Exit Code

by Don Pendleton

  Grano had to admit that he was probably a dinosaur when it came to business sense for the Family. He was used to the old-fashioned way of doing things: squeezing local business owners for protection, laundering funds in Vegas, and moving everything from one place to another where the highest bidders were waiting. Grano had damn near done it all. In fact, he’d originally started with old man Lenzini when the guy was just small potatoes. His primary job was mule, escorting jewels, chicks, or guns from here to there without drawing attention and without getting screwed by the other side. Yeah, he’d moved just about everything—except dope.

  Fortunately, Lenzini had been smart enough not to get into that game, and that’s what frosted his ass the most about guys like Pescia. All right, so they wanted to have their own territories and flex their muscles like they were big men. Grano didn’t have an issue with that. Except when it started to compromise the old man, or when it drew attention from the Feds. That’s where Grano had to draw the line, and it looked like that time had come for Pescia.

  Grano looked up at the sound of the door in the wall sliding aside and stood out of respect as Lenzini came in. The troop boss didn’t hesitate, though, when Lenzini waved him into his seat. He could tell there was a bit of disgust in Lenzini’s tone, but the old man was holding back his temper. His health couldn’t afford the kind of venom with which Lenzini had once run his organization. Any overexertion, mental or physical, could be an immediate death sentence.

  “Relax, Serge,” Lenzini said as he stopped behind his desk. “You’re among family. There’s no reason to be so goddamned formal.”

  “Of course, Don Lenzini.”

  Lenzini said, “I understand the situation in San Francisco turned serious.”

  “Yes, Don Lenzini.”

  “You want to explain it to me?”

  Grano could only shrug. “We missed hitting Pescia, boss. Our guys jumped too soon, and Lambretta left them in the cold.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I guess the freaking guy was armed to the teeth,” Grano replied.

  “Of course he was!” Lenzini spit. “What the fuck did you think would happen, Serge? This guy has one hell of a reputation! He’s as loyal as they come, and I planned to use that to our advantage, but because your people jumped too soon, he’s going to figure out it was us who sent them! And what do you think he’s going to do then, eh?”

  “I was talking to him when the hit went down. He’d never suspect it was me that set it up. There’s nothing to tie them to us.”

  “There doesn’t have to be,” Lenzini replied, settling down after his outburst produced a fit of coughing. “That’s my whole point. Nobody else knew he was in town.”

  “Except Pescia,” Grano interjected.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Something about this Lambretta isn’t as loyal as you might think, Don Lenzini.” Grano knew he had the old man now. He loved Lenzini, but the guy was brutal and Grano had sworn long ago he’d make sure he never looked bad in front of him. There always had to be someone else to blame. “Yeah, you heard me right. Lambretta went to see Pescia at his club. They apparently had a nice long talk.”

  “About what?”

  “About how he ran because of a Fed at the Garden of Allah.”

  “You think Gino flipped him?”

  Grano shook his head. “Flipped him with what? I don’t think Gino could come up with the kind of smack necessary to buy off Lambretta. Besides, the guy is supposed to be loyal. I think he was probably just looking to take over the operation once you gave the order to have Gino whacked, and this gave him a chance to scope the territory.”

  “I warned him about screwing us around,” Lenzini said, coughing again.

  “Well, it would seem that he didn’t listen to you very good.”

  “What do you think we should do about that?”

  “I think we better ‘find him.’”

  “What do you mean ‘find him’?” Lenzini asked. “I thought he was still in San Francisco?”

  “His tail was one of the team that got whacked. We don’t know what happened after that. We know that his hotel room got blown apart, and what we’re hearing from our guys inside the cops there is that machine guns were used. We’re also hearing that something went down at some motel just outside of town with machine guns and grenades, and they’re thinking the two jobs are related.”

  “So that’s what they think, Serge,” Lenzini said. “What do you think?”

  “I was thinking it sounded an awful lot like what went down at the club in D.C.”

  “That’s a good thought.” Lenzini was quiet for a long moment, and said, “That’s a good thought indeed. I think you could be onto something. I want you to take Ape and go to San Francisco and find Lambretta. And I want Gino brought back here alive like we originally planned.”

  “Understood, but we have another problem you need to know about. They screwed up in Texas and lost the government broad.”

  For a moment, Grano thought Lenzini’s head would explode off his shoulders. The man’s face turned a deep scarlet, and Grano could tell he wanted to unload but that he was holding back. They couldn’t afford to lose Lenzini at such a crucial time, and nobody knew that better than Lenzini.

  “I can’t ask Trabucco to do one simple thing without him fucking it up. And he’s got DeLama’s kid with him. You know, I’m like an uncle to that kid. You know this, right?”

  “I know, Don Lenzini,” Grano said softly.

  “Well, you’re in charge of security and the bulls, Serge, so I expect you’ll know how to handle this. Don’t bring this petty shit to me. This one time, I’ll tell you what you do. You have those guys meet you out on the West Coast. They can help you look for Gino and Lambretta.”

  “What about Lambretta? You want we should bring him back too?”

  “No, I wouldn’t waste your time with that.”

  “So what do you want done with him?”

  “I don’t care,” Lenzini said. “Just see that he doesn’t come back.”

  11

  Los Angeles, California

  Mack Bolan looked over Pescia’s assembled crew, cautious to maintain his air of authority.

  He couldn’t afford to let the crowd of mobsters think he was soft, but he also had to convince them Gino Pescia was still ultimately in charge of things. That was really the only way he could insure that his plans would succeed while still keeping the loyalty of these men. Bolan searched his near-photographic memory, and after a few minutes he realized that Pescia was rather well-connected on the West Coast. There weren’t just soldiers and bulls gathered, but also a few midrankers and even one high-level capo.

  What Bolan found most ironic was that he was about to send some of these guys into a situation where they were going to encounter members of the New Islamic Front—if everything went off as planned—and by drawing them out he would be able to destroy both enemy groups. It was risky, but it was all he had to go on, and the Executioner had to play the hand the way it was dealt to him.

  “All right, listen up,” Pescia said, putting an end to the idle chitchat. “I wanna thank all of you for coming on such short notice. This here is Frankie Lambretta. Some of you might have heard of him.”

  Bolan quickly scanned their faces, but there were no real acknowledgments of recognition at either his face or his name. That was okay, just as long as they all got a good look. Bolan was planning on a few escaping the upcoming encounter so they could get word back to Grano and the rest—when the time was right.

  “Now, Frankie was sent by Don Lenzini to ice me, but when I explained what we were trying to do out here, that plan suddenly changed.” Pescia made a funny gesture with his hands, and everyone laughed boisterously. After they’d settled down, Pescia continued, “But we’ve got a common enemy, guys. The Arabs have taken over, and Don Lenzini’s in for a fall unless we do something now.”

  “How do we know it’s the Arabs?” one guy asked.

&nbs
p; “Because we saw a bunch of our dead crew in San Francisco,” Bolan said. “Somebody blew them all to hell, and we know that the only others who knew their location would have been the Arabs. Plus, I talked with Serge Grano back in Boston. He told me that they did something similar in D.C. not that long ago.”

  “So what’s with this powwow?” another asked.

  “We’re going to get some payback,” Bolan replied. “Gino here helped Don Lenzini’s people set up the technical site downtown that the rags are going to use for taking over the world, or whatever the hell it is they’re planning. We think that once they’re up and running, they’ll no longer have a use for us and we’ll be throwaway.”

  “There’s no way they outnumber us,” one of the guys popped off.

  “What’s your name?” Bolan asked him.

  “Ray Donatto,” he replied.

  “Of the San Fernando Valley Donattos,” Pescia added.

  The guy nodded respectfully at Pescia.

  Yeah, Mack Bolan knew exactly who Ray Donatto was, although he hadn’t seen any pictures of him since Donatto was a just a snot-nosed hood up and coming in the world. All of the intelligence channels through Brognola’s Justice connections had it that Ray Donatto was as nasty and ruthless as they came. Donatto was actually a capo in charge of many of the soldiers working for his father, and had managed to establish quite an empire of his own. Rumors had it he had once taken a chain saw to a Cuban dealer in a drug buy gone sour, and then mailed the remains back to the dealer’s spouse. Once word got around he never had any trouble after that, and the repeated attempts by state and federal officials to put him behind bars had failed.

  “I’ve heard of you, Donatto,” Bolan said. “No disrespect, but I’d have to disagree with you.”

  “About what?”

  “The mere fact we outnumber the Arabs won’t be enough to put them down. We also need to show our muscle, and a hell of a lot of it. They’re well supplied with arms and support, and they probably have near as good connections as we do. The only difference between us and them is that we have the advantage of working on our home turf. We need to keep that advantage, and we do that by putting them down and keeping them down. We don’t give them any quarter and we put our foot on their necks when they get out of line. They have to understand we’re not just going to roll over, and we need to make sure we send a message about what happens when you go against the Family—when you go against us.”

  Bolan was surprised when every man in the room burst into applause, some even cheering. He hadn’t really meant to give a speech, but nobody could have blamed him for getting into the part. It was something the Executioner did naturally in role camouflage. He inspired and commanded, no matter what the setting, and there was something in his nature that even now demanded the attention of these men. They were different from him—so very different—and yet he could still set a command-and-control atmosphere.

  “That all sounds good, Frankie,” Donatto mouthed off again. “But just how do you suggest we do this?”

  “By sending them the same message they sent us,” Bolan said, snapping back. “Word has it these guys are going to be working tonight. We need to return the favor for San Francisco, and we need to do it now. There’s no telling what they’ll be able to do once they get this computer system going that they’ve been making us all pay for, and we can’t just let what happened go by without making sure they understand what happens when you cross us.”

  “So you want us to risk sending in a bunch of our guys and blowing everything to hell?” Donatto asked.

  Bolan fixed him with a level stare and replied, “Yeah, that’s what I’m suggesting.”

  There was a long pause as the two men studied each other. Donatto’s expression seemed almost like one of amusement, as if he were sizing up Bolan. He was, after all, probably the highest-ranking Mob member in that room, but he’d chosen to let others run the show. The reality was that he probably didn’t know a whole hell of a lot about the New Islamic Front, and maybe he didn’t care. It was entirely possible that Donatto was there to sniff around and see if he could get something out of the deal. The guy was a cutthroat opportunist, and Bolan didn’t trust him one damn bit. Still, this is what he had to work with and he couldn’t very well throw any offer for assistance back in their faces, or it would most definitely arouse suspicion.

  Finally, Donatto looked around at the others and said, “I’m willing to commit ten of my best guys. What about the rest of you?”

  It didn’t take but a moment for the rest of them to nod among themselves, and Bolan was satisfied. The first part of his plan was working. Sure, the Mob fought with one another like ravenous wolves, but give them a common enemy and they would flock together putting “Family” honor first.

  “So now that we’re all in agreement,” Donatto said, after the group had calmed, “how do you propose to do this?”

  “I say the first thing we do is go to where we set up their systems and take care of business. We have to send a message.” Bolan watched the faces and all seemed agreeable.

  “Then what?” Gino asked.

  Bolan’s tone was cold and hard and determined. “And then we find the ones in charge of these bastards, and we cut out their hearts.”

  BOLAN FOUND AN EXCUSE to get away after the meeting broke, and after driving around the town to verify he wasn’t followed, he found a pay phone near an abandoned warehouse and called Stony Man.

  “It’s me,” he told Brognola. “How are things going?”

  “Not good,” the Stony Man chief replied, getting immediately down to business. “I’m afraid they’re not good at all, Striker. Some members of the NIF snatched Rhatib, and in the process they killed a number of federal correctional officers as well as two U.S. Marshals.”

  Bolan’s heart went out to the slain officers and their families. He knew what it meant to suffer that kind of loss. There were countless brave souls just like those federal officers, making the ultimate sacrifice to protect those who could not protect themselves. He knew their kind because he was their kind, and because he had fought beside them repeatedly. The worst part of such tragedies was that the majority of the country didn’t know their names, and yet they were benefactors of their sacrifice.

  “We have any leads?” Bolan asked.

  “I decided to go through usual channels to conduct the actual investigation. Phoenix is handling something overseas right now, and I’ve got Able dealing with the protection of MacEwan’s mother. That was part of the deal. But Barb will be working with the FBI in keeping up on any of their findings.”

  “So, you’ve got MacEwan’s family covered but what about her? Is she safe?”

  “Yes,” Brognola replied. “We’ve got her tucked away in a safehouse, and she’s working diligently with Bear to figure out what’s happening with the network systems. I’ve get to tell you, she is one sharp lady.”

  “Agreed. So with Rhatib on the loose, where does that leave us?”

  “Well, we might have an opportunity here if we exploit it,” Brognola suggested. “We believe the NIF has some agents operating inside the country who are in fact remnants of your little visit to that mountain fortress in Afghanistan.”

  “How did you find this out?”

  “It was actually Barb who picked up on it.”

  Yeah, that didn’t surprise Bolan at all. There were few—very few—like Barbara Price. The woman had a knack for finding needles in haystacks, and it was this insight that had averted more potential disasters than anyone at Stony Man cared to count. While Price wasn’t a field operative, she remained an invaluable part of the team as Stony Man’s mission controller.

  “About three days ago, a plane went down just off the D.C. coast. The Coast Guard was about to conduct a spot inspection of a yacht when the call came through, so they had to break off and head for the downed aircraft,” the big Fed continued his explanation.

  “Let me guess,” Bolan interjected. “Members of the NIF were on
that boat.”

  “Well, we don’t have any proof but we think that’s what happened,” Brognola replied. “The Air Force’s tracking systems were never able to confirm that any aircraft was in that area when it reportedly went down, and the Coast Guard team never found any wreckage.”

  “It does sound suspicious,” Bolan said.

  “We’re still investigating, but we’re not optimistic we’ll find anything to suggest it was anything other than a decoy.”

  “And it’s too elaborate to be a practical joke.”

  “Issuance of a false Mayday is no joke,” Brognola said. “It’s a federal offense and usually carries jail time. Which means the perpetrators of such a hoax cared little for any possible penalties they might face, or were extremely desperate to accomplish their true objectives. We’ll keep on it and see if we can find that yacht.”

  “Good enough. But I’m still not sure about the ties to the group I took down in Afghanistan.”

  “That has to do more with Rhatib. Rhatib’s father was killed during the liberation of Afghanistan by American forces, but apparently he has an uncle who was once part of the Taliban. He also held an honorary military rank as a colonel in Iraq’s Republican Guard.”

  “What do we know about this guy?”

  “His name is Umar Abdalrahman. His current status and location is unknown, unless we’re correct about him possibly being here in the country now. He’s on Homeland Security’s most-wanted list. There’s no telling how deep his involvement with the NIF goes, or what he’s really responsible for.”

  “I think I could guess,” Bolan replied dryly. “What about Lenzini’s network?”

  “You should know that Bear and the team managed to crack his security. Apparently, it wasn’t as difficult as we’d thought it would be. But then again, it served its intended purpose by wasting a lot of precious time. Frankly, I’m afraid this news isn’t any better than the last.”