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figure it out in a hurry.
    “How exactly do you know my…friend?”
    “Nairobi’s a small town. Your friend’s got lots of aliases. Not sure who he really is, but I know who he’s linked with and it goes way up the food chain. That’s a chain I’d like a piece of.”
    I looked at the camera, then back to the woman. She returned the stare, unblinking yet somehow anxious. Her body language spoke nonchalance as she reclined on her cot, but the way her eyes darted to the cameras said something else.
    “You’re a plant, aren’t you?” I guessed. “They want him, I’m the most obvious connection, and you’re here to figure out what I know. They’re probably feeding you enough information to draw me in and get me to confide in you, thinking I’ll be so concerned with protecting my own neck, I’ll give them anything they want.” I looked up at the camera, addressing my comments to the unseen viewer. “Considering how I’ve just been screwed over, I’d like to help, but I have no idea who he is. Until this morning, or yesterday, or whatever day this is, I’d never seen him before. I can’t even tell you the chain of connection between us because I don’t know how anyone got in touch with him either. Further, I’m guessing you’ve seized my client list, my business partner’s name, and are looking up my family members to decide who to arrest next. Have fun with that. It’ll be like beating your head against a brick wall. Now, do I get my shim or not?”
    Even though I didn’t have a clue what I was talking about, I sounded incredibly savvy to my own ears—like I breezed through these types of situations every day.
    The woman’s head cocked to the side as if listening to something I couldn’t hear. Then she leaped up from her cot, padded barefoot across the cell, and pounded on the door.
    “Spook don’t got the goods. Let me out!” she yelled as she pounded.
    Nothing happened. She pounded harder, but the door didn’t open. She pounded a good five minutes to no avail. At first I thought it was a show for my benefit, designed to manipulate me. But as I watched, I revised my opinion. Her frustration grew and her pounding became more desperate. She tore out an earpiece and hurled it to the floor.
    “Let me out!” she screeched until she was in tears, wild with rage. She whirled on me. “Tell ’em what they want! Tell ’em about the hopped-up t-mod git. I gotta get out! I can’t take more time in here! Do it, or…or I’ll hurt you real good!”
    She looked like she could too, but what could I offer when I didn’t know anything? She advanced. I stood my ground and held up a hand as if that might stop her. “If you touch me, any confession I make will be suspect. No one will believe what I say if it’s under duress. Beating me up may make you feel better, but you won’t get out any quicker and you’ll have another charge against you. Besides—if you really were one of the protesters—we were at the clinic for the same reason.”
    “What reason’s that?” she asked suspiciously, voice hoarse.
    “We’re both women denied a basic right for reasons we don’t understand, and we want that to stop.” I wasn’t sure on that last part, but it couldn’t hurt to appeal to some sort of sisterhood if it kept her from punching my lights out. Besides, I felt sorry for her. “You picked your way to protest. I picked mine.”
    “Give ’em the name,” she said, but sounded less certain. “I got people waiting on me. I can’t spend time in here again. The hooahs got no problem forgetting you’re here. Don’t care much about basic human rights either. No such thing as that in here.”
    “I don’t have anything to tell,” I lied. Maybe I’d feel different if left in the pit a few more days, but right now, all I had were my convictions and I’d stand by them.
    The woman went back to her cot. She looked defeated, but I still wondered if it was an act. I sat on one of the vacant cots, tucked my