by Mark Aitken
‘Good,’ said Aaron, raising his whisky glass so the ice clicked. ‘Meet Mike. Ex-Aussie Navy.’
‘G’day,’ said the man, leaning over and delivering a dry shake from a large forearm. ‘Mike Ford.’
Gallen took the handshake, realised the Aussie was putting nothing into it. ‘Gerry Gallen.’
‘Know how I was looking for combat divers two weeks ago?’ said Aaron. ‘Found a crew of Aussies working salvage out of Honolulu. Sent two out to Thailand and offered Mike a job.’
Gallen nodded politely.
‘So, Gerry—three of you?’
‘Yeah,’ said Gallen. ‘Last-minute drop-out from my sergeant.’
Aaron slugged at the amber fluid. ‘Mulligan wants four.’
Gallen tried to keep it light. He knew the theory behind a bodyguard of four: you could rotate teams of two and always have a strong presence. ‘We’ll be four soon. I need a couple days.’
‘Gig started this morning, at oh-nine-hundred, Gerry. I don’t need soon. I need four guys now.’
Returning to the front of the plane, Gallen felt the adrenaline rising. Not just the same old uncertainties and threats from the field, but the trickle-down of bullshit that people in Gallen’s position had to accept, whether they were being micro-managed by some spook from the Pentagon or taking shit from a corporate senior manager.
‘All okay?’ asked McCann, dealing a game of gin rummy with Winter as Gallen scrolled his cell for a name. ‘They cool ‘bout Bren?’
‘Yeah, they’re fine,’ said Gallen, mentally playing with scenarios. They were meeting Harry Durville tomorrow morning at nine, and Gallen had until then to recruit his fourth man.
~ * ~
CHAPTER 11
The Oasis headquarters was in Calgary’s downtown but the minivan dropped Gallen and his crew at the oil company’s compound, over the river from the city and a few blocks north of the Calgary Zoo.
The compound had a trucking and gas storage component but also demountable quarters and a mess hall, arranged on little ‘streets’ with hedges and trees that blocked them from the distribution operation. It wasn’t the Marriott, but as far as transit bases for North America’s oil and gas workers went it was clean, and the minivan driver promised that the showers ran hot.
‘Got that manifest?’ said Gallen as the minivan motored away, leaving them outside their barracks.
‘Yep, boss.’ Winter showed the bill from the PX buy-up in Longbeach.
‘Stow that gear and tick everything off, okay?’
‘Got it, boss.’ Winter turned to the pile of black holdalls on the step of the barracks.
‘And, Kenny—check for tampering, right?’
Finding a table on the small veranda that fronted the demountable, Gallen sat with a pen and pad and started calling.
Of the people who were out of the Corps, there were guys doing night security at Sea World in Florida, guys riding shotgun in armoured trucks, and guys wandering the floors of casinos in Las Vegas, ready to show drunks to the door when the booze and losing streaks became too much.
Wendell Favor had taken over his father’s sports store in east Texas, Tigger Lawrenson had pursued a lifelong dream and was playing AAA-league baseball for a team in Omaha, and Len Mantrill—the biggest, meanest street fighter Gallen ever saw—was going door to door for Jesus somewhere in the suburbs of Seattle.
Everyone wanted to catch up with Captain Gallen, but no one wanted to join a bodyguard detail at short notice.
Some of Gallen’s calls went straight to voicemail; Gallen guessed they were part of the flood of US Marines being immediately reabsorbed into Iraq and Afghanistan under the military contractors.
The afternoon turned into early evening and Gallen re-entered the demountable as the chill descended. On the floor in front of him, McCann stacked and counted while Winter ticked the items on Chase Lang’s manifest.
‘How we going, boss?’ asked McCann, counting out the magazines for the Heckler & Koch assault rifles.
‘Striking out,’ said Gallen, moving out of the small living area to the kitchen. There was a stash of basic provisions on the counter: bread, coffee, milk and cereal. Opening the refrigerator, he found a six-pack of Sprite and handed them out.
‘Can we work a crew of three?’ Winter lit a smoke.
‘Not ideal,’ said Gallen. ‘As you told me: two teams of two, rotating. That’s how to get it done.’
‘You sure Bren’s out?’ said McCann, slugging at the soda.
‘What he told me.’
‘He won’t return your call?’
‘Trying since the AM. You wanna try?’
McCann reached out his hand for the cell, and then thought again. ‘Might use my phone, see if he picks up.’
He dialled and reclined back on a stack of fatigues. ‘Brenny Dale, my man,’ he said, thumb raised at Gallen as he sat upright. “Sup, dawg?’
Gallen watched as McCann’s bonhomie succeeded only so far, right up until he told his old unit-buddy that he was in Calgary with Gerry Gallen, and what’s this about not being able to make it?
McCann took the cell from his ear and looked at it. ‘Hung up. Bren Dale hung up on me.’
Gallen sighed. ‘What’d he say?’
‘Said, tell the boys I’s sorry. Not my call.’
Gallen’s ears pricked up. ‘He said that?’
‘Just like that. Not my call,’ said McCann. ‘Think his daddy put down the foot?’
‘Don’t know,’ said Gallen.
‘What about his daddy?’ asked Winter.
‘Seen the TV ads, car salesman calling hisself the King of Chev?’ said McCann. ‘Seen that scary-ass fucker pointing at the screen, telling you to come down, see the King?’
‘Yeah,’ said Winter, smiling. ‘That Bren’s dad?’
‘Fuck yeah,’ said McCann. ‘Come back from Vietnam, makes a fortune selling cars and says ain’t no son of his ever gonna fight in no shit overseas, for no fucker.’
‘So Bren?’
‘So Brenny turn around, joins the Marines when he’s supposed to be on a football scholarship to college, and the next thing you know he in the shit in Mindanao, getting chased by Filipino bad-asses through the jungle.’
‘Donny’s thinking that Bren’s dad has told him, Don’t think you can inherit this empire if you go back to that shit,’ said Gallen.
‘Yeah, but—’ said McCann, then waved it away. ‘Who else we got, boss?’
Draining his Sprite, Gallen moved back to the veranda, shrugging into his jacket as the temperature plummeted.
Looking at the phone, he toyed with an idea. In Indonesia it was about eight or nine in the morning, but it wasn’t the time that worried him. The number on his phone was for Pete Morton, a former Marines Recon captain who’d leapt to DIA while Gallen was posted in Zamboanga City, Mindanao. Morton had remained in South-East Asia, in an indistinct capacity, although Gallen had heard that he now arranged off-the-books solutions for US intelligence, using local assets and deniable payments. It was the side of the military Gallen hadn’t wanted to be associated with while he was commissioned, and even now—though he was privateering himself—he baulked at calling the man.
Gallen waited for the call to connect. It purred for five seconds and clicked into what sounded like a different system.
Just when he was about to give up, someone answered.
‘Yep,’ said the man’s voice.
‘Morton? Pete, that you?’ said Gallen. ‘It’s Gerry Gallen, from Recon.’
‘Hey, Gerry. How’s life in Calgary?’
‘I—’
He couldn’t finish because of Morton’s laughter. ‘Enjoying the lions and tigers, are you, Gerry?’
‘Shit, Pete,’ said Gallen, not in the mood. ‘You got one of them boxes?’
‘Sure. It says Mountain Bell, roaming, Calgary Zoo.’
Gallen waited for the giggling to subside. ‘Okay, Pete, you got me. I’m feeding the monkeys. I need a favour.’
&n
bsp; ‘Try me, sport.’
‘You know any military guys, preferably special forces, want to work a corporate bodyguard detail? Starts tomorrow morning, North America. I’m the boss.’
‘What’s the money?’
‘Two grand a week, full health, death and disability.’
‘Nice work, if you’d called a year ago,’ said Morton. ‘Now they’re all going back to Iraq and the Ghan. Every time a bomb destroys a souk, the contractors are upping the money, and you know what soldiers are like.’
Gallen knew what soldiers were like: as soon as the bivvie chatter laid off on women, it went straight to money and how to make it so fast that the cold and the bullets wouldn’t matter.
‘Okay, just thought I’d touch base.’
‘Hey, good to talk, Gerry. Heard you kicked on to captain?’
‘The only punishment they could think of.’
‘Hah!’ said Morton. ‘I’ve got your number. I’ll call if I think of anyone, okay?’
~ * ~
They found a bar with a good menu in East Village and Gallen bought a round of Buds off the tap.
‘Break a leg,’ said Winter, raising his glass.
McCann raised his too. ‘Mud in your eye.’
They all touched glasses and Gallen relaxed slightly, glad the gig had now been launched without jinxing it with a call to good luck, or any of the other sentiments that troopers could live without.
Gallen still had no answers for Aaron, but for now McCann and Winter were getting along and that mattered more to him than having the full crew. The barbecue ribs arrived with more beers and they unwound with the band playing 1980s covers.
As they walked from their cab to the guard house of the Oasis compound a couple of hours later, Gallen’s phone rang. The screen said Pete Morton.
‘Pete,’ said Gallen.
‘Hey, Gerry. The penny dropped, buddy. You’re not wiping the ass of a certain oil billionaire who likes getting hammered, getting in fights?’
‘That’s no comment, Pete.’
‘I met the Brits who came before you, Gerry,’ said Morton, a slight taunt.
Gallen stopped and waved the others on. ‘Oh yeah?’
‘Yeah. A Para named Piers, did a lot in western Iraq.’
‘Nice for him,’ said Gallen, fumbling for a smoke.
‘I guess you’re not interested.’
Gallen tried to play it cool, but he was hooked. ‘Anything I should know?’
‘Like, why they were fired?’
Gallen looked at the orange glow of Calgary on a still and cold night. ‘Fired?’
‘What Piers told me,’ said Morton.
‘Thought they took a big contract in Iraq.’
‘Sumatra ain’t exactly Iraq, buddy,’ said Morton. ‘Shit, they don’t even wear towels on their heads.’
‘Piers and his crew are in Sumatra?’
‘Sure,’ said Morton. ‘Chasing them separatist Muslims up in Aceh. ExxonMobil got a big push on there right now.’
‘So why were they fired?’
‘Don’t know, buddy,’ said Morton. ‘This was a social introduction, a week ago.’
‘Can you find out?’
‘I can do a lot of things, Gerry. You know that.’
Gallen felt conned, but he wasn’t going to let this go. In the days when he was responsible for up to fifteen men in the field, getting good intelligence was crucial to everyone’s survival. And if any of it pointed to increased danger to his men, he’d squeeze that intel until it bled.
‘Okay, Pete, what will it take?’
‘We can keep it informal,’ said Morton, the spy in him creeping out like a shadow. ‘I help you and you help me, right?’
‘Help?’
‘You know how it works, Gerry. You need information and I need information. We meet in the middle.’
‘Sounds like a pact with the devil.’
Morton laughed hard. ‘You’re very dramatic for someone who spent years collecting information and handing it on to people like me.’
‘It’s what I was trained to do, Pete,’ said Gallen, before realising what he’d said.
‘Elegantly put,’ said Morton. ‘Back atcha.’
The line went dead and Gallen trudged up the driveway to his demountable. Somewhere in the back of his mind he heard the voice of a drunken US Army Green Beret, in a USO facility at Chicago O’Hare, telling anyone who would listen that combat veterans don’t ever retire, their senses just play switcheroo: what was once a bivvie dream of comfortable civilian life is now their daily reality, while all the shit they ever took in the field visits them every night in their dreams.
Gallen forced a smile as he entered the demountable and found McCann and Winter watching America’s Funniest Home Videos.
Lying on his bunk, in the dark, Gallen thought about the conversation with Morton. That a couple of soldiers were fired by a difficult boss was not the issue. What worried him was why Paul Mulligan had lied about it.
~ * ~
CHAPTER 12
The atrium of the Oasis Energy high-rise on 7th Street smelled of freshly brewed coffee as Gallen lead McCann through at 8.55 am. Meeting Winter at the espresso stand they observed the large area of sofas and newsstands, trying to find the people who didn’t belong, assess the risks. He saw him on the first pass: Aaron, sitting at a sofa with Mike Ford, the Aussie naval combat diver.
‘Christ,’ said Gallen to himself as he paid the barista and carried the coffees to his crew, noticing that Winter and McCann had both taken the sofa that faced Aaron.
Aaron rose as Gallen approached. ‘You don’t have a fourth.’
‘You can count.’
‘Sure I can, Gerry, and I count four thousand clams a week that you won’t be getting ‘cos you can’t get the crew.’
‘I can get ‘em,’ said Gallen, keeping one eye on the Aussie. The previous night Winter had reminded him that the Aussie naval commandos had done a lot of the hard yards in the Gulf, boarding the vessels that British and US special forces were in no hurry to storm. They didn’t have a high profile on CNN but they were respected in the special forces world.
‘I count three of you, Gerry,’ said Aaron, smirking. ‘We’re not going up to see the big guy with three. Durville’s about comfort.’
‘I’ve got calls out.’
‘No, you have your ass hanging out.’ Aaron looked, ostentatiously at his big Omega watch. ‘I have a solution but we’re due up there in three minutes so you decide now.’
‘What’s the deal?’ said Gallen, feeling his pulse bang in his head. He didn’t know if he was ready for this, so soon after the shit.
Aaron flicked his chin over his shoulder. ‘Ford’s your fourth man.’
‘No offence, Aaron.’ Gallen held up his hand. ‘I don’t know the Aussie and my guys don’t know him either.’
‘Let’s change that,’ said the former spook, turning and walking for his sofa.
Shaking with Mike Ford, Gallen sat, totally pissed. ‘I got nothing against you, Mike, but I don’t know you.’
‘I get it,’ said Ford, cool blue eyes above wide cheekbones. ‘Don’t know your crew, neither. I like to know who’s in my bivvie.’
Gallen couldn’t hate a guy who talked straight. ‘Tell me about yourself.’
‘Aussie Navy, clearance diver, combat diver. Spent four years in the Gulf in a unit called Team Three.’
‘Team Three? That’s like SEALs, right?’
‘I guess,’ said Ford, shrugging. ‘Vessels, rigs, clandestine insertions. Recon and demos mostly. Some take-downs too, and a lot of welding.’
‘Welding?’ said Gallen.
‘You’d be surprised.’
‘So, you saw action in the Gulf, but I think you were in the hills too?’ said Gallen, meaning Afghanistan.
‘Yeah. That was a great secret, wasn’t it?’
‘Where were you?’
‘Can’t say,’ said Ford, giving Aaron a look. ‘But I can tell you that if a mo
vie maker ever finds a hero in all that shit, then he’s the one should have the fucking medal.’
‘Hah!’ said Gallen, standing. ‘Okay, Mike, you’re in, but there’s one rule.’
