Kitabı oku: «Killing Game», sayfa 2
Extra magazines for the Beretta, and a TOPS SAW—Special Assault Weapon—knife, in a sheath—hung under his right arm, helping to balance out the weight of the Beretta and sound suppressor. Pouches on his belt carried spare .44 Magnum magazines. He covered all of the weapons with the sport coat, then slid back between the seats as Platinov had done a few moments earlier.
By the time the Executioner had taken the passenger’s seat, the Russian woman had guided the Nissan out of the Notre Dame district into a quieter part of town. People still walked up and down the sidewalks, but those sidewalks were lined with hostels, hotels and bed-and-breakfasts.
“Where do you want to stop?” the Russian agent asked.
“One’s as good as another as far as I’m concerned. Just find a place to park.”
Platinov let a tiny laugh escape her lips as she spotted an open space along the street and pulled up to the side of the car in front of it, preparing to parallel park.
“Did I miss something?” the Executioner asked.
“Only something in my mind,” Platinov said as she twisted the wheel and her neck, backing up into the open space before pulling forward again. “I was just thinking about the fact that everywhere else I go, and everyone else I go there with, takes orders from me. When I am with you, however, I seem to automatically follow your lead.”
When Bolan didn’t respond, Platinov added, “I wonder why that is?”
Bolan still remained silent.
“Perhaps it is because we have slept together,” Platinov went on as she twisted the key and killed the Nissan’s engine. “I do not sleep with every male I work with, you know,” she added somewhat defensively as she pulled the key out of the ignition.
“I never thought you did,” Bolan replied. “Now, let’s get checked in and see what leads we can find in that bag, okay?”
Platinov nodded. “Okay,” she said simply and exited the vehicle.
Bolan and Platinov entered the lobby of a hotel directly in front of their car. Letting the straps from their nondescript equipment bags slide onto the hardwood floor as they reached the front desk, Bolan stared at an open door behind the counter. When no one appeared, he tapped a bell on the countertop.
A surly faced, unshaven man wearing a coffee-stained white undershirt and dark trousers appeared in the doorway, then waddled to the counter. The shirt stretched across his immense belly as tight as one of the Executioner’s own blacksuits, and the ribbed stitching threatened to burst apart with every bounce brought on by the man’s steps. The stub of a cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth, sending wisps of smoke upward into the air. Without bothering to greet them, the man in the filthy undershirt reached beneath the counter, pulled out a registry card and slid it across the slick top.
Bolan registered them as Mr. and Mrs. Josh Murphy, of Enid, Oklahoma.
The unshaven man dropped a key attached to a large wooden stick on the countertop and said simply, “Passports.”
Bolan reached into one of the bags and pulled out a pair of the blue booklets. They had been made up for both him and Platinov by experts at Stony Man Farm, the top-secret counterterrorist installation with whom the Executioner sometimes worked.
The man in the dirty clothing glanced at the pictures inside the passports. As the Executioner and Marynka Platinov moved toward the elevator, Bolan noticed him leering at the Russian woman’s buttocks as she walked.
Platinov appeared to notice it, too. A slightly disgusted frown spread across her face.
A few minutes later, Bolan unlocked a door beneath the number 307. Holding it open for Platinov, he looked in to see the sparsely furnished room. A threadbare brown plaid bedspread was stretched tightly across the twin bed, and a chipped wooden table and two chairs set against a wall. Other than that, the room was empty.
“You always take me to the nicest places, Cooper,” Platinov said, dropping her bags on the bed.
“Thanks, Plat,” he said simply. He dropped his own luggage on the ragged rug on the floor. But immediately, he picked up the canvas bag that contained what they had collected from the corpses at the safe house. Setting it on the table, he took a seat in one of the splintery wooden chairs.
Platinov sat down across from him.
Bolan unzipped the bag, then turned it over, dumping the contents onto the tabletop. Out came a wide variety of objects, from key rings and more hideout guns and knives, to folded papers, receipts, chewing gum wrappers, billfolds, money clips and broken cigarettes. One man had been a cigar smoker, and a leather cigar case carried three medium-sized cigars with Cuban wrappers.
Bolan examined the cigars, careful not to touch the label, which might retain a fingerprint. Rising to his feet, he dropped the cigar and moved to the bed. From one of the black, zippered cases he produced a small fingerprint kit and a package of blank index cards. He returned to his chair.
“Separate everything that might hold a print,” he told Platinov. “And get the laptop up and ready.”
The Russian woman rose to her feet as Bolan unscrewed the lid off of a small bottle of black fingerprint powder. Setting it down carefully, he did the same with a bottle of white powder.
The dark powder would be used on light-colored objects such as the keys. The white was for the cigars, the smooth leather cigar case and other darker items.
Fifteen minutes later, the tabletop was covered with both white and black powder. But the Executioner had lifted seven full prints and fourteen partials from the items that had been in the terrorists’ pockets. Two of the best had come from the cigar case itself.
“Is the computer up and running?” Bolan asked as he pressed the clear plastic tape of the last print onto its index card.
“Ready,” Platinov replied. She took the stack of index cards he pushed across the table to her and began to scan them via the mini-scanner plugged into one of the laptop’s USB ports.
Pulling his satellite phone from the front breast pocket of his blazer, the Executioner tapped in the number for Stony Man Farm. The call took several seconds to connect, bouncing off numerous satellites and running through various dead-end numbers to throw off anyone who might be trying to tap in to the call.
It was a precaution that everyone associated with Stony Man Farm always took.
Thirty seconds later, though, the Executioner heard Barbara Price’s voice on the other end of the call. “Yes, Striker?” she said.
“Tell Bear I’m getting ready to send him seven full fingerprints and fourteen partials,” Bolan answered. “I want him to run them through AFIS. But he also needs to hack in to the similar systems in Europe. Especially France.”
“Affirmative, Striker,” Stony Man Farm’s honey-blond mission controller replied. “Send them on.”
Bolan shut the phone and dropped it back into his coat pocket, then reached across the table and took the laptop from Platinov. Then, one by one, he called up the files and e-mailed them to Stony Man Farm.
Five minutes later, the laptop beeped and a mechanized voice said, “You have mail.”
Bolan tapped the appropriate keys to open the e-mail from Aaron the “Bear” Kurtzman, Stony Man Farm’s computer wizard.
When he had read the message, the soldier said, “We’ve got a hit. It leads to another safe house address.” He grabbed a large canvas-and-leather portfolio, which looked little different than a shoulder-carried bag any tourist or French businessman might have. Quickly, he unzipped it and pulled out a long, triangular-shaped canvas case with a zipper that ran three-fourths of the way around.
“What is that?” Platinov asked as he dropped the case into his shoulder bag and turned back to her.
“I could tell you—” he said as they started toward the door again.
“But then you’d have to kill me,” Platinov finished the tired, overused cliché as she rolled her eyes.
The Executioner chuckled as he led the way down the hall to the elevators, then pressed the down button.
A minute later, he and Platinov were striding out of the lobby of the hotel and back to the Nissan.
CHAPTER TWO
Bolan kept the Nissan just under the speed limit as he and Platinov made their way toward the next safe house. He had just checked in with Stony Man and learned that what had begun as mere rumors that CLODO was working up toward some kind of large-scale terrorist attack had now been confirmed by two independent CIA informants. And while Bolan wasn’t, and never had been, employed by the CIA—or any other government agency for that matter—he did retain an “arm’s length” relationship with Stony Man Farm. And Aaron Kurtzman, the wheelchair-bound computer genius at the Farm, regularly hacked through all of the Central Intelligence Agency’s security safeguards to obtain the intelligence information the “spooks’” field agents collected.
Word in the terrorism underground was that CLODO was building up to something big. Something, according to one of the CIA snitches, that would reputedly make the attacks on September 11, 2001 seem like a Fourth of July fireworks display by comparison.
Bolan knew it was true. He could feel it in his gut. Though not rigged for war, he had adequate weapons for the hit. In addition to his pistols, he had brought along his TOPS SAW knife, which was sheathed at the small of his back. Platinov had slid into the double horizontal shoulder rig that bore her twin Colt Gold Cup .45 pistols. Inside her skirt, she had the other 1911 Colt .45, and several spare mags that would fit any of the three pistols.
After crossing the Seine and traveling some distance, they arrived at a residential area of the city. While there were still lights on in a few of the house windows, the streets were devoid of pedestrians.
Bolan turned onto the Rue de Jeanette as Platinov pulled a small flashlight from her purse and unfolded a map of the city. Frowning in the semidarkness, she asked, “Can you see any of the house numbers?”
Bolan nodded. “There’s 1112,” he said. The Nissan continued to roll past the next house. “We’re at 1116.”
Platinov nodded back. “Good,” she said. “We’re going the right way. It should be about three blocks farther down on the left.” She cleared her throat. “Don’t you think it’s about time you told me the game plan?” She glanced over her shoulder at the Executioner’s bag, where the mysterious canvas case was hidden.
Bolan nodded. “Yeah.” He indicated the back of the vehicle with a twist of his neck, then said, “Grab the case I stuck in there.”
Platinov twisted between the seats and pulled the triangular object out of the Executioner’s bag.
“Unzip it,” Bolan said as he slowed, then stopped at a stop sign.
The sound the zipper made was loud inside the vehicle, which added to the rising tension as they inched their way down the dark and lonely Parisian street. When Platinov pulled the top cover back to reveal a giant revolver with a scope mounted on top of it, she burst out with, “Are we expecting these CLODOs to be elephants?”
The Executioner chuckled. “No. But by now, word of what we did at the other safe house will have reached this place. They’ll be on their guard, so the element of surprise is already lost to us. I think we should take out as many of them as possible from long range.”
“Well, this should do it,” Platinov said. “What is it? I’ve never seen one before.”
The former Olympic track and field star might never have seen that particular model of Smith & Wesson wheel gun, but she’d seen enough S&Ws to know how they operated. Pushing the latch on the side of the weapon with her thumb, she swung the cylinder away from the mammoth frame.
“It’s a 500 Smith and Wesson Magnum,” the Executioner said. “Meaning .50-caliber on Smith’s new X-frame.”
“It’s big, all right,” Platinov said. “But it holds only five rounds.”
Bolan drove on through the intersection as he said, “Imagine how big it would have to be to hold six.”
“Point taken,” Platinov agreed. “What you have here is a rifle disguised as a pistol.”
“Exactly,” Bolan agreed as he cruised slowly past the next block. “It was created for long-range silhouette shooting and big game hunting. But it’s easier to carry and conceal than a sniper rifle, and for what we’re about to do it should be more than accurate enough.”
Platinov agreed. “We don’t need the pinpoint accuracy of a true sniper rifle from across the street,” she said, nodding. “How long is this barrel?”
“Eight inches,” Bolan said. “But the last inch, you’ll notice, is actually a recoil compensator.”
“I expect it still has quite a kick,” the Russian agent said, turning the weapon around in her hand to stare at the compensator holes.
“Well, I think you’ll know you’ve fired something. There’s factory ammo on the market with bullets up to 500 grains. But since we’re after men instead of dinosaurs, I’ve got it loaded down with 325-grain hollowpoints.”
“I suspect I’ll still feel quite a jolt,” Platinov said.
Bolan laughed. “It doesn’t scare you, does it, Plat?”
Platinov looked up from the gun, a quick trace of anger on her face. “Of course not,” she said.
One of the many things the Executioner had learned about the beautiful Russian woman over the years was that she couldn’t stand her courage, or dedication to an assignment, being questioned. Another was that while her days of Olympic stardom might have ended, she had retained the same competitive mind-set that had won her the gold medals.
Bolan stared ahead but watched Platinov out of the corner of his eye. Almost as quickly as the grimace of anger had appeared, he saw it disappear, leaving her face deadpan. “No, it doesn’t scare me,” she said again in a voice that betrayed only a slight degree of irritation. “Have you shot it yet?”
The Executioner nodded.
Platinov’s smile was as plastic as a smile could get. “Then it should be quite easy for me,” she said with phony pleasantry.
Bolan let the Nissan roll on as he suppressed a smile. One of the things he liked most about working with Platinov was her competitive nature. He didn’t know whether she’d been born with it or had it taught to her as she grew up in one of the Soviet Union’s “athletic schools,” but she definitely had it now. It made no difference whether she was sprinting or running hurdles in the Olympics, or helping him take down a terrorist cell during a firefight, Marynka Platinov was going to win.
Platinov broke the icy silence by saying, “Okay, that childish little outburst of ego was my fault and I apologize for it. Now—” she paused to draw in a deep breath “—does all this imply that I’m the one who’s going to be shooting this monstrosity?”
“That’s right, Plat,” Bolan said. “I’m going to park somewhere down the block, then give you time to find a decent place to snipe from. I’ll make my way up next to the house before you start shooting, then hit them up close and personal.”
Platinov nodded. “Makes sense. Is that all there is to it?”
“No. Couple of other things.” He twisted at the waist and reached into the bag in the backseat. Pulling out a plain brown paper bag, he set it in his lap, opened the top and pulled out a round steel object with .500 Magnum rounds sticking out from it in a circle. “The .500 wasn’t designed as a combat weapon,” he said. “And nobody makes speed loaders for it. So I had a friend do a little gunsmithing on it. He had to bevel out the holes in the cylinder so the moon-clips would fit. But now you can load all five rounds at the same time.”
Platinov frowned, tipped the big pistol up in her hand and caught the 5-round bundle already loaded as it fell out. She nodded as she skillfully stuck it back into the weapon, then took the sack filled with full moon clips from the Executioner. She began transferring the extra ammo from the sack to the side pockets of her jacket.
“There’s one other thing,” Bolan said as he drove on. “And it’s the most important of all.”
Platinov waited.
“Once I enter the house, I’ll be close to your targets. Don’t shoot me by mistake.”
Platinov laughed. “If I ever shoot you, Cooper,” she said, “it will not be by mistake.” Now her smile turned seductive. “Besides, I have other plans for you. And I’ll need you alive for them.”
Bolan grinned. It seemed there was no getting around the attraction between them. “Then it sounds like I’m safe until then,” he said.
“Yes, certainly until then.”
Bolan slowed the Nissan as they passed the address Kurtzman had sent them. It was a split-level clay house, at least a century old. Nothing unusual about it. Nothing that made it stand out from any of the other older dwellings up and down these residential streets.
Except for the fact that an oversized picture window was set in the front of what Bolan expected would be the living room. The curtains were tightly closed, but a light glowed brightly behind the draperies.
And unless there was some kind of party going on inside the house, there were far too many vehicles in the driveway, and along the curb, for it to be occupied by just one family.
Bolan circled the block, passed the safe house again, then pulled over to the curb as soon as he found an open space just past the other parked vehicles.
The Russian agent got out of the car, then paused, looking back in. She held the huge S&W 500 in her right hand, and the side pockets of her jacket bulged with the extra moon clips. “I’m going to see if I can get up on top of that house without waking anyone inside,” she said, pointing to the darkened structure directly across the street from the safe house. “From there I should have a direct shot into the living room through that front window.” She paused a second, then said, “Get that curtain out of my way as soon as you can.”
“I’ve got a better idea,” Bolan stated. “Signal me with your flashlight when you’re in place and ready.”
“I will. But what—”
The Executioner held up a hand to cut her off. “I’ll signal you the same way when I reach the corner of the house.” He paused a moment, thinking through his strategy once again. “When you see my beam, take out that front window with your first shot. Then wait. I’ll be diving through the broken glass and, with any luck, taking the curtains down to the floor with me when I land inside. That should not only get me in, but give you a wide-open view of the inside of the house at the same time.”
Platinov quietly closed the car door and headed out.
Bolan turned toward the safe house. Every so often, he glanced to the house across the street, waiting for the flashlight to tell him it was time to go into action.
Five minutes later he saw a light flash on, then off, atop the roof of the house where Platinov had taken up her post. A couple of seconds later, he saw the signal once again.
Show time.
The Executioner got out of the Nissan slowly, closed the door behind him, then sprinted across the street. Seconds later, he was over the curb and up on the grass of the yard next to the safe house. He ducked into the shadows and pressed his back against the wall.
All of Bolan’s senses went into high gear as he waited to see if his movement had been noticed by anyone keeping watch over the safe house. It was not unusual for at least one member of a terrorist cell to remain outside to keep watch over the house’s exterior. But as he watched, listened and even noted the smells around him, Bolan saw no indication that that was the case here. If there were outside sentries, however, they would already have alerted the terrorists inside the house via cell phone or walkie-talkie that something strange was going on. There was no sense in wasting any more time, either way.
Bolan sprinted from the house next door to the corner of the safe house nearest the picture window. Then, pulling a small flashlight from the side pocket of his blazer, he pointed it across the street and flashed it on and off twice.
A second later, he heard an explosion erupt atop the house across the street, then saw at least three feet of flames burst from the barrel of the big S&W. At the same time the picture window next to him all but disintegrated.
The Executioner wasted no time. Rounding the corner of the safe house, he dived into the curtains, the fingers of both hands grabbing the velvety material as he flew through the air. A screeching sound rent the air as the metal curtain rod above him was pulled from the wall, and then he fell to hardwood floor, entangled in the mass of material and thin steel. The soldier drew the SAW knife with his left hand, the Desert Eagle with his right. It would take far too long to find his way out from inside the curtains, which meant that the only sensible action was to create his own opening.
Bolan rose to his knees. Thrusting the knife tip through the curtain material directly in front of him, he sliced down as far as he could. Then, still holding the knife and the big .44 Magnum pistol, he reached forward and grabbed the sides of the opening, clutching them between his fingers and the two weapons.
Ripping both hands apart, Bolan caught his first glimpse of light since diving through the window. A man wearing a blue beret and brown slacks was bringing a British Sten submachine gun to bear.
Pulling the Desert Eagle’s trigger, the Executioner caught the terrorist in the chest, driving him back.
Another mammoth blast came from across the street, covering fire from Platinov, but another enemy gunner fired on Bolan, rounds tearing through the curtain missing his left ear by a millimeter.
He had to get out of these curtains of death, and he had to do it now. Bolan rose from his knees to his feet as first his head, then his shoulders, and finally his legs came up and out of the curtains. Then he stepped away from the tangled material as the real battle began.
The Executioner took in his environment in a heartbeat. Just as he’d guessed, he was in the safe house’s living room. He could hear a television almost directly behind him. Against the other three walls were sofas and chairs, and the time it had taken him to untangle himself from the curtains had given the terrorists time to push away from the walls and take cover behind the furniture.
Bolan knew it hadn’t been him who had prompted such actions. Had he dived through the window and into the curtains alone, the hardmen inside the living room would have had only to draw their weapons and send a massive hailstorm of gunfire into the disarrayed clump of curtains. It had been Platinov’s fire from the roof across the street that had saved his life. The terrorists now taking cover were doing so to avoid the thunderous assault that was coming from somewhere outside of their house.
But now that they could see Bolan, and the giant pistol in his hand, they turned their attention his way.
The Executioner fired another round directly into a stuffed armchair behind which he had seen the top of a balding head. The 240-grain Magnum round easily penetrated the leather cover material and stuffing, then hit the man behind the chair somewhere critical enough to send him sprawling out to the side in instant death.
Return fire suddenly poured from the other men around the room as they recovered from their initial shock. Covered on three sides in the living room, Bolan knew it could only be a matter of seconds before he’d be nailed.
To his side, an archway led from the living room into a dining area. Firing two more quick rounds from the Desert Eagle, Bolan heard the springs inside one of the sofas sing out as the bullets shredded through them and took out another terrorist hiding behind them. The man had just enough life left in him to stand up, but not enough to lift the heavy Thompson submachine gun in his hands before he fell forward over the back of the couch.
As soon as he’d pulled the trigger the second time, Bolan dived toward the archway. He had not yet had time to sheath his knife, so he tucked both the blade and the Desert Eagle flat against his chest. The shoulder roll took him out of the living room into the entryway behind the front door, and he rolled back to his feet at the foot of a staircase that led to the second floor of the house.
The Executioner ducked and pivoted back around as gunfire sailed over his shoulder. The men in the living room had now been forced out from behind the couches and chairs in order to get into a position from which they could attack. And as yet another sonic boom sounded from across the street, Bolan watched one of the men’s heads totally disintegrate atop his neck.
Bolan leaped to the third step of the staircase. He had seen no one at the first landing of the split-level home, and could see no one at the top, either. This unconventional tactic provided him with no cover or concealment, but it made the men trying to kill him pause for a few tenths of a second.
Which was more than enough of an edge for the Executioner.
Bolan had finally sheathed his knife, and now he drew the Beretta 93-R. Thumbing the selector switch to 3-round-burst mode, he cut loose with a trio of 9 mm rounds that stitched another CLODO terrorist from navel to neck. The man’s eyes widened in disbelief, then he fell forward onto his face, dropping the .357 Magnum Taurus 8-shot revolver he had been about to bring into play.
The Executioner’s unorthodox movement had worked once. So he reversed it, jumping downward, landing on his rubber-soled hiking shoes with the grace of a cat. But the roar that came out of the Desert Eagle was that of a lion as he pressed the big pistol’s barrel directly into the chest of a young terrorist, pulverizing his heart.
Bolan ducked back from the archway, climbing up one step again to avoid the torrent of lead that zipped his way. When he leaned back around with the Desert Eagle, he spotted another younger terrorist sprinting toward the window.
The Executioner raised the Beretta to fire, but another loud blast kept him from wasting his ammunition as Platinov sent yet another 325-grain semijacketed hollowpoint into the man’s chest.
Bolan watched him hit the floor on his back like a sack of potatoes falling off the back of a truck. The young man had just enough strength left to crane his neck up and look at his ruined chest.
Then he closed his eyes forever.
According to Bolan’s count, Platinov had fired all five of the rounds in her weapon. Now, she would have to reload the big X-frame wheel gun and, even with the full moon clips, that would take time.
Time during which he couldn’t count on getting any cover fire from her.
Only two CLODO men remained in the living room, and the dining room across the entryway appeared empty. The Executioner pulled the triggers of both pistols at the same time. A .44 Magnum round ended the life of a French terrorist when it drilled through his black T-shirt and into his even blacker heart. At the same time, a left-handed 3-round burst of 9 mm slugs cut through the ragged tweed sport coat of another hardman.
Bolan dropped the nearly spent magazine from the Desert Eagle as he transferred the Beretta from his free hand to his armpit. Jerking another box mag of .44 Magnum rounds from his belt, he jammed it into the butt of the huge Israeli-made pistol.
He had seen the glitter of brass at the top of the ejected magazine as it fell from the Desert Eagle’s grips before hitting the floor. He had not been able to keep count during this battle, but the mere fact that at least one round was left in the discarded magazine assured him that another was already chambered in the .44.
No sooner had he reloaded the Desert Eagle than the Executioner’s fine-tuned ears heard movement above him, at the top of the staircase to his side. His head jerked that way and he saw yet another terrorist in a blue beret. The man wore the same brown slacks as many of the others. But it looked as if a tie-dyed T-shirt covered his chest—at least at first glance. As he turned toward the threat and got a closer look, the Executioner realized that the man was actually shirtless. His chest and belly had been completely covered with tattoos.
And he was aiming a Mossberg JIC—Just in Case—12-gauge shotgun down the steps.
The Mossberg—with a stubby eighteen-inch barrel, pistol grip and no stock—came as close to being the perfect close-quarters-combat firearm as any one gun could. But it was as useless as a stalk of dry spaghetti if a bullet took the shotgun’s wielder before he could pull the trigger.
Twisting at the waist, Bolan let the Desert Eagle rise, as if on its own accord, to shoulder level. He stopped as soon as the heavy barrel pointed at the nose of the man atop the steps.
The terrorist had obviously trained in the “competition style” of shooting, in which the shooter always tried to superimpose the front sight over the target before squeezing the trigger. There were several drawbacks to that style of shooting when it came to a real gunfight rather than a pistol match at a gun range. First of all, it went completely against human nature, during times of life or death, to focus on anything but the threat itself. The rear, ancient, primordial part of the brain literally screamed at the defender to look at the threat rather than the front sight or anything else.
Trying to find the front sight under such emotional strain was further complicated by the fact that the eyes got the message from the brain as well, and fought against focusing on the end of the gun when it was the target that was about to kill him.
And last, but hardly least, was the theory that the trigger should be gently squeezed rather than pulled. Under such tension, the human body’s small motor functions shut down and sent blood and adrenaline flowing to the larger muscle groups to increase strength. A death grip was automatically taken on the gun, and the trigger was pulled, not squeezed, regardless of what the shooter had been capable of doing during practice.
