“No, no—not on his terms; my terms, Charlie. We fight on the same terms, see—only I got a hell of a lot more experience. And a lot more class.”
“Class will tell, won’t it? You know, Zeno, at this moment you are looking and thinking and talking just exactly like the small-time hood you really are.”
“Get outta here, you bastard you!” Varone snarled. His hand tightened around the glass, the knuckles whitening with tension.
“You’re sure that’s what you want?”
“I’m sure.”
“All right, gladly,” replied the other in a pleasant voice, and Charlie Rickert, full-time cop and part-time Maffiano, went quietly to the door and got out of there.
“Hey, I’m ready for some R and R,” Andromede announced. He dropped to the floor in front of the couch and flaked out, face down, his forehead resting on an upflung arm.
“He got rich in one day and he’s bitching,” Fontenelli observed, winking at Blancanales.
“But oh, my nerves,” Andromede said in a muffled voice.
Blancanales was delicately applying a burn ointment to a reddened area of Fontenelli’s shoulder. “Don’t find many men with hair on their shoulders,” he muttered, then added, “It’s not a bad burn, Chopper. Could a been a lot worse, considering.”
Fontenelli merely grunted.
“Hell, it’s three o’clock,” Andromede announced. “Let’s get some sacktime.”
“We’re gonna hit ’em, and hit ’em, and keep on hittin’ ’em,” Fontenelli declaired, in a fair imitation of Bolan’s voice, “until Flower Child starts crying for some sacktime.”
“Up your butt, brother,” Andromede replied quietly.
Bolan entered from the kitchen, carrying a sandwich and coffee. “How’s the shoulder look, Politician?” he asked.
“More pain than damage,” Blancanales assured him.
“But not enough pain to straighten his brain,” Andromede added. He rose to a kneeling position and rocked back on his haunches, staring expectantly at Bolan.
Bolan was positioning a TV tray in front of a chair. He sat down, pulled the tray closer, and sampled the coffee. “We got lucky,” he said simply.
Fontenelli flexed his massive shoulders and directed a veiled gaze at Bolan. “The sarge pulled leather on me tonight,” he announced casually.
Deadeye Washington, seated in a large recliner across the room, chuckled and said, “And you’re able to talk about it? I guess you did get lucky, then.”
“Yeah.” Fontenelli was still staring at Bolan. “I think everybody oughta know—he also pulled me outta one hell of a bad spot. He was free and clear, and he came back to get me out. I’ll never forget that, Sarge.”
Bolan swallowed a chunk of sandwich and nodded his head. “I’d like to think you’d do the same for me, Chopper.”
A grin slowly spread across Fontenelli’s dark face. “Sorry I got out of line. It won’t happen again.”
Bolan winked at him, then turned his attention to Gadgets Schwarz. “Did you get Varone’s office doctored up okay?” he asked him.
Schwarz stared solemnly back at Bolan. “Sure. That jazzed-up joint was a natural. Never saw such an overdecorated layout. He’s rigged good. And I got a twelve-hour recorder with a voice-impulse starter up on the roof of the next building. Bloodbrother was assisting, so he knows where it is. We can slip up there twice a day and change the tapes, and that gives us a twenty-four-hour automatic surveillance on the place.”
“Great.” Bolan washed down the last of the sandwich with a swallow of coffee. He glanced at his watch. “I’d like to have that first tape before ten this morning. Take Bloodbrother to cover you. Oh, and since Giordano is out of the picture now, maybe you better figure some way to get your gadgets out of his place before someone discovers them. No sense tipping our hand before we just have to.”
“I already did that.”
Bolan’s eyebrows raised.
“These things are too damn hard to come by. I don’t leave them laying around in a dead drop.”
“My nerves,” Andromede said. “I wouldn’t have your job between a nympho’s tits.”
Schwarz smiled. “I enjoy it,” he murmured.
Bolan was staring at Fontenelli. “That cop,” he mused.
“What cop?” Schwarz asked.
“I was, uh, thinking out loud, I guess,” Bolan replied. “Chopper and I had a little encounter with a plainclothes cop out at Tri-Coast tonight.”
“Yeah, we heard about it,” Andromede said.
“That cop was bad news—plenty bad news, I’m afraid. Did, uh, any of you get a good look at the cops we boxed off the freeway this afternoon?”
The men exchanged glances. None volunteered a reply. “I did,” Bolan said, after a moment of silence. “They were right alongside me for a few seconds there, you know. And I had ’em in my rear view for damn near a full minute.”
Another short silence followed. Bolan seemed to be lost in thought. Presently, Zitka said, “So?”
“Well, so the cop who was breathing on Chopper and me at Tri-Coast tonight was also in that tail car on the freeway this afternoon.”
“What does that prove?” Zitka wanted to know.
“Well now, look—cops are like troops. I mean, a guy in Dog Company is not likely to be found over in a Charlie Company firefight. A cop who’s on a routine stakeout over at Giordano’s at three in the afternoon isn’t likely to be found on a routine investigation out at the edge of Burbank at midnight that same night. They just don’t play that way.”
“Unless the guy is in some elite squad,” Zitka muttered thoughtfully.
“Exactly. And the police response was quick. Damn quick. They were all over that place in no time at all.”
“Like they’d been just sitting and waiting for someplace to run to, eh?” Blancanales observed.
Bolan showed him a faint smile. “Yeah. And this cop called me by name.”
“Hell, he called me Bolan, too,” Fontenelli remarked.
“Makes it even a worse case,” Bolan replied. “It wasn’t a matter of personal recognition. It was a case of expectation. He went there expecting to find me.”
“Hell, you’re a celebrity,” Harrington piped up, grinning.
“Goes deeper than that, Guns,” Bolan replied. “It looks as though the police have set up some sort of special unit. A unit that is directed squarely against us.”
“Screw ’em,” Fontenelli sneered. “They haven’t showed me anything yet.”
“We don’t get off that easy, Chopper,” Bolan said thoughtfully. “It pays to know your opposition. If those people are gearing up to bring us down, then we damn sure have to do some gearing of our own. I don’t like it. All of you know what can be accomplished with just a little bit of close-order organization. We’ve been successful so far because we’ve been playing it to a cadence count. Now if the cops are playing that same game, then I’d say we’d better come up with a counterpoint.”
“The sarge is right,” Andromede said. “We need some intelligence. Who’s our intelligence officer?” His gaze fell squarely upon Gadgets Schwarz.
Schwarz merely smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
A momentary silence followed; then Loudelk said, “I’ve tried everything else. I guess I could try infiltrating copsville.”
Bolan smiled wanly. “We’d better look at the idea pretty close. Could be a suicide mission.”
“It’s be just like sending Deadeye to Montgomery,” Zitka growled, “to infiltrate the triple K.”
Deadeye snickered and rolled his eyes.
“Gadgets and me could figure something,” Loudelk insisted stubbornly. His eyes were on Bolan, but he was speaking directly to Schwarz. “If I got you into range, couldn’t you come up with something?”
Andromede snapped his fingers and sang a little tune to the words “In the fuzz’s hall, we’ll give our all, for a bug or two on the men in blue.”
“Cut that crap out,” Fontenelli growl
ed.
Bolan was returning Loudelk’s direct stare. He was thinking about it. “What do you say, Gadgets?” he asked in a barely audible voice.
Schwarz also was thinking about it. “There are several ways to go about it,” he replied slowly. “We could monitor their radio frequencies, and that would be the safest and the easiest, but …”
“But?” Bolan prompted.
“Well we really do need to have a monitor on their radio nets, but it will take some inside work to just find out what those frequencies are.”
“All right, consider that as an objective,” Bolan agreed. “We want their radio frequencies. That should be an easy mark. Any radio amateur could probably give us that. But they probably have some special radio net for their elite unit. We’ll need that above all. Go on, Gadgets.”
Okay, that would be in the nature of just routine intelligence. These people don’t tell their secrets over the radio though, bet on that. So we need some way to monitor their telephone conversations, their official discussions, and their bull sessions. That means we have to get inside or …”
“Or what?”
“If this elite squad has a … well, they have to have, don’t they? A honcho, a guy in charge. We need to know who he is and where his headquarters are located.”
“The L.A. cops operate out of the Hall of Justice, don’t they?” Harrington put in.
“I don’t mean just the damn building,” Schwarz said. “I mean a particular room or office.”
“You’re really serious?” Fontenelli asked. “You’d try to get in there and plant bugs, right in the damn police station?”
“That may not be necessary,” Schwarz replied. “I might be able to use a directional mike.”
Bolan and Zitka exchanged thoughtful glances.
“I made a pickup once from a quarter mile,” Schwarz told them. “Of course, it was in quiet countryside. Noise level is much higher in a city like L.A., with a lot of diffusion of sound waves. Generally, without too much diffusion, you can trap a sound from anything you can see.”
Bolan sighed. “Give it a try, Gadgets. You and Brother get down there as soon as you feel ready and scout the layout. See what you can figure out. but don’t make any actual move until I’ve reviewed your plan. We’ll give this a top priority, and we make no further hits until our intellingece apparatus is functioning. While you’re out, pick up that tape from the Varone drop. I’ll want to know his reactions to tonight’s hit.” He showed Loudelk a grim smile. “I’m depending on your instincts, Brother, to keep this play safe. If it can’t be done without undue risk, we’ll just get along without it. Okay?”
Loudelk smiled. “Okay.”
“I’ll have to build a mike,” Schwarz added.
“You have all the stuff you need?”
“I think so. If not, I can pick up what I need in any electronics shop.”
Bolan shifted his gaze to Blancanales. “We’ve used the vehicles long enough, Politician,” he said crisply. “Better drop them and get some more. Be very discreet. Include my ’Vette—get me something else. Anything that’s got some fire. Maybe a Porsche, eh?”
“You don’t mean the horse, too?” Blancanales asked, frowning.
“No, but see what you can do about some new paint and decals. What about license tags?”
“No problem there.” They’re scared to death you were going to make me rig up a new horse.”
Bolan chuckled. “We might have to drop the horse idea entirely after another strike or two. They’re bound to tumble to it sooner or later, and then that big mother becomes a dead liability. Be thinking about a new gimmick.”
Blancanales’ frown deepened. “My nightmares are gettin’ worse all the time,” he groused.
The remark produced laughter from around the room. Andromede leaned over to place a hand on the Politician’s shoulder and loudly announced, “My nerves, man, I wouldn’t have your job—”
“Yeah I know,” Blancanales sourly interrupted, “Between a nympho’s tits.”
“No, I was going to say, in a confession booth in a cathouse.”
When the good-humored eruption had quieted, Andromede added, “And I’m ready for some R and R.”
Bolan was studying his watch. “Well, it’s getting on to four o’clock,” he said. “I can’t offer you much in the way of recreation, but it is time for a bit of rest. Let’s all turn in. Eight o’clock reveille.”
“Four hours!—I’m losin’ my powers!” Andromede groaned.
“I’m gonna shove that poetry right up your ass one o’ these days,” Fontenelli growled good-naturedly.
“Only with your nose, bro,” Andromede replied. He tossed a playful punch that missed Fontenelli by a foot, then danced lightly away, shadow boxing across the room and into the hallway.
Bolan sighed and got to his feet. He was having second thoughts about this death squad bit. The responsibility for these men’s lives and fortunes was beginning to weigh heavily upon him. He was using them, and he knew it, and the knowledge bothered him. Bolan had a consecrated interest in this war upon the Mafia. These men did not. What right had he to involve them in this life-and-death business?
Deadeye Washington had also risen to his feet and was now walking beside Bolan toward the hall to the bedrooms. He seemed to sense Bolan’s feelings. “These guys are here ’cause there’s really noplace else they’d rather be,” he told Bolan in a soft drawl.
“Maybe you’re right,” Bolan murmured.
“Sure I’m right. Some men just live to die, ’cause they’re already dead.”
“Are you already dead, Deadeye?” Bolan asked, looking at the big Negro with some surprise.
“This black man? Sure, man. I was born dead. And I’m still borning.”
It was not a particularly comforting idea for Bolan to take into his dreams.
Chapter Nine
ONE LITTLE INDIAN
“Okay, so Bolan turned up a new gangland front for us,” Captain Braddock said wearily. His manner was clearly one of irritation as he glared at his young detail leader, Sergeant Carl Lyons. “So what do we do—hang a Legion of Merit around his neck?”
Lyons responded with an embarrassed smile. “I merely pointed out that his presence here isn’t entirely negative,” the sergeant replied. His gaze wavered, broke, and shifted to Lieutenant Rickert. He found little comfort there.
“Looks like Bolan’s found a convert,” the lieutenant sneered. “Listen, kid, don’t get your wires crossed. This guy and his drill team are the most vicious threat to hit this city in my memory. Don’t go getting any romantic ideas.”
“Who is he a threat to?” Lyons replied stubbornly. “The only people I’ve seen hurting so far are those who should be hurting. Hell, I—”
“That’s enough of that!” Braddock snapped. “I don’t want any intellectual discussions around here about the debits and credits of Mack Bolan. It’s nonsense, utter damn nonsense, and I’ll release you, Sergeant, from Hardcase duty, effective immediately, if that is your wish.”
“That is not my wish.” Lyons clipped back. “My wish is to see Mack Bolan behind bars.” His anger seemed to evaporate in a flash. He raised a smile to the captain and added, “I’ll bet you an evening on the Strip that I’m the man who brings him in.”
Braddock’s face brightened. “You’re on. You want a piece of this action, Charlie?”
Rickert smiled and shook his head. “I’m just a cop, doing a cop’s job,” he said. “I don’t make book on anything that might happen. But you’re going to win that bet, Tim. Wet-behind-the-ears, here, won’t get within hailing distance of Bolan. The word is out, all over town. My informants tell me that Mack Bolan is as good as dead.”
“What do you mean, Charlie?” Braddock was wearing a troubled frown.
Rickert spread his hands in a delicate gesture. “Only that the Mafia generals are taking over the action, that’s all.”
“I’m still not sure I understand what you’re saying.”
/> “Accounding to the words I’m getting, the family has not been overly worried about Bolan. They put out a hundred-thou open contract and forgot about him. You know what an open contract means. Anybody can collect—anybody who can bring in Bolan’s scalp. Well … now the family is getting worried. The bounty hunters have been striking out. They can’t even get a finger on the guy, and meantime he’s chopping hell out of the local nephews. So they’re taking over the action. It probably means a hot war.”
“So why the roundabout way of letting me in on it?” Braddock snapped. “Hell, Rickert, do you know what you’re saying? Gang war, that’s what! Where did you get this information?”
Rickert was smiling, unruffled by the hostility of Braddock’s tone. “It’s all in my report, Tim. It’s lying right there on your desk.”
The captain’s harsh glare snapped down to the desk. “Okay, so I’m behind in my reading,” he growled.
“Figured you were,” Rickert observed. He was smiling. “Tell you what. I’ll break a long time M.O. I’ll make some book on this case. If Mack Bolan is not lying in a drawer of the morgue within seventy-two hours, I’ll give you both an evening on the Strip.”
“I, uh, don’t like to bet on life and death,” Braddock replied quietly.
Lyons scraped to his feet. “Me either. Well, it’s past noon and all’s quiet. I’m due back on the streets at six. I’m going home and get some rest, if that’s okay.”
Braddock gave Lyons an absent-minded nod. Obviously his mind was occupied with the information Rickert had just dropped. The sergeant’s departure was hardly noticed. Rickert was toying with a paperweight. “That kid will make a pretty good cop if he ever grows up,” he said.
Braddock ignored the comment. “We’re in trouble, Charlie,” he declared.
“I know it.”
“We are not one inch closer to Bolan than we were this time yesterday.”
“I know that, too.”
Braddock scratched his forehead and rocked back in his chair. “Gang war, eh?”
“Worse than that. Little Vietnam.”
“We’ve got to stop it. Before it gets started. Today. Now.”
Death Squad Page 9