Annotation
Mack Bolan persuades a Mafia target to betray the brotherhood, as a trade for a new life in the federal witness program. But the Mob snatches the informant before he has a chance to "sing."
The trail of the traitor leads the Executioner to New York, where the local don is holding court to pick a Mafia monarch for the vacant throne.
Bolan crashes the coronation dinner to find the head of the snitch on the royal menu.
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Don Pendleton's
Prologue
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Don Pendleton's
Shock Waves
If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
George Bernard Shaw
The Mafia's closet is filled with unquiet skeletons these days. It's time they learned to dance again: a dance of death.
Mack Bolan
To Sergeant Dominic Sansone and the seven unidentified MIAs returned by Hanoi on July 17, 1984. Your war is over. Sleep well.
Special thanks and acknowledgment to Mike Newton for his contributions to this work.
Prologue
The tall man moved through darkness, wrapping shadows about him like a cloak. Dark trees surrounded him and screened him from the traffic flowing even at this late hour on Fifth Avenue. A dozen strides from the curb, and he found himself in a different world.
It was a world habitually shunned by law-abiding locals once the sun set, a realm where predators held sway between dusk and dawn, but that did not intimidate the hunter. He was used to jungles, darker and more dangerous than this one in the heart of New York.
The Executioner had come to Central Park to keep a rendezvous, and he was early, taking his time along the footpath, making sure he had not been followed when he left the cab. He dawdled past the zoo, closed now, the night sounds of the animals inside completing the jungle atmosphere.
The predators in there, he knew, were under lock and key, secure. It was the human animal, outside the bars, who had transformed the once-majestic park into a place of dread, its name synonymous with mugging, rape and murder after nightfall.
He almost wished that one of them would find him, try lining up this mark — but he was on a different mission, and there was no time to spare. His contact, unaccountably, had picked the Chess and Checker House to be their meeting place. It was some fifty yards in front of him now, just visible between the trees.
At thirty yards. Mack Bolan spotted the waiting figure in the shadows, standing against the south wall, dragging at a cigarette held within his cupped palm. The glowing ember flared, disappeared, and flared again as Bolan started circling, a gliding shadow in the velvet black, diminishing the gap between them.
And he made the recognition ten yards out, despite the shadows. There was no mistaking that profile, the large but well-formed nose, dark hair swept back from the face in a modish style.
The men had never met, but Bolan knew his contact well enough from photographs — including mug shots taken over several years by agents of the FBI and the Baltimore Police Department. And he could have picked Nino Tattaglia out of a crowd any day of the week.
His contact gave a little start when Bolan showed himself, emerging from the shadows with a magician's slick timing. Hesitant, unsure if he was being set up for a fall, Tattaglia took his time about approaching, taking a last drag from the butt and flicking it away.
When they were close enough to speak in whispers, Nino glanced around self-consciously and said, "I'm Sticker."
Bolan took the hand he offered, pumped it once and gave the countersign.
"How's everything in Wonderland?"
Tattaglia relaxed — but only just. His eyes were constantly in motion, searching every shadow for a sign that they were being observed by enemies who might have followed either of them.
"You clean?" he asked.
"For now. We haven't got a lot of time."
"You called that right. I was afraid it might come down before you got here."
"So I'm here."
"Yeah, right. Well, anyway, the meeting's on as planned. Minelli's looking for a confirmation, as you suspected."
"And what about the opposition?"
"They'll be here, but rumor has it that Minelli's got a big surprise planned. Something that'll take the wind out of their sails and leave him sitting on top of the heap. I take it he's planning on a coronation."
"That must be some surprise."
Tattaglia's smile was devoid of mirth.
"Remember Dave Eritrea?"
A little graveyard chill swept along the Executioner's spine, and he nodded in silent affirmation.
"Well, according to the scuttlebutt, Minelli's got 'im, and his wife, to boot. He's sitting on 'em, waiting for the meet, so he can serve 'em with cocktails and take a few bows."
"How solid is your rumble?"
"I'm confirmed. My man in Wonderland reports their safehouse empty, recently abandoned. In a hurry, if you get my drift."
The Executioner was drifting with Tattaglia, sure, and he was damned unhappy with their mutual direction.
"What went sour?"
"No one knows for sure. They had some minor problems with the paperwork to start, but nothing recently. Could be they need a plumber down there."
Bolan read an understandable concern beneath the other's tone.
"You keeping dry so far?"
Tattaglia shrugged.
"I guess. Who knows? You do the best you can, and then one day some bastard pulls the plug."
And he was worried, sure, this man who had staked out a life along the razor's edge. For if the Mob could find Eritrea, despite his cover...
"How much time?"
Tattaglia did not have to check his watch before he answered. "It should be done this time tomorrow."
Right.
And time, as always, was an adversary to be faced and conquered with the rest, made hostile by its own unshakable neutrality. The clock ran down for friend and foe alike, and there was no escape once it had chimed the Armageddon hour.
"Where's the package?"
Nino frowned.
"Long Island, last I heard." He rattled off an address. "That was five, six hours back."
A lifetime, sure.
"What kind of guard?"
Tattaglia spread his hands.
"That's all I have, except the rumble says Minelli's got it safe. Real safe."
"All right. Can you get clear?"
"I wish. Don Carlos picked me special for the delegation."
Bolan frowned. "Some reason?"
Nino thought about it, finally shook his head. "No sweat. He likes me."
Bolan hoped the guy was right, for everybody's sake.
"Okay," he said, "I've got to move. Whichever way it breaks, stay hard."
"Hard, hell. I'm petrified."
They shook hands again, and Bolan left him by the Chess and Checker House, and moved in the darkness toward another rendezvous.
And this time he was flying blind, on a collision course, perhaps, with fate. He knew, of course, precisely whom he should expect to see, but as for what might lay in store...
The Executioner discarded his uncertainty at once. He knew precisely what was waiting for him on Long Island. It would be hell on earth, the usual, and any minor variations ad
ded by his enemies would be confronted as they came.
He had been down that road before and knew exactly where it led.
The terminus was death, for some — or all — concerned, and once you bought your ticket there was no disembarking until the final destination.
As for Bolan, he had seen his ticket stamped and canceled long ago. And he was riding, as always, to the end of the line.
1
"Remember Dave Eritrea?"
The question haunted Bolan as he made his final preparations for the probe, double-checking gear and weapons that could save his life.
And he remembered, sure.
The name, the circumstances of their meeting in New York, were stamped indelibly on his memory.
Eritrea had been an up-and-comer in the Mafia, intent on seizing power in the wake of capo Augie Marineilo's fall, when he had crossed the Bolan path and come to sudden grief. The Executioner's command strike on Manhattan had upset Eritrea's plan... and very nearly trashed the "Black Ace" network, which comprised the Mafia commission's own gestapo in the process.
Nearly, but not completely.
As the coup de grace Mack Bolan had arranged for Dave Eritrea to be exposed as a stoolie, a role he had never played... until his shaken fellow mafiosi made it necessary. Already doomed, Eritrea had little choice but to accept the offer of a new identity, another life inside the federal witness program, as a trade-off for his vast knowledge of the Mob. His turning had been counted as a major coup in Washington, and Hal Brognola, manning things at Justice, had received the lion's share of credit for the victory.
But Brognola had known of Bolan's part, oh yes, and quietly, behind the scenes, spread the word.
Eritrea's conversion marked a turning point in Bolan's private war. The Mafia was reeling even before the capo made his move; when it was later caught between the Bolan hammer and Brognola's anvil, it appeared to be the beginning of the end for the brotherhood of evil. Bolan felt secure enough to listen when Brognola broached the subject of a wider war against a larger enemy, and after one last mile against the old familiar foe, the Executioner moved on to other battlefields.
But he had watched carefully for any signs of a resurgence in the Mafia, damn right, and more than once he had diverted from pursuit of terrorists to swat the capos down. Lately released from all official ties and sanctions, he had spent more time investigating what appeared to be a rejuvenated syndicate.
In Florida, where mafiosi had joined with Cuban-exile terrorists and agents of Havana's DGI, Castro's secret police.
In Hollywood, where drugs, sex and blackmail simmered in a rancid stew of politics and crime.
And in Las Vegas, where the old-line mobsters waged a brutal shooting war against invaders from the Yakuza.
It made good sense, of course, that these and other tracks would lead him eastward toward New York, but he had not expected anything like the Tattaglia bombshell dropped in Central Park.
He trusted Nino, knew from past experience that his intelligence was solid — even if delivered, as it sometimes was, with obvious reluctance. Nino was Brognola's man inside the Mob now, replacing Leo Turrin. Nino had been pressed into service with an indictment hanging over him for double murder. The alternative was to serve life without a chance of parole. Since Nino had turned informer, there had been nothing in his behavior to suggest duplicity on Nino's part.
He was a top lieutenant in Don Carlos Narozine's family of Baltimore, linked to every outfit on the eastern seaboard. His contacts had alerted him to "something big" in store when mafiosi from around the country gathered for their largest conclave in a decade, but the "something big" had taken Nino off his guard. So far, two people in the world outside the Mafia had been informed of the Eritrea scheme.
Tattaglia's first call, naturally, had gone to Hal Brognola.
And his second, at the big Fed's urging, had been patched through blinds and cutouts to Mack Bolan, via brother Johnny and the San Diego Strongbase.
It was time to move, and Bolan finished checking out his mobile arsenal. The warrior was in blacksuit, hands and face obscured by Special Forces war paint. Underneath his arm, the sleek Beretta 93-R was secured in its harness, built to accommodate the special silencer it carried. The silver AutoMag, Big Thunder, rode his hip on military webbing, and the canvas pouches circling his waist held extra magazines for both weapons and a selection of grenades. The pockets of his nightsuit held stilettos, strangling gear... the grim accessories of death.
Though he was going in with thunder, he preferred a silent probe to a violent confrontation. A quiet in-and-out would suit him fine, providing the hostile guns cooperated, and providing he found what he was looking for.
The Mafia safehouse was a rambling split-level on Long Island Sound. Its wooded grounds provided solitude, but from the terrace, facing westward, the Bronx was visible, and the speckled darkness of Connecticut farther north. It was the kind of view some people mortgaged lifetimes to secure, but tonight no one in the house cared about it. The focus lay within.
A sentry was posted in the front, another in the fear, but neither seemed much concerned about the possibility of meeting an intruder. It was the kind of duty that consumed so much of any soldier's time with watching and waiting, usually in vain.
He approached the front man from behind, looping taut piano wire around his neck while the guard was gazing at the stars. Bolan followed up with a twist and drag to throw the guy off balance as the wire sliced through his larynx, blocking his intake of oxygen and slashing his jugular. Then the Executioner rode him down, maintaining pressure while the blood spewed and the tremors faded, finally passing away. He used the slim garrote to haul the straw man out of sight beneath a hedge, and moved toward his second target.
Standing on a narrow pier that thrust out twenty feet or so into the sound, the sentry was staring distractedly across the calm obsidian water toward the mainland, heedless of the gliding death approaching on his flank. The soldier could have advanced upon the pier itself and been within striking range, but it was too damned risky. One sound, one creaking board beneath his feet, and nothing in the world would stop his target from unlimbering the stubby scattergun tucked beneath his arm. Then, no matter if Bolan won or lost the draw, the sound would rouse his enemies in the house and blow away his slim advantage of surprise.
He slid the Beretta from leather, eased off the safety, braced it in both hands and sighted upon his target, who faced away from him at a distance of thirty yards. Bolan lightly stroked the trigger, riding out the recoil to assess his shot. The parabellum mangier drilled a tidy hole behind an ear and expanded into bone and brain, its force contained within the gunner's skull. It lifted him off his feet and threw him overboard, the splash muffled by the wind rising off the sound.
Bolan doubled back to the house. He crossed the patio, its windows obscured by the curtains drawn across French doors, and circled around to a darkened window standing open to the night. Whatever else they were, the occupants were sloppy when it came to defense, and he was counting on that edge to see him through the next few moments.
Bolan pushed back the curtains, letting his Beretta lead the way inside. With a single fluid motion he cleared the sill, discovering himself inside an unoccupied bedroom. He reached the door and eased it open minutely, gun in hand, studying the corridor beyond. The sound of talking reached him.
"She's too damned old for me," one guy was saying.
"Yeah? So what the hell do you know, Junior?"
"Young or old, it's all the same," a third voice said.
"My ass."
"Could be. I haven't tried it yet."
In the ensuing chorus of hoots and jeers, he eased the bedroom door a little farther open, risking one quick glance down the hall in each direction. To the right, the hallway ran some twenty feet and ended at another door, evidently opening upon another bedroom. To the left, in a brightly lighted sunken living room, several gunners were lounging, their jackets off, revealing holstered
hardware.
"We'd better get her ready," one of them said; Bolan ducked back under cover as an armchair groaned beneath the soldier's shifting weight.
"She's ready now," a second gunner chortled.
Bolan wondered if the troops were using alcohol to pass the time. It would not hurt his chances any if reaction times were down, the combat reflex slowed by liquor. Any edge was a welcome one.
A burly gunner passed before him, visible in profile through the crack of the open door. He waited long enough to let the hardman reach his destination, heard him fumbling with keys and chanced another glance along the corridor.
The parlor troops seemed oblivious to everything, caught up in the retelling of a story everyone already seemed to know. A fifth of Johnnie Walker was visible behind a bouquet of artificial flowers on the low-slung coffee table, and the sight gave him the impetus he needed to complete his move.
He left the cover of the doorway and glided toward the far end of the corridor. The other door stood open now, and while the gunner was no longer visible, his voice was crystal clear from just beyond the threshold.
"Up an' at 'em, momma," he said. "Time to take a little ride."
Despite his proximity, Bolan heard no response, and did not have time to wait. The sleek Beretta filled his hand as he slipped inside and silently closed the door behind him.
For just an instant, neither tenant of the bedroom sensed his presence, and he had the chance to size them up. The gunner was familiar, but nothing had prepared him for the woman, bundled in a sheet and plainly naked, who sat huddled in the center of the bed.
The hardman had her clothes all wadded up beneath one arm, and he tossed them to her. They fell just short enough so she would have to drop the sheet and reach a little.
"Get those on," he said. "I ain't got all day."
"You called that right," said Mack Bolan.
The woman gave a little choking cry and dropped her sheet, despite herself, but Bolan's eyes did not shift from the gunner. He saw the enemy begin to reach for the nickeled Smith & Wesson in his shoulder rig, knowing that the guy could never make it, knowing that he knew.
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