Eventually Samir got bored with me and busied himself with the call girls. The gods were raging all around me as I returned to the office. Vishnu and Shiva were still fighting, and the entire pantheon was egging them on.
I didn’t want to use the office phone to call Amsterdam, so I used my mobile.
“Julia, change of plans. Are you still friendly with Shazia and Adelaide?”
“I’m meeting them tomorrow for lunch.”
“Good. See if you can talk them into getting married.”
“Sorry, Ravi, did I hear that right?”
“Say whatever it takes. If they get married, have a license, it means Shazia can’t marry Samir Langhani. It’ll keep her safe.”
“I take it your meeting with Samir didn’t go well.”
“Tell Ken and Clive to come home. We don’t need them to grab her.”
“So who do you want them to grab? Samir?”
I didn’t answer.
“That won’t work, Ravi.”
“Just tell Ken and Clive. And help Shazia.”
I hung up and found Marcie standing behind me.
“You going off the reservation here, dude?”
“I’m looking for a third option.”
“Tell me.”
“Samir is an abusive dickhead. He’s in our world. Shazia isn’t part of our world and doesn’t deserve to be dragged into it. None of the team feels good about this.”
“So you’re going to, what, have Ken and Clive lean on him? He’s rich, and his dad’s rich. You can’t scare him off. He’ll just come after you with all his money, and if his dad has access to Pakistani Intelligence muscle, you’re opening yourself up to a world of shit.”
“Mark already fell apart. I won’t, but if I have to get sacked to stop that wedding, I will.”
“Whoa, whoa, let’s not go there. Let’s think. The job is to find her, right? You’ve done that.”
“The Ibrahims also want her back, and she’s not going to come back willingly. Unless there’s no wedding she’s being forced into.”
“Okay, so the solution here is to kill any chance of a wedding. So let’s think about this. If there was information leaked to the public that puts too much heat on Samir Langhani and his antics, that might sour Shazia’s parents on the marriage.”
“I like where this is heading.”
“And then if his dad’s business dealings, all of which were considered suspicious and already reported as such, were to be in the media that people actually paid attention to instead of just the business news, that could also make the family too hot to marry into.”
“Can you do that?”
“Let me make a couple of calls. I still got some moves.”
“Brilliant. Thanks, Marcie.”
“That’s what I’m here for.”