mpassi said.
“And make sure to ask your contacts in Turkey to share their passport photos with your broker.”
“Of course.”
“Is there anything else?” Westcott asked.
“No, sir.”
Mpassi stood, offered a short nod of respect, and left the dining room without another word. Westcott didn’t watch him go. Instead, he stared at the last dark sip of coffee. He trusted Mpassi. The man was competent, he had good judgment, and he was loyal.
Still, there was something about the two operatives who had disappeared in Istanbul that made Westcott’s instincts itch. Loose ends, no matter how quiet, had a habit of unraveling entire empires.
And Westcott had no intention of letting anyone undo what he had built.