Free Dreams to Die For by Alan G Boyes

working for an American organisation, but he didn’t like the people much so I offered him a job there and then. Anyway, he’s married now and settled down. I think you are a bit paranoid about him.”
    Had Alan Crossland bothered to investigate his driver’s background he probably would have found out very little, but at least he would have tried to verify his suitability for the post. The absence of any adverse information about his driver did not however mean that he was an upstanding citizen. As a child, Jack was neglected by his single parent mother and drifted into petty crime and almost permanent truancy from his inner city comprehensive school which he left at the earliest opportunity to join the army. There he found the male companionship he had lacked as an adolescent but he gained little experience of relationships with women. On the couple of occasions he had dated a girl, his overeager and clumsy advances were quickly rebuffed and he ended up feeling humiliated and ridiculed. His frustration turned to anger and it was not long before he started using his physical superiority to enforce his will on any vulnerable female who would not respond to his overtures.
    Sergeant Jack Donaldson had been accused, though it was never proved as there were no living witnesses, of the rape of two Kurdish women whilst he was serving in the Gulf. He finished his time with the British Army and gained an honourable discharge. As a mercenary in Mozambique, he was able to satisfy his predatory sexual needs almost whenever he wished as most tribal villages were devoid of any men to protect them and the remaining women were easy prey. Several women would have testified to Donaldson’s brutality if only he had allowed them to live. He returned to Iraq in 2004, having gained a contract to assist in the protection of an oil installation taken over by the Americans, but when that got blown up by insurgents he found himself wandering around the streets of Baghdad. At that time the old city was in chaos and virtually lawless – just the sort of environment Jack Donaldson relished – and within two weeks of arriving he had obtained a military uniform that made him indistinguishable from the various, and numerous, coalition troops. Suitably camouflaged and anonymous, he set out to enjoy the second largest city in Western Asia.
    One day he happened to be walking along a side street when he spotted a high school, deserted except for the playground where a group of three teenage girls were playing. As he watched them the thunderous rolling sound of bomb blast filled the air. The few pedestrians in the street ran for cover behind walls or in nearby buildings and the girls fell to the ground, protecting their heads with their bare arms. He seized his moment. The girls were clearly frightened by the proximity and loudness of the blast and when he motioned them with his rifle to go into the building, they thought he was going to shelter them and ran inside. The school had clearly been disused for several months and was filthy. Everything was covered in thick dry dust mixed with coarse sand and the place was littered with debris of every description. There were broken desks and chairs and various papers were strewn everywhere. Some boxes of equipment had been ransacked, the ropes once securing them cut, with anything of value long since gone. All the light bulbs had been taken and radiators had been ripped from the wall, leaving dried and dirty water stains from the broken pipes. Many of the windows had been smashed and glass shards littered the floor.
    Once they were out of sight of the road Donaldson shouted at the frightened girls asking if any of them spoke English and one answered that she did. He then pulled his knife from his belt and pointed his rifle at her, ordering to tell the others that they must do exactly as they were told or their throat would be cut. The girl translated and one girl started to scream. Donaldson