including tips to Colonel Ramsdale and several other middlemen. Everyone was too busy and/or too afraid and the times were too chaotic for anyone to bother keeping close tabs on exactly what the money was used for, or exactly where it went. There was plenty of it, in cash, and the mandate was to get Iraq up and running again. Subtext: whatever it cost.
For example, in the first month of the contract, Allstrong's trailer park had run out of drinking water within a week, a true crisis. Jack had gone to Ramsdale and told him he desperately needed to buy more water immediately, but that he was out of money, what with payroll, housing costs, legitimate security equipment, weapons, and vehicles such as armored Mercedes-Benz sedans, and all other daily supplies for his now close to 150-man staff. Without a personal look at the situation and apparently without a qualm, Ramsdale signed off on an authorization for Allstrong to add six hundred thousand dollars to the original sixteen-million-dollar contract over its six-month life-peanuts considering the fact that the contract as written already was paying Allstrong a little bit more than eighty-eight thousand dollars a day, all of it in cash.
Allstrong had requested a total of a hundred thousand dollars from Ramsdale for the water, but the colonel had been so used to thinking in one-month units that he'd okayed six times the requested price, and Allstrong had seen no reason to correct him. And after all, the truth was that they were all working in an extremely hostile environment, where the danger of death was real and omnipresent. In Allstrong's view, that risk should not go without significant reward, even if much of it turned out to be under the table. It wasn't as though people like Ramsdale didn't know what was happening. In fact, Ramsdale was planning to retire from the active military before the year was out, and he'd already made a commitment to stay on in Iraq as one of Allstrong's senior security analysts at a salary of $240,000 per year.
Standing over by his wall map, Allstrong caught the latest toss of the packet of bills from Nolan and turned it over in his hands. 'So.' It wasn't a question. It wasn't an answer. The tone seemed to say,
'Yes, sir.' Nolan tipped up his scotch. 'It's turning out to be a good year.'
'Yes, it is.' Allstrong crossed over to his desk, casually flipping the wrapped bills package over to Nolan. 'And I think it could be even better, but I'm leery of burning out my best assets, which are men like you. No, no, no, don't give me any of that false modesty bullshit. I send you out to do a job and you get the job done. It's not every guy in the world can walk around with two million dollars and not be tempted to disappear with it.'
This was more than just idle chatter. That exact temptation, though for far less money-a quarter of a million dollars-had proven too strong for at least one of Allstrong's other senior employees in the past two months. Beyond that, almost two dozen of his first crew of guard hires-from pre-Kuvan sources-had disappeared with guns and credentials almost as soon as they'd been issued them.
But Ron Nolan merely shrugged. 'You pay me well, Jack. I like the work. It's nice to get a regular paycheck. Beyond which'-he broke his own smile-'I disappear with two million of your money, I'm pretty sure you'd hunt me down and kill me.'
Allstrong pointed a finger at him. 'You're not all wrong there. Nothing personal.'
'No, of course not.'
Allstrong put a haunch on the corner of his desk. 'What I'm getting at is whether you're starting to feel stretched a little thin.'
'No, I'm good.'
'I ask because another opportunity has come up-I know, they're growing on trees nowadays, but if I don't pick 'em somebody else will. Anyway, I wanted to run it by you, see if you wanted to take point on it. I should tell you, I consider it pretty high risk, even for here.'
'Taking a walk over here is high risk, Jack.'
'Yes, it is. But this is in the Sunni Triangle.'
Nolan tossed the package up and caught it. He shrugged. 'What's the gig?'
'Pacific Safety-Rick Slocum's outfit, he's tight with Rumsfeld-just pulled in a contract through the Corps of Engineers to rewire the whole goddamn Triangle in three months. High-voltage wiring and all the towers to hold it. You ready for this? He's going to need seven hundred guards for his people.'
Nolan whistled. 'Seven hundred?'
'I know. A shitload. But I'm sure Kuvan can get 'em.'
'I'm sure he can too. You gotta love them Kurds.'
'Who doesn't? So…you want to hear the numbers?'
'Sure,' Nolan said. 'I haven't had a good hard-on in a couple of days.' With the wrapped bills in one hand and his tumbler of scotch in the other, he got up and crossed over to Allstrong's desk.
His boss pulled over the adding machine and started punching and talking. 'Let's assume two hundred a month for the guards, what we're paying now. Good? We've got seven hundred guys working for ninety days, that's four hundred twenty thousand. Plus food and ammo and other incidentals. Let's go wild and call that twenty bucks a man per day, so forty-two grand. Shooting high, call our whole expense five hundred grand. Slocum told me off the record that because of the high risk in the area, he expects the winning bid to come in at no less than twelve mil. Which is exactly what I'm going to bid it at and which, if you're doing your math'-he hit the calculator-'is a three- month profit of eleven million five hundred thousand dollars.'
'I've definitely got wood,' Nolan said.
'So you're in if we get it?'
'All the way, Jack. We'd be crazy not to.'
'I agree. But I'm not sugarcoating it. I'm thinking we might lose a dozen guys. I'm talking dead, not deserted or disappeared.'
'Okay.'
'There'd be a significant bonus in it for you. Twenty a month sound good?'
'When do I start?'
'First, let's get the gig. But remember, I want you to be sure you're good with it. You'll have your bare ass hanging out there.'
'And seven hundred guys guarding it, Jack. Can I bring my escorts? I like that guy Scholler. He runs a tight ship.'
'I'll talk to Calliston, but I can't imagine there'd be any problem. He doesn't even know who those guys are.'
'Poor bastards.'
'Hey,' Allstrong said, 'they enlisted. What'd they expect?' He went around his desk and stood looking out the window at the airport outside. An enormous C-17 Globemaster III transport plane coasted by on the tarmac-several hundred more tons of supplies and equipment direct from the United States. Without turning around, he said, 'So between now and then, what's your schedule look like?'
'When exactly?'
'Next couple of weeks.'
'Pretty free. I got the message out up at Anaconda and Tikrit. We've definitely got friends trying to hook us up in both places, but they've got to clear their own brass first. We might have to sub under KBR, but I got the sense they're generally open to us doing what we've done here. Whatever happens, it's going to take a little time. Why?'
Now Allstrong did turn. 'I'd like to send you back to the States for a week or two. Clean up some problems in the home office. I'd go myself, but I don't feel like I can leave here just now if we want to pick up these jobs we're talking about. You'd be back in plenty of time for the Triangle thing if that comes about. And after today, payroll's covered until next time.'
'What kind of problems?'
'Well.' Allstrong tipped up the last of his scotch. 'I hired a private eye and he's found Arnold Zwick. The idiot went back home to Frisco.' Zwick was the company's senior executive who'd disappeared with a quarter million dollars of Allstrong's money about six weeks before. 'I'd kind of like to get my money back. I was hoping you could talk some sense into him. After that, take a little well-deserved R and R wherever you want to go. Sound good?'
'When do you want me to leave?'
