Executioner 055 - Paradine's Gauntlet Read online

  He left the satchel full of diamonds with his military hardware, locked securely in the Citroen's trunk. Bolan put his trust in the Beretta 93-R, and in his certainty that Paradine would not be anxious to provoke a public firelight. The mercenary wanted Bolan to himself.

  Bolan reached the pier and continued on, mingling with tourists. Unbidden, his mind recalled another walk along that pier, with a score of gunners waiting for him, fingers itching on the triggers. He had survived that gauntlet and now returned, this time to face a single man.

  The warrior found a place against the railing, and stared off across the sunlit water. He felt a man beside him, at his elbow.

  "The sea is beautiful," the man said.

  "But cold and cruel," Bolan answered. Password completed, Bolan turned to face the new arrival. His contact was average size and build, with a pock-marked face and sandy hair worn long over ears and collar. The pistol in its shoulder rig was obvious beneath the O.D. fatigue jacket. Denim jeans and paratrooper's boots completed the picture.

  "Let's walk," the contact said.

  Bolan fell into step beside the man, moving out along the pier.

  "Where's Paradine?" Bolan asked.

  "Waiting for you," his contact answered. "First, he wants to make certain his demands are met. You have the diamonds?"

  Bolan nodded, then growled, "I deliver them to Paradine, or not at all."

  "Understood. You were told to come alone."

  Bolan glanced around and said, "I don't see any reinforcements."

  "We've arranged some precautions. You'll be passed through a series of checkpoints like this. In between, you'll be observed. Any contact or delay you cannot explain will sacrifice the hostages."

  "How do I know they're still alive?"

  "You don't. Your next checkpoint is in Chiasso." The contact checked his wristwatch. "It's around 170 miles. Call it four hours from the time I make the call. Someone will be waiting for you off the square."

  Bolan nodded, turned and left. He reached his Citroen and slid behind the wheel. Paradine' s man had vanished by the time he cranked the engine into life. Bolan wheeled out of the parking lot toward the open road.

  Five minutes later, he recognized the tail. A red Peugeot was hanging tight, changing lanes a mere beat behind the Citroen. Bolan counted four men sandwiched into the compact, hard eyes staring at him.

  Bolan took the car around the block, and by the time he merged again with mainstream traffic, a Fiat had fallen in behind the Peugeot. Call it eight guns, minimum, clinging to his track.

  He ticked off the possibilities, discarding each in turn. Brognola would never stick him with a tail, but there were other players. The Egyptians and Israelis both had lives at stake; either side might attempt to monitor the drop and take revenge against the terrorists. The Mossad especially was capable of picking up the challenge, but . . .

  Bolan shrugged off the thought. Any secret service that could penetrate Brognola's Stony Man security could also run an unobtrusive tail. The gunners on his track were clumsy in their eagerness, edging closer, not trying to conceal themselves.

  He thought of Paradine. It was conceivable the terrorist would try to suck him in, walk him through a setup rendezvous and then pick him off with his defenses down. In that event, Bolan knew his enemy would be among the trackers, or waiting close at hand, ready to administer the killing stroke.

  He gunned the Citroen, cutting hard across two lanes of traffic, breaking off from the main drag. Behind him, a screech of brakes and the clamor of protesting horns reported that the tail was hanging on. That was fine with Bolan, but he did not want to engage the enemy with innocent civilians in the cross fire.

  His first preference would be to shake the trackers. Failing that, the Executioner would stand and fight, but on a killing ground of his choice, where the danger to civilians could be minimized.

  Bolan headed northeast through a neighborhood of smaller shops and restaurants.

  Suddenly, someone in the Peugeot got anxious, started feeling for the range with semi-automatic fire.

  The first round struck Bolan's trunk, caroming into empty space.

  He checked the mirror and saw the tail cars bristling with weaponry. Steady fire was crackling from the Peugeot, and gunners in the Fiat, momentarily obstructed by the point car, were looking for a field of fire.

  Bolan weaved back and forth across the center stripe, throwing off the gunners' aim. Driving one-handed, he reached under the seat. He freed the Uzi mini-submachine gun from its harness and laid it beside him.

  The mini-Uzi was a severely cut-down version of the classic Israeli submachine gun. With the metal stock folded, it measured an incredible 9.5 inches shorter than the parent weapon, and a full inch shorter than the Ingram M-10 machine pistol. Designed with concealment in mind, the stubby man-shredder nevertheless sacrificed none of its antecedent's firepower, rivalling the full-grown Uzi in velocity, rate of fire and stopping power. Thirty-two 9mm parabellum steel-jackets nestled in the staggered-box magazine. A broom-handle arrangement of vertical magazines could be used to escalate the number of rounds dramatically.

  Bolan had his weapon and his target; all he needed was the killing ground. And if he did not find it soon, the gunners on his tail might start getting lucky.

  A side street appeared on the right. Bolan swung hard, making it on two wheels, the squat sedan rocking into touchdown as he cleared the corner. Behind him, the Peugeot's driver missed the turn, standing on his brakes and smoking rubber as the Fiat cut across his track to follow Bolan. For the first time, gunners in the Fiat opened fire.

  Running ahead of the hounds, Bolan was opening the throttle, looking for some combat stretch.

  Then he saw his error: he had picked a cul-de-sac, and ahead of him, the street was sealed off tight by a solid wall of brick and native stone.

  The Executioner was boxed in, gunners at his back, hurtling on a collision course with stone at sixty miles an hour.

  7

  LOUIS, THE CORSICAN, had hoped to take the ransom payment from his solitary target with a minimum of violence. He was not opposed to killing and did not expect his quarry to surrender voluntarily, but at the same time he dreaded any thought of open battle in the streets of Monaco. A daylight battle meant police, investigations, the inevitable questioning. Publicity was poison, and the mobster shunned exposure as a night-feeding carnivore avoids the sun.

  But now he was committed to the chase, without alternatives, forced to see it through, whatever the result. There was no turning back.

  He had taken all precautions possible, he had mobilized an army for the job—and still the outcome was in doubt. A long block up ahead, the hare was running flat out with two carloads of gunners on his tail.

  The Corsican's chauffeur was keeping them in sight, but cautiously, prepared to reinforce the troops only if the quarry turned to make a stand.

  Genet, the Corsican's lieutenant, had provided them with rendezvous coordinates, the scheduled meeting place pinpointed by a Sûreté official on the payroll of the Union Corse. An ambush in the parking lot had been impractical, but still Louis had hoped for a discreet transference of the ransom. Everything sounded so simple in the planning stages. . .

  The Citroen's lead had narrowed, and the trailing gunners pressed their quarry, crowding him, attempting to provoke a rash mistake. The snaking caravan was clear of the casino district now, and running through a neighborhood of modest shops and homes. The set was not ideal, but if the strike force could overtake him here, they had a chance.

  Louis picked up the walkie-talkie, brought it to his face, keyed the button for transmission. He was in communication with the spearhead at last, prepared to call the shots, and there was very little time to lose.

  "Close in," he snapped. "Thomas, Henri, take him now!"

  His driver goosed the Mercedes's accelerator, keeping pace, and in the seat behind him he could feel his own crew of gunners craning forward, hungry for a piece of the upcoming a
ction. One of them drew back a submachine-gun bolt to bring up the round into his weapon's firing chamber.

  And the Corsican could feel their tension and excitement. He matched it with his own. The predator remembered other kills; he missed the old exhilaration of the hunt, the thrill of mortal combat. A nagging apprehension, warning him of danger, was quickly smothered by the adrenaline of the moment.

  Sharp, excited voices clamored at him from the radio receiver, static overriding noise as both teams tried to answer him at once. He cursed, held the transmitter button down, silenced all of them at once.

  Intent upon the chase, he jabbed his elbow at the driver, urging him to greater speed.

  Another moment now, another block until they overtook the Citroen and forced it to the curb with automatic weapons blazing. He slid a hand inside his jacket to free the Browning automatic from its shoulder rigging. He held the cannon in his lap. Ready.

  The point car closed in.

  And the Citroen cut hard right into a narrow side street. Its tires screamed, smoked on the pavement. The Peugeot overshot the intersection, drifting as the wheelman rammed the brake to the floor.

  In second place, the Fiat's driver saw the Citroen's maneuver in time to twist hard into the turn and career after the prey.

  The Peugeot whined into hot reverse, fish-tailed, and nosed right around to join the chain of pursuit.

  "Allez, allez," the mobster snapped. "Get after them!"

  The driver grunted his acknowledgment and floored the crew wagon's gas pedal, milking five more screaming miles an hour out of her. Louis was trembling, and he gripped the armrest fiercely, knuckles whitened from the strain.

  It was the killing time at last, and the Corsican was more than ready.

  WITH LESS THAN ONE HUNDRED FEET to spare, Bolan floored the brake pedal, twisting hard on the wheel to put the Citroen through a screaming turn. The engine sputtered and nearly died, but he saved it at the last instant. The Citroen now faced toward the enemy.

  There was only one way out, and the Executioner was taking it. He held the accelerator down, rear tires spinning, leaving smoking rubber on the pavement, then finding traction as the take-off pushed him back against his seat. With the tiny Uzi in his left hand, he sighted out the window, lining up the shot as he closed the gap.

  The enemy driver saw it coming, and he spun the wheel, veering away from Bolan's line of fire. Bolan corrected, squeezing off a short burst on the fly, and through the disintegrated windshield he saw the driver's face dissolve, becoming something less than human. He was past them in a heartbeat. Behind him the driverless Fiat began to drift, losing speed until a dead foot slipped off the clutch and the engine faltered and died.

  Ahead of Bolan, the Peugeot's wheelman had seen it all go down. Thinking fast, he swung his car around broadside, blocking off the narrow street and penning Bolan in. Gunners were erupting from the car, seeking cover, weapons tracking onto target, but the driver kept his seat, ready to respond to any move Bolan made.

  Bolan put the Citroen into a shuddering broadside skid. The Citroen crashed into the Peugeot, crumpling and shearing off the open starboard door, rocking the car on its springs.

  Crouched behind the plug car, three gunners were knocked off balance by the stunning impact. Bolan swung the mini-Uzi up, sighting on the driver's pallid face. The guy had expected avoidance action from Bolan, not an all-out crash. In the suspended moment of changed expectations, Bolan stroked off a very short burst.

  One second the guy was sitting there, mouth ovaled to emit a scream, and the next he was undergoing transformation—face exploding as his skull expanded to impossible dimensions, contents violently released.

  The other guncocks recovered fast, coming to their feet behind the Peugeot, shouting in French. The language registered on Bolan the second before they opened fire—by then he was hunching over as a bullet whistled past his face.

  He floored the accelerator, holding the wheel steady, feeling the vibration as his sedan grated down the Peugeot's length. With the small arms roaring at its mangled bodywork, his car broke free, showing them his tail and powering away with hellfire chewing up its ass.

  Twenty yards out Bolan skidded to a halt, wanting to take out the bastards for good. He took the Uzi with him as he rolled out of the Citroen into a combat crouch. He saw the Fiat unloading three gunners.

  Bolan was exposed. The hardguys were swinging their guns around. One of them was rapidly finding the range.

  Bolan answered with the miniature Uzi, laying a wreath of steel-jackets around the burp-gunner's neck and blowing him away. Before the gunner's body hit the pavement, Bolan's fire was tracking on. It scattered the other soldiers, dropping one of them and driving the other two for cover behind the Fiat. Bolan was probing for a hot spot and he found it as the Uzi emptied, the final rounds igniting fuel under the Fiat's hood. Another second and the hood blew off. A ball of oily fire rolled along the Fiat's length, consuming flesh and steel. A burning figure rolled away from the inferno, his strangled screams engulfed in flames.

  Bolan reached lightning-swift inside the Citroen and came out with two extra clips for the Uzi. He reloaded, rising from his crouch to face the others when he saw a black Mercedes sliding to a stop beside the Peugeot, doors flying open, disgorging reinforcements.

  There were close to a dozen guns against him now. One of the new arrivals was barking orders, manhandling hardguys into line. He was a scowling, bearlike man with slicked-back hair and heavy jowls, dressed in an expensive pearl gray suit. Bolan did not recognize the face, but he made the type at once.

  The guy was a mobster, and Bolan knew instinctively that he was not sent by Paradine.

  The Executioner braced himself to meet the charge. He was ready when they came for him, three gunners breaking out around the nose of the Peugeot, two more pounding into view around the tail of the Mercedes. They were firing as they came, and their comrades behind the car were laying down a covering barrage.

  Bolan ducked below the leaden hail, rolling out to his right, toward the nose of the Citroen. Around him, the sedan was taking repeated hits. The three soldiers circling his left flank were thirty yards out when Bolan gained his chosen vantage point, leaping out to take them unaware.

  Bolan had put his faith in speed, accuracy and the element of surprise.

  It paid off.

  The big guy caught them flat-footed with a blazing figure eight, the hot steel-jackets ripping in at chest level, sweeping them away. Two of the gunners fell together, sprawling on the pavement in a bloody, tangled heap, but their companion on the right was slower going down. He was kneeling in the street, still fumbling to get off a shot with mangled hands, and it took another burst to put him on his back.

  That left the gunners who were providing cover, and the Executioner was moving to meet them as the cover fire converged on his position. Diving, rolling, he slithered back along the Citroen's length, Uzi probing out ahead. The tiny subgun made for almost limitless body maneuverability.

  It was a worm's-eye view, and he saw the enemy from the knees down. There were two pairs of pumping ankles in his sights when he stroked the trigger and let the muzzle drift from left to right. Twenty yards downrange, the gunners stumbled, crying out in pain. One of them dropped his machine pistol. His side-kick was clinging to a stubby automatic, but getting nowhere with it as the impact left him breathless. Bolan did not give him time to catch his second wind. The Uzi chattered again, dispatching half a dozen parabellum manglers. Both gunners died on their bellies, grovelling in blood and misery.

  Bolan fed a fresh magazine into the Uzi's pistol grip. He was on his feet and moving out of cover when he saw his enemies mysteriously begin to die.

  One of the gunners was near his boss when his skull exploded into bloody fragments. Bits and pieces of the guy were running down the boss's face, soaking through his flashy jacket, when a second hardman sprawled across the hood of the Mercedes, dark blood pumping from his mangled throat.

&nb
sp; Only then did Bolan hear the firing, the heavy-metal thunder that rolled in from somewhere behind the enemy. Someone had joined the battle, squeezing off precision rounds from a heavy-caliber assault rifle.

  Another guncock was spinning out of view, clutching at a shattered face with dying hands, when Bolan made his move. The first announcement of his sprinting approach was the deadly chatter of his weapon. Two of the remaining soldiers never even turned to face him; riddled where they stood, both were lifted off their feet and cast away like broken mannequins.

  Bolan stitched a third distracted gunner from crotch to throat.

  The leader was alone, and Bolan found him kneeling in the shadow of the black Mercedes. He was empty-handed.

  Sirens sounded in the distance as Monegasque police responded to the blazing fire-fight.

  The mobster was clearly no more anxious than Bolan for a confrontation with the gendarmes. With a snarl of fury, he flung himself at an automatic pistol on the tarmac nearby, big hands clutching at salvation that was hopelessly beyond his reach.

  Bolan let the Uzi rip, firing damn near point-blank at the human target. Flesh and fabric rippled with the drumming impact.

  There was no time to swap the bullet punctured Citroen. He reached the battered vehicle on a dead run and fired the engine, relieved to hear it running smoothly. With any luck the car would see him safely to his next checkpoint.

  If there were no more ambushes along the way.

  And if the scarred Citroen did not attract police.

  Someone had helped him, and there was that to think about as he put the car in motion, powering away. Two wheels jounced across the curb as he passed the Mercedes, the Citroen growling toward the open road. Emergency lights were winking at him from the rear-view mirror as he gave the Citroen its head, racing down the first major side street and running free toward the next rendezvous with Paradine's ambassador of death.