They were turning now, preparing to depart, and Lyons realized that he might very well be kissing off his only chance to bag the bastard. Toby's mission, all the rest of it was secondary now. The Raven's presence transcended all priorities.
He had one chance, and Lyons knew that he would have to make it count. The Jeep was just below him, still accelerating, as he raised the scattergun and fired.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Executioner was up and moving, angling to intercept the Jeep, when thunder suddenly erupted from the headstones opposite and the tableau disintegrated into milling chaos. Breaking stride, he saw the Jeep begin to swerve, the Raven rising from his seat, the AK-47 tracking off to starboard as the right front tire exploded. The wheelman tried to save it, turning with the skid, and then a second thunderclap reached out to drill the grill and blow the hood back in his face.
The Raven scrambled clear before the Jeep had come to rest, his autorifle stuttering a burst in the direction of the headstones as he scuttled toward the truck. Around the Mercedes, Axelrod and company had gone to ground, the gunners hauling weapons out from under their jackets, searching for a target that was still invisible.
They hadn't noticed Bolan yet — and wouldn't, if he took to cover now, allowed the action to proceed and find its own conclusion. He could let the cannibals devour one another, watching safely from a ringside seat. It would be easy.
Except for Toby... and the Raven.
The lady was in danger, and Bolan would not permit the Raven to escape if there was any way on earth to bring him down. He had no way of knowing who had sprung the trap and did not particularly care. The Raven's unexpected personal appearance was a shock, but grim experience had taught the Executioner to seize on any opportunity that might arise.
Vachon no longer mattered. Axelrod was less than nothing in his mind. The single target of his hatred crouched before him now, concealed from hostile fire behind the van but totally exposed from Bolan's line of sight. The soldier eased his AutoMag out of its holster with a steady hand.
Across the narrow drive another shotgun blast erupted, the pellets rattling off Vachon's Mercedes. A gunner scrambled from the truck, his Uzi stuttering across the hood before he hit a crouch behind the fender, edging forward to achieve a better line of fire. Wild, sporadic rounds were coming from behind the limo now, chipping marble from the tombstones opposite. From where he stood, the soldier caught a glimpse of Axelrod with a pistol in his hand, hunched down behind the limousine with Toby at his side.
A sudden hint of movement behind a sculpted angel, and he caught a fleeting glimpse of the attacker. Blond hair, and the glint of sun from aviator's glasses as he raised his shotgun, worked the action, fired, retreating instantly before the hostile guns could find their range. One of Vachon's torpedoes stumbled, clutching at his midriff, toppling forward on his face.
One down, and seven left to go... but only one of them held any real significance for Bolan now. The twisted brain behind a brutal hijack and his own humiliation crouched before the soldier, less than thirty yards away. The range was virtually point-blank for Bolan's AutoMag. He couldn't miss.
A handgun opened up across the drive — a Magnum by its sound — and Bolan idly wondered if the shooter over there was calling in reserves. No matter. Bolan had his target now, was tightening his finger on the trigger when the big Mercedes roared to life and started rolling, gathering momentum and abandoning the figures crouched behind it.
Bolan glimpsed the driver, riding low behind the wheel, a look of desperation plastered on his face when he was forced to risk a glance above the dash. Vachon and company had scrambled clear, the Canadian beating on the driver's window and shouting at him, jerking furiously at the door latch.
A booming Magnum round reached out to claim the second gunner, spinning him around and dumping him facedown on the grass. Before Bolan could react the Raven was in motion, scrambling toward the cab of the abandoned truck, already disappearing through the open door.
The AutoMag exploded in Bolan's fist, the heavy round evaporating windshield glass downrange, its passage spraying shiny pebbles out across the hood. The Raven spun to face him, obviously taken by surprise but running on his instincts now, the AK-47 answering with deadly, searching fire. The soldier hit a slide and came to rest behind a gravestone, angry hornets swarming overhead and clattering against the stone, mere inches from his face.
But his easy, one-time-only shot was gone, and the warrior knew he would be lucky now to make it out of there alive.
* * *
Gerry Axelrod could not believe it when the goddamn limo started moving, carrying his cover out of range and damn near dumping him beneath the fat rear tires. He rolled away and came up cursing, scrambling for safety as the car began to gather speed. Vachon was pounding on the driver's window, bellowing in French for him to stop the frigging car before they all got killed, and then another Magnum round came sizzling in from somewhere on the slope directly opposite, and hardman number two was nothing but a memory.
Reflexively, the Georgian aimed his squat Detonics at the tombstones, squeezing off a round that didn't make him feel the least bit better. They were sitting ducks down here, and now the chicken-shit chauffeur was taking off with half their transportation, leaving them with nothing but the truck.
It struck him then, and Axelrod was conscious of precisely what he had to do. No time for second thoughts, no time for anything except a dead-end run for cover at the van.
He had given up on wondering who the gunner was. There had been too damn many shocks already — first, the Raven popping up from nowhere, making off with the valise of cash, and then the hidden gunner, damn near popping him before he had a chance to clear the scene.
The Raven was alive, as far as Axelrod could tell. His driver hadn't been so lucky — he was stretched out in the middle of the narrow blacktop, leaking from half a dozen holes — but from appearances, the Raven had emerged unscathed.
Vachon had thrown himself across the limo's windshield, heedless of the gunfire all around him now, obscuring the driver's view and forcing him to creep along by jerks and starts. Incoming rounds were whining off the armored body, etching cobweb patterns on the safety glass, and still the tank kept inching forward, like an armadillo suddenly deprived of sight.
A shotgun blast sent pellets swarming overhead, and Axelrod bugged out, aware of Toby scrambling for cover on his left, intent on finding sanctuary among the headstones there. The bitch was on her own; he had no time for anything except survival now, and even that was hanging by a thread.
Ahead of him, he saw the Raven make his move, already at the truck and climbing to the cab. Great minds, he thought, and he was almost there when someone opened up in front of him, a frigging cannon roaring in his face and taking out the windshield of the truck.
He flattened on the shoulder of the pavement, watched the bullet-scarred Mercedes lurching out of sight behind the van. And he was watching as the bullet took Vachon, its impact punching him away and backward off the windshield, frantic fingers scrabbling at the glass for purchase. The French Canadian caught a windshield wiper, bent it backward with his sagging weight... and it was just enough to keep his bulk from rolling clear. As Axelrod lay watching, Paul Vachon slid beneath the limousine. One tire passed over both his legs, the femurs snapping with a sound of muffled gunshots, lost within the echo of a strangled scream.
The Merc shot forward, suddenly accelerating, but the driver lost it as a gunner suddenly descended from the tailgate of the van and blundered straight into the limo's path. The impact rolled him up across the hood, and Axelrod could see the driver's hands fly up as if to intercept a blow before the big car started drifting, gathering momentum on a collision course with the abandoned Jeep. The armored nose of the Mercedes almost cut the Jeep in two, and then the gas tank blew, an oily ball of fire devouring the limousine and bringing it to a halt.
He didn't wait around to watch the driver scramble for his life, his suit
in flames. The Raven was already cranking on the van's ignition, struggling to put the juggernaut in motion, and it was the only hope that Axelrod retained of getting out alive.
The Georgian lumbered to his feet and sprinted toward the truck, aware of fleeting movement on his left. A man in black was rising up to risk a shot, and what the hell was that, a cannon in his fist? The squat Detonics roared, his target dropped from sight instinctively, and Axelrod was at the truck, with no time left to think about the enemy.
He scrambled for the cab — and came up short, the muzzle of an AK-47 in his face. The Raven recognized him, hesitated for a heartbeat, finally let the rifle drop.
"Come on!" he shouted, wrestling the gearshift into first, already standing on the gas to put the van in motion.
And he flooded it. The engine shuddered and died.
The Raven slammed one fist against the dashboard, cursing bitterly in Spanish as he twisted the ignition key, and Gerry Axelrod was wondering when his life would start to pass before his eyes.
"Let off the gas!"
"Shut up!"
Still pumping at the van's accelerator, cursing as the engine cranked and groaned, the Raven turned to Axelrod ... and smiled. A chill raced up the Georgian's spine, the short hairs lifting on his neck as he realized that he was riding with a lunatic.
The bastard was insane. He was enjoying all of it, as if the massacre had been arranged for the purpose of entertainment.
And everyone was wrong, the Georgian knew with sudden clarity. Your life did not begin to flash before your eyes when you were on the verge of death. Instead, your future ran before you, like a newsreel in fast forward, tantalizing you and tearing at your guts with all the things that might have been.
The spokesman for American survivalists hunched down inside the cab and stolidly prepared himself to die.
* * *
Carl Lyons fed another round into the shotgun's magazine and worked the slide. Crawling on his belly near the headstones, he was searching for a target, aware that he was running out of time. If nothing else, the smoke from burning vehicles would soon attract attention, bringing firemen and police around his ears.
He scanned the narrow battlefield, intent on finding out precisely who had joined the battle. He hadn't seen the gunner yet, but he could scarcely miss the gunshots, echoing among the headstones like the rumbling of artillery.
A Magnum, definitely, but...
The half-formed thought was teasing him when Lyons caught a glimpse of movement among the headstones opposite. A flash of color, and he recognized the lady fed, evacuating while she had the chance. She cleared a statue of the Virgin, was proceeding toward another monument when someone tackled her and rode her to the ground.
Goddammit! Lyons couldn't see a thing now for the drifting smoke and intervening obstacles. He risked a closer look, and someone down below released a burst of automatic fire, the parabellum rounds defacing family headstones on his left and right.
The guy was too damn good, and Lyons had determined to eliminate the threat... when, suddenly, he heard an engine turning over, revving, slipping into gear. A glance, and he was startled as the truck began to move, a grinning figure hunched behind the wheel and keeping low, providing him with little in the way of target.
Out of nowhere, Gerry Axelrod was pounding toward the truck, his ruined jacket flapping out behind him, and Lyons was about to drop the bastard when he saw a figure rising, wraithlike, from behind a tombstone just in front of the survivalist. He didn't need a second glance to recognize the black-clad figure or the silver hog-leg in his hand.
Mack Bolan.
The goddamn guy was sighting on the truck, intent on picking off the Raven, when Axelrod cut loose a double punch and drove him under cover. Lyons fired instinctively, his buckshot chewing pavement at the Georgian's heels, and Axelrod was out of sight, already in the cab before he had a chance to pump and fire again. He fired another round, etched jagged snowflake patterns on the driver's door — and ducked for cover as the Raven let him have another pinpoint burst of automatic fire.
The shithead must have nerves of steel, or else he must be running purely on survival instinct. Lyons heard the engine revving up again, was rising on his knees to risk another shot... and then it stalled. He felt a savage smile distort his face, aware that he could have them now with Bolan's help.
Rising out of smoke and shadow, a surviving gunner broke in the direction of the truck, his Uzi tracking on the hillside, milking short, staccato bursts toward Lyons's nest. The guy was firing blind but coming close enough to force the Able warrior down, and Lyons pumped an angry round in his direction, knowing it would miss his target by a mile.
And he was watching as the bastard reached the truck, got one foot on the running board, one hand upon the windowsill. He meant to join the party, tag along to safety if they ever got the van in motion. The guy was shouting something, still inaudible from Lyons's vantage point, when Axelrod reached over, pressed his automatic up against the gunner's cheek and fired.
As if on cue the engine caught, and Lyons was convinced that he could hear a twist of high-pitched laughter drifting upward from the open window of the van. The Raven poked his AK-47 through the driver's window, firing off a burst, but Lyons held his ground, the twelve-gauge roaring as he worked the slide with lightning speed. When it was empty he discarded it and ripped the four-inch Python from its armpit holster, banging off six rounds at the retreating cab.
Across the narrow drive, Mack Bolan's AutoMag was bellowing in concert with his Colt, the heavy rounds impacting squarely on the target, savaging the Raven's flanks as he accelerated out of there. The truck began to shudder as he took it through the gears, and crates were spilling off the open tailgate, shattering on impact, spewing AUGs and submachine guns in the street. Another moment and the bullet-punctured dinosaur had vanished, lost behind a screen of trees that lined the curving drive.
The Ironman cursed beneath his breath. He'd blown it, let the bastards get away, and there was nothing left to show for all the carnage but a scattering of two-bit gunners, dead or dying from their wounds. Worse yet, he'd blown it with Mack Bolan looking on.
Carl Lyons shook his head, returned the Python to its harness, stooping to retrieve the shotgun. Grimly, knowing he had failed, he started down to face the Executioner.
"Longtime."
Mack Bolan nodded, shook Lyons's hand.
"Too long," he said.
"Well, if we're done with class reunions here..."
The lady's voice was peevish, and she made no effort to conceal her irritation as she joined them, hobbling down the hillside, shoes in hand.
"I didn't have the Raven figured for a personal appearance," Bolan said, ignoring her.
"You saw him, then?" There was a trace of doubt in Lyons's voice, as if he half suspected he had been hallucinating.
"Everybody saw him." Toby's voice was mocking, almost bitter. "He was sitting right up there as plain as day."
"I blew it," Lyons said, disgusted with himself.
"Then so did I," the Executioner replied. "I had him cold before he hit the cab."
"Goddamn it!" Lyons shook his scattergun in the direction of the vanished truck. "We were that close."
"Spilt milk," the lady fed observed. "We'll be that close to jail if we don't get our tails in gear."
"We've got a minute," Bolan told her, trying to project a confidence he didn't feel. "I want to check on something first."
He moved among the corpses, pausing here and there to turn a body over, checking for a pulse or peeling back an eyelid, seeking signs of life, but all in vain. He was about to call it off when he reached Paul Vachon, the Canadian lying on his back with shattered legs, his shirt and jacket saturated with the scarlet seepage of a chest wound.
And the guy was still alive.
Against all odds, his eyelids fluttered, rolling back on glassy orbs. The Executioner knelt down beside him, slipped a hand beneath the dealer's head to help him br
eathe. The eyes were unseeing, and Vachon believed that he was being comforted by Gerry Axelrod.
"It's not my fault," he gasped.
"I know that," Bolan told him.
"Did you... save the shipment?"
"No. We lost it, Paul."
Vachon stiffened, trembling. "Merde." He fought for breath a moment, finally found it. "Steyr. I have people there, inside. You tell them that I send you."
And he knew that he was dying.
"The Raven, Paulie. What's his action?"
"Partner. His connection... Steyr."
Strength and life ran out together, and the guy was suddenly flaccid in the soldier's hands. As Bolan rose he heard the distant sirens drawing closer, running all the numbers down to doomsday zero in his mind.
"You ready now?"
The lady's voice betrayed anxiety in place of anger and Bolan nodded, striking off along his backtrack toward the hidden rental car.
"I've got some wheels back there," Carl Lyons told him, nodding vaguely toward the cemetery's southern quadrant.
"We can drop you off," Bolan told him, pushing on among the headstones, putting death behind him for the moment.
"We?" The lady fed was close behind him, walking in his tracks, avoiding contact with the graves. "You got a hamster in your pocket there, or what?"
The soldier let it go, his mind already occupied with other problems. They had blown it, and there was nothing left to do but try and save the pieces now. Whatever happened next, the three of them were in it together. Wherever it might lead them, they could not afford to let it go.
The Executioner could not afford to let it go.
He had too much invested in the chase to simply watch his quarry slip away. He had no option but to forge ahead, regardless of the cost.
And if it cost his life, it would be worth it, to feel the Raven's throat within his grasp, to see the spark of life snuffed out behind those gloating eyes.
Flight 741 Page 17