Sonny's suit was ruined, never mind his shoes, and he was shaking like a leaf — but he was still alive, and that was more than he could say for anybody in his crew. The loss of personnel would be a strike against him, but he'd been quick enough to save the cash, and he was banking on Bartoli's mercenary instincts to prevail.
It was a miracle that he'd managed to survive the fireworks, with the rebels using cannons, rockets, everything except the kitchen sink. At least he figured it was the rebels, trying for a major score against their government. Who else would have the balls and military hardware to produce the devastation he'd witnessed moments earlier?
Okay. So the bastard Sonny tried to nail had looked American. But who could say for sure, with all that war paint on his face? And when you got right down to it, what difference did it make? The rebels could be hiring mercenaries in an effort to improve their chances. After all that he'd seen today, it would have taken purple elephants with laser guns to startle Sonny Esposito.
He'd been looking at a fancy funeral when the Haitian soldiers happened by and saved his bacon. Esposito didn't know why they were following the convoy, and he didn't care. It was a stroke of luck, regardless, and he never tried to second-guess his destiny. This time out, salvation wore an OD uniform and went a little heavy on the hair oil; next time, maybe it would be his turn to play the hero.
The smell of roasting bodies faded in a while, and Sonny started counting footsteps, trying to forget how much three-quarters of a million dollars weighed. The leather handle of the suitcase had begun to chafe an angry blister in his palm, but Sonny couldn't switch. He couldn't shoot left-handed worth a damn, and while blisters could be cured, dead was fucking dead forever.
He could hide the suitcase somewhere, lead Bartoli's people back to it when he met them on the road. But what if he was being followed? Sonny stopped and checked tracks, first relieved — then apprehensive — when he saw that he was alone.
The rebels had surprised him once; they knew about the forest and could move like shadows when they had to. There could be a hundred men staring at him now, and he'd never know until they showed themselves or cut him down.
"Tough shit."
The sound of his voice restored a measure of Sonny's confidence. If he was bound to die, then he would damn well die defending Don Bartoli's money.
"Nobody's dying here," he told the forest, drawing courage from the silence of the trees. "Nobody fucks with me and Mr. B."
Somebody had, of course, and in a major way. The raid was going to require an explanation, and he hoped the Haitian troops were able to secure a prisoner or two. It would have been a treat for Sonny to assist in their interrogation, tightening the screws until they begged for death and meant it.
First he had a package to deliver, and it weighed a ton. He stood the suitcase on end and sat on it, resting, spitting in his blistered palm and fanning it to cool the fire. He must have traveled two miles by now, which meant only he had another twelve or thirteen left before he reached the city limits. Long before that time, he'd have met Bartoli's backup crew or seen the soldiers coming back.
And if he didn't?
Esposito checked his watch, confirming sundown in an hour and a half.
"Tough shit," he said again, to no one in particular.
Let darkness come. The road would still be there, and if the night brought snakes or other forest predators, he had the.45 for company. There were a couple rounds left in the magazine, and he had a spare clip in his pocket, just like always.
Suddenly it didn't sound like very much at all. The shadows reaching out for him on either side seemed hostile. Hungry.
"Watch your step," he growled. "I'm going."
And he hoped the forest understood.
* * *
The third grenade had taken out Bolan's lead pursuer, shrapnel punching through the grille to sever wires and hoses, but it still left three behind him, hanging back far enough to render his defensive tactics ineffective. Bolan had a slender lead, but it wasn't enough to save him from the.30-caliber machine gun mounted on the next jeep in line.
The gunner hadn't found his range yet, but it wouldn't take long. Already Bolan heard the angry hornets whispering around him, chipping at the windshield, shredding vegetation on the roadside.
The warrior reached behind, fumbled blindly in a pack soaked with gasoline and closed his hand around an M-8 smoke grenade. He clipped the cylinder to his harness and reached back for several more.
The smoke grenades had a two-second delay on ignition, but Bolan didn't intend to lob them behind, as before. Instead, he pulled the pin on one and hurled it forward with all his strength, swerving the jeep to bracket the can with the tires as he passed. It was already spewing smoke in his wake when he tossed out the second and third.
Behind him, the machine gun faltered and fell silent. Bolan grabbed his carbine off the floor and pivoted to fire a high burst through the drifting smoke, covering his track and giving his pursuers something else to think about. With any luck, it might delay them long enough for him to reach his turnoff, lose the tail and find someplace to lie low.
He dropped the empty rifle, settled both hands on the steering wheel — and found two military vehicles ahead of him, approaching on a hard collision course. A storm of automatic fire reached out to greet him, crackling above his head. Cursing, Bolan swung the wheel hard right, directly toward the green, unyielding wall of jungle.
Impact threw the warrior in his seat, but he hung on to the wheel, his boot heel grinding the accelerator to the floor. The web of vines resisted for a heartbeat, shuddered, then parted to admit the vehicle, which plunged downhill, Bolan's gear exploding from the rear like popcorn.
Drifting now, the fat tires losing traction in the loam and rotten leaves, Bolan felt the jeep begin to fishtail. He saw the tree too late, and couldn't have missed it either way and braced himself for the collision.
Momentum snapped him back and cracked his skull against the knotty bark with numbing force. He slithered toward the floorboards, smelling gasoline fumes before his brain shut down and darkness pulled the shades.
3
René Solange ordered two of his subordinates to check the capsized jeep before he scrambled down the slope. There seemed to be no point in taking chances with a lunatic, especially when he might have reinforcements lurking in the forest. When his soldiers made it to the bottom and survived, Solange could find no other reason to delay.
The steep embankment had been gouged and furrowed by the jeep, undergrowth uprooted, and he lost his footing several times, once landing on his backside in the mud. He made it with the aid of vines and creepers, using them like ropes.
Approaching from the rear, Solange discovered that the jeep had taken many hits before it left the road. The smell of gasoline from punctured jerrycans was powerful, but there appeared to be no imminent threat of fire.
It was a miracle the driver had survived — or had he? Solange stepped closer to the jeep and caught sight of his enemy, who was decked out in camouflage fatigues and war paint, and was wearing guns, grenades and knives. At first the captain of security police believed the man was dead, but then he heard a muffled groan and saw him move. A fraction of an inch, no more, but it was all the evidence of life Solange required.
They had been joined by other troopers, and he had the rebel lifted from the wreckage, stripped of bandoliers and weapons. Other gear was scattered on the slope and strewn among the trees, evidence the captain was determined to retrieve. He put three soldiers on the job and settled back to watch his captive, as a sergeant graced with basic first-aid knowledge gave the prisoner a hasty physical.
The man had come prepared for war, and he had found it. In the captain's personal opinion, there was too much military hardware for a single man. If he could keep the prisoner alive until they reached the capital, Solange would soon extract the names and number of his rebel allies. It would be a coup, discrediting the critics who ascribed his present rank to nep
otism.
"No broken bones that I can find," the sergeant announced, "Internal injuries are possible, of course. Impossible to tell without an X-ray. He's unconscious from concussion, probably the tree or something in the jeep."
"How long?"
The sergeant shrugged. "Some come around like that…" he snapped his fingers"…some take longer. There's a chance that he won't come around at all."
"A coma?"
"Anything is possible."
Solange dismissed the sergeant's dire suggestion, concentrating on his captive. Pockets of his battle dress gave up a folding knife, garrotes, incendiary sticks and flares, but there was nothing in the nature of ID. Intrigued, the captain crouched beside his hostage and wiped off a portion of his war paint with a handkerchief.
A white man, almost certainly a foreigner.
Solange experienced a surge of visceral excitement. He was on to something big and knew it. If the man was a mercenary, he'd be compelled to name his masters. If he was an army regular — a Russian, say, or an American — he'd eventually ask to speak with someone from his embassy. Whichever way it went, Captain René Solange had definitely snagged a coup.
A foreign soldier found on Haitian soil, engaged in brutal crimes against civilian businessmen, would be enough to capture headlines from Washington to Buenos Aires. It was a no-loss situation for the junta. If their captive proved to be a Russian, the United States would have to drop its stern self-righteous pose on military rule and rush to the defense of a beleaguered anti-Communist regime. If he turned out to be an American, embarrassment would force the White House and the CIA to disavow their criticism of the junta's tactics. Either way, uncomfortable pressure was relieved, and there might even be a profit in the situation, couched in terms of foreign aid.
The soldier's gear and weapons were primarily of American make, but that meant nothing in itself. The Soviets had ready access to American equipment from a thousand different sources, and it would make perfect sense to arm a Spetznaz warrior with the enemy's equipment.
Yes, considering the junta's right-wing stance, it would be preferable if his captive proved to be a Communist.
Solange was thinking of his own promotion, smiling, when the captive stirred and moaned again. The sergeant crouched beside him, slapping none too gently at the soldier's cheeks, and was rewarded by a flicker of the eyelids.
"There!"
Solange moved forward, shouldering the sergeant to one side.
"Hello? Do you speak English?"
In the absence of response, he tried it out in French and Spanish, using up his store of secondary languages. The captive's eyes swam out of focus after several seconds, and he slipped away.
Content to wait and take his time, Solange instructed his subordinates to haul the prisoner uphill, inflicting no unnecessary injuries, and place him in the captain's staff car. He'd let them have a fair head start then follow, making certain there was no one to see him if he slipped and fell. An officer in line for a promotion had to think about his image, after all.
* * *
Bolan struggled back to consciousness through waves of pain. The sound of voices speaking French was small at first and far away, but they grew closer as his mind began to clear. Another moment and he knew he was surrounded by the enemy.
The soldier made an inventory of his injuries, slowly tensing muscles in his arms, legs, back and abdomen, and was relieved when he didn't experience the spastic agony of broken bones. His ears were ringing, there were bolts of lightning lancing through his skull and he was bruised from head to foot. But he would live.
Unless his captors decided to kill him on the spot.
He turned his head and moaned — no need for acting there, as pain speared his temples and settled behind his eyes. Immediately someone knelt beside Bolan and slapped him roughly on the cheeks, attempting to revive him. He endured it for several seconds then finally cracked his eyelids open when the impact had begun to echo in his brain like a drum.
The warrior could see three uniforms, and voices came to him from his left and right, with more behind him somewhere, elevated and at a distance. He experienced a rugged flashback of his recent downhill slalom and decided reinforcements were on the road above.
A sweating, moon-faced officer loomed over Bolan, first addressing him in English, then trying French and Spanish before he gave it up. The Executioner kept silent, went limp and rolled back his eyes in an approximation of unconsciousness. He lay immobile as his captors argued over means of transportation, offered no resistance when they tied him on a makeshift sled and hoisted him with ropes. Each jolt along the way lighted flares of pain in Bolan's skull, back and ribs, but he maintained his silence; ferns reached out to stroke his face before his stretcher crushed them flat.
Topside, his captors released him from bondage, lifted him into the rear of a staff car and placed him on the hard metal floorboard. A moment went by, then he heard the officer barking commands, sounding winded from the climb up the slope. Engines growled to life and the staff car took on other passengers, gunners in back with their boots prodding Bolan, the honcho up front.
Bolan wondered if these were the regular army or secret police. In the long run it might make no difference, but the warrior had studied the Tonton Macoutes before turning thumbs up on the mission to Haiti. Technically renamed the Volunteers for National Security in 1971, the organization's original title remained in general use and its evil reputation remained intact, a blight on Haiti as well as on the Western Hemisphere.
He knew that the Macoutes were skilled in torture, that they favored raping prisoners — of either sex — and had invented various mechanical refinements to instill a spirit of «cooperation» in their subjects. The Macoutes reportedly took pride in keeping prisoners alive for days or weeks on end before permitting them to die, and Bolan wondered how much he could take, in concrete terms, before he snapped. He had a strong will, but there were always limits.
It wouldn't come to that, the Executioner decided. If he couldn't manage to escape, then he would damn well find a way to die before he let the bastards break him down. There were ways to push interrogators overboard, provoke them into striking once too often.
But suicide would be the last resort. So far, his captors had been relatively careless, believing him to be unconsciousness. They had disarmed him, but his combat rigging lay up front, beside the officer in charge. Bolan thought he just might reach his side arms, given half a chance. The guards behind him carried automatic rifles, but they weren't truly on alert. Their prey was vanquished, helpless at their feet, and they were feeling smug in their success.
He worked out the move in his mind, imagining the pain and willing it away: a backward roll, the jolting car providing adequate momentum as he swiveled, sizing up the opposition at a glance and reaching for the nearest weapon, striking with an open hand before the gunner could react. There'd be no opportunity to fire at point-blank range, but he'd drop his other escort with a butt stroke, turn to kill the driver and the officer in charge with well-placed head shots.
Bolan braced himself, preparing for the moment that would save his life or end it. Either way, he was committed to the game and there would be no turning back.
* * *
The headlights startled Sonny Esposito, nearly blinding him before he let the heavy suitcase drop and raised a hand to shield his eyes. He held the.45 behind his back, concealed but ready as the long car drew abreast and stopped. A window powered down and Sonny braced himself, prepared to kill or die if these were enemies.
"You look a little bushed there. Sonny."
Esposito recognized the voice of Marco Rizzi, and smiled as he eased the automatic's hammer down.
"I feel a little burned."
"We heard you had a little problem."
Still no offer of a lift, no invitation to climb in, sit down — but he could wait.
"They hit us, man. You can't believe the hardware they were using."
"What about the c
ash?"
"Right here."
"You got it?"
"Every dime."
"That's something, anyway." A rear door opened, and the dome light showed him beefy men with automatic weapons. "Take a load off, Sonny. We got work to do."
He stowed the.45 and settled in a jump seat, wedging the dusty suitcase between his feet. Bartoli's enforcer eyed the bag suspiciously before he studied Esposito's face.
"It's lucky you could save the payroll," Rizzi said. "I notice you're alone."
He felt uncomfortable, despite the air-conditioning.
"The others never knew what hit them."
"Even Carlo?" Rizzi shook his head. "That's cold. The pencil pusher, too?"
"Some kinda shrapnel got him. It was like a fucking war zone."
"This I gotta see. Let's go."
The crew chief felt a sudden rush of panic. They were going back to make a body count. He told himself that it was merely caution on Bartoli's part, a way of making sure nobody in his own camp tried to rip him off. Hell, Sonny would have done the same if it was on the other foot. And then again…
He didn't like the implication of mistrust, the thinly veiled suggestion that his own survival might be too coincidental. If Bartoli started thinking that the ambush was an inside job, then Sonny Esposito was as good as dead.
No, he decided, dead was better. If he couldn't sell the truth to Don Bartoli, Sonny Esposito's future would be one long scream.
With his sweet ass riding on the outcome. Sonny figured he could sell the Brooklyn Bridge. Once Marco Rizzi had a look around the battleground, he'd be standing square in Esposito's corner. No one would have nerve enough to ride inside the limo if he knew a rocket was about to blow up in his face.
Haitian Hit Page 3