Episode One: His New Girl

Sibusiso Mthembu had spent most of the evening introducing Ndivhuwo Netshidzivhani as his new girl, which she found amusing because he hardly knew her. Three weeks of messages, two after-work drinks and one dinner had somehow been enough for him to decide that she belonged to him. Ndivhuwo had learnt that some men did not need much before they started claiming women. Sometimes all you had to do was laugh at the right jokes, reply to a few late-night messages and let them believe getting close to you had been their idea.

The dinner was in Hyde Park with eleven other people Sibusiso called his people. There were business partners, old friends and their partners, gathered around a table with enough wine to keep them there for hours. Ndivhuwo fitted in easily. She looked good without looking like she had tried too hard, spoke when she needed to and remembered everyone's name after hearing it once. By the second bottle of wine, nobody was asking who she was anymore. She was simply Sibusiso's new girl.

He seemed proud of that. His hand found her knee under the table more than once, and she allowed it to stay there. There were parts of her job that required patience, and men were easier when they believed they were desired.

Sibusiso spoke for most of the evening. Ndivhuwo listened because listening was one of the things she did best. She had built an entire marketing career from paying attention. Her other job wasn't that different.

People always told you what they wanted if you listened long enough.

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Never Stay for Dessert

The dessert menus arrived shortly after nine and Ndivhuwo looked at her watch. She told the table she needed to get home because the following day was going to be busy. Sibusiso tried to convince her to stay, but she kissed him goodbye, collected her handbag and said goodnight to everyone.

Eleven people watched her leave. So did the waiter, the woman at reception and the security guard downstairs.

That mattered.

Ndivhuwo always made sure people remembered when she left.

Sibusiso stayed behind. Another bottle of wine arrived, followed by whisky, and the evening became louder as the restaurant slowly emptied around them. He sent Ndivhuwo a message, then another when she didn't reply. He wasn't worried. She had told him she was tired, and he assumed his new girl had gone home to sleep.

At 22:41, Sibusiso finally left the restaurant.

He would never make it home.

The Basement

Nobody knew exactly what happened in the parking basement.

The cameras showed Sibusiso walking towards his Range Rover alone. He checked his phone, stopped suddenly and turned around before disappearing behind a concrete pillar.

A security guard later remembered hearing a scream, but by the time he reached the lower level, whoever had been there was gone. Another person claimed to have seen someone walking towards the exit, although they couldn't remember whether it had been a man or a woman.

Sibusiso was found beside his car. His phone was underneath it and his keys were several metres away.

He had been stabbed twenty-two times.

Detective Mulalo Mbedzi had seen enough dead men to recognise fear, but there was something else on Sibusiso's face that bothered him. Surprise, perhaps. Confusion. Whatever had happened in that basement, Sibusiso appeared to have recognised the person who had been waiting for him.

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Thursday Morning

At 07:45 the next morning, Ndivhuwo arrived at work with coffee in one hand and her laptop in the other. She wore black trousers, a white shirt and her hair pulled neatly away from her face. By eight she had already answered several emails, and by half past, Thembi had arrived carrying the biggest story of the morning.

A businessman had been murdered in Hyde Park.

By nine, Sibusiso's photograph was playing across the television in reception. Ndivhuwo walked past it twice. The first time she didn't look. The second time she allowed herself a few seconds.

The news had chosen a photograph of him smiling at a business event. Beneath it were the usual words: businessman, family man, community leader. Nobody in that office knew that twelve hours earlier his hand had been resting on Ndivhuwo's knee. Nobody knew he had spent the evening proudly introducing her as his new girl.

And nobody knew Ndivhuwo Netshidzivhani had been paid R250,000 for Sibusiso Mthembu to die.

By lunchtime, the office had already created its own version of events. Someone said taxi violence. Someone else said tenders. Politics came up too. There was even a WhatsApp voice note doing the rounds from somebody who supposedly knew somebody close to the family.

That was Johannesburg. A man could be dead for six hours and already have fifteen different stories attached to his name.

Ndivhuwo ate her lunch and listened.

She never corrected anyone.

The New Girl

The first problem arrived after lunch when the news broke that Sibusiso had been with a woman before his death. Apparently she was a new girlfriend. Apparently she had left before him. Apparently the police wanted to speak to everyone who had been at the restaurant.

Thembi thought the woman must be terrified.

Ndivhuwo wasn't terrified. Annoyed, perhaps, because being remembered was never ideal, but there had been no other choice. Sibusiso needed to trust her. His friends needed to believe their relationship was real. Most importantly, everyone needed to see her leave.

Her phone vibrated beneath the table.

Balance cleared.

No thank you. No congratulations. People who paid other people to die rarely had much to say once the job was done.

Ndivhuwo checked her account.

The money was there.

She deleted the message and finished her lunch.

The Woman Who Left

Across Johannesburg, Mulalo was also thinking about Sibusiso's new girl.

Fourteen witnesses remembered her. They couldn't agree on everything, but the descriptions were close enough. Beautiful, young, corporate and quiet. Nobody knew her surname. One person remembered Sibusiso calling her Nandi. Another was almost certain he had called her Ndi.

The restaurant cameras showed her leaving shortly after nine, alone. They also showed Sibusiso alive more than an hour later.

On paper, there was no reason to suspect her.

That was exactly what bothered Mulalo.

People with something to hide usually tried not to be seen. This woman had done the opposite. She had sat at a table full of witnesses, allowed herself to be introduced and walked straight past the restaurant cameras on her way out.

Either she had absolutely nothing to do with Sibusiso's death, or she knew exactly what she was doing.

The Next Man

Ndivhuwo got home shortly after seven. She showered, changed into an old T-shirt and made herself something small to eat. She didn't watch the news. She already knew what had happened.

At 20:06, the second phone vibrated inside her bedroom drawer.

There was a photograph waiting for her.

Jonathan Whitfield. Forty-seven. Married. Property developer. Bryanston. R220,000.

Ndivhuwo had never seen him before. She didn't know whether he was a good man or a terrible one. Maybe somebody wanted his business. Maybe somebody wanted his wife. Maybe somebody simply hated him enough to spend R220,000 making sure he didn't come home one evening.

She never asked.

Another message arrived.

Two weeks.

Jonathan was easy to find online. Men like him usually were. His life was spread across LinkedIn, Instagram and old business articles. Golf days, cycling photographs, Cape Town holidays, expensive restaurants and smiling family photographs with a wife he had been married to for almost twenty years.

Ndivhuwo wasn't looking for a reason somebody wanted him dead. That wasn't her job. She was looking for a way into his life.

It didn't take long.

Jonathan liked women.

Not publicly, of course. Publicly, he was a husband, father and businessman. Somewhere else on the internet, he was simply Jon, 47, looking for good conversation and no complications.

Ndivhuwo almost laughed at the last part.

She deleted the dating profile Sibusiso had known. His new girl disappeared in seconds. The photographs, age, job and name she had given him were gone.

Then another woman appeared.

Rendani. 32.

Ndivhuwo found Jonathan's profile before going to bed and liked it.

Three minutes later, her phone vibrated.

It's a match.

His first message arrived soon afterwards.

You look familiar. Have we met before?

Ndivhuwo looked at his photograph. She had never met him. She didn't hate him, didn't want revenge and didn't know why somebody wanted him dead.

She typed back.

I don't think so.

The three dots appeared almost immediately.

Jonathan was typing.

Ndivhuwo put the phone down and went back to her dinner. There was no need to rush. She had two weeks.

And Ndivhuwo Netshidzivhani had always been very good at meeting deadlines.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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