by AJ Stewart
“There,” she said.
Bence slowed and cruised by. It was a US Army jeep. That was obvious despite the lack of identification markings. It was parked in a slot in front of another building, just like the Bence’s office, only this one was tan in color.
“This might not be the one,” said Hutton. “A jeep is a jeep.”
“Unless there are two military visitors not in the log, this is it.”
“You don’t get many military visitors?”
“We get plenty. But most arrive in a Humvee. The only ones who drive the road to Basra in an unarmed jeep are the ones that can’t justify the reason they want to take a Humvee off base.”
Bence continued past the jeep and another block of cabins, and then he turned right and pulled a U-turn on the side street. He eased back to the corner so they could look down the road at the jeep.
“Do you know what that building is?” Hutton asked.
“It’s corporate HQ. The top guys. At least the top guys in this part of the world.”
“What do you think he’s doing there?”
Bence shook his head. “Nothing good.”
They sat in the SUV and waited. The air-conditioner was blasting hard but losing. An hour wait was going to be hard work. But they didn’t wait an hour. They only waited fifteen minutes. Dennison came out of the building alone. He carried a green duffel bag, the kind of thing GIs would lug around. But not a GI headed for deployment. This one was smaller. Like he was off for a weekend’s R and R. He stepped down from the office cabin to the jeep, fired it up and backed out slowly.
“We need to follow him,” said Hutton.
Bence shook his head. “Sorry, Hutton, no can do. I need to find out why he was here and who he was visiting first. My responsibility ends at the gatehouse. You got someone outside?”
Hutton nodded as she pulled out her radio. She did have someone outside.
Yusuf pulled away from the gate and turned away toward the oil fields in the distance. Fontaine had switched to the front seat. He told Yusuf to drive a hard kilometer and then turn around. Yusuf eased out from the dirt road leading from the gatehouse onto the paved road out to the oil fields. It was a good road well made. Designed to facilitate the transport of heavy machinery out to the oil fields. Yusuf hit the gas.
“Okay, we’ll follow him,” Fontaine said to his comms unit.
“He’s on his way out,” said Hutton in response.
“What about you?”
“I’ll get a ride back to Basra later. I’ll contact you as soon as I’m in range.”
“Got it.”
“And Fontaine. Stay safe.”
Yusuf hit the brakes hard and pulled out onto the dirt shoulder and swung a U-turn, across the blacktop and onto the dirt on the other side. The SUV bumped back up onto the road, facing back toward the compound. Toward Basra.
“Ditto,” Fontaine said to the comms unit. There was no response.
They drove back toward the compound slower. They were about five hundred meters from the gate when they saw the jeep swerve off the dirt entrance road onto the blacktop and head toward the city. Yusuf didn’t speed up. He let the jeep get away. Just not all the way. The earth was flat and the jeep had nowhere else to go.
The staff sergeant drove faster on the return trip. As if something had changed. As if there was some kind of urgency now. As if he now had some place to be. Yusuf accelerated to match his pace. They hit the outskirts of Basra and Yusuf moved closer to the target. It was easier to hide in the city traffic, but it was also easier to lose their quarry. Cars and trucks and motorcycles and bicycles and pedestrians used the traffic signs and signals as general suggestions rather than cast-iron rules. Vehicles headed in all directions and at their own discretion. Several times Yusuf got stuck behind random cars, but he used sidewalks and gutters to get around. The jeep headed on toward familiar territory.
Fontaine told Yusuf to back off. The jeep was lost in the traffic. But Fontaine knew where it was going. He just wasn’t sure why. They drove on and the traffic got lighter and then almost died away completely as they passed into the residential area. They turned onto the road that led past the store where Fontaine had acquired the bourbon and then past the stores that he had walked by. Toward the hotel they were billeted in.
The jeep was parked out the front of the hotel. Dennison wasn’t in it anymore.
Chapter Twenty-One
Fontaine told Yusuf to stay in the vehicle. He got out and looked at the jeep. The engine was ticking as it cooled. Fontaine went inside. A breeze blew from the rear to the front of the building. The interior was cooler than outside. Fontaine stood in the shadows of the entrance hall and listened. Heard nothing out of the ordinary. The sounds of a city, the sounds of a building. He glanced up the stairs. Then he stepped into the lounge.
The shutters had been pulled so slats of light and dark played across the tables and chairs, making the room look like an abstract painting. There was no one at the coffee station. The owner was nowhere to be seen.
Staff Sergeant Dennison sat in the corner where Fontaine had sat several times with Hutton. Two chairs separated by a low wooden coffee table with ornately carved legs. Dennison’s face was in shadow but his body was lit, and he looked for all the world like he had no head. He was wearing half the standard combat uniform. Regulation trousers. The t-shirt was army-issue but there was no way army regulations recommended leaving off the desert-patterned coat while off base. Fontaine could see dog tags hanging against the t-shirt. The staff sergeant was leaning back in his chair with his boots kicked out under the coffee table. By his feet lay a small canvas duffel bag.
Fontaine said nothing. He stepped to Dennison and sat down opposite. He had his back to the door, which didn’t make him happy, but Dennison had the best seat in the room. Fontaine let his eyes adjust to the light and dark until Dennison’s face came into focus. He wasn’t smiling. His laconic posture was betrayed by his eyes. The lines around his eyes were full of stress. The staff sergeant watched him back, but Fontaine still waited. He could wait forever. He could certainly wait for Dennison to say something.
“You’re a traitor,” Dennison said.
Fontaine said nothing.
“But you know that, don’t you?” Dennison leaned forward and his face fell into the light. His mouth was pulled tight as if he were fighting his emotions. “You betray everyone, don’t you? First your country, now you betray this little band of thieves you call an army.”
He frowned at Fontaine. “Cat got your tongue?” He frowned deeper. “Whatever. You need to listen now. We’re all getting out of this hellhole. You included. You might not care much for orders but you’re gonna listen to this. You are about to get new orders, and this time you better listen to them. Or you’ll be made to.”
Dennison smiled. It wasn’t a smile designed to spread joy. “I’d just as soon you ignore them, because then they’ll get as sick of you as I am and they’ll get rid of you. Permanently. Which would be my choice, that’s for sure.”
“Like the women and children?”
Dennison jinked his head like he was stunned Fontaine could talk.
“What women and children?”
“You know. The ones you left in your little meeting place in Baghdad.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, traitor. And I’m done with you. I’ve got things to do. And you’ve got orders coming. Be smart. Take your band of merry men with you and leave. Everyone else is.”
“I like it here.”
Dennison shook his head. “I believe it. You’re an idiot. But here’s the daily scoop, traitor. You don’t care about yourself, that’s fine with me. But if you care about your men, you’ll play ball. ’Cause if you don’t, you’re taking them down with you.”
“Who’s taking them down?”
Dennison brushed at the sweat dripping down the side of his neck. “You’re not hearing me. Forget the questions. You can’t find them. The eight probably don
’t even know each other. But they know you. So forget it.”
“The eight? Who is the eight?”
“They’re gods, do you understand? They’re big business and big government. They’re the system. And they don’t like you much. Not hard to figure why.”
Dennison stood and looked down at Fontaine.
“Why do you give a damn what happens to these rag heads anyway?”
Fontaine said nothing. Dennison shook his head again.
“Have it your way. I’ll enjoy watching you go down,” he spat. Then he strode away. Fontaine sat in the dark and light and listened to the jeep start up and then pull back and drive away. He sat for a moment, thinking. About Dennison. About people leaving.
His mission had been to find and eliminate those who would commit acts of terrorism against France. He knew his role. He knew the French Foreign Legion was a blunt tool of convenience that the French government could use to simultaneously meet dark objectives while keeping distance from them. The foreign aspect of the Legion was a political convenience. France could protect itself and not spill French blood doing it.
But Fontaine didn’t feel used. Neither did his men. The Legion was very good at breaking down a bunch of rag-tag foreigners to their barest souls and then building them up again into a highly trained, highly skilled team. A team whose first and last and every commitment was to the Legion. To their brothers. They were Frankenstein’s monster. A unit that France built and used, but ultimately one they had only illusory control of.
Fontaine carried with him the words of his father. Men of character have a responsibility to protect those unable to protect themselves. Fontaine believed his father would ultimately approve of his choice. Regardless of the flag under which it was done, he fought for the ideals of freedom and liberty. He wasn’t any kind of traitor. He couldn’t say the same about Staff Sergeant Dennison.
Fontaine’s thoughts jumped to his men. His brothers. Some had joined the Legion with him. Some had joined later. He had become their leader and had been given command of his unit despite not being a commissioned officer. It was unusual but not unprecedented. He took the command seriously. Above all else, his brothers in arms—his family—were his responsibility. Somewhere the tide was turning on them. Someone was playing them and it was his responsibility to protect them.
Fontaine stood. As he did he noticed the duffel. Dennison had left it behind. His mind flew back to the attack on him and Hutton in the Green Zone. The suicide bomber. He couldn’t see Dennison carrying around a live bomb. But he couldn’t rule it out. He dropped to his knee and inspected the bag. Ran his hand gently over it. He found nothing that resembled any kind of booby trap. He unzipped the bag. And got a very bad feeling.
The duffel was stuffed full of cash. Currency that Fontaine knew well but had rarely used. He knew it was made from a cotton and linen blend, not pulp-based paper. He knew that Crane and Company had produced the cotton paper since 1879 and used a secret family recipe. He knew that the cotton was largely sourced from the offcuts of denim jeans, which results in the bills wearing to a soft fabric through use, just like the jeans themselves. American schools abroad saw it as part of their role to make their students more American than kids growing up in the homeland. So Fontaine knew a lot of useless stuff about US currency. He knew the face of Benjamin Franklin. He knew that face meant he was looking at one hundred-dollar bills. Lots of them. They were banded into bricks and stacked in the bag. He flicked through the pile. All hundreds. Bricks of a hundred notes. Maybe a hundred bricks.
He was looking at a million dollars. It fit into a much smaller bag than he thought a million dollars should. It wasn’t more money than he’d ever seen. His team had found caches of cash before, hidden by terrorist organizations to fund their activities. He’d seen and transported and handed over millions. But this million had been left at his feet by a US Army staff sergeant. A staff sergeant who had just come from an oil field operating base. He considered for a moment the logic of it. A bribe, certainly. A very large bribe. Did they believe that such a large amount was necessary to buy his compliance? Did they believe his price was that high?
Fontaine grabbed the bag and ran. He dashed out of the lounge and pounded the stairs three at a time. He knew what his price was. And the look on Dennison’s face and the staff sergeant’s threats told him that he knew Fontaine’s price as well. They had both come to the same dollar figure. And it wasn’t a million dollars. It wasn’t more and it wasn’t less. They both knew that Fontaine couldn’t be bought. Dennison didn’t understand why, that much was obvious. It didn’t compute for him. But that made his next move illogical. If he knew Fontaine wouldn’t accept the bribe then why leave it?
Fontaine burst into his small bedroom and grabbed his go bag. He hit his comms unit and called for Gorecki.
“Gorecki, mon Adjudant,” came the reply.
“Code noir, Gorecki, code noir,” called Fontaine as he ran back down the stairs.
There was a short pause, then, “Confirm code noir. We have the shipment.”
“D’accord. Destination is Basra airport. The warehouses to the southeast of the airfield. Leave the shipment there.”
“Leave it?”
“Leave it and go. You get me, Gorecki?”
“I get you, mon Adjudant. Code noir. Gorecki out.”
Fontaine strode out of his room. The duffel of cash felt heavy. Heavier than the weight of ten thousand pieces of cotton paper. Things were going bad, and until he knew why he wouldn’t be able to figure out who. And until he knew who, his best move was to get his team out of harm’s way, regroup and refocus. He knew they had to run. Get out and live to fight another day. Dennison was headed for his truck, but the container on it was not his. So whatever was in the original container was not in his grasp and was being taken away by Gorecki. Fontaine knew without the time and space to inspect the container, the best play was to make it lost, somewhere even Fontaine didn’t know. No one in his team could be coerced to give up its location if they didn’t know it.
But leaving now meant giving up Dennison. The staff sergeant was right. Soon he would leave Iraq, along with the entire US military presence. And once gone, Dennison would be lost to Fontaine. And that gnawed at him. Someone was playing him. A general from the French army had given him orders to kill his investigation. Someone possibly working for that general had killed Babar. Someone had provided Dennison with a million dollars in cash. There were powers at play way above Fontaine’s pay grade. And Dennison was the only link he had.
He heard the commotion from below in the lobby. The sounds of sudden deceleration. The screech of brakes and the crunch of displaced gravel and the groan of a ton of steel shifting from a fast approach speed to a sudden stop. He dashed to the window and looked down on the street. The Highlander was gone. Yusuf was nowhere to be seen. He had been replaced by two armored vehicles. High mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles, or HMMWVs. A mouthful otherwise known as Humvees. They were US Army versions, worth about a quarter million dollars apiece. But the soldiers who jumped out were not US soldiers. They were NATO-badged military police. On their shoulders Fontaine saw the tricolored flag of the Netherlands.
The pieces fell into place. It was a smart move. Dennison had made the drop. But he, and whoever else was involved, wanted distance between themselves and whatever happened next. So they called in a NATO favor. Non-US troops capturing a Legion soldier accused of bribery. Captured with a million dollars in his hand. It would cause one hell of a storm. The Legion would be raked over the coals. It had survived worse in its long history, but not in the media-obsessed world they lived in now. Such things had brought bigger organizations down. Fontaine would be the face of all that was wrong with the Legion. That would be the story.
If he was captured.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Fontaine ran. Much of the multinational force in Iraq was there to train the locals and MPs were no different. The Dutch contingent was part of a team tasked with
training Iraqi law enforcement, just like Hutton. So Fontaine had no doubt these guys would know their stuff. They would form up into two teams at the front. One would come in fast, the other would hold outside. Another Humvee would no doubt be positioned at the rear. They would sweep in from both sides of the hotel. Driving Fontaine into their trap. So Fontaine went the only way he could. He went up.
He ran hard. Past his billet and up further. On to Hutton’s floor. Past the room he had slept in the previous night, Hutton wrapped in his arms. He thought to stop but he didn’t know why. So he didn’t. He kept going up. Crossed Hutton’s floor, his boots echoing around the empty space. He heard the crunch of the front door flying open and the sound of boots below and the yells of the MPs as they charged in. He noted they yelled their warnings in English. He didn’t wait to listen. On the rear side of the floor he hit another set of stairs that took him up to the roof. It was flat and open and hot. If it were on the Mediterranean it would have been a patio, with lounge chairs and a bar and a killer view. In Iraq it was nothing but rough concrete. He sprinted away from the rear and then broke left. Ran hard to the edge of the building. And jumped.
The hotel that could have been an apartment had been built close to its neighbor. Not close enough to step across but close enough to make anyone who wanted to walk between the buildings have to do so sideways. He landed on the next roof without breaking stride. It was the same as the last. Concrete, open and hot. A blank slate. He sprinted on and jumped again without hesitating. This jump was just as easy but the landing was harder. The buildings were packed in tight together, but the third building was one story lower.
Fontaine flexed in the air and prepared to drop what he figured to be about three meters. Ten feet down. Not far, but far enough when the landing was onto hard, unforgiving concrete. Timing was everything. His feet hit the roof. He let his knees bend and absorb the impact some, and rolled as he did, at an oblique angle. Half roll, half somersault. Across his right shoulder and back up onto his feet in one move, just like he learned in parachute school in Calvi. He kept running to the end. But this time he didn’t jump.