Recovery Force. Don Pendleton

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СКАЧАТЬ least you can rest assured it’ll be accurate.”

      “So you still haven’t told me why I should work with you,” Hall said. “Or even trust you, for that matter. For all I know you could be working for Casco.”

      “The current case count for your squad is up to what now, Hall, maybe a hundred-sixty?” Bolan calmly asked.

      “Something like that, yeah.”

      “At that rate, I wouldn’t be turning down any help.”

      “But how do I know you’re legit.”

      “I could have let you die today,” Bolan said and gestured with the flat of his hand. “I could have just walked away and left you and your men to deal on your own.”

      “What does that prove?”

      “Look, Hall, I threw you one lifeline this morning and I’m throwing a second one this evening. The difference is, are you smart enough to reach for it? You’re not convinced for the sake of your own life, then at least be convinced for the sake of those you’re responsible to protect. There’s a war about to break out right here in Phoenix. Maybe I can’t stop it, but I might be able to contain it long enough for the spark to die. And I can give you some breathing room to operate so that when you do step in to take down Casco, at least it’ll count for something.”

      Hall fell silent and Bolan gave him the time to let the wheels turn. He could empathize with the policeman but he also didn’t have time for games. If Hall didn’t go for it, Bolan knew he might end up in a cell. He’d taken a risk doing this, but like most things, the Executioner was playing a hunch and it was one he figured would pay off. Hall and his team had been at it a while and had come up empty-handed, so far. That couldn’t be looking good on Hall, a career-minded cop if Bolan didn’t miss his guess, and that had to be eating up the guy’s insides. Through the years Bolan had become a very good reader of people, and his gut told him Hall would take the deal.

      As usual, his gut was right.

      “All right, Cooper,” Hall said. “We’ll try this your way and see where it leads. Where do we start?”

      3

      The Executioner peered through the night-vision scope of the PSG-1 sniper rifle.

      Night had overtaken Phoenix several hours earlier, and Bolan began to feel weariness ebb into his body. In spite of it, his mind remained fully alert to any dangers. There would be plenty of chances to rest later—at least that’s what he told himself during the more time-critical missions—but at the moment he needed to stay at peak operational readiness.

      The lives of several young women depended on it.

      The girls were working in a club owned by Los Negros. When most people heard that name, they typically thought of the Afromestizos group seeking to be recognized as a third ethnic voice within Mexico, a country that had not become a truly pluralist society until the 1990s in order to buy in to the good graces of the United States.

      Most didn’t know about the other Los Negros, a group that had kidnapped, murdered and terrorized the American Southwest. Even with major successes by the DEA and joint agencies in operations like Xcellerator in 2009—the genesis of which began in Imperial County, California, and ultimately spanned more than twenty-five states and seized approximately one billion dollars in Sinaloa cartel assets—the fight continued. Like all such organizations, Los Negros continued to rear its ugly faces like the multiheaded monster it was. Well, Bolan had something for the Hydra, something that it would not soon forget. He had a battle plan, the opening of which involved Bolan behind the sniper rifle, concealed by a tarp over the bed of a large pickup truck. While it might have seemed a crude way of establishing a point from which to strike, it provided Bolan with the position he needed and would buy him the element of surprise. Plus from his vantage point, Bolan had a perfect view of the club entrance.

      Initially Hall hadn’t been keen on Bolan’s plan to turn Los Negros on its ear, but eventually he listened to reason. Bolan convinced him by outlining the wisdom of such a move. There was only one way to keep a guy like Hector Casco from establishing a foothold in Phoenix and that was to turn his operation upside down. And keeping the enemy off balance and teetering on the brink of chaos was what the Executioner did best.

      The skintight blacksuit Bolan wore exacerbated the stifling heat. He made a final adjustment to the scope and then pulled his eye away from it long enough to inspect the luminescent hands of his watch. It was nearing 0230 hours and the club had pretty much emptied of the majority of partiers. A few stragglers had emerged in the past thirty minutes—some single men and a few couples, but not Bolan’s targets. The warrior realized he could have a very long wait and that wouldn’t do, considering the sweat that soaked his body and had on more than one occasion run into his eyes.

      The double wooden doors of the club swung outward again, their ornate carvings painted bright hues of red and black, the enamel shimmering under the streetlights. The three VIPs Bolan awaited stepped into the muggy air. All of them were gaudily dressed and accompanied by about a half-dozen bodyguards wearing slacks, silk shirts and black jackets. Each of the VIPs also had a woman on each arm.

      At last, Bolan’s opportunity had presented itself.

      He recognized one of those faces as he lined it up in the blue-green shorthairs of the 6 × 42 scope. A brainchild of Heckler & Koch, the Präzisionsschorfschützengewehr-1 sniper rifle dispatched the 7.62 × 51 mm NATO round at a muzzle velocity exceeding 2800 feet per second. With Bolan less than two hundred feet from the guy, he couldn't miss and a first-shot, first-kill probability was imminent.

      Even as the first report thundered inside the confines of the truck bed, Bolan had confirmed the hit to the first target and was already working the silent bolt as he swept into acquisition of the next in line. No more than two seconds elapsed before Bolan had taken out the second target with a kill shot that struck the guy in the chest and caused his heart to burst. The bodyguards reacted with incredible enthusiasm—too bad their reactions were so utterly ineffective.

      As the bodyguards fanned out and drew their weapons, Bolan was easing back the 3-pound trigger on the third and final target. The round struck the guy in the top of the head and blew his skull and most of his brain out the other side. However, the round struck at just such an angle that the impact sent the hood spinning and he twirled several times with all the grace of a drunken ballerina before collapsing to the pavement.

      Bolan withdrew the rifle and pawed at the back of the pickup to lower the tailgate. He coiled his body before launching off the bed and rushing to the driver's side. Bolan hopped into the massive F-350, started the engine and rocketed down the street. He checked his rearview mirror as he did and felt some satisfaction as he saw four of the six gunners rush for a sedan.

      Bolan made a hard left at the first street, proceeded two blocks and then made another hard left. He continued on until he passed the first street that would move beyond the club, and then the second, then made one more left. The last thing in the world the Los Negros thugs would think he would do is return to the scene. Not to mention they would have their own hands full in about a minute when a passel of Phoenix P.D. squad cars suddenly converged on them from every direction.

      Bolan rounded the corner and found the two remaining gunmen seated on the curb, pistols dangling from their hands, neither of them completely recovered from what had transpired. Bolan bore down on their position and brought the truck to a screaming halt at the last second so that he was in a direct line of sight. He aimed out the window with the MP-5 that he'd left on the seat and triggered СКАЧАТЬ