The Missing American

Kwei Quartey

Books by the author

The Inspector Darko Dawson Mysteries

Wife of the Gods

Children of the Street

Murder at Cape Three Points

Gold of Our Fathers

Death by His Grace

The Emma Djan Mysteries

The Missing American

Other Books

Death at the Voyager Hotel

Kamila

This is a work of fiction. The characters, dialogue, and incidents depicted are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published by

Soho Press, Inc.

227 W 17th Street

New York, NY 10011

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Quartey, Kwei, author.

The missing American / Kwei Quartey.

ISBN 978-1-64129-070-8

eISBN 978-1-64129-071-5

1. Fiction/Mystery & Detective/Police Procedural. 2. Fiction/Mystery & Detective/Women Sleuths. 3. Mystery fiction. 4. Suspense fiction.

LCC PS3617.U37 M57 2020 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

Interior design by Janine Agro, Soho Press, Inc.

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To Ahmed Hussein-Suale, a Ghanaian journalist martyred
on Wednesday, January 16, 2019

Part One

ONE

January 4, Sekondi-Takoradi, Ghana

Lying flat with the stock of the long-range rifle pressed firmly against his shoulder, the assassin positioned himself on the gable roof of the UT Bank building off Shippers Council Road. His legs were stretched straight out in a V on either side of the roof’s ridge. He would have preferred a flat surface, but the advantages of this location easily outweighed any drawbacks. From this angle, he had an unobstructed view of the road through the Zeiss scope.

He waited. When the moment arrived, he would place the pad of his right index finger on the trigger rather than the crease between the first and second joints. That could result in a sideways torque on squeezing the trigger. So too could wrapping the thumb around the buttstock. Leave the thumb on the stock pointing forward toward the end of the barrel—that was what he had learned in his first days as an officer in the Ghana Police Service’s SWAT Panther Unit. Now, two years later, he was one of the best marksmen among his peers. Unfortunately, GPS talk was cheap, and they never put their money where their mouth was. Only the sniper’s freelance work, like this assignment, bought him the good life—a nice car, good clothes, new furniture. And women, of course.

Political rallies in Ghana are a serious business. There’s blaring music, dancing troupes, and handkerchief-waving groups of women in matching outfits. Gangs of ferocious biker youths careen erratically through the streets, sometimes colliding with cars and each other, but these excitable young men, their bodies soused with adrenaline, leap right back up and keep riding.

So it was for Bernard Evans-Aidoo campaigning in the city of Sekondi-Takoradi against incumbent President Bannerman. Big, charismatic, and dressed flamboyantly in his signature red, black, white, and green—the colors of the National Democratic Congress party, the NDC. Evans-Aidoo stood out of the sunroof of his black Benz and waved to the thrilled crowds lining Shippers Council Road. A full brass band, rocking and high-stepping in rhythmic unison, preceded the slow-moving vehicle, and behind the car was a bunch of random kids and teenagers whirling and jumping up and down with unspecified exuberance. Every so often, the Benz paused and Evans-Aidoo got out with surprising agility to press palms with his fans. He saw the worshipping, idolizing expression in their eyes as they stretched out their hands to be blessed by his touch.