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  When he was about ten yards away, Bolan noted that the doctor had sweated through the brown shirt he was wearing. He also noted that the woman pushing the baby carriage had reversed course and was now walking back toward them.

  Something seemed off to Bolan, but he wasn’t sure exactly what. A few more pedestrians walked leisurely by, pointing to the ride and laughing.

  Debussey was only about ten feet away now. His voice sounded brittle as he called out, “Agent Cooper.”

  Bolan nodded, still surveying the surroundings. He glanced at the young couple, both African American and clean-cut. The other pedestrians looked Hispanic, maybe members of the same family. That left the woman pushing the baby carriage: blonde, slender, very fit-looking.

  Something about her struck a chord of familiarity with Bolan. Had he seen her before? If so, where? A benign smile was on her face.

  Debussey crossed in front of the Hispanic family without looking.

  “Cooper,” Debussey said, his voice a harsh croak. “We have no time to lose. You have no idea...”

  “Why don’t you tell us then?” Grimaldi interrupted.

  Bolan and Grimaldi were about five feet from him now, and they formed a loose circle. Debussey started to speak, then hesitated and glanced around.

  The Hispanic family passed by, as did the woman with the baby carriage. That left only the young black couple, Debussey, Grimaldi and Bolan by the bench.

  “Doctor,” Bolan said, addressing the man. Then something caught his eye. The woman had parked the baby carriage by the end of the bench and had taken off in a sprint, digging into her purse as she ran.

  Bolan glanced at the infant inside the carriage. A blanket was drawn over the torso... A blanket on a hot day? He looked closer and saw a plastic doll’s head with closed eyes.

  “Bomb!” Bolan said, shoving Grimaldi and Debussey away and jumping forward toward the carriage. “Get down,” he yelled as he grabbed the handlebar of the carriage, trying to catch a glimpse of the running woman, and then did a long, twirling sidestep, flinging the carriage like an Olympic hammer-thrower toward the vacant area by the pool. The carriage arced in the air and Bolan allowed the momentum of his toss to take him to the ground.

  Seconds later, just as the carriage hit the surface of the water, a resounding explosion ripped through the afternoon silence, and a concussive wave swept over him. Bolan’s eyes scanned for the immediate threat—the woman—and saw her drop her purse, a small, semi-automatic pistol in her right hand. Rolling to his feet, the Executioner pulled his Beretta from his shoulder rig and brought it in to acquire target acquisition.

  A gaggle of people was running now. Others were screaming and some lay motionless on the ground. The woman had vanished into the crowd.

  Bolan ran to Grimaldi and Debussey. The scientist’s breathing was labored and his hands gripped a growing bloodstain on the front of his shirt.

  “He caught some shrapnel,” Grimaldi said.

  “You okay?” Bolan asked, noting that his partner’s left shoulder and back were peppered with red.

  Grimaldi nodded, taking out his cell phone. “Go get that assassin.”

  Bolan tried to pick out the woman through the cluster of running bodies. He caught a quick glimpse of her heading toward the carousel. It was still too risky to try a shot, and he began a sprint.

  The woman glanced over her shoulder, then kept running.

  Bolan prayed she wouldn’t shoot into the crowd.

  She pivoted left, disappearing behind the carousel, the jaunty music mixing with the cacophony of people’s screams.

  Bolan angled to the left, as well, passing on the opposite side of the merry-go-round. He bumped into several people, knocking them down, stopping and spinning to the side to avoid striking a small child, all the time scanning the crowd.

  A mother ran across his path, a youngster in tow. Bolan jerked to an abrupt halt. An older gentleman cowered in place, tears streaming down his face. A uniformed police officer, his weapon drawn, was running full-tilt toward him. A slender blond man in a sleeveless, white T-shirt, blue running shorts and white Nikes ran toward the reflecting pool, fastening a fanny-pack around his waist. Small hands... Bolan caught a glimpse of the man’s face, a smear of red over his left cheek.

  Blood?

  No, Bolan thought. Lipstick. The Talon? Was that him?

  Raising his Beretta, Bolan zeroed in on the running figure. Still, before he pulled the trigger, he had to be sure. But how? Then his mind flashed back to Belgium.

  “Arretez!” Bolan yelled.

  The man jerked at the command, his head twisting to glance over his shoulder, his hand digging into the fanny-pack.

  Too many civilians in the area... Bolan knew he couldn’t afford to miss.

  The running man was raising a small, blue-steel pistol.

  Bolan centered the Beretta’s sights on the man’s chest area and squeezed off two rounds, controlling the recoil with a double-handed grip.

  The man’s lipstick-streaked face twisted into a feral grimace as he fell. Bolan advanced, keeping his weapon in a combat-ready position until he was close enough to step on the prone man’s gun hand.

  Through the haze of screaming people and the fuzzy ringing in his ears, Bolan heard a voice yelling, “Police! Drop your weapon.”

  He set the Beretta down and raised his hands, still keeping his foot on the hand with the gun. It looked to be a .380 Walther PPK. He kicked the weapon away.

  A uniformed Metro policeman approached, gun extended toward Bolan.

  “Matt Cooper, DoJ,” the Executioner said. “My ID’s in my shirt pocket.”

  “Don’t move,” the police officer said.

  Bolan nodded, inverting his hand to point toward the body at his feet.

  “This is an international assassin known as the Talon,” Bolan said, speaking slowly and clearly. “He set off the bomb over there, and my partner’s with the wounded. Call for backup and an ambulance.”

  The policeman seemed frozen for a split second, then said, “Remove your ID slowly and carefully.” The policeman studied the ID, then lowered his weapon and keyed his radio, calling in the message.

  After displaying his DoJ identification, Bolan checked the man he believed to be the Talon. The killer’s sightless eyes stared upward. Retrieving his Beretta, Bolan instructed the policeman to stay with the crime scene, then ran toward the park bench.

  Grimaldi and another pair of uniformed officers knelt by Debussey, who lay on his side.

  “Looks like a collapsed lung,” Grimaldi said. “Ambulance is on the way.”

  “He give you anything?” Bolan asked.

  “Plenty,” Grimaldi replied. “Stevenson’s definitely got Karen, and that’s not all. We’re fighting the clock on an epidemic.”

  Stevenson Dynamics

  Fairfax County, Virginia

  THE SWIMMING POOL was Olympic size, and they were clustered by the diving boards, the smell of chlorine heavy in the air.

  Stevenson watched with fascination as Quarry kept the hose focused directly over the burlap bag covering the woman’s face. Her body, which was still clothed and secured to the special wooden backboard with leather straps, shook as she gasped for air. Quarry seemed to have a knack for knowing just when to avert the flow, sending her gasping for breath and coughing and wheezing.

  Amazingly, she’d lasted almost twice as long as Perkins had. He lay naked and shriveled next to the high-dive ladder, strapped to another backboard. Stevenson wasn’t surprised. He’d had the reporter pegged as a wimp from the get-go.

  Quarry glanced up, waiting for a signal to continue. Stevenson nodded and watched as the security man adjusted the watery cascade over the burlap hood once again.

  Jefferson’s body stiffened and jerked.

  Stevenso
n felt himself becoming aroused as Jefferson endured the torture.

  How much longer could this bitch take it?

  His cell phone vibrated and Nelson’s image appeared.

  “What?” Stevenson asked after pressing the button.

  “The truck’s back from the stadium,” Nelson said. “Take a look.”

  The image changed to a sweeping view of the loading dock area. The truck with the air-conditioning logos of the Apollo Stadium emblazoned on the sides pulled to a stop. Two men in orange maintenance uniforms matching the logo got out.

  “Looks like everything went as planned,” Nelson said.

  “Good.” Stevenson signaled for Quarry to stop. “Any report from the Talon?”

  “No, but the news reported some kind of explosion at the National Mall.” Nelson chuckled. “Sounds like our friends went out with a bang.”

  “Have the HazMat crew do a full decontamination of the truck, and strip those logos off,” Stevenson ordered. “Then move the canisters to the compactor.”

  “Will do,” Nelson said. “How goes the session?”

  “She’s got some grit.”

  Nelson laughed and said he’d be there shortly.

  Stevenson terminated the call and walked over to Quarry and their captive, the soles of his shoes making a scuffing sound on the coarse surface. He motioned for the hose to be moved farther away, so he wouldn’t risk getting wet, then reached forward and began touching Jefferson’s body, roaming his fingers over her legs, her hips, her breasts. Her soaked blouse left little to the imagination, but he regretted that she wasn’t partially nude. He longed to see her caramel skin.

  Leaning down, he whispered in her ear. “Are you ready to talk me yet, my dear?”

  No reply, only the sound of her ragged breathing.

  He reached into his inside jacket pocket and removed the glasses, looking first at the reporter and then at Jefferson. The recording from the specks had told him virtually everything. Now it was only a matter of finding out who and what Jefferson had told.

  “You’re making this more difficult than it has to be,” he said.

  No response.

  Stevenson straightened and held his extended index finger under the flowing stream of water. It was cold, very cold.

  Smiling, he told Quarry to take off Jefferson’s clothes.

  The big man reached down to a sheath containing a large, fixed-bladed knife on his left side.

  “No, don’t cut them. Keep all her clothes intact.” Stevenson looked down at her. “Be careful not to rip anything, and don’t remove all of them.” He wanted no signs of force evident on her discovered corpse. Not until the cover story was in place. Until then, he might as well enjoy it. It was like directing his own snuff film. “Leave her underwear on. For now.”

  Quarry sheathed the knife and dropped the hose to the pebbled floor. His big fingers began fumbling with the buttons on the woman’s blouse.

  * * *

  SHE WAS ALMOST completely nude now and Stevenson assessed her body. Leaving the woman’s underwear on would give them another level of threat and intimidation...one more level of humiliation to hold over her. Besides, seeing her in bra and panties was more erotic for him.

  After Quarry had refastened her extremities with the leather straps, Stevenson leaned down close to her ear again. “Are you ready for round two?”

  Her breathing quickened and, from the wheezing, Stevenson guessed that some residual water was still lingering around her trachea. Better to let her agonize for a few minutes before starting the water flow again.

  He patted her bare shoulder.

  “Why not make it easy for yourself?” he asked. “Your friend Perkins did. He told us everything. Saved himself a lot of pain. You can do the same. That’s all we’re asking. Just talk to us.”

  No response. Just the labored breathing.

  Stevenson glanced at Quarry. The man’s face was emotionless, impassive. A good soldier, doing what he was told to do.

  Stevenson sighed theatrically. “All right. I guess if you don’t want to talk, I’ll have my friend commence with the water again. I hope this doesn’t go on much longer. You know, most people have drowned by this time.”

  He saw her body racking and, at first, thought she was coughing, but then he realized that wasn’t it. She was crying.

  Crying...

  Not so tough, after all.

  A little more pressure was all it would take.

  “Let’s try some immersion,” Stevenson said.

  Quarry nodded and dropped the hose. He grabbed the edges of the backboard and lowered it into the pool. Jefferson managed a scream as the water began to slowly engulf her head. Stevenson watched her take a rapid breath and then hold it as her head went completely under the surface.

  Stevenson looked at his Rolex. The second hand swept around the dial and he wondered how long she would last. Ten seconds ticked by. Fifteen...twenty...twenty-five.

  Stevenson signaled for Quarry to bring her up. He did.

  Stevenson’s cell rang and he grabbed it.

  “What now?” he asked, his voice grating with irritation.

  “Ah, sir,” an unfamiliar voice said. “This is Jenkins from HazMat.”

  “What is it?”

  “Well, sir, we just checked the misting tanks in the Apollo Stadium truck. They’re full.”

  “Full?” That perplexed Stevenson. What the hell was the idiot talking about? That wasn’t possible. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’ll get back to you,” Stevenson said. He immediately dialed Nelson, but the phone went to voice mail.

  What the hell was going on here?

  Jefferson’s body began to toss back and forth, but the straps holding her didn’t allow any play. Stevenson motioned for Quarry to lower her head into the water again. She made a sputtering noise as she went under.

  The sound of the locked hallway door popping open intruded. Nelson walked in, his face tight and anxious, followed by two men wearing the orange, air-conditioning maintenance outfits from the Apollo Stadium, their baseball caps pulled low on their foreheads.

  The two bastards who’d brought back the truck...

  Stevenson slipped the phone back into his pocket. “You two get your asses over here. You’ve got some explaining to do.”

  The trio continued toward him. One of the maintenance workers shoved Nelson to the side and leveled a pistol in Stevenson’s and Quarry’s direction.

  “Pull her out of the water,” the man ordered. “Now.”

  Stevenson recognized the man’s face. It was that DoJ agent. Cooper.

  * * *

  BOLAN WATCHED AS Quarry pulled the backboard Karen Jefferson was strapped to out of the water. The burlap bag covering her head lifted and fell with a rapidity that verified she was still breathing. Stevenson was on the other side of them, half crouching by the ladder to the high-dive. A naked man Bolan took to be Perkins lay tied up a few feet away. It was unknown if he was alive or dead.

  “Set her down,” Bolan said.

  Quarry didn’t move.

  “I said, set her down,” Bolan repeated. He had a clear shot at Quarry’s head but didn’t want to take it unless absolutely necessary for fear of possibly hitting Jefferson.

  Stevenson turned sideways, his body flattening against the pillars of the diving structure. He reached inside his jacket and tore out a Glock, which he started firing over Quarry’s shoulder.

  Bolan jumped to the left, as did Grimaldi.

  Nelson grunted in pain and stumbled forward, clutching his chest.

  Bolan brought up his Beretta and fired a round at Stevenson. It ricocheted off the metal structure of the diving platform.

  Quarry picked up the board with
Jefferson and held it in front of him like a shield. Bolan didn’t have a clean shot, and both he and Grimaldi ran for the jutting corner of the locker room wall. Quarry fired a shot that chipped the tiles next to Bolan’s leg. The Executioner dived forward and rolled. Grimaldi fired his SIG in Quarry’s direction.

  The security man moved behind the jutting structure of the diving platform, then pushed the backboard with Jefferson toward the water. It tumbled over the edge and disappeared with a splash. Quarry leaned around the platform, exposing a thin ribbon of himself, and fired three rounds. Stevenson was firing, too, but wildly and without discipline. Grimaldi returned fire, and Bolan saw Quarry’s exposed right foot explode with a spray of blood. The man’s face twisted in pain and he fell back behind the platform. Stevenson began a flat-out run toward the doorway at the far end of the pool, holding his Glock under his left arm and firing it blindly.

  The Executioner aimed and squeezed the trigger. The tall man took two more lurching steps and fell face-first onto the hard floor.

  Bolan was up and approaching the diving platform at a rapid pace, knowing they still had one more adversary, Quarry, to take out. Jefferson had sunk beneath the surface of the water.

  Grimaldi raced toward the pool and dived in, his body knifing into the water.

  Quarry rose and tried to fire his pistol, but Bolan drilled two double taps into his chest. The big man fell backward. Bolan was next to him in four seconds and kicked the gun from his hand.

  The Executioner glanced to the right to check on Grimaldi, and Quarry lurched upward, his big hands grabbing Bolan’s wrists.

  The two big men crashed backward into the metal struts of the diving platform. The Beretta slipped from Bolan’s hands as he and Quarry fell in a tangle over the side and into the water.

  Bolan realized Quarry was wearing a vest as they thrashed together, each seeking to tear at the other as they sank under the surface, a murky trail of blood from the security chief’s foot spiraling upward as the two combatants descended. Bolan punched the other man’s face, but the water robbed the blow of power. Quarry’s hands clutched at his adversary’s throat, his fingers sinking into the flesh. Bolan tried to spin upward, to grab a breath to give him the edge, but he couldn’t. Grimaldi was struggling beneath them, trying to lift the heavy backboard with Karen strapped to it, but was making no progress.