Bear’s compound inside Speicher was a fortress of steel shipping containers stacked three high. It was reached by a narrow alley with heaped tires on each side, and the gate was a deuce-and-a-half military truck with an iron wall ratcheted to its outfacing side. In the center was a two-story building and a small warehouse used as a garage. All in all, it was a comfy little hole, and I told Bear that as soon as we arrived.
“We could bunk up in Baiji with the oil works,” he said, “but I like to fuck with ISIS. They know not to mess with us here. You look like shit, by the way.”
“Go have sex with yourself,” I said, jumping down from the Humvee.
“Speaking of which, I have a surprise for you.”
He pointed toward the warehouse, which was clearly the living quarters. “I hope it’s a cold beer,” I said.
“Even better,” Bear said with a sadistic smile, as Kylah came walking out of the darkness on the other side of the door. She sparkled in the midday light, her red hair radiant. Did I mention she knew how to walk? Kylah knew how to walk.
“Dr. Locke,” she said, putting the sexy into it, as Bear looked on with a grin. She grabbed my cheek, patted it, then walked past me to Boon. They were already kissing, Kylah clearly putting on a show for the lads, by the time I turned around.
“Holy shit,” Bear laughed.
“She chose the right man,” I said, and I meant it.
“Oy! Get a room, you birds!” Wildman yelled. “Nobody wants to see your rumpy pumpy.”
“Sorry about that,” Bear said, still laughing as we walked toward the warehouse. “I was in Erbil when you called, and I just assumed you’d want to see her.”
“Oh, I do,” I said. “Wildman is the best piece of ass I’ve seen since I left.”
“I don’t know. What about the pregnant girl?”
I had forgotten about Marhaz. When I looked back, Farhan was helping her down from the Humvee. She had her hand on her belly and a queasy look on her face.
“Oh shite,” Kylah said, pulling away from Boon. “You didn’t tell me you had an eight-month-pregnant woman as cargo.”
She rushed over to help Marhaz out of the vehicle. The Humvee’s door was narrow, and Farhan was in the way. It was a terrible maternity wagon.
“How do you feel?” Kylah asked Marhaz, who nodded, then winced in pain.
“Strong,” she said, without her past conviction.
Kylah took her pulse. “A bit fast,” she said. “I need to check your blood pressure. When was the last time the baby moved?”
“Hours,” Marhaz said. It looked like the only word she could muster.
“Careful now, habibti,” Farhan said, as he helped her along.
“You need to lie down,” Kylah said, leading them toward the warehouse. “Have you been drinking water?”
Marhaz shook her head no.
“I thought you were a doctor,” Kylah said to Boon as they passed him, but he didn’t respond. Did I mention that Kylah knew how to walk? And load an AK-47? And hopefully deliver a baby.
“Your surprise is better than mine,” Bear said, as he watched them disappear. He took out a cigar. It was a cheap one. Smoking a cigar at the end of a mission was an Army tradition since the days when the corps was winning the Wild West, but some guys never got the details right.
“No thanks,” I said, when he offered. I went to my ruck and took out my portable humidor. I only had two quality cigars left, and I felt a pang of regret as I took out the Cohiba Siglo IV. I didn’t have any idea where or when I’d get another as good, as I offered my last to Bear.
“I usually only smoke after the mission’s done,” I said, biting off one end and starting to toast the other end so I’d get an even burn, “but for you, Bear . . .”
I didn’t need to say any more. This wasn’t the life either of us really wanted, that much was clear.
“I miss the boys, Locke,” Bear said, already puffing away while I continued working the end of mine with the lighter. “I miss the professionalism. Half the guys I hire out here are American vets who couldn’t adjust back home. Good guys, but damaged goods. Short tempers. Too happy about the killing. Some wake up at night, screaming, still hearing the gunfire.”
I breathed deep. There’s nothing like the first hit off a quality cigar. “Heroes nonetheless,” I said. “It’s not their fault our country pissed away their lives.”
“Touché,” Bear said.
I knew what he was thinking about. He was thinking about the list: the dead friends we’d shared since our time in the army. Was he, like me, thinking about Jimmy Miles, or did he have someone special he’d lost? Or was it the length of the list that got to him, the fact that, if Bear was anything like me, he still wasn’t sure what the sacrifices of those good men were for?
“I hope you’re not going too far with the pregnant girl,” Bear said.
“Only the landing strip.”
“Here?” He took the cigar from his lips. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
I smoked before answering. “I hear the runway here is big enough to land the space shuttle,” I said.
“You’re flying a plane in here?” Bear replied, the cigar smoking in his fingers as he strangled it.
I nodded.
“When?”
“This morning.”
Bear shook his head. “That’s a bad idea, brother.”
“I thought you said this was your base.”
“This is my base,” he said, pointing around him. “You got two hundred ISIS out there, at least, holed up in a hangar by the runway. You got fifty Shia a few kilometers to the south.”
“And I’ve got, what, thirty of the best damn men in Iraq with me here,” I said. “And $25,000 to spend.”
Bear smoked, looking out at his fortress of shipping containers. “Sorry, brother, it ain’t gonna be enough. These men don’t even know you. Why would they risk their lives for you?”
I have to tell him about the nuclear key, I thought.
But before I could say the words, an explosion knocked me to the ground and gunfire burst around me. I looked up, dirt in my face, in my eyes, in my mouth. The gunfire was Bear’s guards on top of the steel container wall, firing out at an enemy on the other side. Below them, smoke was billowing inward from a rocket attack or mortar attack.
There must be a breach in the wall if the smoke is coming inward, I thought, as a figure appeared out of the smoke. He’s short, I thought, but then I realized why. He was a boy, no more than eight or ten, running as fast as he could. He took a shot in the arm, but he didn’t stop. Instead, he reached to the side of his bulletproof vest . . . except it wasn’t a bulletproof vest.
“Suicide bomber,” I yelled, as the child pulled a cord and obliterated himself. Seconds later, his head returned to earth, bouncing on the hard-packed sand.