Plains Of Fire. Don Pendleton

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СКАЧАТЬ until they reached a jetty twenty yards from the stern of the lurching craft. He reached up and anchored himself on the low-slung dock.

      Bashir had recovered enough of his senses to break loose, hammering Bolan in the stomach. The African had intended to knock the wind out of the Executioner, but his fist’s power was blunted by rock-hard abdominal muscles. Instead of catching Bolan while both of his hands were occupied and he was off balance, Bashir only elicited a sudden surge, Bolan snapping the African’s forehead against the hard edge of the jetty. The water-worn wood met Bashir’s skull with a stunning impact, splitting the skin on the man’s forehead.

      Stunned, blood pouring down his head and stinging his eyes, Bashir was a docile charge that Bolan heaved up onto the planks. With a kick, and the power of both of his arms, Bolan launched out of the water and knelt next to his stunned captive.

      Bashir wiped his eyes free of the blinding blood and began to sit up when he noticed the massive .44 Magnum Desert Eagle leveled at his nose.

      “Don’t move,” Bolan ordered. He planted his knee into Bashir’s chest, then looked toward the gunfight between the smugglers and the Thunder Lions. Broken planks and dented hull were fused together, and the Russian and African factions had ceased their mutually destructive battle to escape being sucked under the water by the sinking ship. The Peugeots and the transport trucks lurched and slid off the dock, creating fountaining splashes as they hit the water.

      Bolan looked back down to Bashir. “Roll over and place your hands at the small of your back.”

      “Don’t kill me,” Bashir begged, his face a glistening mask of blood.

      “Do as I say, and you’ll live at least another day,” the Executioner promised.

      Bashir glanced at the carnage, watching men scrambling across railings and broken piers and splashing helplessly in the dock waters. In the space of a few seconds, his captor had turned a major arms deal into pure mayhem. He rolled onto his stomach and assumed the position of surrender.

      CHAPTER THREE

      Calvin James gunned the engine on the Fiat, swinging it around to rendezvous with Bolan.

      The Executioner strode forward. He had Major Antoine Bashir by the collar, his hands bound behind him, the omnipresent Desert Eagle screwed against the prisoner’s ear.

      “That’s a hell of a souvenir,” James said, pulling up to the end of the boardwalk. Rafael Encizo sat in the shotgun seat, MP-5 at the ready, scanning for the opposition. The Russians and the Africans were still busy escaping the destruction of a multiton freighter grinding down on a pier, but all it would take would be two or three men with rifles to turn their Fiat into a sieve with a blast of automatic rifle fire.

      “Take him to the safe house,” Bolan told James. “I’m not finished yet.”

      James glanced back at the carnage that he and Encizo had inflicted with their sabotage efforts. “You’re going to slip in among the Russians?”

      Bolan nodded. “It will take them a few moments before they realize that a third party caused all this ruckus. Hopefully, Bashir’s second in command will take in the surviving Russians.”

      Bolan gave Bashir’s collar a sharp tug as the African militiaman’s eyes grew wide at the sound of his own name. “Yes. I know your name. And I know that Captain Aflaq is your aide and principal bodyguard.”

      “Want me to talk to him?” James asked, pantomiming an injection. With Encizo’s aid, the Phoenix Force medic would undoubtedly strip Bashir’s defenses and whatever intelligence he carried with him via a shot of scopolamine. The drug was a powerful inhibitor, making people more susceptible to questions and suggestion, and James was skilled enough to administer the drug without causing undue cardiac stress.

      “Do it,” Bolan said. “I’ll see if I can get anything on the Russians and the Thunder Lions, then get some wheels and meet you back at the safe house.”

      Encizo helped Bolan push Bashir into the backseat of the Fiat. Bolan’s statement of getting his own wheels wasn’t lost on the Cuban. “Bring me back something nice and shiny.”

      Bolan glanced around. “In this neighborhood?”

      Encizo chuckled. “Take care, Striker.”

      The Executioner whirled and disappeared into the shadows.

      BOLAN FLIPPED OPEN Anatoly’s cell phone and went through the programmed numbers. His limited knowledge of Russian Cyrillic symbols helped him to decipher the dead sentry’s phone book, and he had the name of the man who was likely Anatoly’s field supervisor, a Russian midlevel crime boss named Grigorei. He hit Send, then stuffed a pair of disposable earplugs up his nostrils to add to his planned ruse.

      The phone rang, and Grigorei answered on the third ring.

      “Anatoly?” Grigorei asked.

      “Where is everybody?” Bolan asked, his words slurred and distorted by the earplugs blocking his exhalations. It was a simple means of disguising his voice.

      “Anatoly?” Grigorei asked again. Bolan waited a moment.

      “It’s me,” Bolan answered. “I got smacked in the face with a plank. I think my nose is broken.”

      “Sounds like it,” Grigorei said. “What the hell happened on the gangplank?”

      “I saw a flash of metal in the distance,” Bolan responded. “I thought they were going after the African.”

      Bolan heard Grigorei’s voice, muffled by a hand. “Anatoly is confirming that there were third-party snipers.”

      “That sounds possible,” Aflaq said. “Neither of our groups had pistol-caliber submachine guns, and yet I have wounds on several of my men matching low-powered carbine hits.”

      “Same here,” Grigorei concurred. The Russian’s voice grew clearer as he removed his hand. “Anatoly, where are you?”

      “Hard to tell, all these docks look the same,” Bolan lied. “Especially since all I have is one eye working.”

      “Where is Bashir?” Aflaq’s voice was audible over the speakerphone function of Grigorei’s set.

      “I lost track of him. We got separated. I tried to hold on to him, but he fought too much.” It was a partial truth. Bolan simply omitted the fact that when he became separated from Bashir, it was on dry land and into the custody of Calvin James and Rafael Encizo.

      “Sadly, the major is a poor swimmer,” Aflaq said.

      “I’m sorry,” Bolan returned.

      “I’m sure you are,” Aflaq responded.

      Bolan tensed. He could detect the skepticism in the African militiaman’s voice.

      “We’ll send someone for you,” Grigorei explained. “Head to the nearest access road.”

      “Sure,” Bolan replied. He snapped the cell phone closed and glanced around. He still retained the AK-47 he’d taken from Anatoly, but the assault rifle would make СКАЧАТЬ