“I have a cousin who works as a courier for Zahed.”
“You do? Why did you wait to tell me?”
“To protect him. And my family.”
“I see.”
“I will get more information from him.”
I finished my tea and smiled at Burki. “I really appreciate this help.”
He raised a brow. “Okay, okay.” He made a gun with his fingers. “You kill Zahed.
As we drove back through the town, we took a side street that ran parallel to the bazaar. A few kids on old bicycles were racing along the street and pointing as they passed the alleys. A huge crowd had gathered along the shops and stalls, and I could see people throwing things into the center square. Were those rocks? I couldn’t quite tell.
“What’s going on?” I asked Shilmani.
“Nothing. Never mind. We have to keep going.”
“No way,” I said. “Pull over.”
“Please, Scott. You don’t want to go there.”
“Why not?”
“Because you won’t understand.”
“You heard me. Stop this car.”
Shilmani took a deep breath. “You have to promise that if I stop, you will not interfere.”
“What are you talking about?”
He pulled over, threw the car in park. “You’ll see.”
NINETEEN
Harruck had never mentioned this issue to me, and I later found out that he’d known all along and had simply been hiding it. The news was simply another of the burdens he’d carried on his shoulders, and it made me understand — at least a bit more — why his stress level was constantly in the red zone.
I ran down the alley and reached the back of the crowd. Treehorn and Shilmani were just behind me.
There, in the middle of the road, was a brown sack, but when I got closer, I realized that a person was covered in that sack and buried up to the shoulders. The person was struggling, so I had to assume the hands were tied behind the back.
“Boss, is that what I think it is?” cried Treehorn.
“Aw, jeez.” I gasped.
A circle had been drawn in the road around the victim, and no one stepped inside that circle. From the periphery, they threw their stones, occasionally hitting the person in the head. Each time a stone made direct contact, the crowd roared.
“I did not want you to see this,” said Shilmani. “And I did not realize it would happen so soon. We would have planned the meeting another day.”
“Why is this happening?” I asked as the crowd chanted
“This is retribution for her sins.”
“Her sins? What the hell did she do to deserve this?”
Shilmani didn’t answer. A rock crashed into the woman’s head, and the sack began to stain with blood. The crowd grew even louder, and a blood frenzy now widened the eyes of those nearest the circle’s edge. The women hurtled their rocks even more fiercely than the men. I started forward, but Shilmani grabbed me — as did Treehorn.
“If you interfere, you will commit a crime,” said Shilmani.
“Okay, okay,” I said, fighting for breath and relaxing my arms so they could release me.
“Her hands are tied behind her back, but if she can escape the circle, she will be free,” Shilmani explained. “She’s only buried up to her shoulders to give her a fighting chance. Men are buried up to their heads.”
“You didn’t answer my question. What did she do?”
“She had sex outside marriage.”
“I knew it,” said Treehorn. “These women can’t do anything without getting punished for it.”
“We’d have to kill most American women if this were our rule,” I said.
“I know. It seems you Americans engage in this behavior quite a bit.”
“It just happens,” I said.
Shilmani made a face. “I still don’t understand how he convinced her to do it.”
“You mean the guy?”
He hardened his voice. “Yes, the American soldier from your camp.”
I considered going to Harruck’s office and telling him what I’d seen, but I realized the men needed something from me. And I felt badly for them. They’d been lying around the billet all day, just wondering what the hell was happening.
Ramirez had come back from the hospital with some antacid to soothe his stomach. He was lying in his bunk with his arm draped over his eyes.
I called the group forward, and after a few seconds, he was the last to gather around.
“Got a couple things going on. We’ll be back up in the mountains tonight. Engineering op. We’re going to blow those tunnels.”
“Hoo-ah,” shouted Brown and Smith in unison.
“I want to do everything we can to avoid engaging the enemy. They don’t call us the Ghosts for nothing. We’ll show them why.”
Hume raised his hand. “Any word back on the HERF guns yet? Do we know if they’ve got more?”
“I know the spook is working on something, and we have to assume they have more. Nolan, we still got two spare Cross-Coms, right?”
“That’s right.”
“Good, I’ll be taking one and Joey’s got the other.”
Ramirez frowned at me.
He was still in command of Bravo team. I wasn’t going to change anything. I’d decided that my paranoia should have no effect on the way I ran my team. And in retrospect, I think that was a good decision.
Up to a point.
“Something else going on you should know about.” I looked to Treehorn, who just sighed. “The water guy? Burki? He wants us to kill Zahed. Seems the fat bastard screwed him over on the deal with the new well, so that guy, the translator guy Shilmani, is going to help us set up a meeting with Zahed.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said Brown. “How’s that going to work? You don’t plan to go in there alone, do you?”
“Shilmani says he’s got a cousin who’s a courier for Zahed. I’ll probably be going in with him.”
“And when does this happen?” asked Nolan, wincing over the whole idea.
“Pretty soon, I’m guessing.”
“Then we need to work something out. The HERF guns don’t affect the chips in our bodies, so we can still track you.”
“You mean in case they take me prisoner.”
“So let me get this straight,” said Ramirez. “You’re going to walk into a meeting, put a bullet in Zahed’s head, and expect to walk out of there alive?”
“With a little help from you guys.”
The group chuckled. Ramirez’s expression remained deadpan. “Boss, I think it’s crazy.”
“Couple other things,” I said. “Higher’s planning a big offensive to sweep through Sangsar. They’re using
