‘Hold on,’ said the colonel. ‘This was your call. You found these guys. You sent them out to the valley. What the fuck happened out there? Don’t you want to know?’
The colonel crouched beside Lucy. He waved a hand in front of her unfocused eyes.
‘Can you hear me, Lucy? I want you to concentrate. I want you to tell me what happened.’
No response.
He sat in the chair next to the bed. He took Lucy’s hand.
‘Can you hear me? Can you understand what I’m saying? We’ve got a little something to help you sleep. But first I need to know. What did you find out there in the desert?’
No response.
The colonel examined the gang photo. The faded, smiling faces. He held the picture so Lucy could see.
‘You have to tell me, Lucy. What happened to you? What happened to your team?’
FIVE DAYS EARLIER
The Score
Lucy and her crew sat on crates and watched marines transfer money from a bomb-proof Peli case to a black canvas holdall.
The soldiers had locked themselves in a caged section of the warehouse. Four men stood around a trestle table. Two to count and re-count, two to bear witness. They stacked bricks of hundred-dollar bills in vacuum-sealed plastic.
‘Got to be three, four million at least,’ said Lucy.
Lucy and her team were wearing full body armour. Lucy had a cheery Sheraton conference badge pinned to her flak jacket. ‘Hello, my name is… FUCK YOU.’
‘That shit is straight from the Federal Reserve,’ said Toon. African-American. Black Power fist scribbled on the breast plate of his vest. Bald head. ‘Consecutive serial numbers. You could steal it, but you couldn’t spend it.’
‘Bet some oily Swiss fucker would give you thirty cents on the dollar. Still a cool million.’
‘Split five ways? Wouldn’t go far.’
Lucy shrugged.
‘I’ve been broke so long, I wouldn’t know how to spend it.’
‘Look at those clowns,’ said Toon. ‘Cherry motherfuckers. Green as grass. They’ve been in-country five minutes. We could take them out anywhere between here and the Interior Ministry. Wouldn’t even put up a fight.’
‘No. Make the drop. Cash the cheque.’
‘Fuck that shit. Five hundred dollars a day. Is that how much your life is worth? Five hundred bucks is nothing.’
Lucy shook her head.
‘My motto? “Live to spend it.” No use being rich and dead.’
‘No one would give a damn,’ said Toon. ‘Victimless crime. Not like this stuff is going to feed starving orphans. They’re just greasing some Provisional chieftain for a bunch more reconstruction contracts. Only a sucker would stay honest in the middle of this shitstorm.’
Lucy watched a rat scurry along a roof girder high above them. She rubbed her eyes.
‘All right, boss?’
‘Yeah,’ said Lucy. ‘Just tired.’
Huang entered the warehouse by a side door. A combat medic and a good driver. He rejoined the crew and sat on a crate.
‘What did you get?’ asked Amanda. A Californian rich girl gone bad. She had blond hair, a nose ring and a meth habit. She had found redemption in the meditative breath control and serene focus of an airforce rifle range.
‘The orderly is a cool guy. Happy to see a bottle of Jim Beam. He broke out a bunch of Percocet. A few Vicodin. Smoother ride than guzzling fucking NyQuil.’
Amanda and Huang bumped fists.
‘You got to score some more Oxy. Pure, sweet buzz.’
‘Fucking pill freaks.’ Voss. Tall, lean, early forties. He had a thick South African accent. ‘You think you’re dealing with combat stress. You’ll just rot your fucking brain, bokkie.’
‘A person has to relax.’
‘So cook up a spoonful of smack. Do the job right.’
The crew adjusted their scopes, their buckles, their laces. A series of pre-mission survival rituals. They checked mags and chambered. Green tip tungsten carbide penetrators.
Lucy bit the cap from a Sharpie. They wrote call-signs, grids and frequencies on their forearms.
‘Radio check,’ said Lucy.
They each wore a short-wave TASC headset. The radio was clipped to their webbing. Five-hundred-metre range. The mike was a Velcro throat-strap. The earpiece was a constant open channel.
Lucy stepped away from the group. She thumbed the pressel switch on her chest rig.
‘Check, check, check.’
Affirmative ten-fours.
‘Ladies. Gentlemen.’
An uptight CO. Hard to tell rank. Most marines removed insignia and ditched the salute when they moved in-country. Overt signs of seniority might attract a sniper’s bullet.
The buzz cut surveyed Lucy’s team with contempt. Mercenaries. Long hair and tattoos. All kinds of trophy jewellery and charms: sharks’ teeth, rosaries, bullet pendants. They wore their sidearms at the hip instead of the chest plate snap-holster favoured by regular army.
Soldiers of fortune. No code. No honour.
They signed for manila packets. They tore open envelopes and counted cash. They tucked money in the map pocket of their vests next to sweetheart photos, goodbye letters and power-of-attorney.
‘Time to move out,’ said the CO.
The team stood and headed for the trucks. Voss had FUCK THE ARMY scrawled on the back of his vest.
A three-car convoy. Marines up front in a Humvee with a .50 cal mounted on the roof. Two black, twelve-cylinder GMC Suburbans behind. The GMCs were ghetto-rigged with heavy ram bars, ballistic windows and Kevlar panels.
They climbed into the first Suburban. A marine private took the wheel. Lucy rode shotgun. Amanda and Toon took the back seat. A young marine sat between them, hugging the padlocked money bag, trying to hide his fear.
Huang took the wheel of the third vehicle. Voss was rear gunner. He took a fire position at the tailgate.
Lucy watched the crew of the lead Humvee form a huddle and butt helmets.
‘These fucking kids are going to get us killed,’ muttered Lucy. She turned in her seat. ‘Weapons very free, all right? Don’t wait for an order.’
‘Fuckin’ A,’ muttered Toon, adjusting his grip on his carbine.
Amanda cracked her knuckles.
‘Wire-tight and good to go.’
The marine kissed a St Michael medallion and tucked it into his ballistic vest.
‘Don’t feel ashamed, kid,’ said Amanda. ‘Only a fool wouldn’t be scared.’
Engine roar echoed through the vaulted warehouse. High-beams shafted through broiling diesel fumes.
A marine private hauled back the hangar door and the convoy rolled out into torrential rain.
They drove parallel to a row of warehouses. They sped through a field of Conex shipping containers and headed for the perimeter wire.
The compound gatehouse was a narrow breach in a HESCO sand barrier with twin machine-gun sangars either side.
They got waved through. They sped down a fresh strip of asphalt laid across desert to the expressway. Route Irish. The twelve-kilometre thunder run between the airport and the Green Zone. They passed bullet-pocked signs for Fallujah and Ramadi.
They drove fast and tight. Rain lashed the windshield. Wipers swept-double time.
Adrenalin high. Lucy stroked the rubber custom grip of her rifle. Every smell, every texture, hitting with the heightened clarity of dreams.
A few other cars on the road. A white Toyota pulled close behind the convoy. An old man and his son. Windshield decked out with prayer beads and a gold fringe. Voss waved them back. They didn’t respond. He shouldered his assault rifle and put a shot through the front grille. The Toyota swerved across the median and hit a ditch jetting steam.
‘Salaam Alaikum, motherfucker.’