Andrew
Selsky
Email:
andrew.selsky@gmail.com
COWBOY JIHAD
By Andrew Selsky
“Andrew Selsky’s COWBOY JIHAD is timely, provocative, and
propulsive. Like me, readers will be thrilled by this debut novel by a
novelist who has been there and knows of what he writes.”
— C.J. Box, NY Times best-selling author of STONE COLD and
SHOTS FIRED
© copyright 2016 Andrew Selsky
CHAPTER
1
The
sidewalks of the narrow street in Peshawar were crowded with hawkers selling
pirated movies on DVDs, panty hose, used books, hookahs, spices piled in
orange, red, yellow and brown heaps in disc-like straw baskets, knockoff
sunglasses and hundreds of other articles. Pete drew the scent of paprika,
curry, saffron and turmeric into his nostrils, a heady perfume, full of the
exotic mystery of the orient.
He
remembered his endless flights that had taken him here. Portland airport, to
Chicago, to Heathrow, to Dubai, to Islamabad. The flights done on the cheap,
passengers crammed into planes with hardly any leg or elbow room, like Irish
immigrants more than a century ago traveling in steerage in the bowels of ships
bound for New York harbor. He’d arrived in Pakistan just two days ago.
Sweating
slightly, Pete arrived at a building with peeling white paint housing Guardian
Security Resources, the military contracting outfit that Yashid had told him
about. Yashid’s cousin was a fixer for Guardian, one of many contracting
companies in Afghanistan. A scowling Pakistani in the company’s tan uniform
checked his ID against a list attached to a clipboard. The man scribbled on the
list, then pushed a buzzer that opened a heavy door with bulletproof glass that
let him inside.
A
middle-aged British receptionist with thick makeup masking fine age lines
greeted Pete at the anteroom to the manager’s office.
“Mr.
Fenton will see you soon. Please have a seat,” the lady said, gesturing toward
a couch. Pete sat down and picked up a copy of Soldier of Fortune from the coffee table. He flipped through the
tales of derring-do and ads for contracting firms. There was so much money
being offered by the U.S. government to contracting outfits that the firms were
often on hiring frenzies. If you were willing to take the risk and could pass
security clearances, it was usually easy to get a job in Afghanistan or Iraq.
Pete was listening to Metallica on his iPod Nano when the receptionist came
into his field of vision. She had probably been calling his name but he hadn’t
heard her over “Enter Sandman.” He removed one of the white ear buds.
“I
said Mr. Fenton will see you now,” the lady said with a frown, giving him a
reproving schoolmarmish look. She ushered Pete into the office of Tom Fenton,
the branch manager. They shook hands, Fenton giving Pete what seemed to be an
unnecessarily steely grip that crushed his fingers. Pete sat down in a
leather-upholstered chair opposite Fenton’s desk.
Fenton
had a handlebar mustache. He was probably in his 40s, was tanned and looked
fit. Pete imagined him as one of the regimental sergeant majors of 150 years
ago, with white pith helmet and red uniform, fighting the Zulus at Rorke’s
Drift or in some other battle at the far reaches of the British Empire. He
looked to Pete, who considered himself a film buff, like Sean Connery in The Man Who Would Be King.
Pete
stuffed his ear buds into his pocket. The sergeant major got right down to
business.
“So,
what experience do you have as a driver?” Fenton asked.
“I’ve
driven big vehicles, like buses,” Pete replied. In reality, he had only driven
a school bus at a summer camp in Friday Harbor, Washington.
Fenton
shook his head, the tips of his mustache turned up in a wry smile.
“Driving
a truck is different from a bus. We’ll try to keep you in the smaller five-gear
vehicles,” Fenton said. He had a blank job application form on the desk in
front of him. “Fill this out. You’re hired. 80k a year, tax free, in dollars.”
“Thank
you!”
“I’ve
got a security guy taking one of our SUVs to Kabul tomorrow. You can hitch a
ride with him and report for duty at our offices in Kabul. Go see Anne, my
assistant. She’ll take your photo and make up an ID card for you. We have a
villa here in the Hayatabad neighborhood. You can spend the night there,”
Fenton added. He scribbled the address down on a notepad embossed with the
Guardian symbol, two crossed swords over a shield with some fancy scrollwork,
and handed it over the desk. “Leave your passport here. We’ll get it stamped
with a visa and Roger will bring it to you.”
Anne
told Pete in her British accent to sit in a chair in front of a digital camera.
Pete tried not to put on a fake smile as she took his photo. Another machine
sealed the ID in stiff plastic. It also carried the crossed swords and identified
the bearer as a U.S. Department of Defense contractor, appearing official and
impressive as was its purpose.
As
simple as that, Pete was in.
He
took a taxi to his guest house, stuffed his dirty laundry into his bag,
retrieved his toothbrush and toothpaste and hopped back into the cab for the
ride to the compound. Situational awareness, which experts in the security
field develop as a second nature, was alien to Pete, who had grown up in upper
middle-class comfort in Oregon, never having had cause for concern about
bombings, kidnappings or even common crime other than some bullies in middle
school.
“So
what is an American like you doing in Peshawar?”
Pete
looked at the rearview mirror from the back seat. The taxi driver had spoken to
him, and in English. He saw broad lips smiling, a missing front tooth and
patches of white stubble on the chin, making it look like the man had missed
the rim of a salted margarita glass.
Pete
was instantly wary. Foreigners didn’t generally come all the way to Peshawar to
interview for contracting jobs. They did the interviews in Virginia, or Houston
or London. Few Westerners dared come to Peshawar. Some had even been kidnapped
here.
The
cab was a beat-up Toyota. A small photo of a woman and a little girl was stuck
in an orange and blue magnetic frame to the dashboard. The driver’s wife and
daughter, obviously.
Sensing
Pete’s discomfort, the driver said, “Sorry if I’m being nosy. It’s just that I
don’t get many American passengers. I used to drive a cab in New York until I
had some visa problems. Where are you from?”
“Portland,
Oregon,” Pete said, feeling more at ease.
The
crowded narrow street spat the taxi out onto a boulevard. Purple bougainvillea
spilled over white walls fronting large houses. Pete rolled down his window.
The air blowing back his short hair was hot and dry. The sky was smeared with smog,
like a stained tablecloth.
“I
was in Portland too, and San Francisco. I worked on freighters before I wound
up in New York. Ahhh, to be young again and to be on the seas, with
possibilities stretching as far as the horizon,” the taxi driver said with a
sigh. “Little does one think then that the years will pass so quickly and that
you’ll wind up driving a broken-down cab in your own hometown. “
Pete
felt a twinge of pity for the cab driver, his dreams as a young man having come
to this reality.
“But
if that is your wife and your daughter, you have at least two wonderful
blessings,” Pete said, leaning forward from the back seat and pointing at the
photograph.
“Yes!”
the driver exclaimed, flashing his flawed smile. The missing tooth and the
man’s disregard of it as he beamed made the smile more genuine, the man more
endearing. “Oh yes! Thank you for noticing. I would rather have those two than
be a rich man in New York, like your Donald Trump! My name is Imran, and ...”
Neither
of them saw the black SUV coming. It shot out from a side street without
slowing for a red light and hit the taxi at a 90-degree angle, striking it in
the trunk and spinning it like a top. The car came to rest against the sidewalk
curb. Silence followed. Pete tried to get his bearings, the world still
spinning like he had been on a carnival ride.
“You
stupid, stupid man,” Pete heard someone say. He looked over at the driver’s
side window. A Western man – American judging from the accent – was leaning
into the window and berating the driver. “Didn’t you see the traffic light?
Don’t you Pakis ever learn how to drive?”
“Are
you all right,” Pete asked Imran.
“Yes,
but my car is a wreck.”
Pete
pushed open the door. It resisted with a protest of metal on metal. Pete looked
at the rear of the vehicle. The little taxi was indeed heavily damaged. If the
SUV had struck it just three feet forward, Pete would have been toast. The
trunk was caved in on the side, one of the rear wheels pointing at an angle it
should not have been. This would cost to fix: the body work and getting a new
wheel, plus maybe a new axle.
The
man leaning down and berating the driver was wearing a suit. He straightened
himself when he saw Pete exit the cab.
“We
had a green light sir,” Pete said calmly but authoritatively. “You ran the
red.”
The
man looked surprised to see another Westerner in the taxi. He stopped speaking
as he looked at Pete, who was lean and fit from swimming and long-distance
running. The 30-something man was probably reconsidering his words, Pete figured,
thinking now that he wouldn’t be able to throw his weight around like he had
assumed he could. Pete looked over at the SUV which had been left in the
intersection. There was a little damage to the right front bumper and fender
and that was all. The car bore CD plates.
“I’m
from the U.S. Embassy,” the man said haughtily. Pete caught a whiff of whisky
on his breath.
“I’m
a DOD contractor,” Pete said, flashing his new ID card. “You’re going to have
to square things with this man. You’re lucky no one was hurt.”
Imran
got out of the car and saw the damage.
“Oh no,” he wailed, his hands flying to his
bearded cheeks. “How will I get this fixed? My life is ruined!”
“How
much will this cost to repair,” Pete asked Imran.
The
driver studied the damage to the squashed-in fender and trunk, then laid down on
the road on his back and scooted his head and shoulders under the vehicle.
He
emerged a minute later, wiping his hands together to get the grit off.
“The
axle is damaged so it will have to be replaced, along with the wheel. And the
body work. This will easily cost around $2,000.”
Pete
pulled the SUV driver aside and spoke to him in a low voice.
“If
you settle with the driver, the embassy won’t have to hear about this, or about
your drinking,” Pete said.
The
driver had lost his bluster and now looked sheepish.
“I
have $1,200 on me. Cash,” he whispered. Only don’t breathe a word of this to
the ambassador or anyone else. Got it?”
Pete
sidled over to Imran.
“Will
$1,200 take care of it?”
“Yes,
Inshallah, it should take care of it!”
The
American Embassy official handed over the cash to Imran and departed. Imran
blessed Pete, his family, his future children and his future grandchildren.
“Be careful,” the driver said. “Not everyone
likes Americans here. If you need a ride, call me.”
Imran
handed him a business card with a cell phone number. He then got on the phone for
a tow. Pete was just two blocks from the Guardian Resources villa so he walked,
feeling rejuvenated, his jet lag completely gone.
Presently
he was at the scrolled iron gate of the villa. A guard emerged from a glass
enclosed guardhouse – bulletproof obviously, judging from the thickness of the
panes – and went through the routine of checking his drivers license against a
list, then had Pete walk through a metal detector. His bag went through an
airport-type scanner. The guard handed Pete a plastic card key and pointed
inside the compound to a small one-story house with whitewashed walls and red
tile roof. The guard was as taciturn as the cab driver was talkative.
Sprinklers
made a syncopated rhythm, matching Pete’s footfalls as he walked on a narrow
gravel path bordered by white stones that bisected a lawn that was as manicured
as a putting green. The path led to Pete’s lodgings. A flower bed with pink,
yellow and white flowers planted next to the front door greeted Pete.
It
seemed to be the VIP quarters, a big contrast to the seedy guest house where
Pete had spent the previous night.
Leather
armchairs looked onto a flat-screen TV. An intricate Persian carpet full of red
and orange hues gave the room a rich, autumnal feeling. Kindling and wood were
stacked neatly next to a fireplace.
Pete
cast an appreciative eye over a small bar, which boasted several single-malt
Scotch whiskeys. Shelves against the wall were crowded with books of ancient
Afghan history. One described Britain’s disastrous military expedition into
Kabul from which only one British survivor, a surgeon, returned to Jalalabad in
January 1842, the bodies of thousands of his comrades left among Afghanistan’s
frozen passes, plains and gorges. Accounts of more recent debacles and heroics – the Russian misadventure of the 1980s, the
post 9-11 invasion by the U.S. – were
also represented. A couple of “Flashman” novels featuring a cowardly hero of
that name rounded out the collection, along with some Stephen King books and
other bestsellers.
Pete
picked up a leather-bound guest book from a table. Those who had stayed in the
VIP house before Pete included an admiral, an American newspaper reporter and
two Victoria’s Secret models en route to a USO tour of American bases in
Afghanistan.
Pete
disliked the excess that America represented, but after staying in squalid
lodgings and trying to sleep in uncomfortable seats in airplanes, he reveled in
this luxury. He started a bath and poured three fingers of Lagavulin into a
tumbler.
He
stepped gingerly into the tub, steam rising from the water, and enjoyed a soak.
He
lifted himself out, toweled off and climbed into bed, enveloped in clean white
sheets.
------------------------------------------------------
Pete
was watching a belly dancer shimmy and shake, the spotlight sparkling off her
skimpy sequined top. The light illuminated the warm flesh of her ample breasts.
The dancer’s olive skin was flecked with beads of sweat. She moved closer to
Pete, her eyes locked on his and then looking down demurely as her hips jiggled
wildly in time to the music.
But
the music became disjointed. The drummer lost the rhythm. The music and the
dancer dissolved, but still the drum could be heard, thumping and growing
louder. With a start, Pete woke up and realized that someone was knocking on
the door.
Pete
went to the door, the sheet wrapped around him like a toga. It was his ride to
Kabul. Roger Dalton, a stocky guy of about 40.
“You’d
better pack and get yourself some breakfast,” Roger said brightly in a Cockney
accent. It was just getting light outside. “We roll in half an hour.”
Pete
threw on some clothes. Packing took one minute since he had so little with him.
He got some eggs, toast and coffee at the compound’s small cafeteria.
A
half hour later, he and Roger climbed into the Land Rover. The tinted windows
were thick, bulletproof glass and couldn’t be rolled down. A guard opened the
gate of the Guardian compound and Roger steered through a blast barrier and out
onto the Torkham Road, also known as the N5 Highway that went straight to
Afghanistan. After an hour they were clear of Peshawar’s outer suburbs and
rush-hour traffic.
In
the brown, desolate flatlands, Pete and Roger Dalton passed trucks and buses
painted in a brilliant rainbow of colors with tassels swaying from their
bumpers, as if everyone were going to a grand party or parade. Men, women and
children were squeezed into the vehicles, even perched on roofs of buses upon
which the owners had welded curving parapets, making the riders appear like
passengers on exhaust-belching schooners sailing the arid plain.
The
highway began climbing into mountains.
The
Khyber Pass, through which Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan passed, stands
only 3,510 feet above sea level. A disappointing height for such a famous world
landmark, Pete thought as he and Dalton reached the top of the pass.
An ancient Buddhist temple was crumbling into
the earth alongside the highway. The twin tracks of a railway line built by the
British a century ago now carried nothing more than rust, giving the buckled
rails a red, orange and yellow patina. To Pete, the relics were evidence of
grand plans by religious and colonial leaders to put their enduring stamp on
this untamed land, and failing.
Pete
and the driver breezed through the border checkpoint with little delay. Pete’s
passport sported a new Afghan visa, courtesy of Guardian Security Resources’
well-oiled system of cutting through bureaucratic red tape with the liberal use
of bribes.
The
Land Rover descended the pass into Afghanistan on a road cut into the
mountainside. Trucks belched and wheezed as air brakes were engaged to try to
control the steep descent. The traffic thinned out once they reached the
bottom.
A
woman shrouded in a head-to-toe burkha walked forlornly along the side of the
road. In the distance a village stood 100 yards off the highway. The buildings
were nothing more than mud hovels. A bearded man on foot took a branch to the
backside of a donkey heavily laden with water jugs.
“Welcome
to the 13th century,” said Dalton. “In a lot of Afghan villages the
only modern accessory is the Kalashnikov.”
They
were rolling along an undulating road whose asphalt was scarred by shallow
potholes. Dalton glanced up at the rearview mirror. An old Mercedes had
appeared behind them and was a half-mile back. A minute later it was just 100
yards behind. A man leaned out of the passenger-side window holding a rifle.
The man brought it up to his shoulder and pointed it forward. There was no
mistaking that he was aiming right at the Land Rover.
“Shit!
We’ve got company,” Dalton said, looking away from the rear-view mirror and
stepping hard on the accelerator. The Land Rover began bucking over the uneven
road.
Pete
looked back. The pursuing car was now maybe 50 yards behind. Three rounds hit
the back of the Land Rover like lethal hailstones. The SUV’s armor plating
stopped two of the bullets. The third round hit the rear window, causing Pete
to flinch and Dalton to push the gas pedal all the way to the floor. The Land
Rover was lurching wildly. So was the Mercedes, causing the gunman to miss as
he squeezed off several more shots. Flashes bloomed from the muzzle of the
rifle but there were no corresponding hits on the Land Rover. A gouge in the
rear window marked where the third slug had impacted.
“Who
are they?” asked Pete, trying to keep his voice under control and not shout in
panic.
“Bandits.
Or jihadis. Or maybe both.”
The
lighter and faster Mercedes was closing the distance.
Pete
swiveled around and could see the gunman, effortlessly aiming the rifle out of
the front passenger window. How simple it is to kill, Pete reflected.
The
man appeared to be aiming lower.
“He’s
trying to blow out our tires,” Dalton said as the muzzle flashed again, a
sunflower suddenly appearing and vanishing just as quickly.
“Hang
on,” Dalton shouted.
Pete
felt completely helpless. He braced himself as Dalton swerved right. The Land
Rover bounced over the verge and onto the hard-packed earth, then Dalton steered
away from the road at top speed.
“Yeah!”
shouted Pete. The SUV kicked up a plume of dust. Pete looked back again and
couldn’t see the Mercedes, which wouldn’t be able to handle off-road conditions
as well as the SUV. The gunmen couldn’t see the Land Rover either. Bullets were
no longer whanging into the vehicle.
“Damn,”
Dalton muttered, staring at something straight ahead.
Pete
swiveled around to see what Dalton was looking at. A ravine blocked them from
driving further from the highway, preventing them from getting more distance
between themselves and the gunman. The wadi ran parallel with the highway.
About 70 yards separated them from the road and the gunman. Not far enough.
Dalton steered the Land Rover so they were driving alongside the wadi. It was
too deep for the SUV to cross.
Pete
looked past Dalton to the road. He could see the Mercedes Benz now that it had
moved beyond the SUV’s dust cloud. The car was still on the highway, keeping
pace with the Land Rover as both vehicles headed west.
The
Land Rover suddenly developed a limp. The reinforced left rear tire had been
pierced by two bullets and now as the last of the air leaked out, the Land
Rover was violently shaking side to side as Dalton drove on the flat tire. He
was forced to slow down to keep control of the vehicle.
“Well,
at least we can keep moving, and maybe this wadi that’s got us hemmed in will
veer away from the road,” Dalton said.
No
sooner were the words out of his mouth than the Land Rover slowed and came to a
dead stop. Dalton hit the gas but the tires only spun out. They were mired in
loose sand.
“Damn,”
Dalton said again, giving the steering wheel a whack with the heel of his hand.
He
shifted into reverse. The engine strained, the wheels kicked sand but the SUV
only rocked back slightly before settling again into the sand, only deeper.
Pete
and Dalton looked over at the Mercedes. It had stopped too. The passenger door
swung open and a man with a gray turban, or maybe it was just white and
unwashed, got out, almost at a leisurely pace like he was going to a picnic. He
had the AK in his hand. The driver got out too and retrieved another rifle from
the back seat.
“What
do we do?” murmured Pete.
Dalton
had an assault rifle with collapsible stock between the front seats. He grabbed
it and crawled between the front seats into the rear.
“There’s
a pistol in the glove box,” Dalton said. “Do you know how to use one?”
The
two men were walking slowly toward the SUV, guns at their hips. They headed for
a boulder that was between them and the Land Rover, off at a slight angle.
Dalton
flipped open a small firing port on the side of the car, stuck his barrel out
and fired a shot at the men. The awkward shooting position inside the vehicle
made it difficult to aim. Dalton’s bullet went wide but the assailants were not
walking so leisurely anymore. They scooted to the cover of the boulder.
“Shit.
Missed. Whoever designed these firing ports didn’t care much about whether the
shooter could aim,” said Dalton. Pete’s ears rang from the rifle going off in
the confines of the SUV.
He
dug the pistol out of the glove box. A lot of good it would do against two men
armed with AKs.
Several
shots came in very quick succession, the sound entering through the open firing
port. Both men had fired double-tap shots at almost the same time from the
boulder which was some 50 yards away. The bullets smashed into the SUV.
“These
men know what they’re doing. Very controlled firing. They’re trained,” Dalton
observed. “The windows won’t be able to take much more of that.”
He
returned fire. The men, barely visible behind the boulder and taking careful
aim, were almost impossible for Dalton to hit. A bullet hit the driver’s side
window, creating a spider web that radiated out three inches. An instant later
a second bullet hit, almost breaking through the glass.
Pete
slid low in his seat. He spotted an electronic box with a microphone attached
to the underside of the dashboard.
“Can’t
we call for help with the radio,” Pete asked.
“That’s
not a two-way radio,” Dalton replied as two more rounds hit the side of the
SUV. Thunk, thunk. “We couldn’t reach anyone in Kabul or Peshawar on a radio
from here anyway, and no one could get here in time to save us.”
Dalton
stayed low and squeezed off two more rounds at the boulder. “That’s a PA
system. When we’re in a convoy or rushing off somewhere we use it to warn other
motorists and people to steer clear, or to talk to our people on the ground.”
Pete
had arrived in Pakistan only two days before. And now he was already deep in
the shit, before he could even make a difference in Afghanistan. So deep he was
about to die.
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