Battle Lines Read online

  About the Book

  Coming back from war is never easy, as Sergeant Dave Henley’s platoon discovers all too quickly when they return from Afghanistan – to find that home can be an equally searing battlefield . . .

  When they are summoned to Helmand once more, to protect the US team assigned to destroy the opium crop, it is almost a relief to the soldiers – if not to their wives, girlfriends and families, turned inside out yet again by their men’s sudden departure.

  And now danger lurks around every corner – for Dave’s team who must learn new skills to survive, and their loved ones in England, whose lives can be ripped apart by an arsenal of equally deadly weapons: blind prejudice, corrosive anger, harsh misunderstanding, ugly rumour . . .

  Like War Torn, Battle Lines is at once a gritty, close-to-the-action thriller and an unforgettable drama of the agonies of separation and deeply conflicting loyalties, made hauntingly real by Andy McNab, whose continued involvement with the men and women of the British Army gives this extraordinary novel its authenticity, its toughness and its heart.

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Epilogue

  The Andy McNab Dossier

  Copyright

  Prologue

  They lay motionless on the cave’s rocky ledge, straining to hear in the extreme darkness. Dave wasn’t sure if that deafening thud was his own heart or the combined hearts of all four of them, thumping in unison against the rock.

  Sure enough, there were voices. At first it sounded like just a couple of men. Good. With the element of surprise on their side they could deal with a couple. But then more voices joined the others, calling from outside. They were climbing the steep ridge, silenced by the gradient until they reached the cave.

  Then he heard a dog bark. Shit! Another dog snapped back at it and the barking that followed reassured him that these animals were not following a scent. They were arguing over essentials like food and resting places. Dave felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up when he realized that the men were coming up to the cave to stay here. For the rest of the night, perhaps. Maybe for longer.

  His heart ached. They had come so far. In their lives. And on their journey tonight. Was this as far as they were destined to travel? For a few moments he allowed himself to give in to despair. It was as black and cold and rocky as the cave itself, only despair had a much smaller exit.

  A few moments later, voices entered the cave. He did not hear anyone strike a match but a hand held up a tiny flame. By its light Dave saw dark faces, moistened with sweat, eyes bright. He could not count how many. The hand holding the match stretched out so that the light flickered around the cave walls. Dave did not breathe. He shut his eyes as the light neared his face. The other lads all had their heads down and were pretty well undetectable unless someone happened to climb up here. In which case, they were dead. Because he had time to see an AK47 thrown carelessly across a shoulder before the light blinked out.

  So these men were not wandering camel-keepers or local goat-herders who had scrambled up here for the night to rest. They were Taliban. They perceived no danger. They made no attempt to drop their voices. They called to each other and one man shouted at the dogs to get outside. Dave thought the whole cave must stink of terror, the terror of four silent, trapped British soldiers. But the insurgents chatted amiably among themselves, oblivious to their presence.

  Chapter One

  YOU COULD HEAR the clock tick. The freezing night was silent. There was not a gust of wind or the sound of a distant motor. The darkness out there seemed to crouch, motionless, like an animal waiting to pounce on its prey.

  Dave heard someone flinging open the door and a moment later a blast of icy air hit him. He didn’t turn around. He focused. Steadily, quietly, he reached out.

  The beer glass stung his hand it was so cold, cold enough to have been sitting in the snow. He lifted it, gulped and swallowed. Shit. It scratched his throat it was so icy. He put the glass down heavily in disgust. He had been looking forward to a quiet pint slipping down easily and instead the beer was half-frozen. He glared at the barman’s back.

  Someone was standing next to him now.

  ‘Bloody hell, Sarge, the missus has got a strop on tonight.’ Simon Curtis, corporal of 3 Section in Dave’s platoon, was trying to attract the barman’s attention.

  ‘Are you talking about my missus or yours, Si?’

  Curtis’s face was red, as though he was still arguing with his wife.

  ‘If there was yelling over at yours I wouldn’t have heard it. On account of all the yelling over at mine.’

  The door opened again.

  ‘Fucking hell!’ said a voice.

  ‘Evening, Jonas,’ Dave said.

  ‘My bird’s giving me so much shit I’m not putting up with it,’ said Lance Corporal Danny Jones from 2 Section. ‘I mean, I’m just not fucking having it. All I did was pay the car tax. And she’s: I already did it! Who do you think you are? And I’m like: Duh, I’m the bloke who owns the car. And she’s: Don’t you come back here thinking you’re going to tell me what to do! And I haven’t told her what to do, I’ve just tried to pay the fucking car tax and I’m—’

  ‘Spare us the details, Jonas,’ said Dave, catching the barman’s eye by glowering at him, ‘and I’ll buy you a pint. We’ve heard it all before.’

  ‘Not from me you haven’t, Sarge. Me and my bird don’t do a lot of arguing.’

  ‘From you, from me, from everyone.’

  The door slammed behind them.

  ‘Dave!’

  This time Dave turned around in surprise. Corporal Sol Kasanita from 1 Section seldom came to the pub. Dave looked at Sol’s wide, dark face carefully. You had to know the Fijian well to know when he was ruffled and right now he was angry or upset or both.

  ‘Anything up with Adi?’ Dave asked cautiously.

  ‘Adi and me don’t ever fight, not ever, and guess what? Tonight she shouted at me!’

  ‘Never had a cross word until tonight?’ asked Si Curtis sceptically. ‘Not ever?’

  ‘Listen, we get annoyed with each other sometimes and she goes sort of cold on me but shouting? If anybody shouts in my house it’s me.’

  ‘Don’t suppose you’ll have a pint?’ Dave asked him. ‘In the circumstances?’ He knew that Sol sometimes did drink with the other Fijians at the camp, but Sol had never yet shared
a pint with him.

  ‘Nah, it’s orange and lemonade for me.’

  ‘Ice?’ demanded the barman.

  ‘Ice, no way, I just slipped on some of that outside. It’s enough to make you fantasize about Helmand.’

  ‘Yeah,’ agreed a few voices nostalgically.

  ‘The way the sweat used to run down your back all the time, I sort of miss it,’ said Danny Jones.

  ‘Run faster in the morning, Jonas, and you’ll sweat more,’ Dave told him.

  More men arrived. Everybody was moaning. After another pint Gerry McKinley and Andy Kirk of 2 Section were admitting to a group of mates that Christmas with the family hadn’t been much fun.

  ‘You forget,’ said Gerry McKinley, ‘when you’re in a hot FOB dreaming of a white Christmas with your kids opening presents around the tree, you forget that they start at four in the morning and your fucking mother-in-law’s around the tree too.’

  By the time Rifleman Adam Bacon walked in, the pub was heaving with men who had escaped from home. He paused to stare at the crowds and then saw Dave at the bar.

  ‘Hello, Streaky,’ said Dave. ‘My round, what are you having? I thought you were in Wolverhampton.’

  Streaky avoided his eye. ‘Came back, Sarge.’

  Dave looked at him closely and saw that the dark face had closed in on itself.

  ‘It’s just my little brothers are in my bedroom now and … well, everything round my manor’s a bit different, see, since I went away.’

  They joined the others and Sol, who was Streaky’s section commander, greeted him warmly. ‘So you came back early. That proves the barracks is your home now.’

  Sol and Dave both caught the look of sadness which flickered rapidly across Bacon’s face before it disappeared behind his pint.

  ‘Fighting out in theatre can change you,’ said Dave. ‘So sometimes lads don’t always fit straight back in when they go home.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Streaky. They waited for him to say more but he just looked down at his pint. Finally he asked: ‘Where’s Mal and Angry tonight then?’

  ‘I saw them going back into barracks,’ Sol told him.

  Streaky said: ‘They can’t have run out of money this early in the month.’

  ‘They left when they realized that this place is full of men getting away from the missus tonight,’ said Dave.

  Streaky continued to look around.

  ‘Everyone here married except me?’

  ‘Soon we’ll all be fucking divorced,’ said Jonas.

  ‘Too right,’ agreed Si Curtis.

  ‘Yeah,’ McKinley and Kirk said grimly.

  ‘Lads, this is normal,’ Dave told them. ‘The more often you go away the more you get used to it. There’s banners and flags and hugs and tears when the coach pulls in. And a few weeks later they’re ripping us apart.’

  ‘They’re all weeping at the medals parade …’ Sol began.

  ‘And screaming at us before we’ve got the fucking things mounted,’ Jonas finished.

  Dave nodded. ‘That’s the way it always is. There’s usually a bit of truce for the holidays and Christmas, then the yelling starts again. Lasts around three months as a rule.’

  ‘Well, if she thinks she can manage without me, let her try!’ muttered Jonas. ‘I don’t mind moving back into barracks.’

  ‘This is no time to make decisions like that,’ Dave told him.

  ‘I’ve been to the supermarket three fucking times in two days for Rose and every time I get back I’ve spent a fortune and she still yells at me,’ said Gerry McKinley. ‘And the supermarket’s mad this time of year, it’s like an FOB under fire.’

  ‘Forward Operating Base Tesco,’ agreed Sol.

  ‘Three fucking times,’ muttered Gerry again. ‘In two days. Then I get home with almost nothing left in my wallet and the mother-in-law’s there talking to Rose about some nursery school which costs an arm and a leg.’

  ‘I’ve heard about that place,’ said Dave uncomfortably. That was how tonight’s row with Jenny had started: when she announced that she was going to look at some posh, expensive nursery school for Vicky.

  ‘I keep telling Tiff there’s one in camp. Why are they all suddenly saying they want to drive miles and pay a fortune somewhere else?’ demanded Si.

  ‘Bloody ridiculous,’ agreed Andy Kirk. ‘We get paid a bit extra for going out to theatre and they want to blow it on some nursery school.’

  ‘Have you seen what that place wants for a deposit?’ asked Gerry. ‘Let alone the fees.’

  Si shook his head. ‘It all leads to one thing: no sex. I mean it. You think about sex all the time you’re away and then you come back and after a while you’re shouting at each other and what’s the outcome? No fucking sex.’

  ‘Welcome back to reality,’ said Sol.

  ‘Yeah, well maybe we don’t like this reality,’ said Gerry McKinley.

  ‘Being in theatre,’ added Andy Kirk. ‘That’s the best reality.’

  Many heads nodded in agreement.

  Dave sipped his beer. Now that the pub was busy its temperature had risen a little. He felt the velvety liquid slip down his throat.

  ‘They’re adjusting; we’re adjusting,’ he said evenly. ‘Just go with the flow.’

  ‘So have you had a row with Jenny, then?’ asked Sol.

  Mid-swallow, the beer turned thin and cold and scratchy.

  ‘Well … yes,’ Dave admitted. ‘Because Jenny’s heard about this new nursery. And we’re both sleep-deprived because the baby’s had a cold. And …’

  ‘And,’ said Sol, ‘it’s nicer at the pub tonight.’

  ‘Fucking right it is,’ Gerry McKinley said. Everyone agreed and took another swig of beer.

  Dave looked around at their faces. The same features as in Afghanistan but back here their expressions were different. They stood in the pub looking discontented, their eyes dull, their backs rounded. They’d been home only a few months and in that time they had changed. Most had put on weight; a few had developed beer paunches. And they had all lost the lean, alert look of front-line soldiers.

  Jenny Henley was still livid with Dave when she sat down at the computer and began to look for a job. Leanne and Rose were coming over but she had a few minutes before they arrived. If the baby didn’t wake up again.

  She couldn’t exactly remember all the words she and Dave had hurled at each other tonight but it had started when Jenny said she wanted to see the new nursery school everyone was talking about. Dave thought it cost too much. Jenny said the staff at the camp nursery school weren’t interested in the children and didn’t supervise them properly. Dave said Vicky had to learn to stick up for herself sometime and why spend all that money to take her out of the camp and away from her friends? From there they had argued about money in general, reverting to familiar firing positions. Jenny said that Dave could earn a lot more outside the army and he said didn’t she know there was a recession and if she thought there were so many jobs out there why didn’t she get one herself?

  And wasn’t it then that he’d said it? Said that thing? Said that she was turning out just like her mother? The bastard.

  Her fingers clattered across the keys. She found the jobs website of the local newspaper. Jenny had been working at a travel agency when she met Dave. But in the time it had taken to have two children travel agents had all but evaporated, so there was no point looking for that sort of job again. She needed something part-time which would bring in enough cash to make a good nursery school for Vicky affordable. As for baby Jaime, she would pay someone nice to take her for a few hours a week: maybe Adi.

  Jenny scanned JobsJobsJobs: General. There were a surprising number advertised. But they all seemed to start with questions to which the answer was no. Could fostering be your next challenge? Are you a campaigner? Do you have experience of fund-raising? Are you a carer with a car and the right attitude? Can you work nights? Are you ready to get on in sales? Do you have a degree in Hotel Management? Are you a nurse who�
��d like to get back into nursing? Always wanted to work with children?

  She tried JobsJobsJobs: Administrative and Office. Most were full-time but there was one vacancy for a part-time medical receptionist. Presentable appearance, pleasant manner, ability to work under pressure and good typing skills required. She decided to apply and then found she had to submit a curriculum vitae electronically. She had been taught how to write a CV at school but that seemed a long time ago. And what would she write now? ‘As a mother of two I have highly developed coping skills. My nappy-changing is second to none. All army wives, especially those who are married to front-line soldiers, have daily experience of stress management.’

  She widened her search. Nanny needed for busy, cheerful family … Trainee negotiator for estate agency, must work weekends … Assistant required for popular city bakery. That one sounded OK. No early mornings, training given, uniform provided. Must have experience dealing with the public and an enthusiasm for home-cooked, quality produce. She closed her eyes and imagined the smell of fresh bread. The bakery was a nice one in the city with fancy breads and continental cakes covered in fruit. It was the sort of place you went if you wanted to buy a treat. It would be full of smiling people buying cakes for happy occasions.

  She noticed the closing date. Tomorrow. Applications in writing. She would have to do it quickly and drive it over to Market Street.

  She wrote:

  My last job involved helping clients choose the right holiday destination. Whether people sat down for an hour or just put their head around the door, I enjoyed establishing the kind of relationships which encourage customer loyalty. Finally, I enjoy cooking myself and have a passion for good food which I like to share.

  She was so engrossed that she hardly heard the quiet tap at the door. Leanne Buckle and Rose McKinley stood there grinning and holding a bottle of white wine.

  They greeted each other in quiet voices. Everybody in this street spoke quietly after about seven in the evening because every house had small children. Dave and Jenny’s bitter row earlier had been conducted entirely in whispers.

  ‘You didn’t need to bring a bottle, I’ve got one in the fridge,’ said Jenny.

  Leanne stepped inside and small, thin Rose behind her was completely eclipsed by her vast frame.