The driver looked at Naomi in the rear-view mirror of his taxi. Since he picked her up from Ikeja she had not said a word other than to tell him the destination: 1004.
When he told her the hiked fare, three times the standard rate because other taxi drivers were afraid of the riots, she just nodded and got into the back. She was now staring out of the window, as she had been doing all through the journey. She was dressed like an ashewo returning from work, so she should have money, but she looked like a worried prostitute; one who had been robbed of the money she earned during the night. What if they arrived at her destination and she refused to pay him? If he tried to insist on being paid, she could say she already had. She could start shouting and screaming, and when a crowd had formed, she would tell them to check his pocket for the crumpled notes she paid him with – and they would find crumpled notes in his pockets. Taxi drivers always have crumpled notes. Or she could offer him sex in lieu of payment. He arched his neck to see more of her exposed legs in the mirror. He looked at her face. Her eyes were red and moist. He was right. She had been robbed of all her money. He had picked up a prostitute who did not have any money to pay the fare.
He bit his lip and cursed his luck. He would take her number and give her his. He would tell her to call him anytime she needed a driver. If she did, he would make his money back; if she didn’t, he might find a passenger in VI. If she offered sex, he would tell her he was a born-again Christian - the same lie he used when his family begged him to get a girlfriend who would one day, God willing, become his wife.
Malik walked along the balcony on the sixth floor and stopped in front of a door. Shehu watched him from inside his Prius. Malik pressed a bell, looked about him, and knocked on the door. He looked through the peephole then turned his back to the door and scanned the car park below. He walked back along the corridor, went down the stairs, and returned to his car. He sat inside and looked up at the flat he’d just visited.