Veiled Freedom (18 page)

An armed phalanx advanced warily across the sand. Four men formed a diamond at compass points around a fifth. Four more ranged out to form a square around the diamond. All wore tactical vests, and all but the center cradled unslung M4s.

“Okay, you've got shooters there. Get him out! Get him out!”

The square's two forward points dropped to one knee and began firing. Behind them, the diamond collapsed, hands grabbing at the center figure and rushing him backward. This would have been easier if he hadn't been six and a half feet tall and upward of two hundred and fifty pounds. Halfway back, the big man slumped to the sand. The square's rear points jumped in to haul the man to a concrete walkway.

“He's safe! He's safe! Break contact!”

Firing stopped. Half a dozen firing targets lay riddled with bullets. The entire phalanx retreated to the concrete.

As Steve joined them, Jamie McDuff ran a pen down a clipboard. “Not bad. You got the principal out. But you lost both shooters and took out a civilian. This isn't the Marines. You don't stay and fight it out. Break contact and get out of there just as soon as the principal's safe. Mac, good simulation. Good thing Khalid isn't your size. Let's try it again. Julio, you take center this time.”

Steve offered McDuff a thumbs-up as he headed downfield where Phil, with no medical emergencies on hand, was putting two dozen assorted TCNs through “scoot and shoot” runs, half the group prone on the sand laying down imaginary fire while the rest retreated, then vice versa.

“Lock and load. Fire. Cease fire. Okay, I think we're ready to hand out ammo.”

The sand wasn't local but had been trucked in to create an artificial dune a hundred meters long and twice a man's height, an effective if inelegant bullet trap for firing exercises. The training facility itself might have been mistaken for a military base. Rows of armored Humvees and personnel carriers. A helipad. Prefabricated Army “hooches” for housing TCNs. A high concrete perimeter wall topped with guard towers and machine-gun nests.

“So how are they doing?” Steve asked as he reached Phil's side.

“More spraying than aiming.” The medic shrugged. “But the Romanians can handle a convoy run, and the Guats are ready for secondary ring security. The Chilean bunch are former Pinochet secret police and know what they're doing. Khalid's own militia have the most actual combat experience.”

“And are most likely to be infiltrated. We'll keep them on outer perimeter—and no ammo.”

The advantage of TCNs or third country nationals was that they were cheaper and endlessly available. So for a high-value contract like Khalid, you did exactly what Condor Securities had done. You surrounded your principal with an inner defense “diamond” you personally could trust, preferably all tier one Special Ops.

Then you started sorting out your second tier of TCNs, finding out who had real combat training, who could be trusted for basic guard duty or convoy ride-along. The best you elevated to supervisory capacity. But you never let them inside your inner defenses. It wasn't that these guys would necessarily take a bribe, sell off their equipment, steal supplies, turn weapons on civilians, or just throw them down and run when trouble came. It was that you couldn't count on them not to do any or all of the above.

“Give McDuff your evaluations. As of tonight we go three shifts, let everyone start getting some decent sleep.”

“And R & R. Cougar brought by an invite to another open house this evening. I think that makes a round dozen.”

“No thanks. Schmoozing bureaucrats and aid workers hardly falls into my CS contract. But, hey, you're off shift with the new schedule.”

Phil shook his head. “My first evening off? Nothing doing. I'll be spending it with my wife and kids. I've got Skype and a webcam set up. You, on the other hand, my friend, have no family restrictions. Go have some fun. Give some poor Peace Corps volunteer a thrill. Better yet, pick one, settle down, and have some babies. I mean, what's the point of making all that dough if you've no one to spend it on?”

“And end up separated three weeks out of four? Not interested.” Steve wished he could bite back his words as he caught the stricken look on Phil's face. “Hey, I didn't mean it that way. I'm just not in the market. Though if I ever come across a gal as special as yours, I'll reconsider.”

An unlikely scenario in his current profession. Which was just as well. Despite Steve's retraction, bottom line, this job was murder on relationships. Maybe Phil could make it work. For his friend's sake, Steve hoped so. But Steve had seen too many Special Forces and PSD buddies go through the misery of divorce to do that to any woman.

Not to mention his own family.

Steve headed toward the administrative modules that made up a small town near the compound entrance. The last three days had been a scramble, but things were coming together. Cougar had squeezed another six tier one operatives out of CS, not all Western Special Ops, but the two Russians and German looked good. Former KGB, Steve would hazard.

Khalid's embassy run had gone smoothly, his handshake with the U.S. Senate majority leader making cable news. The minister's ensuing good humor allowed Steve to push through a solution to their guest flow problem. When a local German beer garden was liquidated for ignoring Ministry of Vice edicts, Cougar had snapped up a metal detector gate they'd installed for security. This now formed a trellised archway just inside Khalid's pedestrian gate.

Now if they could do the same for the Ministry of Interior. Absolute security was never attainable. But the place was just too big, too open, too crowded—and too much a part of Khalid's regular pattern—for even minimal security.

Which was the motivation behind Steve's current quick stride. DynCorp, one of the largest private security companies, had the contract for training the Afghan National Police as well as a recently formed separate counternarcotics task force, placing MOI squarely within their sphere of operation. Combining resources could be a win-win for both sides. A blast of air-conditioning welcomed Steve into a large module. A bored-looking Aussie, feet up on his desk, M4 balanced across a paunch, barely glanced at Steve's CS credentials. There any pretense of helpfulness ended.

“What do you mean, you can't give out that info? Then who does have the authority to discuss this?” Steve looked around the long room with its empty desks and blank computer screens with exasperation. “Where is everyone? This place was full yesterday.”

“It's Thursday. Everyone leaves early to hit the showers and open house circuit.”

Steve needed no further explanation. Friday was the Muslim day of worship, making Thursday equivalent to a Saturday back home. In Basra, a large Western base, the local calendar had been ignored. But here it seemed bureaucrats and aid workers weren't the only expats who'd made a conscientious effort to adapt, at least when it came to playtime.

The DynCorp contractor managed not to topple weapon or chair as he stretched an arm to grab a Post-it pad. Scribbling name and number, he shoved it toward Steve. “Here. If it's urgent, you can try our country manager. Or come back Saturday after the weekend.”

Steve pulled out his cell phone.

“Jason Hamilton.” The DynCorp manager's voice was barely audible above a babble of voices and roar of engines. “I'm out at the ISAF hangar. Then I'm heading over to an open house in Wazir. If you want to come on down there, I'll be happy to discuss details.”

“I'd rather—” A background whine rose to a roar of rotors; then the connection broke. Steve slapped his phone shut with a grimace. Like it or not, he was in for some R & R after all.

Small faces popped up at window bars to watch Amy and Jamil trail Geeti back across the courtyard, though the girl in the pink tunic was not among them.

“The story you told the children, it is a beautiful story,” Jamil told Amy. “The story of paradise, is it not? I did not know you were a follower of Muhammad.”

The green door slammed shut behind them, the prison warden's key ring jangling as she locked them out.

Amy followed Jamil across the plank bridge. “Yes, that was the story of paradise—the creation of earth and the Garden of Eden. But I'm not a follower of Muhammad. I'm a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ. Isa Masih, as you would call him. And the story of Creation isn't just a Muslim story. It's from the Bible, the first chapters of the Old Testament.”

“Your Christian holy book.”

“Not just Christian. The Old Testament was the holy book of the Jews, and a lot of its stories are taught also in the Quran.”

“I did not know that.” Ushering Amy into the back of the sedan, Jamil slid into the driver's seat.

Amy's smile met his fleeting glance in the rearview mirror. “And I didn't know you were a medical student. I feel especially privileged now to have you on board at New Hope. Are you planning to go back to finish?”

But her assistant wasn't giving out any more personal data. “That was another life. To begin again, no, it would not be possible. Now where do you wish to go next? Back to the New Hope compound?”

Amy considered as Jamil pulled out of the unpaved lot. Between MOI and Welayat, her afternoon had evaporated, the sky still light overhead, but the sun already dropped behind the mountain peaks. “No, it's too late to start anything else at New Hope. I think I'll head back to my guesthouse and type up those reports. Do you know how to get to the Sarai?”

“Yes, Rasheed showed me your lodging when he was testing my driving. Then you will not be needing me to drive again today? Rasheed has requested that I transport you anywhere you require to go.”

The questions held the neutral courtesy of an employee. But Jamil's hands were tight on the steering wheel, something of his earlier conflicted expression back in the rearview mirror.

Amy was taken aback. She and Jamil hadn't discussed his hours, though the generous salary by local standards presupposed a certain flexibility. “I don't expect you to be on call 24-7. I'm not planning on going out tonight, but if I do, I'll make my own arrangements or call a taxi.”

She leaned forward. If commenting on appearance was a cultural faux pas, she was about to compound it. But her assistant looked so desolate. “Is everything all right?”

His face went blank. “Yes, everything is as it should be. It is just . . . I had thought to go to the bazaar if you did not require me. I do not have a proper
musallah
for the mosque tomorrow. But it is not important. And you must not seek transport with strangers. It is not safe. Should you choose to go out, you need only call. If not I, then Rasheed will retrieve you.”

“I'll keep that in mind.” Unconvinced, Amy studied Jamil with covert interest as he maneuvered between a mule cart and a swaying, top-heavy city bus. In just three days, Jamil had lost some of the gaunt exhaustion that had first moved Amy to compassion. He was a good-looking man, and in his new finery, even the set of his shoulders seemed straighter and more self-assured. He'd been a medical student, of an educated family by his account, so he hadn't always lived like this. Had Jamil transformed himself only to go to the bazaar? Or did he have evening plans he felt no obligation to share with his foreign and female employer?

It was a reminder of how little Amy knew of her assistant beyond the convenience he afforded her. Did Jamil have a life outside the New Hope compound? What dreams and hopes and aspirations did he have beyond dogging Amy's heels?

A sudden impulse to ease Jamil's somberness, a rebellion against treating another human being as an invisible prop whatever the cultural dictates, prompted Amy to speak. “The University of Kabul has opened again. I've heard they have a medical course of study. I'd be happy to work something out with your employment at New Hope if you'd be interested in finishing your studies. It's never too late.”

“For me it
is
too late! Please, I do not wish to speak of it again.” It was not a request but a harsh command, and as though immediately regretting the force of his reaction, Jamil added in a milder tone, “Miss Ameera, I have wanted to ask. This ‘date' of which your friend spoke. And ‘bash.' I know the English words, but perhaps my understanding is not so good.”

Jamil's gaze touched Amy with limpid candor in the rearview mirror. “How does one have a day of the calendar? Or is it the fruit you speak of? And to bash—is this not an act of violence?”

At least he was talking, and if Jamil's change of subject was intended to deflect intrusion on his personal life, that was his prerogative. “No, in this context a bash is just a big party. And a date is an activity you plan with another person for a certain day and time. Sometimes a friend, like Debby, though it usually means a man and a woman doing something special together.”

“Special?”

“Yes, like going to a party or out to a movie or a restaurant. To get to know each other better and have some fun.”