Season of Slaughter Read online

  “Glen Shephard. He was one of Terin’s top bodyguards. He was found early this morning near Greektown. Didn’t you hear the news?”

  “I didn’t associate it with Terin,” Bolan lied.

  “He was stuffed in the back of an SUV. And the building the car was parked behind was filled with dead and wounded terrorists, according to reports,” Burton continued. “Someone went in and performed like the wrath of God on them.”

  Terin’s limousine finally pulled up in front of them.

  Hector Terin was immaculately dressed, hair combed, nails manicured, seemingly none the worse for wear for having just gotten off a plane after a crosscountry flight. Tall and lean, with a pencil-thin mustache, and black hair combed back to expose a widow’s peak, he was a stark, severe man with piercing blue eyes. Bolan could meet the man’s gaze evenly, and the two sized each other up.

  Terin studied him as if Bolan were a bull who had wandered into his range. All that was left for him to do was to paw the ground and snort steam through his nostrils.

  “Mr. Terin, this is Colonel Brandon Stone. He was sent to do some fact-finding—”

  Terin cut Burton off. “The shipment to the Naval Special Warfare Development Group. I figured as much. Welcome, Colonel Stone.”

  He extended a hand and Bolan shook it. There was a great deal of strength in the handshake, but Bolan resisted the urge to turn it into a contest, even though he could feel Terin trying to squeeze a reaction out of him. “A pleasure to be here, sir.”

  Terin broke the grip and didn’t take his eyes off Bolan. “Sable, I take it part of Colonel Stone’s agenda is to accompany us out to the field to witness our latest testing?”

  “Of course, Mr. Terin,” Burton responded. She sounded uncertain and Bolan didn’t blame her. While much more subtle than the battle of wills with an overzealous security guard the day before, there was still a war raging between the two men.

  Whether Terin was sizing Bolan up as a corporate predator protecting his business interests, or was on edge thanks to his guilt in recent events, the Executioner didn’t know.

  “You know about the MAP-SmarTruck?” Terin told him.

  Bolan tossed Burton a glance, but she shook her bewilderment at the silent struggle of wills.

  “MARS Assault Platform Smart Truck,” she explained.

  “I’ve read the tech sheets on your modifications,” Bolan replied. “If your theory works out, it will make things safer for air and ground forces.”

  “And you possess some doubts?” Terin asked.

  “After Dulles…not anymore,” Bolan said.

  Terin stiffened, eyes flashing with a moment of indignant rage before he cast his gaze downward. “I was afraid of that.”

  Burton looked as though she’d been punched in the gut. “You mean, it was our missiles involved in the massacre?”

  An uneasy silence settled over the three people. It was a minute before one of Terin’s aids got up the courage to announce that they were behind schedule for the SmarTruck demonstration.

  BURTON DECIDED to ride with Stone in his car when they were heading out to the test field. He offered, and she had some suspicions that he had a thousand unasked questions to lay on her. Something was going on behind the icy walls of his blue eyes, flames flickering in a brain that would not stop analyzing angles.

  “Shephard, did you know him well?” Bolan asked.

  Burton nodded. “He was a nice guy.”

  Bolan cast her a sideways glance. “Nice?”

  “He was soft-spoken, quiet. Almost introverted, but polite to the point of knightly chivalry,” she told him.

  “Was he like this to everyone?”

  “As far as I know. He got along with everyone at Terintec. It was only over the past couple months when he seemed to be in a dark mood.”

  “Depressed?”

  “Sad and morose. He didn’t want to talk with people as much. He wouldn’t start a conversation, but it’s not like he avoided people. Shep just got quiet.”

  “How close were you two?”

  “Just friends. It was always the case that he was with someone, or I was with someone. We just ended up…we’re…we were…friends and…”

  Burton lowered her head, the weight of Shephard’s loss finally hitting her.

  She closed her eyes, trying to fight the burning behind the lids, trying to suck breath past the massive, crushing weight blocking her windpipe. It took a few moments for her to get her breathing back to normal. Her stomach still was twisted, nausea spinning in the core of her chest up from her navel, but stopping. She wasn’t going to freak over this, not in front of a stranger.

  “It’s okay,” Bolan said softly. His hand went to rest on her shoulder.

  “No, it’s not, but thanks,” Burton answered.

  “Was he a religious man?”

  “He was, but he didn’t try to push his beliefs onto other people.”

  “Christian?”

  Burton nodded. “Catholic by birth, but he wasn’t any denomination by the time we met.”

  “What kind of friends did he have?”

  The woman’s face flushed. “You already know what happened to Shep!”

  Bolan frowned deeply. Burton felt her ears burning at the thought that he was playing dumb with her, and her nails dug into her palms.

  “I knew,” he admitted. “The men responsible for killing him are dead or in custody.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know why Shep was murdered. Not yet.” Bolan told her.

  “The men who killed him?”

  Bolan remained silent, but his eyes took on a pained look. He wasn’t going to let her in on what he knew.

  She pressed on. “Just who are you?”

  “Someone trying to prevent more tragedies.” His voice lost its authoritative edge.

  Burton set her lips tight and looked out the window. “Shep wouldn’t be involved in hurting anyone. I don’t know what you believe….”

  “Sometimes people can be bullied into following someone else’s lead. A lot of times, when they fall in with the wrong crowd, they develop a conscience and start to do something, and end up getting killed for it.”

  They were getting closer to the field where Terin was putting on his display. The caravan of industry reporters and technology correspondents was turning in ahead of Bolan and Burton. Technicians were making last-minute adjustments to the testing ground even after weeks of work. Burton had been there very early that morning, taking care of finishing touches for the day’s demonstration. She looked back to Bolan.

  “You really think Shephard threw in with Arab terrorists?” the woman asked.

  His icy-blue eyes widened in surprise. “Americans weren’t mentioned?”

  “What Americans?”

  Bolan’s jaw set hard. “There were two white men. Americans. From what I know, they were part of the Army of the Hand of Christ. AHC for short.”

  “The news said—”

  “And I was there. One of them was called Caul.”

  Recognition burned across Burton’s mind. “Caul? As in Stephen Caul?”

  Bolan nodded. “That’s what his driver’s license read.”

  “Oh, God.”

  “You knew him, too?” Bolan asked.

  “Just by name. I didn’t like him. He just had this…aura around him. I wanted to hit him with a two-by-four. Is he dead or alive?”

  “Dead.”

  “Did he suffer?”

  Momentary shock danced across Bolan’s face. “He went down hard. I don’t do torture.”

  MACK BOLAN FELT the cell phone vibrate in his breast pocket and answered it on the second throbbing pulse.

  “This is Stone.”

  “Pol,” came the terse response. Blancanales sounded a little tense.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Just checking in with you. Our young new ally managed to get us a bite.”

  Bolan smiled. “I told you he was good.”

&
nbsp; “I should have never doubted you. We don’t have much time, but figured we’d let you in on the situation.”

  “You let mother know?” Bolan was referring to Barbara Price, back at Stony Man Farm, the mission controller for the teams.

  “Of course.” Blancanales put on an air of mock shock.

  Bolan grunted in approval. “Take care.”

  “That’s what we do.”

  The link disconnected and Bolan put his phone away.

  Things were building to a head again. He wanted this afternoon over with so he could contact Grimaldi and get him to Wisconsin.

  “What’s wrong?” Burton asked.

  “Business as usual,” Bolan answered. “Nothing for you to worry about.”

  A truck was being rolled onto the field, a lump of machinery in the back covered in a canvas tarpaulin that seemed to have the tech-press all a-flutter with anticipation and glee, like children on a Christmas morning. Bolan, being more direct, just turned to his companion.

  “That’s the SmarTruck under the tarp?”

  “That’s for me to know and you to find out,” she said cryptically. Her irritation wasn’t completely scrubbed free by the slight smile on her face, but Bolan was glad to see a change in her mood.

  “Oh. Irony. I encounter that too much. Mostly it’s snide arrogance and political double-talk. Last time I encountered irony, I think bell-bottoms were in style.”

  Burton took a deep breath. “You can be funny, Colonel Stone.”

  “Call me Brandon.”

  Bolan lowered his head. Something was in the distance. He could feel it, more than hear or see it, something that vibrated in his chest, though deeper to the core than the cell phone. He never fully believed in a sixth sense, the paranormal powers of the mind, but sometimes his gut feelings gave him a precognitive sense of danger. Gadgets Schwarz of Stony Man Farm was a strong believer in paranormal phenomena, even if they were explainable by an instantaneous subconscious assessment due to years of experience. Bolan could buy that explanation. His senses had learned every possible angle of ambush and threat in the world. He could memorize the license plates of every car in a parking lot or on a street around a building he went into with just a glance. He entered a room and would tally up every exit he could fit through in a heartbeat. It was no stretch for Bolan to imagine that ordinary senses actually did pick up subtler things than most people perceived.

  Something had drawn his attention. It had raised the hairs on the back of his neck and it was something he’d heard, something crawling under the sound of scripted podium speech and inquiries from the crowd. The vibration rose to his ears over the sound of people still talking and asking questions of Terin who had taken up a position next to the truck. As soon as it was audible at the lowest level, he knew what it was.

  A helicopter of some kind.

  He turned, scanning the sky, trying to focus on the incoming chopper with the help of his hearing.

  “What’s wrong?” Burton asked him.

  Bolan frowned. “Incoming choppers.”

  “We have security.”

  “So did Dulles.”

  Burton paled, then put her hand to her mouth. “Are you armed?”

  “Not with anything that could hold off a platoon coming off a helicopter. And nothing that could knock a chopper out of the sky. By the time I got anything out of the trunk, the assault would be under way, and even then, I start pulling out an M-16, Terin’s security would start chopping me down.”

  “Oh, hell.”

  Bolan started toward Terin, with Burton was in pursuit. “What were you going to do in the demonstration today?”

  “Show off the firepower of the SmarTruck.”

  Bolan knew the specifics of the vehicle. The heavy-shelled off-road vehicle had enough armor to ignore most battlefield threats and could return fire with a rack of specialized grenades and a turreted experimental laser. The Terintec version had, in addition to standard SATCOM communications, an electronic countermeasure suite that could choke an armored division. It could also umbrella an entire armored convoy against aerial strikes, denying enemy pilots radar or laser locks for their smart bombs. Plus it was designed with the MARS system in mind.

  “Of course. The original SmarTruck wasn’t our design, and we decided to go with a laser-guided 25 mm cannon and a shelf for MARS missiles. No live ammo or warheads, just blanks and guided drones,” Burton quickly added.

  “Doesn’t matter, the people coming already have their own MARS missiles and perhaps everything they need to mass produce them,” Bolan growled. He knifed through the crowd, reporters reluctantly moving aside until the first Black Hawk slashed overhead, rotorwash blowing like a hurricane among them. The crowd loosened, confused by the new arrivals, allowing Bolan and Burton to push through the throng to the end.

  “Mass produced?” Burton asked, stunned by the comment.

  Bolan reached Terin. “You have to get your people out of here. Those helicopters aren’t part of your demonstration, and I think they’re going to make a snatch.”

  The businessman darted a glance at Bolan, then followed the helicopters racing back in an orbit toward the field. Streaming canisters spewing smoke hissed out the sides of the low-slung aircrafts.

  At this point, the reporters were taking off. Technicians were looking around in confusion, wondering whether to stay and hold their ground or to run. Tear gas added into the mix only broke their will to stand and fight, and they raced off toward the road or plunged into whatever cover they could find.

  “Who would dare?” Terin asked, eyes wildly dancing across the mayhem around him.

  “You tell me. I’m betting it’s the people who had your bodyguard murdered last night,” Bolan challenged.

  There wasn’t even a flinch from the businessman. Security guards were pushing the crowd aside. One of the bodyguards grabbed Terin by the arm and dragged him back to his limousine.

  “Get the truck out of here!” Terin roared to Bolan. “Everybody else! Get out of here!”

  Bolan turned and took out his car keys, tossing them to Burton. “Take my car and get out of here.”

  “Where are you going?” Sable called.

  “With the SmarTruck.”

  “I thought you said you weren’t armed!”

  Bolan waved her off. “I’ll improvise! Go!”

  DARK HUNG in the door of the helicopter, the straps of his Calico 950 SMGs keeping them from bouncing around on his chest as the Black Hawk sliced through the sky under Harpy’s skillful hands. Adonis was at his back, as were the handpicked and personally trained cream of the Army of the Hand of Christ and Fist of God organizations. He wasn’t sure if they would be returning, and there were more such heavily trained troops back at the base, but it would be inconvenient to lose twenty men after weeks of indoctrination and teaching.

  Dark wasn’t getting sentimental, he was just tired of dealing with the racist sons of bitches every day. For the most part, he was able to keep them intimidated enough to make them bury their prejudices, but sometimes tempers did flare, and he’d had to kill one or two to send a message to the rest of the drones.

  “Dark, check it out,” Adonis said. “Someone just jumped onto the target truck. It looks like everybody’s moving out.”

  Dark had to squint to see who Adonis was talking about. There were times when Dark could swear the big blond giant had binoculars for eyes. Everything about him was extra-muscled and strong. He noticed a tall, slender figure in black crawling into the back of the truck next to their target. “This must be the big scary that DeeDee was talking about.”

  Adonis frowned. “He moves well.”

  Dark pulled a pair of binoculars from his pocket and trained them on the truck when he saw something flash in the stranger’s hand.

  The helicopter jerked, Harpy’s cursing filling his ears. A 9 mm bullet glanced off the stock of one of his Calicos, shattering the grip, and another round sparked near where his hand clutched the door frame.

&
nbsp; “Dammit!” Dark spit. “He’s shooting at us!”

  “And here you thought there wasn’t going to be any challenge today,” Adonis cracked.

  “Yeah, well you didn’t just have a bullet bounce off your chest,” Dark snarled.

  Adonis pushed his partner easily aside, an M-79 grenade launcher held in one of his hands looking like a child’s air rifle. He took aim at the truck and pulled the trigger, a strangling cloud of white smoke draping over the transport.

  The man in black disappeared in the swirling mists.

  “CS-CN tear gas. I doubt he’s got the foresight to carry a gas mask with him,” Adonis said. “I’d have used something stronger, but we want the truck in one piece.”

  “Harpy! Lay down some more of that old school cover!” Dark called.

  “Please and thank you would be nice!” Harpy called back with only mock irritation.

  “With sprinkles and a cherry on top, love!”

  Harpy tossed him a kiss and the Black Hawk shook as a rack on the back of the sleek helicopter ejected a storm of projectiles onto the scattering assembly on the field.

  Chaos took over and Dark was back in his element.

  MACK BOLAN SCRAMBLED onto the back of the truck just as the Black Hawks burst over the tree line. He was impressed that the enemy, whoever it was, had some high-quality vehicles. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the little polymer-framed Beretta 9000. Since he was in polite company, he wouldn’t be able to hide either his Desert Eagle or his Beretta 93-R, both massive in comparison to normal combat handguns. He wished he’d gone with the slight inconvenience of the Beretta 93-R right now, the extra length of the six-and-a-half-inch barrel would have given him better reach and accuracy against the incoming helicopters. Still, the snubby Beretta, capable of taking even the 20-shot magazines intended for his 93-R machine pistol, was accurate and reliable.

  Bolan aimed at the lead aircraft and burned eleven shots, rewarded with sparks flying on the windshield of the helicopter.

  He turned to the drivers of the transport who had their rear window open. “Those choppers are going to wreck anything in their way. Is the SmarTruck ready to move?”

  “Yeah! It’s gassed and ready to go.”