The Executioner®

Firestorm
Don Pendleton’s

www.mirabooks.co.uk

Special thanks and acknowledgment to

Tim Tresslar for his contribution to this work.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Prologue

He was sure his heart would explode.

Javier Montesinos thrashed his way through the latticework of vines and branches that covered the jungle floor. Greens and browns rushed at him in a kaleidoscopic flurry. He sucked for air, felt it burn the insides of his overtaxed lungs. Blood thundered in his ears and his arms pumped wildly at his sides as he tried to gain distance from the monster on his trail.

The sound of an engine’s growl intermingled with the crash of branches and foliage being ripped from the ground, snapped and crushed beneath something big. Motorcycle engines whined, the insistent buzzing nearly swallowed up by the unseen vehicle’s thunder.

Montesinos wanted to stop, wanted to rest, to hide.

He could do none of these things.

He could only run. He needed to escape, to call Maria and let her know what’d gone down. That they were coming for her.

A motorcycle’s whine grew louder. The CIA agent tightened his grip on the Uzi he carried, but kept his pace steady. He’d stolen the weapon from one of the camp’s guards, snapping the man’s neck in return.

He’d covered a couple more yards when something hurtled from the brush. In a blur of black and silver, it shot past him into a large clearing that lay just ahead.

The driver whipped the motorcycle into a J-turn and brought it around 180 degrees. The biker paused, the black shield that covered his face locked on the exhausted agent. He revved the engine, but kept the bike stationary. One hand drifted from the handlebars and slid for a pistol clipped to his belt.

Montesinos jerked to a halt. His chest heaved as he sucked greedily at the exhaust-tainted air. He felt light-headed and the sudden stop caused him to stumble. He caught himself and raised the Uzi. He knew the magazine was nearly empty, depleted by his spraying his pursuers with volleys of gunfire.

The agent heard the rumbling of the big machine as it closed in from behind.

In the instant that he pulled the trigger, the motorcycle blasted forth and bore down on him. The gun chugging out a line of fire, he thrust himself sideways, narrowly escaping the bike’s onslaught. When he struck the ground, he ignored the sharp ends of branches that poked into his body. He focused on his target.

Steel-jacketed slugs struck the frame and sparked against the metal, etching a line along the vehicle’s side. The bullets punched through the rider’s leather boots. An anguished cry exploded from the man on the motorcycle. Frenzied by the sudden onslaught of pain, he twisted the handlebars more than ninety degrees and turned the front wheel into a brake.

Montesinos watched as the bike’s rear tire rocketed off the ground until the vehicle toppled over. The force launched the driver from the bike and sent him airborne. When he struck the ground, his shooting hand broke the fall, and the impact snapped bone, eliciting another cry from the wounded man.

Montesinos hauled himself to his feet. His breath still ragged, as much from rage as exhaustion, he lumbered across the clearing toward the downed biker, who scrambled to unsheathe the pistol holstered on his hip. The Uzi barked again and a tightly grouped burst pounded through the rider’s face shield and into his skull.

The Uzi’s clip emptied, Montesinos hurled it aside.

The whine of additional motorcycles swelled in his ears. He whipped his head left, spotted three of them crashing from different directions through the trees and brush that ringed the clearing. He knelt next to the dead man and snagged the handgun still holstered on his hip. It was a .50-caliber Desert Eagle.

Crouched behind the motorcycle, he waited for the riders to close in, rather than chance a long-distance shot through a web of tree limbs and other obstacles.

The nearest reached a point about fifteen yards away. A figure seated on the back of the motorcycle pointed a black object at him. A heartbeat later it began to spit flame. Bullets whizzed out from the forest, buzzing past him like unseen insects.

At about ten yards, the Desert Eagle thundered three times. The driver jerked as a round drilled into his torso. Suddenly flaccid arms detached from the handgrips and the bullet’s velocity pushed the driver into the second rider who was scrambling to shove the corpse from his bike and get hold of the handgrips. The second motorcycle launched into a zigzag pattern, apparently to evade any further shots.

Montesinos rose, shoved the Desert Eagle into the waistband of his torn blue jeans and grabbed the handlebar of the fallen motorcycle that lay before him.

But before he could straddle the machine, he saw a big black vehicle lumbering toward him, pushing down small trees, crushing greenery.

He muttered an oath, then let the bike fall to the ground.

You know what’s back there, damn it. You know it will kill you! Just go, he thought in a panic.

The mechanical growl filled his ears. As he tried again to mount the motorcycle, he felt something fiery sear the flesh of his calf. He smelled the burned flesh even before he felt the hot lancets of pain coursing up his leg. His lips parted and a sudden scream broke forth, driven as much by shock as pain.

The heat quickly traveled up his leg, even as he dropped his weight onto the motorcycle’s seat, leaving a trail of charred flesh in its wake. Adrenaline and terror overwhelmed all rational thought. He knew he needed to get the hell out before it left him nothing but charred flesh and bones.

Like all the others.

Gripping the accelerator, he felt the bike lurch forward underneath him. Thirty or so yards away sat a line of trees. If he could burst through those, lose himself in the surrounding jungle, perhaps he’d make it.

The heat seemed to intensify throughout his body. It traveled beyond his leg and began to burn through his torso and arms. Skin that first became warm heated almost instantly to unbearable temperatures. Within heartbeats, flesh reddened to an angry scarlet, then began to bubble and blister. Montesinos screamed again as the pain overwhelmed him, blinded him. Fingers uncurled and released the handlebar grips and the Colombian began to grab at himself, as though besieged by thousands of unseen insects. In the flurry of activity, he fell from the bike. It shot ahead a few yards before it rolled to a stop and tipped over.

He lay on the ground, curled protectively into a ball. Within moments, paralysis set into the parched flesh of his throat. The skin of his face and lips blistered, grew taut, emitted small curls of smoke. The orbs that had been his eyes sizzled, their remnants oozing from their sockets like tears. His mind, overloaded by pain, had begun to shut itself down, to shield him from the countless lancets of pain that coursed through his body, tearing away at him like parasites. There will be more, he thought. His body shuddered one last time before a blackness swallowed the last bit of consciousness.

M ARIA S ERRANO, A SUITCASE in either hand, rushed to her car. She popped open the trunk, slipped the bags inside, shut the lid and started back for her apartment. She cast furtive glances as she closed in on the building. Ascending the stairs, she reentered her apartment and moved from room to room, checking to make sure she’d left behind nothing important. She’d packed her calendars, phone books, laptop and a stack of spiral-bound notebooks. She didn’t want to leave anything that would provide clues about her true identity or her mission in Colombia.

It had been twenty-four hours since she’d lost contact with Javier and the others from her crew. The longer she waited, the more isolated and worried she felt. A knot of fear formed in her stomach and tightened as she mulled the situation. Javier never missed a check-in call. That he suddenly was incommunicado was scary; that she’d been unable to contact her own handler troubled her even more.

What the hell was going on? she wondered.

Serrano was operating under nonofficial cover and, therefore, had to tread lightly as she maneuvered through Colombia. She could visit the U.S. Embassy only infrequently and then only for mundane reasons. She had to studiously avoid anyone even remotely connected with the Company who could implicate her as an intelligence agent.

Her cell phone vibrated on her hip. She grabbed it and put it to her ear.

“Yes?”

“You know the situation?” Serrano immediately recognized the voice as that of her controller, a man she knew only as Fletcher.

“I know enough,” she said.

“You need to get out.”

“Obviously,” she said. “Tell me what’s happened.”

“Is this a secure line?”

She considered lying for a few seconds but decided against it. Fletcher could hear a lie in her voice in a heartbeat.

“No,” she said. “It’s not secure.”

“Then I have no information.”

“Fine. I’m leaving.”

“You should. Go to contingency B.”

“But I have a flight in three hours.”

“Fuck it. You have no flight. Don’t risk it. We’ll have an executive jet waiting for you when you arrive. Go to contingency B. Miller will come and get you. Go downtown, to the office and leave your gun in the car.”

“What?” she asked, startled.

“You heard me. We’re going to take you to the airport. But there’s been a lot of chatter from FARC about a kidnapping at the airport. The locals are nervous, and they’re going to be inspecting every car that comes or goes to the airport. We can’t risk them detaining you for any reason.”

“What about Miller?”

“He won’t be carrying either,” Fletcher replied.

Her brow creased with confusion and distrust boiled up from inside. Even on its best day, Colombia was a big slice of hell. The idea that she was to move around without a gun—to possibly force her way out of the country—was unfathomable. She couldn’t even wrap her mind around the idea that her escort also would be unarmed.

“You’ll be fine,” Fletcher said. “Really. I have two choppers at my disposal. We’ll track you from the air, give you an armed escort. If anyone tries to harm you, they’ll get vaporized from the sky. They’re private contractors, so they have more, um, flexibility when it comes to dealing with these situations.”

For reasons she didn’t understand, gooseflesh broke out on her arms.

“Do it, Maria,” he said. “We’re bending the rules by trying to get you out of there. There’s no time for debate. Just do this and in a couple of days we’ll hook up in Mexico to talk this through.”

“Fine,” she said. “Give me the details.”

S ERRANO DROVE HER CAR downtown. When she reached a skyscraper of mirrored glass, one that served as the headquarters for a local bank, she circled the block once to get the lay of the land. When none of the bystanders immediately tripped any alarm bells, she turned onto a ramp that led into a parking garage located beneath the building.

She maneuvered the car down two more levels until she reached the appointed floor. She found a space between two other cars. She put the car into Park but left the engine running.

Turning in her seat, she looked over her left shoulder, then her right to see what was behind her. She saw only more cars and an occasional passerby, but nothing that seemed out of place.

She reached beneath her jacket and drew her 9 mm SIG-Sauer from a hip holster. Holding the gun in her open palm, she examined it. A flurry of questions flashed through her mind as she weighed her options. With the relentless political and drug-related violence constantly rocking the country, she’d never been without the weapon since she’d arrived six months earlier. And, considering what she’d found the previous night, the thought of leaving her weapon behind seemed insane.

Something hammered against the passenger window. Serrano gasped, but reacted quickly. Her motions a blur, she transferred the gun to her right hand, gripped it and drew down on the interloper at her window. The guy outside gave her a pie-eyed stare that, under other circumstances, might have amused her. At the moment she just felt mortified.

“Hey!” Miller snapped. When he realized that she wasn’t going to blow his head off, an angry expression flashed across his pudgy features, replacing the terror that had been there a moment before.

She stowed the weapon and stepped out of the car.

“Lord, woman,” he said in anger-tinged whisper, “you damn near blew my head off.”

“Sorry,” she said.

“Just be careful,” he said. He scratched at the exposed skin on the crown of his head and composed himself. From what she knew, Miller wasn’t a field agent. Rather, he worked in Colombia’s main station as a political analyst where he studied opinion-poll results, newspaper stories and think-tank reports.

As she came around the vehicle, she thumbed a button on her keyfob and the trunk lid popped up. She reached inside the trunk, grabbed her bags by their handles and jerked them free from the compartment.

“Need help?” Miller asked.

She shook her head.

“Suit yourself,” he said. He walked away from the car and gestured ahead of himself. “Car’s two rows from here,” he said. “It’s the red Jeep Liberty.”

“Fine.”

Minutes later, her luggage stored in the rear of the vehicle, they sped from the garage. Miller punched the gas to make a yellow light. Serrano saw the shadows cast by the choppers that flew overhead.

“You were supposed to ditch the gun,” Miller groused.

“Go to hell,” she snapped. “Last thing I need is some fucking analyst telling me how to conduct myself.”

“No skin off my nose,” he said. “You want to buck the boss, that’s your business.”

“Then why are you even talking about it?” Serrano said.

“Just making conversation,” he replied.

“Then talk about the weather. Besides, why do you know anything about my orders?”

He grinned. “Because they told me you’d disobey them. The gun part, anyway. Listen, I’m cleared to know the conditions of this transfer, okay? I don’t know why you’re leaving, why you were here or where you’re going. But I do know that you were supposed to ditch the gun.”

“You didn’t say anything back there about it.”

“You almost blew my damn head off!”

“Occupational hazard,” she replied.

A stream of cigarette smoke wafted into her eyes, stung them. She waved a hand in front of her face to clear some of the smoke. When that didn’t work, she cracked a window to let in some fresh air.

“Damn it!” he yelled. With his left index finger, he jabbed a button to raise the window. “They stay closed. That was an order.”

Serrano started to say something but held her tongue. She could tell he was anxious, and agitating him would probably just make him worse.

Serrano stared through the windshield at the sunbaked stretch of road. Within an hour, they left behind the city limits and continued to follow the road to a small military airport that lay several miles outside Bogotá. Heat rose from the road, shimmering like water as it wafted up and eventually disappeared. On either side, they passed a few shacks, but eventually those structures became fewer until they disappeared altogether.

The road sloped downward. Serrano saw a trough at the end of the decline was blotted out by an impenetrable shadow that looked like a puddle of oil, but actually was a trick of the light.

Something on the road glinted, catching Serrano’s attention.

She opened her mouth to say something, but Miller stomped the brakes before she uttered a word. Hot rubber squealed beneath the car, but the tires grabbed hold of the road. The car slowed.

Serrano felt herself forced back in her seat by the sudden braking.

They hurtled several more yards and the objects in the road became visible. The SUV rolled over the road spikes and the tires were shredded. Farther up the road, a line of vans rolled across their path and blocked them.

“What the hell?” Serrano yelled.

Why weren’t the helicopters doing anything? The question raced through her mind. The answer came almost the same instant, and it made her stomach clench.

She looked at Miller, whose eyes were riveted on the road. He stomped the brakes again and the SUV launched into a sidelong slide at the vans. A panel van mushroomed up against the passenger side of the Jeep and the vehicles collided. The force of the crash tossed Serrano side to side. Her teeth clamped down. A side-impact air bag burst from the door panel and kept her head from slamming against the window. In the same instant, the front air bag exploded from the dashboard.

Her ears rang, and powder from the air bag deployment burned her eyes.

Your gun, Maria! her mind screamed. Grab it! Now!

Working her way around the air bag, she slipped her hand inside her jacket. Her fingers scrambled for the SIG-Sauer’s butt, found it and jerked the weapon free.

With her thumb, she turned off the safety.

A sidelong glance at Miller showed his limp body hanging forward against the seat belt harness. Blood streamed from his nose, over the curve of his upper lip, down his chin before it dripped onto his white dress shirt. She saw that his chest continued to rise and fall. Thank God, she thought.

She released her seat belt and leaned across the console. Her arms strained to reach the door handle. The whipping of the helicopter’s propeller blades grew louder. She opened the door and shoved it hard enough to keep it from swinging closed again. A glance over the seat showed her that the helicopter was landing on the road behind her, its blades kicking up boiling clouds of dust.

She released Miller’s seat belt. To get free of the vehicle, she figured she’d have to climb over him, then drag him free of the vehicle. Without knowing what kinds of injuries he’d suffered she couldn’t risk pushing him from the car first and making them worse.

Figures decked out in black SWAT-style uniforms ran up on either side of the Jeep, guns held high. They formed a ring around the vehicle. One of them, his submachine gun poised at shoulder level closed in on the wrecked vehicle.

“Hands up,” he shouted. Fear swelled inside Serrano, caused her throat to tighten until she swore she’d suffocate. She weighed the situation and realized she was boxed in. Setting the handgun on the dashboard, she raised her hands. The man who’d yelled at her stepped aside and allowed a second man to approach the vehicle. He reached inside, grabbed Miller by the arm and dragged him from the SUV.

“Let’s go! Let’s go!” the lead gunner shouted. Serrano climbed over the console. Another thug stepped forward, grabbed her by the bicep and dragged her from the vehicle. He ordered her to lay facedown on the ground. She complied and almost immediately regretted it when the heat from the asphalt burned her skin. She squeezed her eyes shut against the sunlight.

Someone from the swarm of black-suited men searched her, but found no weapons.

A shadow fell over her. She opened her eyes, looked up and saw a thick-bodied man stalking toward her.

“Sit up,” he said.

She did. She looked him over and saw he had a ruddy complexion and dull green eyes that emitted a thousand-yard stare, as though he was human in form only. A portion of a tattoo—a scorpion’s tail—peeked out from beneath his shirt collar. He nodded at one of the men beside her. The man knelt.

A small sting in her left arm caught her attention. She jerked her arm away, but it was too late. The man next to her was back on his feet, a syringe in his grip. Within seconds, she began to feel light-headed. Black spots swirled in her vision and noises began to sound far away. Darkness fell over her.

S EVERAL MILES AWAY , Albert Bly stood at the edge of the clearing and stared at the smoking remains of a body. A satisfied smirk played over his lips. The smell of burned flesh filled his nostrils. He welcomed it, inhaling deeply.

The camouflage fatigues Bly wore hung loosely from his thin body. His black hair was combed straight back from his forehead, exposing a sharp widow’s peak. His skin was red, as though blood might burst from his pores at any moment.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the man next to him shake his head vigorously, heard him make a disgusted noise. “My God,” Milt Krotnic said, “that smells terrible, like cooked garbage or something.”

Bly turned his head and looked at the other man. His lips peeled back into a smile. “It’s the smell of money, Krotnic,” he said, scolding the other man. “You remember that.”

The other man shrugged. “Sure.”

Two men brushed past Bly. Surgical masks covered the lower halves of their faces. Their hands were sheathed in rubber gloves that stretched well up their forearms, but stopped short of their elbows. They angled toward the corpse, knelt beside it and stretched it out on a black plastic body bag on the ground. One of the men reached gingerly for one of the dead man’s ankles. With a pair of scissors, he began cutting at the fabric of the man’s trouser leg and peeled back the fabric. Bly caught a flash of the charred flesh and felt a surge of excitement.

“Hold it,” Bly shouted.

As he advanced on the two men, he withdrew a digital camera from his pants pocket. When he reached the body, they rose and moved away to give him ample room to perform his grisly ritual. He aimed the camera at the remains and snapped several pictures, making sure to zoom in on the puckered black flesh that still clung to the bones. When he finished, he lowered the camera a foot or so from his face and, using his thumbnail, manipulated the dial that advanced the pictures. Satisfied with the results, he turned and headed back to Krotnic, who was talking into a two-way radio, while the two medics resumed their work. Bly pocketed the camera.

“Sure,” Krotnic said into his radio. “He’ll be glad to hear that. You know where to put her? Good, then do it.”

The former colonel in the Serb military clipped the radio to his belt and nodded at his boss.

“They found her,” he said. “They have her back in Bogotá.”

“Good,” Bly said.

“She put up a hell of a fight from what I understand,” Krotnic said. “We’ve got a couple of casualties.”

“The laptop?”

Krotnic shook his head. “No, she was empty-handed. Couldn’t get her to say shit, either.”

“A temporary condition,” Bly replied.

“Of course.”

1

Mack Bolan was seated at the conference table in Stony Man Farm’s War Room. The soldier was freshly showered and clad in blue jeans, a flannel shirt and black sneakers. Even within the secure confines of the Farm, America’s ultra-secret counterterrorism center, he wore his sound-suppressed Beretta 93-R in a leather shoulder rig. His eyes felt gritty and sore from lack of sleep.

Hal Brognola sat across the table from him, a laptop positioned before him. The director of the Justice Department’s Sensitive Operations Group snatched the unlit cigar from his mouth. His forehead creased with concern, he rolled the cigar between his index finger and thumb, studied it while Bolan waited for him to speak. The Executioner set his coffee on the table.

“You look old,” Bolan said finally.

Brognola snapped his head up as though he’d suddenly sat on a thumbtack. He glared at Bolan. After a couple of seconds, his dark expression melted and a grin tugged at the corners of his lips. “It’s the company I keep,” he said.

“Speaking of which, it’s five a.m. It’s Sunday. You’re wearing Saturday’s suit and tie. Hell, it may be Friday’s clothes for all I know. You need a shave. And probably a shower, though I’m not going to get close enough to find out.”

“In other words, why’d I drag your ass of bed at this hour?”

“Something like that.”

“Fair enough,” Brognola said.

A folder rested on the table at the big Fed’s right elbow. He pinned it beneath one of his big hands and thrust it at Bolan. The soldier opened it and began to examine its contents. A picture of a woman was held to the left side of the folder by a paper clip. Blond hair framed an oval-shaped face. Her complexion was dusky, her eyes dark, lips full. “She is?”

“Maria Serrano,” Brognola replied. “CIA agent. She holds double majors in forensic accounting and international business. And, from what I understand, she’s one hell of an undercover operative.”

Bolan nodded and leafed through the papers in the folder, skimming them. It contained a few government memos—from the CIA, National Security Agency and the State Department—as well as documents he recognized as presidential daily briefings and classified executive orders signed by the President detailing the kidnapping and murder of several CIA operatives.

Brognola continued, “Six months ago, the NSA picked up some noise from an American company’s operation in Bogotá, Colombia. The various bits of chatter indicated someone in Garrison Industries executive suites was breaking arms embargoes with Iran and China, along with some nonstate groups. Specifically, the company was shipping high-resolution camera components we use in our satellite program. They kept listening but took no immediate action. And, the more they heard, the more concerned they became. Two months ago, they discovered that the company was acting as an intermediary between a Chinese group that produces cylinders and other parts used in centrifuges and a group in Iran.”

“For the country’s nuclear program,” Bolan said. He closed the folder and set it on the tabletop. He’d have plenty of time to look at it later.

“Right,” Brognola said. “As far as the satellite components go, the Iranians say they want satellites to track weather and such. Needless to say, we don’t believe them. And we don’t like the notion of them having aerial-surveillance capabilities. The consensus is that the longer we can keep them blind from space, the better off we are.”

“Sure,” Bolan said.

While he took a sip of coffee, the door leading into the conference room swung open. Bolan cast a glance in that direction and saw Barbara Price enter. Stony Man’s mission controller held several file folders in one arm and a closed laptop in the other.

She flashed Bolan a warm smile, which he returned. The two often spent time together when Bolan was at the Farm. He’d left her room only minutes before the meeting, after he’d received Brognola’s page, to get cleaned up and change clothes.

She leaned against the door, holding it open for Aaron “The Bear” Kurtzman, the head of the counterterrorism facility’s cyberteam. The computer expert guided his wheelchair into the room and exchanged greetings with the other two men.

On the arm of his wheelchair, he balanced a carafe that Bolan assumed contained coffee. Kurtzman buzzed up to the table, set the carafe on the tabletop and pushed it toward Bolan.

“Top off your cup,” Kurtzman said, nodding at Bolan’s coffee.

For several seconds, the soldier stared at the carafe. Finally he unscrewed the cap and poured some of the steaming liquid into his cup. The coffee’s color looked like dirty motor oil mixed with black shoe polish.

Price moved around the room, distributing folders to everyone. When she finished, Brognola, anxious to continue the briefing, waved her to her seat. In the meantime, the big Fed poured himself some coffee.

“Initially, the NSA wasn’t sure what to make of the deals. Garrison’s people had a history of being approached by unsavory people. Occasionally, it cut deals, but did so at our behest, as a way for us to gather intelligence on various countries and terrorist groups. But it never passed along any cutting-edge technology or items related to nuclear proliferation.”

“Back up,” Bolan said. “These guys have sold weapons to our enemies before? And did so with government consent?”

Brognola nodded.

“Most Garrison employees have no idea that this goes on. But, yes, they do exactly that. They have a few agents who essentially work as hard as they can to hook up with the bad guys. Word gets around, usually through some cutouts. Pretty soon, the bad guys come to them. They fork over bribes, ask for stuff they’re banned from having. The Garrison people nod their heads, and go along with the gag.”

“And feed whatever information they collect back into the intelligence network,” Bolan said.

Brognola nodded. “The Garrison agents almost never hand over anything of consequence, at least not on a global scale. The thinking has been that it’s better to hand these jerks a couple of RPGs and know they have them than allow them to buy weapons from some freelancer in South Africa, Libya or Iraq. And, historically, the Company—I mean the CIA, not Garrison—always kept close tabs on the weapons. That’s why these particular transactions set off alarm bells. But we’ll cover that in a minute.”

“What’s the breakdown on what they sell?” Bolan asked.

“They have a network of soldiers, intelligence people and support personnel they contract out, mostly to our government. We’ve used their people for operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Colombia. The majority are top-knotch soldiers, not rogues. They do on-the-ground fighting, security and training so that we don’t tie up too many people in overseas operations.”

“What about their weapons design and development operations?” Bolan asked. “I assume most of their R&D work also is for the United States.”

Price leaned forward on the table. “Mostly,” she said. “About seventy-five percent of it is for us and another twenty-four-and-a-half percent is performed for our allies.”

The Executioner set his coffee on the table. “Which leaves a half percent unaccounted for. Give me that list.”

Brognola sighed. “It’s the countries that keep us up at night—North Korea, Iran, Syria. And some bad elements in allied countries like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have also been known to tap Garrison for equipment.”

Price continued, “The intelligence community tried to build in safeguards to minimize any blowback against us or our allies. Sometimes the buyers ended up dead from natural causes.” She gestured quotation marks with her fingers to highlight the last two words. “Or thieves stole the weapons. But the thieves actually were on the CIA’s payroll. Or we sent in proxies to buy back the weapons. It wasn’t a perfect system. It’s not unreasonable to assume that some weapons fell into the wrong hands, that someone, somewhere slaughtered innocents with those weapons. But the operation did generate good intelligence for us. I guess the National Security adviser considered any mistakes a fair trade in exchange for the benefits.”

“A fair trade, maybe,” Bolan said, “but not an equal one.”

“Intelligence gathering isn’t always neat and clean, Mack,” Price stated. “I know that from my own experiences with the NSA. It’s as much an art as it is a science. Perhaps more art than science. It’s as imperfect as hell. You know that.”

Bolan acknowledged her words with a nod.

“And Garrison’s been doing this for how long?” Bolan asked.

“About twenty years,” Brognola said.

“And we’ve known about it how long?”

“About twenty years,” the big Fed stated.

Bolan searched his old friend’s face and waited for the punch line.

“I’ll bite,” Bolan replied. “So it’s twenty years later and suddenly we learn that someone within the organization has gone rogue, and we have an emergency. Are we just concerned about the satellite parts and the tubes?”

Brognola shook his head. “It seems that some of these creeps have begun moving up the Garrison food chain. They’re getting their items more quickly. They get to meet with select members of the senior management team. We’re worried that the Iranian and Chinese transactions are only the tip of the iceberg. So was the CIA, which is why they sent a team of agents down there to investigate.

“And it gets even more complex. Garrison doesn’t just play these cloak-and-dagger games out of a sense of patriotism. They’re sort of enmeshed in the intelligence community.”

“Enmeshed with or part of the intelligence community?” Bolan asked.

“Give the boy a cigar,” Kurtzman said.

“The whole damn operation was planned and sanctioned by the National Security Council,” Brognola said. “Using money from a slush fund, the council bought a small research-and-development firm a couple of decades ago and grew it into what it is today. Unfortunately, it seems to be taking on a life of its own, which has everyone from the White House on down worried.”

The big Fed set down his cigar long enough to take a swig of coffee. His face puckered in distaste, and he shot Kurtzman a dirty look. The computer genius just shrugged and studied at the contents of his coffee mug.

Brognola continued, “Most of Garrison’s money comes from black budgets. Or it uses its proceeds to pay for operations. Traditionally, most of what it made, it sold back to us or other allied governments. So the few politicians who knew about it, ignored it. The thinking behind it is that it allows us to have more control over the weapons we make and buy and it’s a source that, at least ostensibly, has our best interests at heart.”

“Plus it helps folks sidestep congressional scrutiny when budget time comes,” Bolan said.

Brognola gave the soldier a weary smile. “We’ve both seen too much of Washington, haven’t we? Fortunately, most of what they sell to the bad guys is crap. And they sell them precious little of that.”

He lifted his coffee cup about three-quarters of the way toward his mouth, paused and set it back on the table. Instead, he pulled out a roll of antacid pills and popped a couple into his mouth.

“This wasn’t part of a sting operation,” the man from Justice stated. “We already ran all the necessary traps to make sure that that wasn’t the case. No one knew anything about these particular deals.”

“And you believe that?” Bolan asked.

Brognola shrugged. “My gut says they’re telling the truth. What we’re looking at here, in my opinion, is an operation that’s gone out of control. We can debate all day whether it was a good idea to begin with. But the reality is that it’s out of control and we need to pull the plug on the whole damn thing, fast.”

“Explain,” Bolan said.

Brognola tapped a key on his laptop. An image appeared on a wall screen. The image depicted a limousine, the door held open and a young Asian man in a dark business suit stepping from the vehicle. A pair of hardmen flanked him. Bolan could tell from the angle of the photo that it had been shot from above.

Brognola let the soldier study the image for several seconds. With another keystroke, a close-up shot of the man in the middle filled the screen. A whitish scar ran from below the man’s shirt collar and up the left side of his neck, disappearing beneath his hairline. His black hair was long and pulled back into a tight ponytail.

“Name’s Chiun,” Brognola said. “He’s triad. He’s a boss in Ciudad del Este, Paraguay. There are several Chinese gangs operating down there, but his group is the biggest. Runs all the usual stuff—prostitutes, protection, counterfeiting, drugs. Launders money for Hezbollah. Does the same thing in Hong Kong and Malaysia.”

Bolan sipped his coffee. Ignoring the awful taste in his mouth, he studied the photo and committed it to memory.

“He’s a real piece of work,” Brognola said, “but he’s smart and ambitious. He started out as an enforcer for the gang, now he runs it. Spilled lots of blood along the way to get to where he is. Other gangsters, illegal immigrants, police officers—doesn’t matter to him. Everyone’s just a speed bump while he races to the top. When he was an enforcer, that wild streak served him well. Sure, it pissed off a hell of a lot of people back in China, but it also got him where he wanted to go. At least for the moment.”

“How does he fit in with all of this?” Bolan asked.

Price took over, “He’s in tight with Chinese intelligence. Rumor has it that his ties with the government helped him get where he is. Three days before he took over his gang, the government stepped in and snapped up most of the leaders.”

“Giving him a clear path,” Bolan said.

“Exactly,” Price stated. “And he seems all-too willing to repay them for the help. A couple of our intelligence reports indicate that he and his people pull off work for the Chinese all the time. We know of several dissidents killed by his thugs. The victims had no ties to him, but had made enemies in the government.” She snapped her fingers. “Suddenly they end up shot on a street corner or stabbed in alley by one of his people. Chiun’s gang also has smuggled weapons for the Chinese and carried out some small-scale industrial espionage on their behalf, primarily through his own network.

Brognola flashed another picture on the screen. This one showed another Asian man, his gray hair combed back from his forehead. He had a wide face with thick lips turned down in a deep scowl. Bolan saw that the decorated collar of a military tunic encircled the man’s thick neck.

“Colonel Chi Pu Deng,” Price said. “He came up through the People’s Liberation Army, but has focused exclusively on espionage for at least fifteen years. According to some very good sources—one of them a friend of Hal’s who operates in Hong Kong—Deng and his surrogates have maintained regular contact with Chiun and his gang for years. There’s more information on him in the packet I gave you.” Price indicated a folder that sat on the table in front of Bolan. “But the consensus of people paid to know these things is that Deng is the middleman. He pays Chiun for weapons and information and takes those things back to his government.”

“What else do we know about him?” Bolan asked. “If he’s working that close to a gang, he must be skimming money off the top. Or getting some other benefit.”

Price shook her head.

“Surprisingly enough,” she said, “he’s clean, at least from China’s perspective. Consensus is that he’s a patriot and incorruptible. That’s earned him more than a few enemies within his own government, as you can imagine.”

“Sure,” Bolan said.

“To take it a step further,” Brognola chimed in, “we think that’s one of the reasons he sticks so close to Chiun. There are more than a few guys on the take who’d just as soon see this Boy Scout taken out of the mix. But no one has the guts to do it, because they know he’s Chiun’s meal ticket. Or one of them, at least. And he’d be damned mad if someone took the colonel out.”

“Are they that close?” Bolan asked.

“Their only bond is money,” Price replied. “Apparently Chiun thinks Deng is a sentimental idiot. Deng thinks Chiun’s greedy and unpatriotic. But neither of them wants to pull the brakes on the gravy train. That’s why they tolerate each other. It’s an uneasy alliance, to put it mildly.”

“And up here is Albert Bly,” Brognola announced.

Bolan turned and saw a photo of a Caucasian man clad in a tuxedo. He was shaking hands with another similarly clad man whom Bolan recognized as a U.S. congressman. Bly balanced a champagne glass in his other hand as the two mugged for the camera.

“This is from the New York Times society page,” Brognola said. “Up until about two years ago, Bly was a very public face for Garrison. He was all over the news shows. Had audiences with congressmen from both parties. Then the company hit some rocky financial times. The board of directors named him chairman, kicked him upstairs and he disappeared from the public eye, seemingly overnight. We think there’s more to it. We’re still digging around to see what we can find out, but there are a couple of theories.”

“Like?”

“His corporate jet has filed a lot of flight plans to the Dominican Republic and Thailand, if that tells you anything,” Kurtzman said.

“It tells me plenty,” Bolan said. The soldier knew that both countries had booming sex tourism trades, an industry he’d confronted more than once. “Seems a guy in his position was courting disaster by going to those places.”

“No doubt,” Brognola said. “And, if either Chiun or Deng know this, it’d be an effective lever to force him to cooperate.”

“If they had to push him that hard,” Bolan replied. “Money alone can be a hell of a motivator.”

“It could be any combination of things,” Brognola agreed.

“So what’s the request?” Bolan asked.

“We need someone to find Serrano,” Brognola said. “We have to know what she learned, what her team learned. It had to be big for Bly to risk snatching and killing those agents.”

“ If he was the one who took those agents,” Bolan said. “Do we know that yet?”

“There’s a chance that someone else did it, but I’d be surprised. This was a very coordinated snatch-and-grab operation. It’s not something Chiun would’ve pulled,” Price stated.

“Why is this our gig?” Bolan asked. “I mean why won’t the CIA go in and pull her out?”

“Two reasons,” Brognola said. “First, all these operatives are nonofficial cover. That means that our government can’t officially acknowledge any relationship between them and the agents. We aren’t worried so much about the kidnappers themselves, since they’re probably nonstate actors. But, what we can do is send in a Justice Department agent to look for an American kidnapped in another country. And there’s another reason, which more specifically has to do with you.”

“And that would be?”

“The President doesn’t like how this went down, and neither do I. Bly has a lot of contacts in the intelligence world. Not just in the United States, but intelligence agencies in Britain, France, Saudi Arabia, Jordan. Name it. He knows people. We want to handle it because we operate outside normal channels. You’ll have a handful of vetted contacts when you hit the ground, but all the interfacing with other government agencies will happen through us.”

“Did you just say ‘interface’?” Bolan asked.

“Will you take the job?” Brognola asked, ignoring the gibe.

“Of course,” the Executioner said.

“Grab your gear then,” Brognola said. “Jack’s already warming up the plane.”

2

What the hell was happening? Were they going to kill her? What did they know? The thoughts raced through Maria Serrano’s mind as she regained consciousness and found herself seated in a wooden chair, hands bound behind her back.

Think, she told herself. Don’t panic. Use your brains. Use your training, not your emotions. She took a deep breath and looked around the room. She was positioned in the center of the cramped cell. A naked bulb hung from the ceiling and beamed down meager white light that the dark brick walls seemed to absorb. She still wore the blouse and pants she’d had on when she had been captured. Her shoes, belt and watch were gone. She had no way of knowing how long she’d been unconscious.

Her mind still was fuzzy from whatever drug they’d used on her. But she could vaguely recall being brought here by a pair of hulking men, one of whom spoke in heavily accented English.

On the other side of the door a bolt slammed back, then the door swung inward without a sound. A tall man filled the doorway and stared down at her.

Even with his face partially obscured by shadow, she recognized Albert Bly in an instant. He walked slowly to her, reaching into his pocket. Her muscles tensed involuntarily until his hand came back into view holding a white card laminated in plastic. He studied it for several seconds.

“Gina Lopez,” he said.

“Yes. That’s right,” Serrano said.

“What brings you to Bogotá, Gina?”

“Business,” she said.

“Business? Of what sort?”

“I’m not at liberty—”

“Of what sort, Gina?” The volume of his voice didn’t change, but she detected a hint of menace, cold, quiet, unspoken. A seething rage that was, at once invisible but seemed to fill the whole room.

“What business?” he repeated.

“I’m an auditor.”

He waited for more.

“I work for the government. The U.S. government.”

“Of course you do.”

Her mouth went dry, her throat tightened. Something in his tone left her feeling suddenly exposed, as though he knew everything about her, about her classified status. She swallowed hard.

“I work for the Government Accountability Office,” she said. “We investigate things for Congress. I’m not a criminal investigator. This was a fact-finding mission.”

“And what facts did you find?” Bly asked.

“Who are you?” she asked, feigning confusion.

“I think you know,” he said.

“Why are you holding me here?”

He didn’t respond.

She knew that playing the indignant bureaucrat wouldn’t move Bly, but it fit in with her cover.

“I mean it,” she said. “I’m an employee of the U.S. government. If this is some half-assed kidnapping plot, you might as well let me go. You won’t get a dime from me. We—”

Bly’s hand snaked out in a blur. His flattened palm struck her right cheek. The force jerked her head hard to the left. Flecks of spittle flew from between her parted lips. A moment later hot needles of pain jabbed her skin where she’d been struck.

Her muscles tensed and she strained at her bonds. Maria Serrano, a Central Intelligence Agency agent, didn’t put up with that shit. The rare man stupid enough to strike out at her found himself on his knees, sucking for air. Or begging for his life.

Gina Lopez, on the other hand—

She forced a tear from her right eye, trying to put together the right combination of fear and confusion, minus the righteous rage that smoldered inside her. “Why’d you do that?” she asked, her voice small.

“I’m a reasonable man. I’m not stupid,” Bly said.

She ground her teeth and nodded vigorously. A gesture of appeasement, not understanding. The coppery taste of blood seeped between her teeth and onto her tongue. As the physical shock of the blow wore off, she realized she’d bitten the edge of her tongue. He’d drawn blood. Bad mistake!

Bly’s face remained inscrutable. Pale blue eyes remained riveted on her. If smacking a woman made him feel bad or got him off, she realized, he gave no outward sign.

“Please continue,” he said.

“We’re here to investigate Garrison Industries,” she continued. “It’s part of a larger study.”

Bly leaned forward. His hand reached toward her face, this time slowly, deliberately as though to brush a stray lock of hair from her vision. Reflexively, she began to jerk back. Before she completed the move, his palm hammered against the damaged cheek. She yelped in pain and surprise.

She spit a gob of blood and saliva to the floor. She turned to face him, staring at him through the veil formed by her mussed hair. She found his face emotionless, unreadable, like the rattlesnakes she’d seen as a child growing up in New Mexico.

“Will you—will you please stop hitting me?” she asked.

“Ms. Serrano,” he said, “we both know you’re with the CIA. Let’s please cut the shit. In case you haven’t figured this out yet, I have no compunctions against inflicting pain if things don’t go my way. It doesn’t have to be like this. But it certainly will, if you don’t cooperate.”

He leaned forward and she tensed again, braced herself for another blow. Instead, he took a handful of photos from his jacket pocket. One by one, as though dealing cards, he set each on her thighs until she had five of them on her legs, a row of three on top, a row of two on the bottom.

She looked at the first, gasped and looked away. Nausea overtook her and she found herself gulping for air to quell the urge to vomit. Even with her eyes averted, the image stayed with her, seared in her mind. A crumpled skeleton, flesh burned black, marbled with streaks of red, clung to blackened bones. Except for a few wisps, the hair had been burned away, along with the facial features.

“You came here with a group,” Bly said, his voice steady. “There were six of you, I believe. Well, now there’s only one. You can see what happened to the others.” Then he told her about the weapon and how she could escape the fate of the rest of her team.

She started to feel light-headed, and her mind wanted to race away from her. “I don’t know—”

“What I’m talking about? Really? Let me explain it, then. You and your comrades have slowly infiltrated my company. It took a couple of years, but you did it, and I find myself suitably impressed. But once I realized that you were here, well, I couldn’t allow that. I had to deal with you. I would have assassinated you, clean and simple, of course. However, at about the same time as my security people identified you, a laptop went missing.”

Serrano shifted in her chair. “Please, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“My chief financial officer, Rick Perkins, lost his laptop. Actually, it was stolen and replaced with another. Unfortunately for me, that laptop carried all sorts of information about what we’ve been doing here. I believe either you know who took it, or you took it yourself. I want it back.”

He leaned forward until his face was just inches from hers. “Otherwise, you may very well end up like these other people. Your friends. You do recognize them, don’t you?”

“No,” she said. She tried to wrap her mind around the idea that these charred corpses were other members of her CIA operation. The notion made her feel sick.

“You seem upset,” Bly said.

“Well,” she said, “look at them. They were burned to death. Their skin looks like crepe paper. They must have suffered horribly.”

“They did,” Bly said, grinning.

“What? You actually saw this happen? Why didn’t you stop it?”

His head flew back and he laughed hard. “Stop it?” His voice sounded incredulous. “Why would I do that?”

She stared at him for a long moment, and saw that his delight wasn’t a put on. An icy sensation raced up her spine, and she suppressed a shudder. The bastard really was enjoying his little horror show. Rage and grief roiled inside her. A cold dread filled her spine as she realized that her team was gone. No one knew she was missing, except for her handler.

“Where’s the laptop?” he repeated.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

He sighed and slipped his hand under his jacket. He brought out a Glock handgun and pressed the muzzle to her head. “You have one last chance,” he said. “Guess I won’t use Firestorm on you.”

Tell him, her mind screamed. Tell him whatever he wants to know! She licked her lips and shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“Goodbye,” he said.

A scream welled up in her throat as she waited for the inevitable. He pushed the muzzle harder against her temple and pulled the trigger. The gun emitted a sharp metallic click when the hammer struck an empty chamber.

Empty. The gun was empty.

Damn him.

Her lips parted and she released a rush of trapped air from her lungs. Tension drained from her body. Her mind struggled to understand that she still lived.

The mirthless smile returned, and he appraised her for several seconds with what seemed to be a clinical detachment. Without averting his gaze, he slipped the pistol back into its holster.

“Next time,” he said. “I’ll kill you. Maybe.”

He spun on a heel and moments later he was gone.

3

“We got her,” said the voice on the phone.

“Okay,” Mike Stephens said. “What’s that mean for me?”

“Watch your bank balance. We’ll make this all worth your while.”

“How much?”

“Quarter million. Just like we discussed.”

Stephens leaned back into the chair, propped his feet up on the coffee table. “I’ve been thinking about it,” he said. “What I did, it was dangerous, you know.”

“Don’t—”

“Seriously, I’m thinking you owe me more. Like one million.”

“Take your money and shut up.”

“Bullshit,” Stephens said. “We both know this would’ve cost you a hell of a lot more if you’d hired someone else.”

“Leave it alone.”

“The hell I will,” Stephens said. He was on his feet now, stalking through the apartment, his cheeks scarlet with rage. “You wanted her. I gave her to you. Now I want some real money. What’s the problem?”

“Take your cash and shut up,” the other man said. “Now’s a hell of a time for you to try to change the terms.”

“Change the terms? Yeah, I’ll change the terms. I can make a couple of phone calls and let people know what you’re up to. That’d put a little crimp in your plans.”

“If you were smart, you’d shut the hell up, take your money and disappear into your haze of booze and hookers. Or else.”

A cold sensation traveled down Stephens’s spine. Don’t back down now, he told himself. Don’t let this piece of Euro-trash push you around. You push back hard enough and he’ll give you what you want.

“Or else? What does that mean?”

“It means Maria Serrano is on her way out. And you keep popping off, something might happen to that little whore you’re keeping at your apartment.”

Stephens felt his pulse quicken, but when he spoke his voice was flat and cold. “Don’t go there,” he said.

The other man laughed.

“Spare me,” he said. “If you’re smart, you’ll just shut up and walk away. Take your lady on a trip or something. Disappear. ’Cause maybe you can take me. Maybe. But you can’t take the people backing me.”

“You mean, Bly?”

“For starters. But he’s got friends. Ones who’d be only too happy to burn you down, if it meant fewer headaches for them. You can’t handle all that heat. By the way, what’s your girl’s name?”

“Go to hell!” Stephen shouted.

“I can make her disappear. You’ll never see the body. You’ll never see that baby she’s carrying. And I’ll have a good time doing it. It will be just like the war.”

Stephens clenched his jaw and he held his tongue.

“We understand each other?” Milt Krotnic asked.

“Yes.”

“Good. Now, why don’t you take that money and buy your lady something pretty.”

The phone went dead and Stephens stared at it for several seconds. He tossed it on the couch and sank onto the cushion next to it. Squeezing his eyes closed, he dropped his head into his hands. His mind reeled from the enormity of what he’d done. He’d betrayed his country, and he’d done it for no reason other than greed. He’d caused a half-dozen people to die.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to work, he thought. The way Krotnic had laid it all out to him had been different. The lying creep had assured him it’d be bloodless. Stephens would pass along the names of his teammates to the Serb who, in turn, would pass them along to Bly. The executive then would quietly ring up his contacts in Washington and tell them he’d identified their agents and that Langley should recall them. They’d go home, alive, and no one would be the wiser for his role in the whole thing.

And he’d walk away with some cash in a bank account in Zurich. Plenty enough cash for him to leave the cloak-and dagger crap and make a real life for himself. Now he had blood on his hands.

His stomach suddenly tightened and he launched himself from the couch, sprinted for the bathroom. Crouched before the toilet, his guts heaved violently and he emptied their contents into the bowl.

He thought of Eva, locks of lustrous black hair set against smooth brown skin. A chill raced down his spine as he remembered that she’d gone shopping. She’d be out in the open, vulnerable to Krotnic.

Stephens got to his feet and staggered to the sink. Setting his hands on either side of it, he leaned his weight on his arms to support himself as he leaned in close and studied his face in the mirror.

You gotta do something, he told himself. Get cleaned up, get out there and handle this.

A BALL OF NERVOUS ENERGY , Krotnic paced the room while he spoke to Bly on the speakerphone.

“He’s going to turn on us,” Krotnic said.

“Stephens? Well, do something about it, then,” Bly said.

“Sure,” Krotnic replied. “You got some guys I can use?”

“Of course.”

“Send them my way. I need maybe ten.”

“He’s not that good,” Bly said.

Krotnic laughed. “Hell no, he’s not. I just want to play it safe. He lives in an apartment building. I think we should do a little housecleaning, if you get my drift.”

“Are you crazy? That will draw all kinds of attention!”

“I’ve got it under control,” Krotnic said. “We drop a little cocaine in there, buy a couple of witnesses, maybe a local cop and it’s done. They’ll write it off as a drug-related killing. The locals won’t press too hard.”

“Where do I send them?” Bly asked.

Krotnic told him. “And send Doyle, too.”

“Why him?”

“Because he won’t fall apart if he has to kill someone.”

“None of my people will,” Bly replied, his irritation audible.

“I’m talking about a pregnant woman,” Krotnic said. “He won’t freak out about killing a pregnant woman. If his people won’t do it, then he’ll do it himself.”

Krotnic heard Bly sigh heavily on the other end. “Yes,” Bly said. “I suppose he would. I assume all this is necessary?”

Krotnic grinned to himself. “You going soft?”

“Ask me that again,” Bly said, “and you’ll learn what a stupid question that is.”

Krotnic felt his mouth go dry like a well-wrung sponge. “Sure,” he said. “Forget I asked.”

“Like hell,” the other man replied. “Give me two hours and you’ll have your people.”

B ROGNOLA PUNCHED HIS FIST into his open palm as he stood in Barbara Price’s office. He always worried when he sent his people on missions, always considered his decisions to send them into certain battles. The searing pain in his stomach and the onslaught of worst-case scenarios that raced through his mind told him this time was no different. The priorities in the field continued to shift as new intelligence flowed into the Farm. He glanced over at Price, who was seated at her desk. He knew she was combing through the various intelligence reports so she could prioritize and present them to him during a briefing that loomed a couple of hours away.

When the secure phone rang, it startled him. The big Fed hurried to it, snagged the receiver, raised it to his ear.

“Brognola,” he said.

“I need you to make a call,” Bolan said.

“What are the particulars?”

“I need Leo Turrin to run some traps for me,” the Executioner said.

“Sure, I’ll contact him. What’s the message?”

“The intelligence I have on Chiun is too spotty,” Bolan said. “I’m wondering if any of Leo’s less-savory friends might have some light they can shed on Chiun and his organization.”

“I’ll make the call,” Brognola said. “Tell me what to ask.”

Bolan recited his questions while the big Fed jotted them down on a canary yellow legal pad. When Bolan finished, Brognola said, “I’ve got other news.”

“Go.”

“Police found the team’s controller, Clark, a couple of hours ago. Dead. He was in some apartment in Bogotá. It wasn’t his, obviously. The CIA and FBI have already scrubbed the place down to the walls.”

“How long had he been dead?”

“Not sure,” Brognola said. “The body sat in the heat for a while and was pretty badly decomposed when they found it. Actually it was the smell that tipped them off. The neighbors complained about the stench. The custodian went into the apartment to check on the smell and found the guy sprawled out on the living-room floor with a dozen bullet holes in his torso. We’re assuming that the shooter used a sound suppressor. The place is pretty upscale. If the shooting had been audible, someone would have called the cops.”

“Great,” Bolan said. “I guess I’ll scratch him off my list of people to talk to.”

“Yeah. Have faith, though. Barb’s been working her contacts in Washington and she’s come up with some interesting information about Mr. Clark.”

“Yeah?”

“Now that the proverbial shit has hit the fan, suddenly everyone understands what’s been happening for the past couple of months with the Garrison investigation. Bly apparently knew it was happening for a while at least. We’re still trying to figure out how he knew, but he knew. Unfortunately for us, he was smart about it. He offered up a couple of sources to the team, and Clark took the bait. They were offering him all kinds of information, some of it too good to be true.”

“Which means it was,” Bolan stated. “He was an experienced field guy. How’d he fall for that?”

“Hard to say,” Brognola replied. “It’s possible that he was too taken with the information to analyze it and determine whether it actually made sense given what we know. Or that it had enough of an air of credibility about it to make it worth pursuing.”

“That’d make sense,” Bolan said, “considering that the guy at the top was the one feeding the information to him.”

“Sure, it could’ve had just enough truth in it to make the lie seem plausible. I mean Bly was pulling the strings on most of what came out, so he could direct traffic and lead the CIA where he wanted it to go.”

“Do we know who was feeding the controller his information?”

“I’ve got a contact,” Brognola said. “There’s a guy on the ground there, name’s Bill Wallace. He’s a ballistics expert and a gunsmith and a former commando. The U.S. sent him to Colombia a couple of years ago to consult with their military. The assignment stuck and he’s still there. Whenever we—meaning Langley, Justice or the Pentagon—send someone into the country covertly, whether for a drug investigation or some other clandestine op, he provides the weapons and equipment. Saves us the headache of smuggling guns through airports. I know him. We go back a long way. The guy’s absolutely incorruptible.”

“Did he arm Serrano’s team?”

“Can’t say for sure,” Brognola replied. “But, it’s likely he did, and he’ll tell us what we want to know. I’ll let him know you’re coming.”

B OLAN GUIDED THE CAR into a curved driveway that led to an iron gate. He parked and waited for a guard to appear. Jack Grimaldi undid his seat belt and opened his windbreaker, giving him better access to his handgun.

A minute later, Bolan sensed someone coming. He looked into the rearview mirror and saw three guards approaching the car from the rear. Two of the men stopped a few yards behind the vehicle and stood on either side of it, their FN submachine guns cradled in plain view.

A third man came up alongside the car and stopped just behind Bolan’s shoulder. The position made it easier for him to get the drop on the Executioner, should he make a play for a weapon. The guard, a scarecrow-thin man with a bushy black mustache, his eyes shaded by a billed cap, rested his hand on his sidearm.

“Quick,” Grimaldi said, mock urgency in his voice, “hide the joint.”

“Comedy,” Bolan said. “Just what we need.”

The Executioner rolled down his window. A blast of hot air tinged with oppressive humidity blasted his face.

“Can I help you?” the guard asked.

“Matt Cooper,” Bolan said. “I’m supposed to meet Mr. Wallace.”

“ID?”

Bolan dug out the leather carrying case that contained his wallet from the cup holder built into the car’s console. He handed it, already flipped open, to the guard. The man studied it, nodded and handed it back. They repeated the process with Grimaldi. Then the guard reached up and keyed the microphone clipped to his shoulder and ordered the gate open.

Once inside the compound, Bolan navigated the car along the curved driveway. He noticed most of the land around the house was stripped of trees and most shrubs, for security purposes, he assumed.

The rooftop became visible before the rest of the house did. He turned another corner, followed the driveway as it dipped and finally rolled up in front of the big hacienda-style house.

Wallace stood in the driveway and watched them roll in. Except for the Glock that rested on his hip, he otherwise looked like a father waiting to take his kids to soccer practice. He wore a polo shirt, khakis and brown loafers. His wide face seemed to swallow up a pair of glasses with small, round lenses that were perched on his nose.

Bolan parked the vehicle. He and Grimaldi exited it.

Wallace ambled toward them. He shook hands first with Grimaldi and then with Bolan, who found his handshake firm and confident.

“Sorry about the theatrics,” Wallace said. A soft Southern accent colored his voice. He made a sweeping wave that took in his house and a pair of Mercedes SUVs parked nearby. “People see all this and they want to help themselves to it. They can have it. But it’s my family I worry about. Place is filthy with kidnappers.”

“Understood,” Bolan said.

“Come inside,” Wallace said.

They followed Wallace through the house, ascended a circular staircase that led to the second floor and adjourned to Wallace’s luxurious study.

Several bottles of water and a carafe of coffee stood with some cups at the center of a small conference table ringed with chairs.

“Help yourselves to a drink,” Wallace said. “Cop a squat. Do whatever you want. Any friend of Hal’s is a friend of mine.”

Wallace seated himself at the conference table. He took a bottle of water, twisted off the cap and gulped some. Grimaldi took a seat at the table while Bolan continued to stand.

“Did Hal tell you why we’re here?” Bolan asked.

“He told me enough,” Wallace replied. “I work with the Feds on pretty big projects, so my clearances run pretty high. Not bragging. Just letting you know that I have access to things other nongovernment folks can’t touch. Hal said that a CIA ops team that was looking into Garrison went missing. Said you’d come down here to find them.”

“You familiar with the team?” Bolan asked.

“I provided them with some surveillance equipment,” Wallace said. “And a secure phone, along with a few pistols and submachine guns. They were under nonofficial cover, so they couldn’t go through any of the traditional channels. They couldn’t go near the embassy or meet with anyone from the local CIA station. It’d raise too many eyebrows.”

“Meeting with you wouldn’t?” the Executioner asked.

Wallace nodded. “Hell, yeah. But they didn’t meet with me. I have a couple of freelance operatives I run around here. I used one of them to pass things along.”

“Which means they met at least some of the team.”

“Wrong,” Wallace said, a hint of irritation in his voice. “I’ve done this a few times, remember? My guy was brand-new to the area, an unknown quantity to everyone but me. I had him leave the stuff at a dead drop, get the hell out of there before the recipients arrived. He never met anyone face-to-face. I monitored the drop by camera until someone picked up the gear.”

“Was it someone from the team?”

“Of course,” Wallace said. “I would’ve sounded the alarms in Washington if it’d happened some other way.”

Bolan nodded. “Have you heard anything from them since?”

“Not personally,” Wallace said. “But I am hearing other stuff. Funky stuff.”

“Like?”

“I’ve got a couple of buddies with MI-6. Occasionally, I do a little work for them. They have a couple of guys on the ground here in Colombia, including a guy named Richardson. Ethan Richardson. He does a lot of the same work I do here. He’s just not quite as choosy about his clientele. It’s all just business to him, whether it’s Hezbollah or the Chinese. That’s his reputation and he likes it.”

With loud gulps, Wallace guzzled down more water.

“A few hours ago, someone contacted him. An American. The guy was looking for weapons. It was a stupid move on his part, too. He wanted a couple of handguns and an Uzi. This place is lousy with that kind of stuff. But he called the Brit who was more than happy to sell him the guns. And then he immediately called me and passed along the information.”

“For a price,” Grimaldi said.

A weary smile spread across Wallace’s features. “Friend, nothing comes free in Colombia. Anyway, Richardson assumed that I’d want more information on this American even before we spoke. Once he sold him the weapons, he put a tail on him so we know where he’s going. He also gave me a picture.”

He punched a key on his laptop, turned it around so Bolan and Grimaldi could see it. Bolan saw a pair of photos positioned next to each other on the screen. In one, the soldier observed the grainy image of a man wearing a baseball cap. The second depicted a close-up shot of the man’s face. It was a Caucasian with a flat, wide nose and thick black eyebrows and dull brown eyes.

“Michael Stephens,” Wallace said.

“What do we know about him?” Bolan asked.

“Drifter, of sorts. He used to be with U.S. Army intelligence. According to his file, he was sharp. But he couldn’t stand to take orders from anyone. He took a swing at his sergeant over something petty, like a bad evaluation. The guy repaid him with a busted nose and a dishonorable discharge. He blew a twelve-year career over something stupid. He scrounges around for information, occasionally comes across something that he can sell to us, the Colombians, the rebels, whoever might buy it. Most of what he learns is penny ante stuff, including things compiled from foreign newspapers that he rewrites into intelligence reports. I buy it anyway, just to keep some goodwill with him. Occasionally he comes across something I can use or pass along to someone else. But we have to watch him. He’s a backstabber.”

“You have an address?”

“Yeah,” Wallace said. “And that info’s on the house.”

“So who’s he arming himself against?” Bolan asked.

“Hard to say,” Wallace replied. “Maybe you guys.”

“Not too many people know we’re here,” Grimaldi said.

“Then maybe something else scared him,” Wallace offered. “Maybe his erstwhile employers parted company with him. Or he just pissed somebody off. From what I know about this little turd, there’s no shortage of people who’d happily snap a cap on his ass for free. Hell, a couple might even pay for the privilege.”

“Which means that someone else is going to be heading out there to talk with him,” Grimaldi said.

Wallace nodded again. “Probably. By the way, Hal gave me a shopping list. I have your gear packed in a helicopter and ready to take you wherever you want to go.”

A smile ghosted the Executioner’s lips. “Thanks,” he said.

“W HAT IS GOING ON ?” Eva asked. Her voice was marked by fear. “Why are you doing this?”

Stephens shot her a withering look. “Shut up and pack,” he said through clenched teeth. “You’ve asked me three times, and it’s the same damn answer every time. So do as I say.”

Anger flared in her eyes, and her lips tightened into a thin line. Crossing her arms over her chest, she stared after him for a few minutes while he packed. Stephens could see at least part of this from the corner of his eye, but ignored her, knowing she’d give up quickly.

After several tense seconds, Eva spun on her heel and headed for the bedroom to pack.

Once she was gone, Stephens pulled his shirttails from the waistband of his pants and let them drape around his waist. He reached inside his nearby briefcase, rooted around inside it for a moment until he found his newly acquired Glock still sheathed in a nylon holster. Lifting his shirttails, he clipped the weapon to his waistband and let his shirt drape over the weapon’s butt. He’d already stowed the second pistol in an ankle holster before Eva had returned home. He didn’t want her to see the weapons. He knew she’d panic and bombard him with questions he didn’t want to answer. Maybe he’d tell her more when they got to the United States. Maybe not. But he’d make that decision later. Right now, getting the hell off the bull’s-eye was the main priority. And, if she had any gratitude, she’d shut her mouth and let him handle the situation. He was, after all, doing all this for her and the baby, which was all she needed to know.

He checked his watch and muttered a curse.

“Eva,” he shouted, “get moving! We’ve got to go.”

“Why do we have to go?” she shouted from the bedroom.

“Shut up. Pack. No questions!” he shouted.

The phone on his belt trilled. He cursed again and answered it.

“Yeah?” he said.

“Hello, Mike,” Krotnic said.

“What the hell do you want?”

“Do you like the guns you bought? Do you think they’ll keep you safe?”

Unconsciously, Stephens’s hand dropped to the Glock moored to his hip. “What do you want?”

“I asked you a question,” Krotnic said.

“Why don’t you come up here and I’ll answer it.”

“Sorry,” Krotnic said. “I can’t make it. But I sent some friends over for a visit. I hope you’re a good shot. There are a lot of them.”

The phone went dead.

4

Doyle pulled open the van’s rear doors to reveal five men seated in the back. The gunners, all togged in street clothes, stared at him, awaiting their orders. He stepped away from the door and gestured for them to disembark.

“Look alive, ladies,” he said. “Got no time for you to be back there, darning your socks, for pity’s sake.”

Silently, the men filed out of the vehicle. Doyle swept his gaze over the whole crew.

Each carried a duffel bag strapped over his shoulder. All the bags contained an identical weapon, a Ruger MP-9, and extra clips. They also carried Beretta 92 pistols fitted with sound suppressors. Every last one of them hailed from a military background, and they were veterans of some of the world’s worst killing fields. This particular group consisted of three South Africans, an Israeli and a Russian, each formerly from the special forces of his respective country.

When it came to technical proficiency, each was a top-notch fighter, unafraid to mix it up with anyone. However, they all had little discipline and even less desire to develop what they did have. They were fighting for money, not cause or country. Doyle knew that made them inherently weaker than traditional soldiers.

A second van rolled in behind them, bits of gravel popping as it approached. The driver guided the vehicle left and parked it next to the first van. A second group of mercenaries joined the first. Doyle had split them into two teams. One would hit the building from the outside. The second would scour the inside for their targets.

“We need to take out the bastard,” Doyle said. “He’s starting to make noises, ones we don’t like. Sounds like he’s starting to have pangs of a conscience.”

A couple of the gunners shot Doyle a knowing smile. He ignored them.

“We find his change of heart unacceptable,” the Irishman said. “Another important point. Your target has a housemate, a young woman who’s carrying his child. We want no witnesses, period. Zero. Variation from that plan is unacceptable. She takes a bullet. If anyone’s too squeamish to drop the hammer on her, speak now or forever shut up. The last thing I need is for one of you nancy boys to choke when you get that stupid wench in your gunsights. Clear?”

He fell silent and slowly dragged his eyes over the motley assortment of hired guns lined up before him, made sure his expression telegraphed heavy doses of disdain for each of them. He wanted them to know that, while they got paid handsomely for their work, he had no personal regard for them. More important, he didn’t fear them or care what happened to them, as long as the mission succeeded.

“You also need to go from apartment to apartment,” he said. “Take out anyone unlucky enough to be home tonight. Do we all understand?”

A couple of them nodded, while others fixed their thousand-yard stares somewhere over his shoulder, like they’d heard enough.

“No questions? Fine, then get your damn asses in that building and raise some hell.”

T HE E XECUTIONER WAS a block away from his destination when he spotted several hardmen entering the apartment building through the front door. The sight of them set off his combat senses. The warrior brought the com-link to his lips and pressed the talk button.

“Jack?”

“Go, Sarge,” Grimaldi replied.

“I’ve got five guys entering Stephens’s building.”

“Weapons visible?”

“No. I’m acting on instinct.”

“Good enough for me,” Grimaldi said.

Bolan signed off. He trekked toward the building until he reached the fire-escape ladder, jumping up to grab the bottom rung in his powerful grip. Once his other hand got hold of it, he pulled himself up the ladder, hand over hand, until his foot could gain purchase on the lowest rung. Bolan reached the top of the ladder and pushed through a square opening that led onto the first landing. Taking the steps two at a time, he reached the next level.

Slipping off his jacket, he wrapped it around his fist and lashed out at a windowpane. The glass disintegrated and fell inside the apartment on the other side. Bolan was through the window in seconds. He tossed aside the jacket and fisted the Beretta 93-R as he crossed the sparsely furnished apartment. No lights were on and it appeared to be empty.

Before he reached the door, he spotted shadows as they edged past the door. He halted in midstride and listened. The shuffle of feet registered with him, but he heard no one speaking.

He brought the com-link to his lips.

“Jack?” Bolan asked.

“Go,” Grimaldi replied.

“I’ve got a team on the second floor.”

“Clear,” Grimaldi said. “The second team just entered the building. I’m coming in from behind them. My guess is they’re either going to knock off any witnesses or they’re the B-team in case Stephens actually gets away.”

“Fat chance of that happening,” the soldier said. “Not under his own power, at least.”

Bolan signed off. In the next instant, from out in the corridor, he heard the crash of a door being kicked in. He grabbed and twisted the doorknob and yanked open the door.

He found three of the gunners stationed outside Stephens’s apartment. He assumed that the other two were already inside. A heavyset thug with his hair cut into a blue Mohawk stood between Bolan and Stephens’s suite. The other two gunners had taken up positions on either side of the door, apparently waiting for the command to enter.

They’d never get it. Not if Bolan could help it.

The gunner with the mohawk whipped around. His MP-9 came up with him. His lips were creased into a grin, and Bolan guessed that he was expecting one of the other residents, a helpless bystander. The Executioner was neither. The grin melted away, and the guy’s arm twitched as he started to bring the MP-9 to bear.

Bolan fired and three subsonic rounds drilled into the guy’s nose. His body suddenly fell limp, as though his skeleton had turned to dust. He crumpled to the floor. Bolan barreled forth, the Beretta seeking its next target.

The two men at the door spun toward him in unison. Bolan tapped the Beretta’s trigger twice and two swarms of bullets drilled into the torso of the man closest to him. The force pushed the man into the wall behind him, his gun falling from his grip.

Tracking fire erupted from the third killer’s MP-9 and cut a swath toward the big American. The soldier brought the Beretta to bear on his opponent. A 3-round volley erupted from the handgun’s barrel and lanced into the man’s throat, the hollowpoint rounds nearly decapitating him.

Bolan changed out magazines and headed for the apartment. The sound of gunfire crackled from inside the suite. He came around the door, his weapon held at shoulder level, and looked for a target. Running a quick check of the living room and kitchen, the first two rooms inside the apartment, the soldier double-timed it toward a hallway that ran off the opposite wall. He peered around the corner, spotting one of the gunners crumpled in the corner. A collage of a half dozen or so red blooms that indicated bullet wounds were stitched across his chest. Empty hands, palms pointed upward, hung at his sides and his head lolled to one side, mouth agape.

The second shooter, his body wrapped around the doorjamb, squeezed off several shots into the bedroom. He whipped back into the hallway, using the walls for cover. The instant he did, he spotted Bolan, who’d already bracketed him in the Beretta’s sights. Another trigger pull by the Executioner, and the man suddenly found himself retired from the gun-slinging game.

His limbs rubbery, he dropped to the floor, his body falling across the doorway he’d been shooting through moments ago.

The corpse’s sudden drop-in elicited a scream from someone inside the room. Bolan took a couple of steps down the hall but pulled up short. Small shafts of light, mottled by flocks of dust motes, filtered through a couple dozen holes punched through the plasterboard during the gunfight.

“Michael Stephens,” Bolan shouted. “This is Matt Cooper. U.S. Justice Department. Throw out your guns. Step out here with your hands in the air. Eva, do the same.”

Gunfire chattered from the floor below Bolan, and he knew Grimaldi likely was taking fire. His grip tightened on the Beretta. He wanted to go downstairs and help his friend, but he couldn’t risk Stephens escaping. Without the backup team outside the building, Stephens could slip through his bedroom window and take off, either with or without his girlfriend.

“Come on,” Bolan shouted again. “I want to talk. I have some questions for you.”

“Screw you,” the woman yelled. “You just want to kill us.”

“If I wanted you dead,” Bolan replied, “I never had to lift a finger. I could’ve just let these guys take you out. Both of you.”

Ears still ringing from the gunfire, Bolan tried to hear whether they were speaking to each other, but the surrounding noise made it too hard.

“I’m coming out,” the woman shouted.

“Okay,” Bolan yelled.

“Don’t hurt me.”

“Sure.” Standing off to the side of the door, Bolan trained his pistol on it, felt his body tense slightly as a slow-moving shadow poked through it and began to grow and climb up the wall opposite the door. The woman came into view, her hands held above her shoulders. She took a sideways glance and saw Bolan aiming his weapon at her. Her eyes grew wide.

Bolan motioned with his hand for her to come closer.

“It’s okay,” he said.

She started toward him. After her third shuffling step, another shape filled the doorway and Bolan turned his attention to it. Stephens came into view, his weapon hunting for a target. The soldier changed the Beretta selector switch, and the weapon coughed out a single shot that whistled past Eva and slammed into the man’s hip. The impact spun Stephens and caused his shooting hand to flail. His finger squeezed the trigger, and the weapon pumped a round into the ceiling.

The soldier surged forward, his pistol held high. He shoved the woman aside and inserted himself between her and Stephens. The other man, his attention temporarily focused on his injury, saw Bolan bolt for him and raised his pistol. The soldier’s hand stabbed out and he grabbed Stephens’s wrists, shoving his hand skyward. He stabbed the Beretta’s still-hot muzzle against Stephens’s neck, and he responded with a yelp.

“Drop it,” Bolan shouted. His face was only inches from Stephens’s.

The pistol fell to the floor with a dull thud.

The Beretta still trained on his opponent, Bolan gathered up the fallen weapon and shoved it into the waistband of his blue jeans.

From behind him, the woman screamed, “You bastard! What the hell are you doing to him?”

She took a step toward Bolan, who turned his head slightly to look at her. She halted. Anger flared in her eyes and she lowered her fist, which had been raised over her head like a hammer. She looked at Bolan, then at her boyfriend, then back at him.

Bolan, his heart still pounding from the confrontation, said, “Get me a sheet.”

She gave him a confused look.

“A sheet,” he repeated. “His hip needs to be bandaged.”

The tautness of her lips signaled that she still was angry, but she disappeared into the bedroom. Bolan hoped she was going to retrieve the sheet and not another weapon. He hated to let her out of his sight, but it couldn’t be helped.

Stephens remained propped against the wall. His face looked pale; it glistened with sweat. His breathing was ragged. He pressed a bloodied hand to his injured hip and glowered at the Executioner.

“Who the hell are you?” he asked.

“Not a friend,” Bolan said.

“No shit.”

“You’re going to tell me things,” Bolan said.

Stephens swore at him.

Bolan wagged the Beretta’s muzzle at the floor. “Lay down,” he said. “I want to have a look at that hip.” Stephens gave him an uncertain look. After a few seconds, though, he sighed and eased himself to the ground. Bolan gripped one bicep to help him to the floor.

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