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  With his main rival behind bars, Tsvetanov had the best chance to make a decisive strike. It needed some thought. Once started, gang war was likely to be bloody and savage.

  * * *

  LEOPOLD MARCHINSKI SAT patiently waiting for his lawyer to arrive. He was seated at the steel table in an interview room, his cuffed hands attached to a short chain manacle fixed to the top of the table. He wore prison garb—a bright orange jumpsuit that had the penitentiary logo printed across the back and his inmate number on the front. Marchinski hated the prison uniform. It was baggy, made of coarse material and had that institutional smell he despised. Even though he’d been in jail for almost five months, he still couldn’t get used to it.

  Marchinski, though, was a man blessed with great patience. He’d known from day one that he wasn’t about to get out of this easily, so he’d sucked it up and become a model prisoner. He had planned to stay that way until it suited him to change.

  And now he wanted change.

  He wanted out of jail.

  Marchinski was no caged animal. He needed his freedom, but he understood the position he was in. The authorities had shown him the video of him slaughtering Jake Bixby, and there was no denying he’d done it. The image on the recording was clear and sharp. No doubts. The camera had faithfully taped the brutal crime—every terrible, final, bloody minute of Bixby’s life. Even his high-priced lawyer, Jason Keppler, had told him his position was dicey. The evidence could not be argued against. Marchinski was a career criminal who had escaped justice for a long time. This was the prosecution’s chance to lock him up for the maximum term, and they were not about to pass on the opportunity. Marchinski was theirs.

  In retrospect, Marchinski knew he’d been foolish. Bixby needed to be punished, to be made into an example. The mistake had been acting on a wild impulse. Marchinski should have dealt with Bixby quietly, under controlled circumstances, rather than attacking hog wild. Pent-up fury had led Marchinski straight to a jail cell.

  Marchinski understood that. He was looking at a lot of jail time—too much for someone like himself. If he survived he’d be an old man when he came out.

  He had two ways to go.

  Kill himself—an option he’d seriously considered for five full seconds.

  Or manipulate his way out of jail.

  Getting out wouldn’t be easy and once he did, he’d have to leave the U.S. and move somewhere where the authorities couldn’t touch him. He could live with that. There were countries with no extradition treaties, and with his money he could live high wherever he chose.

  The first step was getting out from behind the prison walls. It would have to be a well-orchestrated escape. So Marchinski had spent his empty days working on various schemes and rejecting them all until he came up with the one that had been put into action.

  The kidnapping of Larry Mason’s young daughter.

  Mason, the man directly responsible for Marchinski’s incarceration. The state’s prosecutor who seemed to have made it his personal crusade to lock Marchinski away for the rest of his natural life.

  Marchinski had discussed the idea with his brother over a number of visits. Gregor had gone for the idea the moment it had been explained to him. He might have blurted it out loud if Marchinski had not calmed him down, making him realize the serious nature of the discussion.

  Over a couple more visits, Marchinski had detailed what the scheme would involve. Gregor had added embellishments of his own and after almost a month, they were ready to make their move.

  Simple enough in theory.

  Marchinski’s people would kidnap Mason’s daughter from the man’s isolated weekend lodge and kill the child’s nanny as an indication of intent. Mason would be told and given a deadline. Free Marchinski, or lose his daughter. It was a bold move, with no guarantee of success. Mason loved his child—his only link with his dead wife—but Marchinski was taking a gamble.

  The first part of the plan went off without a hitch. But just as the scheme got underway, Marchinski had heard from one of his lawyers that a hard strike had taken place on Tsvetanov’s turf. Three of Tsvetanov’s men had been killed and one of his stash houses burned to the ground with expensive cargo inside.

  For a brief time, Marchinski’s attention was drawn to the incident. He couldn’t figure out who had carried out the hit. There was no other crew large enough to take on Tsvetanov, and he didn’t believe it was the work of any law force. That wasn’t the way they operated, although it was something they dreamed about. The matter gave Marchinski something to think about when he returned to his cell; he’d ordered his lawyer to instruct his crew to check the incident out.

  Later, as he slumped on his bunk, staring at the ceiling, his mind refused to move on from what had happened to Tsvetanov. Any pleasure he had initially experienced faded quickly. It was replaced with a faint but growing concern over the matter. He found he was unable to dismiss it completely. It skittered around the fringes of his thoughts—in the background but never far away. If Tsvetanov had been targeted, what had it got to do with him?

  He remembered a line from an old musical show. The one they made into a movie with that bald actor—Yul Brynner.

  It’s a puzzlement.

  Chapter 6

  Stony Man Farm

  Bolan had Brognola on the line, and he was filling him in on his foray into Tsvetanov territory.

  “You really think this is going to work, Striker?” the big Fed asked.

  “Having Marchinski and Tsvetanov at each other’s throats should ease the pressure on Mason a little,” Bolan said. “Marchinski will be getting reports from his people about what’s happened, and he’ll be getting uptight because he’ll figure Tsvetanov will start hitting back. He’ll be focused on making sure his people are ready for anything Tsvetanov might do. That gives us a little breathing space. Just make sure Mason does his part. Make it look as if he’s working on Marchinski’s release.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “So do I,” Bolan said. “A nine-year-old’s life depends on me working this right. Getting Marchinski and Tsvetanov to hammer each other senseless is a bonus. These bastards are due for a big fall.”

  “Try not to raze the town to the ground while you’re doing it,” Brognola said. “You have a habit of creating expensive black holes.”

  “That must be the other guy,” Bolan said.

  “Oh, yeah. The one who wears tights and a cape. So what next?”

  “A nudge in Marchinski’s direction,” Bolan said. “Something to draw his attention.”

  Brognola sighed. He knew what that meant. Trouble for the Marchinski mob. News would filter back, and it would tell him the Executioner was doing what he did best.

  In the past, Hal Brognola had done his best to stop Bolan. In that distant era, Bolan was considered a menace to society, an out-of-control killer wreaking his own kind of justice on the criminal fraternity. Every law-enforcement agency in America was hunting Bolan. But as time revealed Bolan was not a wild killer, but a man on a mission to eradicate the evil that was terrorizing the nation, even Brognola began to see that Bolan was a force for good.

  In the end, the President had invited Bolan to come on board and work with the administration. Successive Presidents had been made aware of the covert regime occupying the Stony Man facility. The need for the Commander in Chief to have a surgical strike unit within reach had remained constant. Bolan and Stony Man had proved time and again they were needed.

  A major incident at Stony Man Farm forced Bolan to assume a new role in covert operations. These days he had an arm’s-length relationship with the government. He often worked with Brognola when missions for the President dovetailed with missions he would have undertaken eventually. But he still worked his own agenda and chose the targets he saw as needing his intervention. He placed himself in da
nger every time he stepped out of the shadows, proving to Brognola his dedication to protecting the people who were helpless against the onslaught of evil.

  Now that Bolan had set his sights on the mobster, Marchinski, and by default, Tsvetanov, would be brought to their knees. Brognola had no doubts about that. Larry Mason’s daughter would be the focal point in Bolan’s maneuvers, but tearing down the mobs would be a consequence of that mission. Bolan would create havoc as he moved inexorably toward his goal. He could do nothing else.

  Names and faces changed. Mack Bolan’s ongoing war against evil never wavered.

  Hal Brognola sat behind his desk at Stony Man, preparing for the havoc that would come now that the Executioner was once again on the offensive.

  * * *

  HARRY JIGS HAD provided Bolan with the location of one of Marchinski’s businesses. Stony Man had given Bolan more specifics and the soldier was ready to make his move.

  The Shake A Leg club was a cover for one of Marchinski’s trafficking operations. Topless women and lap dancing, though legal, were the dubious attractions that brought in the customers. They gathered around the bar and paid for expensive drinks so they could watch the listless performances, while in the basement the club’s real business operated in squalid anonymity.

  The victims of the trafficking trade were kept in guarded cells. Confused and disoriented, they had no idea where they were or what awaited them. Young women snatched from their home soil and transported to America, they were watched over and ill treated if they made any kind of protest. Eventually, they would be auctioned off, sometimes singly or sometimes in batches, dependent on what individual purchasers required. The only certainty was their fate, which would be light-years away from whatever they might have been promised—likely prostitution or forced labor. It might be the twenty-first century, but for these hapless individuals, it might as well have been the Victorian era. A number of these women would be given drugs to draw their minds from the pitiful conditions they were now experiencing; it was simply a way to draw them even deeper into the darkness of their new lives.

  Harry Jigs had told Bolan about the club during their meet as an extra fillip of information. He’d made it obvious that Marchinski was covered by people on the take, which was why the frequent influx of covert trafficking was overlooked. Money, Jigs said, changed hands on a number of levels, covering the operation from interference.

  The Shake A Leg club stood on a slice of open ground, a less-than-glamorous building with a gaudy frontage and bare brick and plaster walls on the other three sides. The front of the club was dark at this hour, the neon display switched off. Bolan had parked a couple of streets away and made his silent way through the rain to the rear of the club. At this hour, only a few vehicles were pulled up close to the back wall.

  Bolan wore a blacksuit, his 93R in a shoulder rig and a Cold Steel Tanto knife clipped to his belt. Crouching in shadow, he checked out the area and saw only two sentries; he corrected that assessment almost immediately because the men were not acting like any sentries he’d seen before.

  The pair, in long leather coats, were lounging against the wall, hats pulled down across their faces. One held a stubby shotgun under his left arm, barrel pointing at the ground. His partner had both hands deep in his pockets. It was obvious neither of them were happy about being forced to keep watch in the cold and wet. That worked for Bolan; lack of enthusiasm went hand in hand with poor attention spans.

  He moved past the parked cars, bringing himself close to the pair. When one of the men turned to speak to his partner, Bolan saw his opportunity. He rose from behind the vehicles, a dark shadow in the gloom. Long strides brought him up behind the sentries. Without pause, Bolan struck.

  He kicked the legs out from under one man and as he went down, Bolan struck the second. A hard-edged blow from his fist crunched in beneath the startled man’s jaw, smashing bone and cartilage, rendering the victim speechless. The man toppled against the wall, hugging his crippled throat and desperately trying to suck in air. As he fell away, Bolan sensed the first man pushing himself to a sitting position and trying to haul the shotgun round for a shot. Bolan didn’t pause and drove his right foot out—a smashing blow that almost took the man’s head off his shoulders. He went backward, a strangled cry bursting from his lips, accompanying the spurt of blood and broken teeth. The man slammed back to the wet ground, body arching in a silent protest before he jerked, then became still.

  Bolan moved with practiced ease as he slipped plastic ties from a pouch on his belt and bound the wrists and feet of both downed men. He checked them both for cell phones and weapons, finding two auto pistols. Bolan unloaded the weapons, disassembled them and tossed the magazines beneath the parked cars. He unloaded the shotgun and scattered the shells then crushed the cell phones beneath his booted feet.

  The door the men had been positioned near was unlocked, and Bolan unleathered the Beretta as he slipped inside. A poorly lit passage led him past a couple dark offices. Bolan moved deeper into the building. At the end of the passage he was confronted by two more doors. The first opened onto the main club area, now silent and in shadow except for a few low security lights.

  Opening the second door exposed a flight of stairs leading down. He descended silently, picking up the low murmur of male voices. Reaching the bottom, Bolan rounded a brick wall and saw that the underground room stretched out into a low-ceilinged run of bar-fronted cells. Facing the cells was an open section where four men sat around a long table that allowed them to watch over the captives. Four of the cells were occupied. A haze of tobacco smoke hovered over the table.

  The young women were only partially dressed and slumped on low wooden beds. There was something in the way they were acting that told Bolan they’d been given drugs to keep them quiet. They remained passive, eyes fixed on distant visions, making little effort to move.

  Harry Jigs’s information was proving out.

  One of the seated men arched his back, flexing his arms, then glanced at his watch.

  “You want to make a fresh pot of coffee, Frank? It’s turning out to be a long fucking night. Sooner that transport shows up, the better.”

  One of the men stirred himself and stood. He was tall and lean, his head shaved. He crossed to where a smaller table held mugs and a coffeepot, picked up the pot and headed for the stairs where Bolan stood hidden by the wall.

  “We should make one of those bitches do it,” he complained. “All they do is sit on their asses.”

  “You think they’re fit to even carry the coffeepot?” one of the men said, laughing. “With that shit they had pumped into them, it’s a wonder they can even sit up.”

  The man called Frank walked to the end of the wall, turning toward the stairs.

  He didn’t see the black-clad figure emerge from the shadows. Blue eyes as cold as chipped ice. All he saw was a sudden movement in the gloom, then something struck him full in the face. His nose collapsed under the brutal blow as the bulk of Bolan’s pistol slammed across his face. He gave a strangled cry as the excruciating pain flared, the unchecked flow of hot blood streaming from his nose, spilling down his chin and across the front of his shirt. The coffeepot slipped from his fingers. He offered no resistance as Bolan caught him by one shoulder and spun him around. Bolan’s booted foot slammed against his butt, propelling Frank across the floor to slam face-first against the bars of the closest cell.

  As Frank crashed against the steel bars, the other three men scrambled off their chairs, clawing for the guns they carried. As fast as they were, their actions were way behind.

  Bolan had stepped into view, the Beretta already tracking in. He had set the weapon for triple-burst fire, and the repeated three-round explosions crackled with subsonic energy. Flesh yielded as Bolan’s 9 mm slugs slammed home. Blood sprayed and dark fragments blew into the air as the three hardmen went down in a flurry of jerking a
rms and legs. Two hit the floor. The third slumped lifelessly on his chair, head back, a final gurgle of sound sliding from his throat.

  Bolan holstered his pistol, pulled out a plastic tie and secured the moaning Frank. The guy was barely conscious as Bolan maneuvered him onto one of the chairs.

  At one end of the cell block, a central locking lever freed the doors. Bolan swung open each cell door and helped the young women out. It was a slow task. The drugged women could barely comprehend what was happening. Only one of them seemed to fully grasp what was going on, and she summoned enough energy to gather the others together. She was the one who spotted the coats tossed carelessly on a chair. She brought them to the other women and handed them out.

  “We need to go,” Bolan said. “You understand?”

  The woman nodded. “Yes. I understand,” she said in awkward, strongly accented English.

  “Take the others up the stairs. Go to the end of the passage and wait by the door for me.”

  Bolan turned and stood to one side of the man called Frank. He was still hunched over, blood running from his nose and a gash on his cheek. He seemed barely aware of Bolan’s presence until he spoke.

  “You hear me, Frank?” The man managed a nod. “When you get the chance, pass a message to your bosses. Tell them Drago Tsvetanov is moving in. The Marchinskis are finished. Tell him there’s more to come—a lot more. Got that?” Bolan raised his voice. “You hear me, Frank?”

  Frank nodded again. “Yeah. I hear you, and I got the message.”

  “Make sure it gets to home, Frank.”

  Bolan turned and made for the stairs, leaving behind what was left of the Marchinski crew. The four women were huddled together, waiting for him. The one who understood English turned to him.

  “We can go now?”

  Bolan nodded. “You’re free.”

  Bolan led the women outside to where the parked cars stood. He opened doors and ushered them inside, out of the rain. As they slid onto the comfortable seats, Bolan leaned in and started the motor, pressing the controls that activated the interior heater.