Sharza had no time to react. He was two metres away from Hakimi when the warlord squeezed the trigger. At that range, it was impossible to miss. A deafening boom echoed across the plateau and rolled down the valley as a round flamed out of the barrel. The interpreter spasmed as the bullet slapped into the back of his skull. Blood, bone and brain matter sprayed out of the exit wound, like water out of a sprinkler. Sharza was dead before he dropped to the ground.
Carter stared at the rebel leader in horror and disgust. He felt the blood pounding in his bloodstream. ‘Jesus Christ.’
Hakimi laughed meanly. ‘You are upset? Over the death of this worthless swine? This I do not believe.’
Carter shook his head angrily. ‘It wasn’t necessary. The guy was all right. He brought me here, that’s all. He didn’t know anything about the operation. There was no fucking need to drop him.’
‘The man was a threat,’ Hakimi explained casually. ‘He came from another tribe. Different allegiance. He could not be trusted. He would have reported us to the local Taliban and collected the reward.’
‘No, he wouldn’t,’ Carter insisted furiously. ‘This guy was working against the Taliban, for fuck’s sake. He wouldn’t have shopped you.’
Hakimi shrugged his indifference. ‘This is Afghanistan. Allegiances can change very quickly. It is safer this way.’
Vann stared at the dead interpreter, his brow puckered in deep thought.
He looked up at the warlord. The muscles on his neck were tightly bunched, his hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.
‘Geordie’s right. That was a fucking mistake,’ he said.
‘Is there a problem?’ Hakimi challenged him.
‘Aye, there is,’ Vann raged. ‘You’ve just signposted where we are, you idiot.’
Something like anger flashed in Hakimi’s eyes. ‘There was no choice. If we had let that man walk away, he would have gone straight to our enemies to collect a reward.’
‘You’ve just saved them the bloody effort.’ Vann thrust a hand towards the valley. ‘That gunshot will have travelled for kilometres. Every Taliban patrol in the area will know where we are now. We’ve spent four weeks on silent, and you’ve just shafted it.’
Hakimi shrugged again. ‘We are leaving this place soon anyway.’
‘I don’t give a toss. You don’t go making noise when you’re on silent. That’s fucking basic.’
Hakimi glowered. ‘Remember who you are talking to, my friend.’
Vann managed to bite back on his anger. ‘Fuck it,’ he said. ‘There’s no time for this. You’d better send a couple of your guys down the trail to that vantage point. Tell them to keep an eye on the roadhead. If they see anything coming this way, they can let us know.’
‘As you wish.’
Hakimi shoved his pistol back into his waistband and called out an order to the men in the main building. A moment later, two fighters hurried outside. A grey-bearded guy wearing a black waistcoat and a patterned turban, and a stick-thin bloke with a pencil moustache and a mop of dark wavy hair. Both had AK-47 rifles slung across their backs.
Hakimi barked at them both. Issuing orders. The men promptly turned on their heels and hurried across the plateau, making their way back down the trail.
Once they were out of sight, Vann said, ‘We’ll have to accelerate the packing. Get the mules loaded and ready to go. We need to be ready to bug out of here at short notice.’
‘I will tell my men,’ Hakimi replied.
‘We’ll need to alert our man in Tajikistan as well. Let him know we’re running ahead of schedule. His guys will have to meet us at the roadhead a few hours earlier than planned.’
‘Leave the Tajik to me. I’ll notify him.’ The warlord gestured towards Carter. ‘Keep an eye on your friend until we are ready to leave this place. You can wait in the office. After that, it is up to you to decide what you want to do with him.’
The warlord promptly swaggered off in the direction of the mules, shouting at two of the fighters and clapping his hands, gesturing for them to get a move on. While the fighters rushed to load the bricks onto the mules, Vann ushered Carter back inside the building, through the door at the opposite end of the main room. Back into the makeshift office space. He unscrewed the cap on the vodka bottle, poured generous measures into two disposable cups. Took one and offered the other to Carter.
‘Drink?’
Carter looked at the cup and felt sick. ‘No thanks.’
‘Suit yourself.’ Vann shrugged, raised the cup to his lips and necked the booze in one gulp. He poured himself another slug, filling the cup almost to the brim.
‘He’s a madman,’ Vann said quietly. ‘Hakimi. In case you haven’t noticed. Totally unbalanced. Addicted to the killing. His brother had all the charisma and the tactical intelligence. Frankly I’m surprised he hasn’t fucked things up before now.’
‘What are you doing here?’ Carter demanded. ‘Trafficking drugs? Have you lost your mind?’
‘I’ve got my reasons,’ Vann muttered darkly.
‘No, mate.’ Carter gritted his teeth so hard he thought his jawbone might crack. ‘There’s no way you can justify this shit.’
Vann scowled at the younger man. ‘You don’t know my life, Geordie. Ain’t got the first clue what I’ve been through these past few years. So button it, all right?’
Carter shook his head. ‘I risked my balls coming here to find you. The Company thought you were in serious trouble. Jesus, a good bloke just got himself killed helping to track you down.’
‘Don’t look so scundered, you prick. You must have known I was up to something illegal. Fuck me, why else do you think I ditched the old satphone?’
The words slapped Carter in the face. So that’s why Vann got rid of the phone, he realised.
A hollow feeling spread through his chest as he stared at Vann. A legend of the SAS.
The guy who took me through Selection and helped me to find my feet in the Regiment, Carter reminded himself. The same guy who taught me how to soldier is now in cahoots with a psycho warlord.
Processing heroin.
He couldn’t believe that a man of Vann’s calibre had sunk so low.
‘How long has this been going on?’ he asked.
‘A couple of months,’ said Vann. He grabbed the bottle and helped himself to another measure. His third drink. ‘Give or take.’
Carter shook his head. ‘You’re supposed to be training up the rebels. Getting them ready for the insurgency. Not doing this shite.’
‘Yeah, well. Things changed.’
‘What the fuck is that supposed to mean?’
Vann snorted and said, ‘Open your eyes, Geordie. There is no insurgency. I knew this was a waste of time as soon as I linked up with the rebels. The Taliban have got the Chinese, the Russians and the Pakistanis on their side. Serious firepower and assets on the ground. Any idiot with half a brain cell could see that Hakimi and his mates were going to get walloped by the enemy. Lambs to the fucking slaughter.’
‘So you convinced him to go into the drug business instead?’
‘Wrong way round.’ Vann gave a rueful smile. ‘It was Hakimi’s idea, originally. He took me to one side after his older brother got whacked by the Taliban. He didn’t want to end up the same way, and he was smart enough to know that we wouldn’t get any serious support from the Yanks. Just enough to keep us on life support for a while, so some dickheads in Washington could give themselves a pat on the back and pretend that they hadn’t abandoned their allies totally. Hakimi had contacts in the opium trade. People he knew who would pay top dollar for premium-quality smack. It was an easy decision. Stay here on a doomed op or make millions and live like a king. Anyone else would have done the same.’
Carter gave him an accusing stare. ‘You’re ruining lives. I can’t believe you let yourself get dragged into this shite.’
‘Fuck off.’ Vann returned the hard look. ‘I’m not interested in your moralising. You don’t know what I went through when they kicked me out of Hereford. All because of a fucking mistake with that airstrike. Those bastards ruined my life, Geordie.’
Carter pursed his lips. He thought about the unsanctioned strike Vann had called in while serving as an embed. The four dead Afghan civilians. His clumsy attempt to cover up the attack by inventing a legitimate target, an act that had resulted in his dismissal from the Regiment.
‘I screwed up on the job. I know that,’ Vann confessed. ‘But the Regiment shouldn’t have put me in that position in the first place. They shouldn’t have put that kind of stress on my shoulders.’
Carter shook his head, anger sweeping through his bloodstream. ‘What happened to us embeds has got nothing to do with this.’
‘You’re wrong. That rotation messed with me up here, see?’ Vann tapped a finger against his temple. ‘Messed me right up. I lost my moral compass. Got drunk on fighting. I was teetering on the edge. Running them ops turned me into a war junkie.’
‘Why didn’t you reach out? You should have told someone.’
‘I tried. I got in touch with the head shed, told them I needed some R&R. Decompression. A month or two out of the country to get my head straight.’
‘What did they say?’
‘What do you think?’ Vann laughed bitterly. ‘They didn’t want to know. They never do. They just ordered me to carry on. Said I was doing a great job and told me I’d be in line for a gong at the end of it. All of the usual crap. That’s when I started going feral.’
‘Feral?’ Carter repeated. He felt something shift inside his bowels.
Vann nodded. ‘Me and the guys from the SF team, we were going out on sanctioned hits, right? Following orders and all the rest of it. But then some of the lads started getting clipped by fighters from one of the neighbouring tribes. I took that personally, see. These were my boys. Good warriors. I didn’t like seeing them get chopped up. The lads wanted revenge. So I took them up to the next village and we slotted the other lot. Job done.’
Vann contemplated his vodka for a beat. Then he necked it and went on.
‘After that, we started going out more often. Me and a few of the Afghans. The most capable soldiers. We were still doing the sanctioned stuff, but in between jobs we’d go out and do our own hits. Killing anyone we didn’t like. Rival warlords, tribal militia, people who were trying to muscle in on our turf.’
‘Jesus.’
‘I stopped seeing clearly,’ Vann said. ‘All that time out there by myself, with no support or backup . . . it did something to my wiring, d’you see? I couldn’t help getting mixed up in it.’
Carter felt a chill on the nape of his neck as he listened. He’d always known that Vann didn’t like to play by the rules, but that was true of most of the guys at Hereford. The nature of the SAS tended to attract rogue soldiers. Guys who had no time for the yes-sir-no-sir bullshit of the parade ground. And there had been rumours that Vann’s SF team in Afghanistan had been a little too gung-ho. Nothing concrete, just the occasional whisper in the camp cookhouse.
But Carter had never imagined that Vann had been secretly orchestrating a campaign of illegal murders.
He wondered how such a good operator had allowed himself to go over to the dark side. Where it had all gone wrong.
‘That’s when the business with the airstrike happened,’ Vann continued. ‘I’m responsible for calling it in, and I’ve got to live with the consequences of that decision. Got blood on my hands, haven’t I? But the Regiment is guilty as well. They sent me in there, with no support, no nothing.’ He gestured towards Carter. ‘You were an embed. You know what I’m talking about.’
Carter nodded as he recalled his own time working alongside Afghan SF. Eighteen months spent in near-total isolation from the outside world. No downtime, no way of letting off steam. The constant stress of running deniable operations, knowing that if you suddenly found yourself in the shit, no one was coming to your rescue.
The commanders had cynically encouraged the use of embeds, because it gave them the ability to launch attacks against the enemy without the inconvenience of political accountability. Some guys had flourished in that environment. Others had struggled.
Guys like David Vann.
‘The Regiment shafted me,’ Vann continued. ‘Left me all bitter and twisted. When I landed this job, I saw a way out. A chance to put all of the shit behind me and get on with my life. You might not agree with it, and that’s fine. But I don’t owe those idiots back home a fucking thing.’
Carter made a screw-face. ‘Come off it, mate. Don’t tell me you’re so hard up that you needed to make a few quid on the smack track. You must have found good work on the Circuit.’
‘I did, at first,’ Vann said. ‘One of the lads sorted me out with a contract in Kazakhstan. A security job with one of the big oil companies. Had me a nice penthouse in Almaty, fifteen hundred quid a day after expenses.’
‘So what happened?’
Vann wrinkled his nose. ‘The long arm of the Regiment, fella. They got me sacked. All of a sudden, I was out on my arse. Penniless. What did you expect me to do? Reinvent myself as a social media influencer?’
‘You didn’t have to start dealing drugs,’ Carter hit back. ‘The Company must have been paying you good money for this job. Not millions, maybe. But enough to get by.’
‘Aye, and what am I supposed to do once this gig is over? Tell me that. Most of the big companies won’t touch me with a barge pole. Fuck me, I only got this gig because I had the embed experience and a couple of contacts at Langley. Everyone else has ghosted me. After this, I’m looking at ten years of crap security jobs, if I’m lucky.’
Vann pressed his lips together in suppressed anger and looked away for a beat. Carter let the silence play out between them. He didn’t know what to say.
‘I’m just doing what’s right for me,’ Vann said. ‘Looking out for number one for a change. I’m not going to end up like some of them other lads, living in a council house in Hereford, scraping by on a piss-poor pension, wondering how I’m gonna pay the gas bill.’
Carter remained silent. Conflicting emotions swirled in his chest. On the one hand, he felt a pang of sympathy for Vann. No doubt about it, the guy had been treated shabbily by the Regiment. But no one had put a gun to his head and told him to go into the heroin trade.
‘You’ll never get away with this,’ he said quietly. ‘They’ll catch up with you eventually.’
‘No, mate. They won’t.’ Vann sounded confident. He flapped a hand at the main room and said, ‘This is the last batch of gear. We’re cashing in our chips. After today, that’s it. Job done.’
Carter searched his face, looking for any sign of a lie. He saw none.
‘We’re going to smuggle this last package across the border,’ Vann continued. ‘There’s a courier route to Tajikistan. We’ve used it before, it’s safe enough. We’ll sneak across it with the mule train and sell this stuff to our contact over there.’
‘How much is in them bags?’
‘Five hundred kilos of high-quality heroin,’ Vann said. ‘Heroin is more profitable than selling raw opium. You cut out the middleman. Increase your margins.’
Carter made a quick calculation. One kilo of heroin, he knew, was worth something like six thousand dollars on the wholesale market. Five hundred kilos of premium grade black tar would fetch around three million bucks. Or somewhere in that ballpark. Minus the expenses of the operation, paying for the guards and the raw materials. But still a lot of pocket shrapnel. And they had been doing this for months.
They must have raked in a fortune, Carter realised.
Vann said, ‘This is me, lad. Once this is over, I’ll retire to some isolated spot in the Maldives. See out my days sipping ice-cold beers and watching the rugby. No one will hear from me ever again. You’ve got my word on that. One Blade to another.’
Carter wondered why Vann was telling him all this stuff. The dream retirement plan. But then he saw the pleading look on the Ulsterman’s face, and he understood: Vann was giving him the hard sell, leaning on their close bond in the hope that Carter would let him get away with it.
A last favour to an old friend.
A long pause of silence passed between the two men. Then Carter heard footsteps at his back, and a moment later Hakimi strode into the room, killing the call on his burner. He put the phone away and said to Vann, ‘That was the Tajik.’
‘And?’
‘He’s going to meet us at the roadhead on the other side of the border. Him, and the rest of his guys.’ He stole a glance at Carter. ‘At the same place we used on the last run.’
‘When?’
‘Tomorrow. First light. They will wait for us there.’
‘What if we run into problems?’
‘Won’t happen.’
‘You said that last time. I don’t want any more scares with them border patrols. The last thing we need is things getting tasty.’
‘The Tajik says we should send him a message confirming our position when we are close to the border. He’ll check the area and let us know when we are clear to cross.’
‘Good.’
Carter checked his G-Shock. One thirty in the afternoon. Ninety minutes since they had set off up the side of the mountain. Back when Sharza didn’t have a hole in the back of his head.
‘This isn’t right,’ he said with feeling. ‘Think about what you’re doing, Dave. There are lads at home getting hooked on the gear. You’re helping to put people in early graves.’
‘Save your breath,’ said Vann. ‘I couldn’t give a shit about the morals. If I don’t flog this stuff, someone else will. Same outcome.’
Carter tried again. ‘Come back with me, mate. We can go home, sort this out with the Company. Tell them about the stresses you’ve been under, your financial troubles.’
Carter knew he couldn’t make a hard arrest. Hakimi and his rebel fighters would plug him long before he could get away. His only hope was to persuade Vann to leave willingly. He could worry about what to tell Six and the Company later.
‘I can’t,’ Vann said. ‘Sorry, fella, but it’s too late for that. Way too fucking late. If I go back now, they’ll send me down. I’m looking at a long stretch behind bars.’
‘It’s got to be better than living as a fugitive, looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life. This is criminal.’
Hakimi glared coldly at him, trench lines carved into his brow.
‘I don’t care for your friend’s opinions,’ he said to Vann. His voice was laced with menace.
‘Geordie will be fine,’ Vann insisted. ‘I gave you my word, didn’t I? He’s just a bit emotional.’
Hakimi sneered and said, ‘I knew it was a mistake to remove that landmine. If you had left it there, this man would have been blown to bits, and we wouldn’t have a problem.’
‘I’ll take care of it,’ Vann replied firmly. ‘It’s under control.’
‘It does not look like that to me. It does not look like that at all.’ Hakimi tilted his head at Carter. His green eyes were trained like a couple of laser pens on Carter.
‘No,’ he said after a long pause. ‘I don’t think we can trust your friend. The risk is too great.’
Carter felt his heart jump with shock. The sides of his head pulsed viciously. Every muscle in his body tensed.
Fucking hell, he thought. This bastard wants to kill me.
Vann started to speak but Hakimi cut him off with a brisk wave of his hand. ‘This man is like a brother to you, I know. You vouched for him, and that was understandable given your position. But we all have to make sacrifices.’
The colour drained from Vann’s face. ‘You can’t. You fucking can’t, fella. I’m not having it.’
‘No one tells me what to do.’
Adrenaline shot through Carter’s body. He started sweating heavily as he looked around the room, frantically searching for an escape route. A side-exit leading outside the compound, or a window he could breach. There was nothing. He’d have to shoot his way out, he realised. He had the shoulder-slung M4, the holstered Grach. He could drop Hakimi, and hope that Vann didn’t retaliate, but he’d still have to deal with the warlord’s loyal footsoldiers in the next room.
No way I’d be able to get through that lot.
I’m fucked.
‘Geordie is a serving British soldier,’ Vann said in a tense voice. ‘Kill him, and you’ll put a load of heat on us. We’re in enough trouble as it is.’
‘Like I said. I don’t like loose ends.’
Hakimi glared coldly at the ex-Blade. Vann stood his ground. For a moment no one moved. The temperature in the room felt arctic. Carter couldn’t breathe.
My life’s hanging in the balance, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
Nothing at all.
Then he heard the urgent thud of approaching footsteps. A moment later, a pair of fighters burst into the office. The grey-bearded guy in the patterned shemagh, and the thin guy with the pencil moustache. The two men Hakimi had sent down the trail to watch for any signs of the enemy.
Greybeard caught his breath while Pencil hurriedly made his report to the rebel leader. Hakimi listened with interest, stroking his disfigured chin. Then his body stiffened, and Carter saw a glimmer of fear in the man’s eyes as he looked towards Vann.
‘What did your man say?’ Vann asked.
‘There’s a force approaching,’ Hakimi said. The tone of his voice betrayed his alarm. ‘Heading right for us.’