Close Quarters. Don Pendleton

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СКАЧАТЬ amounts of Malta Hatuey soft drinks didn’t improve his disposition. Lyons, leader of the elite covert-action team, sighed as he took in their surroundings for the tenth time in the past half hour. “Once more we’ve been

      relegated to doing a job that should be assigned to the federal boys.”

      “You know what I think?” Hermann “Gadgets” Schwarz managed to ask around a giant bite, cheese and sour cream running down his chin. “I think we should order another one of these.”

      Rosario “Politician” Blancanales made a concerted effort to chew and swallow his own decadent mouthful before saying, “Cheer up, Ironman. You should make the most of this. Try to think of it as a vacation.”

      “A vacation.”

      “Sure,” Blancanales said, drawing the word out like a man tempting his grandchildren with a story. “I mean, there are much worse places the Farm could’ve sent us.”

      “Oh, yeah? Like where?”

      “Well, I—”

      “Alaska,” Schwarz said.

      Blancanales jerked a thumb at his companion. “There you have it! Alaska. It’s cold there.”

      “They also have some of the best fishing this time of year,” Lyons countered.

      “They also have polar bears,” Schwarz mused. “You could get eaten alive.”

      Blancanales feigned a conspiratorial whisper, cupping his hand to his mouth as he said, “I don’t think they’d find Ironman too palatable.”

      Lyons ignored the gibes from his friends as two men escorted a third across the street. They headed straight for Able Team’s table in the cabana-style exterior setting of the lounge. Lyons scowled at them, wondering how they’d managed to escort the guy this far without getting him wasted. Their charge wore khaki shorts and a Hawaiian-style silk shirt; sandals adorned his feet. He had light red hair that protruded in clumpy tufts from beneath his Marlins baseball cap. The man’s dress perfectly blended with the styles worn by the Able Team warriors, but his escorts stood out like highway cones in their government suits.

      They stopped at the table, and the taller one in serge blue removed his sunglasses. He looked around, then said, “You Irons?”

      “Yeah,” Lyons confirmed. He gestured to Blancanales and Schwarz respectively. “This is Rose and Black.”

      “Here’s your man,” they said.

      Without a word the pair whirled and made distance back the way they had come.

      The man stood there with a somewhat beleaguered expression. Lyons felt a bit of empathy for the guy. The two FBI agents assigned to bring him here were obviously intent on more important things, and Lyons couldn’t imagine what he’d been through. The wrist brace on his right arm and deep scratches on his legs made it obvious he’d been in a recent tussle. Lyons had no doubt this was Christopher Harland.

      “Have a seat,” he said, waving Harland into the one vacant chair at their table.

      The young man stuck his hands in his pockets and studied their faces in turn—almost as if sizing them up—before he sat.

      “You hungry?” Blancanales asked.

      Harland inclined his head at the disappearing agents and said, “They got me something when we landed. I’m good.” After a pause he added, “Thanks.”

      “How about something to drink? You must be thirsty.”

      He nodded and Blancanales signaled the waitress. The young man ordered a beer—a Tecate—and watched the waitress with obvious appreciation as she jiggled away with his order.

      Lyons smiled at his two companions. Okay, so maybe he could learn to like the kid, after all.

      “How was your flight?” Schwarz asked to break the silence.

      “It was okay.”

      “Those guys, they treat you okay?” Lyons asked.

      “I suppose.”

      “You go by Chris?” Blancanales asked.

      “I prefer Christopher.”

      “Fair enough.”

      Schwarz went back to shoveling food into his mouth while Blancanales took another pull at his malt-based soda.

      Lyons looked around. He saw only a couple of people nearby, nobody within earshot. Midafternoon and the lunch crowd was gone. It was too early for happy hour. “We’ve been briefed on what happened to you.”

      “Okay,” Harland said.

      “Anything you want to add?”

      “It’s pretty much like I told them.” Harland clammed up as the waitress dropped a napkin on the table, followed by his beer.

      Lyons handed her enough cash to cover the entire tab plus a tip that was generous enough to imply they wouldn’t need her again.

      Once she’d left, Harland continued. “I barely managed to escape with my life. Those bastards are holding my friends hostage, including a woman I care about.”

      “What do they want with your team?” Blancanales asked.

      Lyons eyed Harland. “And especially why would they keep the others and release just you?”

      Harland pulled off his sunglasses to expose a fresh black eye. Something in his expression seemed hardened, more mature and empowered than the average twenty-eight-year-old college grad. His expression bore witness to untold brutalities and hardships, and Lyons felt a measure of regret.

      “I didn’t make any deals, if that’s what you think,” Harland said.

      Lyons leaned close. “Hey, asshole, take it easy. We’re on your side.”

      Blancanales quickly intervened in a way that had earned him the “Politician” nickname. “Listen, Christopher, we’re not trying to give you a hard time. You can relax with us. Our job’s to keep you alive, but in order to do that we need to know everything. You shoot straight with us and we’ll do the same, no bull. Just tell us everything you can remember about these men.”

      Able Team had, of course, already been thoroughly briefed by Stony Man Farm. As soon as word came from channels—specifically a SIGINT analyst from the American embassy in the Paraguayan capital of Asunción—mission controller Barbara Price had called the Stony Man teams into action. The situation, as Harland had laid it out, was that seventeen members from a U.S. Peace Corps contingent along with three missionaries had been brutally assaulted and taken hostage by parties unknown. After they razed the camp and brutalized several of the women, they took them all except Harland. He’d been fortunate or maybe unfortunate enough to get the crap beaten out of him and sent to Asunción with a message: don’t attempt to interfere or the hostages would be slaughtered.

      “What were you doing there exactly?” Schwarz asked.

      “I СКАЧАТЬ