Blood caked her right cheek and chin, and her right shoulder was awash in crimson.
“She’s your mom?” Ozzi blurted out, and tried to swing the Bushmaster around.
Helen was faster. She closed on the hit man and swung the machete, her blade deflecting the Bushmaster barrel to the right. With the deadly proficiency born of years of practice, she employed a reverse strike, slashing the machete across Ozzi’s chest, the keen edge cleaving several inches into his flesh.
Ozzi screamed and frantically tried to back away.
Helen wouldn’t let him. She took a measured stride and swung the machete with all her strength, catching the hit man in the throat and nearly decapitating him.
Ozzi was dead on his feet. His head flopped to the left as blood gushed from his ravaged neck, and he sank to the I floor in lifeless silence.
Helen glared at the mobster for a second, then moved to Mindy.
“You’re hurt!” Mindy exclaimed in alarm.
“It’s nothing,” Helen said. “A scratch.”
For a moment mother and daughter gazed into each other’s eyes in mutual love and devotion, and then they embraced in a hug.
“Oh, Mom,” Mindy said, sniffling.
“It’s over,” Helen stated. “You’re safe. No one will hurt you now.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” commented a sarcastic, gruff voice.
Helen spun in the direction of the voice, putting herself between Mindy and the man in black six feet away. She raised the katana.
“I wouldn’t, if I were you,” the man remarked, pointing his Nighthawk at Helen.
“Don Giorgio!” Mindy declared in stark terror.
“How nice of you to remember me,” Giorgio mentioned bitterly. He held the Nighthawk in both hands. On the floor to his right was a brown leather briefcase.
“You’re the one who kidnapped Mindy!” Helen stated.
“Give the woman a prize,” Don Giorgio taunted her. He looked at Sacks and Ozzi. “You Warriors are more trouble than you’re worth.”
Helen took a step toward him. “You deserve to die!”
Giorgio’s grip on the Nighthawk tightened. “Don’t be stupid, woman! You’ll be cut to ribbons before you can get within two feet of me.”
“You’re going to kill us anyway,” Helen noted.
Don Giorgio grinned. “True. So which one of you wants it first? Mother or daughter?”
Helen was girding herself for a desperate lunge.
“No answer?” Giorgio scoffed. “Well, then, I’ll kill both of you together.
What can be more appropriate?”
“How about if you go first, cow chip?” interjected someone in a distinctly familiar Western accent.
Mindy glanced to her right.
Hickok was lying on his stomach on the floor, the Henry snug against his shoulder, sighting down the barrel. He was smiling, his left temple coated with blood.
Don Giorgio froze, the Nighthawk still trained on Helen. He knew Hickok would drill him if he so much as blinked.
“Go ahead,” Hickok said. “Make my year!”
Giorgio released the Nighthawk and the gun fell to the carpet. “I’m not an idiot.”
“You could have fooled me!” Hickok retorted.
Smiling smugly, Giorgio held his arms up, palms outward. “I know all about you Warriors. You’re real spiritual types. You live by some asinine code of honor.” He chuckled. “You would never shoot an unarmed man.”
“Do you know something?” Hickok asked, raising his chin from the Henry.
“What’s that?” Giorgio responded arrogantly.
Hickok’s features became an iron mask. “You’re wrong.”
In a startling flash of insight, Don Johnny Giorgio recognized he was staring death in the face. He took a step backward, fear flooding through him. “No!”
“Yes,” Hickok said, and fired.
The heavy slug from the 44-40 lifted Giorgio from his feet and hurled him over a yard to crash onto his back. He pushed himself into a sitting posture and gawked at a gaping hole in the center of his chest. Whining in despair, he stared at the gunfighter.
“Say hello to oblivion for me,” Hickok said softly, and squeezed the trigger.
Mindy heard the deafening retort of the Henry even as the top of Don Giorgio’s head exploded over the carpet and he was knocked flat. This time Giorgio didn’t move.
Hickok slowly stood and walked over to the Don.
“Is he dead?” Mindy queried hopefully.
“They don’t come any deader.”
EPILOGUE
“Are you positive I can’t convince you to stay longer?” Don Pucci asked.
“Thank you for your kindness,” Blade responded, “but we’ve stayed too long as it is. We must return to the Home.”
They were standing on the front steps of the Golden Crown Casino.
Pedestrians passed on the sidewalk, and the boulevard was filled with traffic.
“Peace has been restored to the city, thanks to you,” Don Pucci remarked.
Blade gazed across the boulevard at the Palace. The front entrance was boarded over. “Will you reopen Giorgio’s casino?”
“Eventually,” Don Pucci said. “I think I’ll have Mario run it.”
“He’s a competent man,” Blade remarked.
Loud laughter sounded behind them.
Blade glanced over his right shoulder, smiling at the sight of Hickok, Geronimo, Helen, and Mindy emerging from the Golden Crown. Hickok sported a white bandage on his head, courtesy of the staff at a nearby hospital. Geronimo’s right side was bandaged under his shirt, and his left thigh was wrapped tight with a white dressing. He had refused a crutch, and was walking with a pronounced limp. Helen’s right cheek had required seven stitches, and her right shoulder was covered by a white binding. Blade reached down and gingerly touched his vest above the area on his right side wounded during the battle. The dressing was itching terribly.
“I tell you, pard!” Hickok declared. “These casinos are great ideas! How about if we try and convince the Elders to build one at the Home?”
“I doubt they’d consent,” Blade replied.
“They don’t know what they’re missing!” Hickok said.
“I know someone who is probably missing you,” Blade mentioned.
“Your wife. We’ve been here a week. It’s time to hit the road.”
Helen walked up to Don Pucci. “Thank you for your hospitality. If you ever get up our way…”
“I’ll keep the thought in mind,” Pucci commented.
“What about the proposal I made?” Blade inquired. “We can always use another member in the Freedom Federation.”
“Thanks, but no,” Don Pucci said. “We have survived for over a century because we have scrupulously avoided all entanglements. We must uphold our neutrality.”
“I understand,” Blade commented.
Don Pucci gazed at the giant thoughtfully for several seconds. “There is some information I must pass on to you,” he said. “But I must qualify my remarks. As you can imagine, with the thousands and thousands of visitors to Vegas every year, we hear a lot of stories, a lot of rumors. Most of it is worthless hearsay. Exaggerated tales. Inebriated rambling. But we do glean important information from some of our customers. They may mention a fact to a hostess, or to a bartender, or one of the pros. And if the information is considered to be of any merit, it is passed up the chain of command to me.” He paused.
“Did you hear something about us?” Hickok asked.
“Was someone blabbin’ about Blade’s snorin’ again?”
Pucci shook his head. “This is most serious. A man passed through Vegas several weeks ago. He spent several nights with one of the pros, and he talked a lot. She didn’t think much of it at the time, because the man was a heavy drinker. But everyone in Vegas now knows we are in your debt. And when she realized you are the ones this man was talking about, she came to see me.”
“What did thi
s man say?” Blade questioned, his curiosity aroused.
“He told her about this group living in Minnesota,” Don Pucci related.
“He said his masters—that was the word he used—were planning to eradicate this group known as the Family.”
The Warriors exchanged glances.
“Anything else?” Blade probed.
“This man mentioned the name of his masters,” Don Pucci divulged.
“They are called the Dragons.” He frowned. “I have heard of these Dragons, Blade. I don’t know a lot about them, but I do know they are based in the former state of Florida. And I know they have a reputation for viciousness unmatched by anyone else.”
“Why would these Dragons want to take on the Family?” Hickok interjected. “We’ve never tangled with them.”
“Again,” Don Pucci emphasized, “I can’t vouch for the reliability of this information. But I thought you should know.”
“Thanks,” Blade said. “We’ll report it to our Leader.”
“Is there anything you need before you depart?” Don Pucci inquired.
Blade thought of the SEAL, parked in the lot behind the Golden Crown.
Mario had driven him from the city four days before so he could reclaim the transport. “No, thanks. We’re fully provisioned and ready to go.”
The giant Warrior and the Don shook hands.
“I hope we meet again some day,” Don Pucci said.
“Take care,” Blade stated. He turned and walked to the sidewalk, bearing to the left, intending to stroll around the Golden Crown to the rear parking lot.
Hickok, Geronimo, Helen, and Mindy followed him.
“Say, pard,” Hickok said, catching up with Blade. “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t say anything to my missus about me spendin’ a week gambling. She might not cotton to the idea.”
“I won’t lie for you,” Blade remarked.
“Who’s askin’ you to lie?” Hickok queried. “I just don’t want to get in trouble.”
“You don’t need to worry about Blade telling your wife,” Geronimo spoke up.
Hickok looked back. “I don’t?”
“Nope,” Geronimo said, grinning. “Because I will.”
“What did I ever do to you?” Hickok demanded.
“Do you want me to list everything?” Geronimo inquired. “There was the time when we were six years old, and you convinced me to take a bath in a mud puddle with my clothes on. Remember that? You claimed everyone did it, and my mother wouldn’t mind. She did.”
Hickok chuckled. “I’d plumb forgotten all about that.”
“And there was the time when we were ten,” Geronimo went on. “You persuaded me to stick a frog down Emily’s dress. You claimed she loved frogs. She didn’t.”
Hickok snickered.
“And how about the time when we were fifteen?” Geronimo continued.
“We went on a double date, remember? You suggested we should all go skinny-dipping in the moat. We were supposed to each get undressed separately, behind the bushes, then come out and go swimming. But when I stepped out in the open, I was the only one naked.”
“I thought the girls would bust a gut laughing,” Hickok recalled, and laughed.
“And you have the gall to ask about my reason for telling your wife?” Geronimo asked in amazement.
Hickok sighed and glanced at Blade. “It’s pitiful.”
“What is?” Blade responded.
“This mangy Injun is one of my best friends,” Hickok muttered.
“I know. So?” Blade said.
“So with friends like him, is it any wonder I’m always in hot water?” Hickok lamented his fate.
Blade smiled. “Look at it from our perspective.”
“What do you mean?” Hickok inquired.
“With a friend like you around,” Blade said, “there’s never a dull moment.”
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