Collateral Damage (Stone Barrington 25)

The man shouted back, “Because if we have to ditch up here somewhere, we inflate the life raft, and it becomes a ready-made tent, complete with emergency food and water—also flares and a radio.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, ‘oh,’” he shouted back.

The chopper was suddenly closer to the ground, but it had not slowed. She looked more closely at the life raft and located the lanyard that inflated it, then she felt marginally better. The pitch of the rotors changed and the machine slowed. Moments later, the nose lifted, and the Huey settled to earth.

“Out!” the agent shouted.

Jasmine jumped to the ground, and she was immediately struck in the back by something soft. She turned and found a small duffel on the ground, along with her backpack.

The ISI agent was getting into a robe and turban. He bent, unzipped the duffel, removed a bundle of black cloth, and tossed it to her. “From here on, you wear the burka,” he said.

“I’m not wearing that fuc

king thing!” she shouted at him.

The helicopter suddenly lifted off, revealing a couple of other men in native dress and a dozen mules, most of them heavily laden, on the other side of where the chopper had landed.

Jasmine looked at the mules incredulously. “And if you think I’m going to ride one of those things, you’re completely crazy!”

The man’s face changed, and he backhanded her, dumping her on her ass. “Now you listen to me, you stupid bitch: you will do whatever I tell you to do. If I tell you to strip, you’ll strip, and if I tell you to fuck us all, you’ll fuck us all. And if you don’t do exactly what I tell you to do, I’ll shoot you in the head and leave you here for the vultures. Do you understand?”

She stared at him blankly, unbelieving. “Do you know who I am?” she demanded, and regretted it immediately.

The ISI man unholstered his Beretta, racked the slide, and pointed it at her head.

“All right, all right,” she muttered, getting to her feet. She held up the garment and tried to figure it out.

He snatched it away and threw it over her head, like a sack, and she managed to get her arms in the sleeves and settle it on her body. He grabbed the hood and pulled it over her head, until only her eyes could be seen. “There,” he said, “that’s very becoming. And by the way, I don’t give a shit who you are. You are alone with three horny men in the middle of nowhere, and you will do as I say and quickly. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” she said.

He pointed at a mule. “Get on that animal, and don’t speak again unless you’re spoken to.”

Jasmine grabbed her backpack, slung it over the horn of the saddle, and managed to get aboard. The mule didn’t seem to care one way or another. A moment later there was a jerk as the rope leading from her mule’s bridle to the saddle of the mule ahead became taut.

—

Eleven hours later the little caravan wound along a steep, narrow trail. The air had become thinner, and the animals sucked and blew. They rounded a corner, and before them was a wide arch, covered by camouflage canvas. Everybody dismounted.

They had had only two breaks all day, and her bladder was bursting. “Where can I pee?” she asked one of the native men in Arabic.

He pointed. “Behind rock,” he replied.

She ran around the big stone, hoisted the burka, dropped her jeans and squatted, leaning against the rock. When her stream made noise, the men on the other side of the rock laughed.

When she returned, the canvas had been pulled back, and the men and animals were inside a cave, lit by dim electric lights. The ISI agent grabbed her elbow and pointed at another woman in a burka. “Go with the women,” he said. “You will be called when he is ready—maybe tomorrow.”

“Maybe tomorrow? I’ve got to—” She stopped as he drew back his hand. “All right.” She followed the woman along a passage and a moment later they emerged into a roundish cavern, perhaps twenty feet in diameter. Half a dozen women sat around a small fire that was lit in the middle, its smoke disappearing into the darkness above.

She was told she could take off the burka, then she was given a surprisingly good stew of lamb and vegetables, which she ate greedily. Then she was given a small pillow and a blanket and told to sleep. She had no trouble doing so.

—

She was shaken awake. Light was coming through a hole in the top of the cavern, and the other women were moving about. She was handed a bowl containing a hunk of bread and goat cheese. She ate the breakfast and washed it down with water from a canteen.

“You!” a man shouted.