Storm Safari

By Lee Nelson

As a divorce lawyer, Moses Storm has probably saved more marriages than he’s destroyed, but he can’t seem to make things right with his own wife. So, when the opportunity comes to go to Africa to hunt some man-eating lions, he jumps at the chance, believing he has nothing to lose.

To Storm’s surprise, he finds himself attracted to a beautiful African woman—a woman who was only a child the last time he visited Africa twenty-five years earlier. Her perfection has only become more refined and convincing. Nicknamed “Victoria” by him because he could not pronounce her given name, she quickly catches his attention—and his heart.


Best-selling author Lee Nelson has written another masterpiece with this timeless and action-packed thriller. Guaranteed to keep you in suspense, Storm Safari isn’t for the faint of heart. This first-rate novel is a long-awaited pleasure for those who love Lee Nelson’s stories!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cedar Fort Publishing & Media
• Release date: Jul 14, 2023
• ISBN: 9781462139040

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© 2021 Lee Nelson

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form whatsoever, whether by graphic, visual, electronic, film, microfilm, tape recording, or any other means, without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief passages embodied in critical reviews and articles.

This is a work of fiction. The characters, names, incidents, places, and dialogue are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. The opinions and views expressed herein belong solely to the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions or views of Cedar Fort, Inc. Permission for the use of sources, graphics, and photos is also solely the responsibility of the author.

Published by Council Press, an imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc.

2373 W. 700 S., Springville, UT 84663

Distributed by Cedar Fort, Inc., www.cedarfort.com

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020950075

Cover design by Courtney Proby

Cover design © 2021 Cedar Fort, Inc.

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed on acid-free paper

Dedication

To Joseph William Billy Johnson

His missionary efforts helped prepare over thirteen hundred Africans from Ghana for baptism by the time the first Utah missionaries arrived in 1979. Joseph and his son, Brigham, took me to many of the places where events in this story take place. After telling me his story, I wish Joseph could have lived long enough to read my story.

To John Riding

Before becoming my neighbor, John spent years as mission president and then temple president for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Ghana. John was never more than a phone call away when I had questions about names, places, history, and customs. John prepared a list of traditional African names—first and last names for men and women. I kept this list on the right side of my desk and reached for it every time I introduced a new character.

Author’s Note

After reading this book, you might decide to visit Ghana and Lake Volta where most of this story takes place.

Upon arrival, when you start having conversations with the locals, you may think they are not speaking English. But they are. They had to learn it during the English Colonial Period.

Over time the King’s English merged with some of the traditional African words, phrases, phonetic styles, and languages. People from London might tell you the Africans have corrupted their language. The Africans might tell you they have made the language more comfortable, better suited to their culture and history, more African.

If your visit is a long one, a month or more, or even two years, the term for most Latter-day Saint missionaries, the day will come when you understand most everything you hear.

My challenge as an author is to write in a manner that is easily understood by nearly all readers. If that doesn’t happen, I fear the reader will stop reading before the story finds its ending.

Instead of wrestling phonetics in an attempt to capture all the sounds and accents in the African dialogue, I write down the words as I hear them after passing through my ears and being processed into plain and simple American English by my brain. I don’t want the reader to miss anything White Fang or Victoria may say, sing, or do.

Foreword

By Sam Storm

I smiled as I drove into the parking lot of Moses Storm’s law office in Salt Lake City. Had he not become a lawyer, he could have been a successful advertising executive. He knew how to get people’s attention. The sign in the parking lot did that, even if you were happily married.

Law Offices

Storm, Savage, Slaughter, and Killgore

888-DIVORCE

One time I asked Moses why his partners were never in the office when I dropped by. He said he had no partners named Savage, Slaughter, and Killgore, just an office manager, a paralegal assistant named Killgore. He used those names in the title in addition to Storm to convey a certain message and image to catch the attention of people thinking about divorce. He said he and his paralegal executive secretary, Ms. Killgore, signed up clients, met with judges, took depositions, produced documents, and negotiated settlements. A bevy of intern law school students did research, ran errands, and served papers. Ms. Killgore took charge of nearly everything going on in the office and made many of the decisions. The office continued to run smoothly when Moses departed on another hunting trip.

Ms. Killgore was a beyond-middle-aged woman with short, blond hair streaked with gray and evenly cropped bangs across her forehead. She was neat and orderly and firm in disposition. She had a determined handshake and looked you in the eye when speaking. I didn’t know if she was married or had children.

Moses once told me that if his opponent was wealthy and well-known in the community, and was cheating on his wife, all Storm had to do was leak news of the divorce to the press. In a few days his client would receive a more-than-fair settlement.

One time I asked Moses if he ever regretted getting paid to break up marriages; if he ever felt like he had dirtied his hands too many times. His response surprised me.

I’ve saved more marriages than I’ve destroyed, he said. "There are lots of people out there thinking about divorce. For whatever reason, things haven’t worked out like they thought they would. Maybe divorce is a good solution. Then they hear about how one of my settlements destroyed a wealthy man’s bank account, or maybe they read some nasty stuff in the newspaper about the divorce.

"They think, ‘That could be me someday. I don’t want to see my world destroyed, sitting across the room from Moses Storm in divorce court. Maybe I should dump a friend or two, spend more time at home, fix the old marriage, and make the best of things as they now stand.’

I don’t know anybody in Salt Lake who’s steered more people away from divorce than I have, Moses boasted.

He hesitated a moment, and then on a more serious note, he said, Martha wants to divorce me. Wants me to fill out the papers now. All she wants is the house and something to live on. Says she never wants to see me again—not ever. Says she blames me for the death of Max. Says she can never forgive me. She says if I had taken the boy to church instead of the shooting range, he’d have gone on a mission instead of joining the Special Forces. Now he’s dead and there’s no way to bring him back. It’s my fault.

Moses told me this a few days earlier. I had no response. How should I know what to tell him? I write articles about guns, hunting, and fishing.

Today, Moses wanted to see me about something else. Wouldn’t tell me over the phone. Said it was important.

Ms. Killgore was expecting me. Rather than inviting me to take a seat in the lobby, she waved her outstretched arm toward Moses’s half-open door. He’s waiting for you.

The first thing I noticed upon entering his office was a huge many-colored map of Ghana, Africa, on the conference table. I wished I hadn’t come.

I cannot go to Africa, I explained. I can’t turn my back on two book deadlines. Sorry.

"This is not your regular hunting trip for Outdoor Life," he said, waving me to step closer.

I don’t care, I can’t go.

I had gone with Moses on a number of overseas hunting trips through the years. It was always the same: he hunted while I took pictures and scribbled in my notebook. Moses paid for it all, including the airline tickets. When we returned home I wrote and sold articles and photos chronicling Storm’s cunning and bravery, hunting down and shooting some of the most dangerous and rare animals on the planet. I got to keep all the money I received for the photos and articles. Storm ended up with a pile of stories and photos chronicling his outdoor adventures for posterity. Now, with Max dead, he didn’t have any posterity.

This time it’s different, he insisted. Lions are eating people. They want me to kill the man-eating lions. You can sell lots of articles, maybe even a book.

I didn’t know Ghana had dangerous lions, I said.

In an effort to bring in more tourism money, they bought and turned loose several thousand wild animals, every kind you can think of, including lions, but apparently the new batch of felines includes some rotten apples, outlaws with a taste for human flesh.

Don’t they have local hunters and trappers to handle this? I asked.

"They have tried that without success. They offer a $2,000 bounty to anyone bringing in a dead lion, and another $2,000 if there are human remains in the digestive system, but the killing continues, with tourism revenues plunging.

"Game managers and some of my favorite hunting guides in other countries have told them that Moses Storm, from Salt Lake, a hunter with many guns, can kill the lions.

This is a good thing I’ve been asked to do, he continued. Not like a couple of rich Americans, drinking beer while cruising around wildlife parks, shooting whatever jumps up for the fun of it. It’s not like selling divorces to rich people. It’s saving lives while risking your own. A worthy thing for me to do.

You’ve sold me, I said. But I still can’t go. I can’t just walk away. My deadlines have already been extended too many times.

I have serious commitments too, he argued. The most important person in my life, the one I love with all my heart—my wife, Martha—wants to divorce me yesterday. I need to stay and work on that.

So the lions continue nabbing humans for breakfast, I added.

Get serious, Storm says, looking me straight in the eye. "What’s more important for me right now, saving the marriage of a lady who hates me and has no living children? Or saving the lives of poor people in Africa and tourists from Germany and France from having their throats ripped out and entrails spilled on the ground.

I have the skills to get rid of those lions without a lot of trouble. That I can do, I think. But I have no idea how to convince Martha that she should not blame me for the death of our son, that she really does love me and should not divorce me. I don’t know how to solve the marriage problem, but I believe I can handle the lion problem. What should I do?

I didn’t answer. Only he could make that decision. We looked at each other in silence.

Suddenly the door crashed open. Killgore rushed in.

Your neighbor called. Martha’s holding a yard sale! she yelled. Your guns, dozens of them, are on a big table by the front sidewalk. People are buying your guns, thousand dollar guns, ten or twenty dollars each . . .

She can’t do that, Storm growled. It’s against the law. She’s not set up to do background checks. She could go to jail.

Go! Go! Go! Killgore screamed. We charged out the front door and piled into his Dodge pickup.

Fifteen minutes later, we turned off Cottonwood Boulevard into the cul-de-sac where he lived. The street was clogged with cars, trucks, four-wheelers, side-by-sides, and motorcycles. Groups of people, mostly men, were crowded in small groups, many holding newly purchased guns in their hands, discussing the sidewalk gun sale of a lifetime.

Martha was standing behind a table where three rifles were still on display. Her strawberry blond hair was perfectly styled like she had been to the hairstylist that very day. She was dressed for a formal dinner at the governor’s mansion, in a glistening gold dress that fit her perfectly, and brand new white heels. The usual friendly expression in her sky-blue eyes was now defiant and confrontational as she shouted, The next three people to hand me a twenty dollar bill get the last three rifles.

Two older men and a fifteen-year-old girl rushed forward with money for Martha. The sale was over. The table was empty. Now it was Moses’s turn.

The police are coming to arrest everyone who bought a weapon today, he shouted. With no proof of passing background checks, jail time is almost certain.

People started running to their vehicles. Moses shouted louder, hoping they would hear his final comment.

Those of you who get arrested, don’t call my wife for help with a bail bond. She didn’t take in enough money today to bail out even one of you.

In two or three minutes, the parked vehicles and bikes were gone. All was quiet.

Hands in pockets, looking down at his feet, Storm strolled quietly toward his wife as she glared defiantly in his direction.

Thank you, thank you, he said when he was close enough for her to hear his words.

For selling your old guns so you can buy some new ones? she asked smartly.

No, he said, and looking up at her, he added, For helping me make a very difficult decision. I’ve been invited to go to Ghana to kill some man-eating lions. But up until a few minutes ago, I thought I had to stay home to help a woman who hates me get a divorce. Since there’s no hope of saving the marriage, I’m going to Africa, and you can go to hell.

But you have to do the divorce, she complained.

Think of it this way, he explained. If the lions win and eat me, you get all the money, even my stuffed animal heads. The hope of that happening will make your wait more pleasant. For the first time he smiled.

How long will you be gone? she asked, no longer sounding angry and defiant.

If I’m lucky, maybe two weeks. But maybe six months. I don’t really know.

And you’ll love every minute of it. You’ll be hunting.

Like I said, it’s a rescue mission, not your typical hunting trip.

There was no more to say. I followed Moses to the truck. We headed back to the office.

As Moses turned into his specially marked parking place, I asked him to hang on a minute, that I had something in my car for him.

A minute later I handed him a thick notebook full of clean, white, blank pages.

A new kind of toilet paper? he asked.

Your journal—a written record of a glorious attempt to save people from the man-eating lions. Your legacy. Write in it every day what you see, hear, taste, feel, and say; the weather, the bugs, the bushes and trees, the blood and guts. Write it all down, every detail, I explained.

And when you get home, I continued. If you succeed, give the notebook to me. I will publish a dozen articles, get a book contract, and then perhaps a movie deal. You could write the book yourself. You don’t need me. The whole world will know about this brave and marvelous thing you have done. And Martha too. Maybe she’ll change her mind about divorcing you.

Moses held the notebook against his chest and patted it fondly with his hand. He had nothing more to say. The next morning he was on an airplane to Africa.

Chapter One

Her countenance was both terrible and pleasant, an African queen, the whites of her eyes flashing like polished ivory. Her nose was wide and flat in contrast to the noses of the chattering white people who surrounded her at the dinner table. The black portions of her eyes were reflecting a subtle radiant light, the glow of life and vitality.

She was taller than the average woman, her muscles stronger. A large woman by most standards, but not plump or saggy. Her navy blue cotton dress, though close at the neck and covering her knees, could not hide the swells and valleys that were both frightening and inviting. Her shin-high boots were thick and brown, the kind men wore in snake country. There were heavy copper bracelets on her sleek, black wrists, and her earrings were polished silver spoons, lures for subduing the wild men-trout of the world.

As I sat there looking at her, I realized the Lord in heaven had shown me his finest work—a frightening goddess for the pagans, or a loving heavenly mother for the civilized nations, I had found her.

Her perfection had only become more refined and convincing during the twenty-five years since I had last seen her. No more than a girl then, she was working with her father, a famous whiskey trader and commercial fisherman. The moment I met her, I nicknamed her Queen Victoria, because I mostly couldn’t pronounce or remember her real name, Adjoa Ewudzie. Her father didn’t seem to mind me giving his daughter a nickname, one that shortened to just Victoria as she grew older.

She had not noticed my arrival, occupied with the others at her table, all talking at her, angry, over-serious, accusatory frowns on their pale, white faces. Victoria seemed to be handling the onslaught with grace and confidence. Otherwise I might have joined her, uninvited, an admirer coming to the rescue.

We were in Vic Baboo’s Cafe, one of the few air-conditioned eating places in downtown Kumasi, Ghana, the last major town on the northern edge of the more civilized portion of Ghana. Kumasi was the stepping off place for those venturing into the wild northern frontier, full of gold, dangerous animals, tribes that still waged war with one another, Muslim terrorists, and slave traders who openly disregarded the anti-slavery laws.

I had driven to Kumasi from Accra in a brand-new Land Rover, provided by the Department of Game and Wildlife. The compartment in the back, as well as the rack on top, were packed with boxes of supplies: ice chests with food and drink, plastic containers and canvas bags carrying ammunition, night vision binoculars, rifle scopes, and firearms. Included with the firearms was a sawed-off, nine-slug, Winchester shotgun, the model stagecoach guards in the 1800s used to call a Mule’s Leg, because every time the shooter pulled the trigger, it kicked like a mule. Also included was a #5 steel bear trap—against the law in the United States—the jaws lined with one-inch steel teeth that when slammed shut on the foot of an adult lion would never let go until the lion was dead.

My plan was to link up with government officials at Vic’s Cafe, game wardens who were directed to guide me to the locations where man-eating lions were stalking and killing people. But the wardens hadn’t arrived yet.

While waiting and watching Victoria, I was trying to make sense of the biggest, thickest, most confusing restaurant menu I had ever seen. There were Chinese dishes, Japanese sushi items, Italian, German, Mexican, and American selections too. Vic seemed to put anything on the menu that anyone might ever want to order, even if the cooks didn’t know how to cook it. I figured my chances for a nice meal would improve if I ordered something African, something they made every day for the regular customers. So I ordered peanut soup with guinea fowl drumsticks and a side dish of brown rice.

The soup arrived in a broad, shallow bowl, looking very African indeed: thick brown swamp water sprinkled with green jungle-leaf herbs, and soggy, boiled drumstick crocodiles lurking beneath the surface. It had a smooth, wholesome feel on the tongue, and just enough kick from some kind of pepper to keep my attention as I swallowed. I was pleased with my selection as I began to wash it down with two cans of cold Coke and bottled water. In the tropics one should never pass up the opportunity to consume lots of liquids.

Mr. Storm, you whiskey smuggler, rum runner, desert pirate. You’re back! I didn’t recognize you at first.

Victoria recognized me after so many years. I pushed my chair back, standing to greet her. I hoped for a hug, or at least a handshake. She offered both.

What brings you back to Africa? she asked as we sat down beside each other at the table.

I am a respectable attorney in Salt Lake City, the land of the Mormons. And a hunter. I’ve come to Ghana to kill man-eating lions.

A lawyer and a lion killer. I shouldn’t be surprised, she said, grinning, obviously pleased with my response. But why did they choose you to kill the lions? We have hunters here.

"Yes,