sudden shift in position apparently threw off his attackers, gained him precious seconds. As his own gun locked dry, he tossed the grenade into a space roughly between the two men. In the meantime, the hardened fighters had already begun to recover from the change and were shooting in their adversary’s direction. The Executioner hurled himself to the ground in between a pair of parked cars. Knee and elbow pads absorbed much of the shattering impact of flesh and bone against concrete, but Bolan still felt flesh rip away from his open palm as he used it to help break his fall.
Letting the Ingram fall loose on its strap, Bolan fisted the Desert Eagle, rode out the stun grenade’s sting and then hauled himself to his feet. Cocking back the big Israeli pistol’s hammer to ease the trigger pull, the soldier stepped from between the cars, weapon leveled in front of him in a two-handed grip. One of the men, face buried in a V created by bending his left arm, fired wildly with a stubby black handgun. The Desert Eagle cracked once, the muzzle-flash illuminating Bolan’s hardened features. The Magnum slug chewed through the air, caught the man in the forehead and knocked him back.
One down.
Bolan saw the other shooter, dazed by the white flash, trying to find a lost weapon. He triggered the Desert Eagle, its shattering report again splitting the night, and the round sliced a crimson line along the man’s shoulder, eliciting a cry and causing him to settle back on his rump.
The Executioner stepped up close to the man, kicked away his AK-47. “You speak English?”
The man looked terrified. “Yes. I studied in America.”
“You and I are going to talk,” Bolan said.
“Yes, yes,” the man said. “Talk.”
Bolan pushed the man to the ground and rolled him onto his stomach, bound his hands behind his back with plastic handcuffs. The warrior came up in a crouch, started for the alley, ready to back up an old friend with whom he spilled more blood than he cared to consider during his War Everlasting.
Moving along a building, he stopped just a few feet from Grimaldi’s combat zone. A moment of eerie silence had fallen, followed by a sudden chorus of anguished cries. Damn!
Before he could take another step, a roar reverberated throughout the canyon of buildings, followed by the tortured sound of grinding metal and a loud crash. A massive front of singeing heat whooshed out, smacked Bolan front-on forcing him to involuntarily cover his face.
What the hell had happened to Jack?
JACK GRIMALDI RAISED his silenced Ingram, unloaded a quick burst at the car blocking his path. Bullets skittered and sparked off its black metal skin, smacking into nearby walls.
Shit, he thought, armored to the teeth.
Orange-yellow muzzle-flashes flared from a pair of assault rifles protruding from the car. Grimaldi dropped into a crouch, caressed the Ingram’s trigger. The hellstorm of bullets thudded against the car and gave the shooters pause, buying him precious seconds in which to maneuver.
Judging by the open windows, the car had no gunports and for that, at least, Grimaldi counted himself lucky. Considering the odds, he’d take any advantage he could get. His first hastily placed burst drilled into a fortified car door, just below the window rim. The bullets bounced away, but threw the shooter off balance, prompting him to withdraw inside the vehicle. Firing on the run, Grimaldi tapped out two more bursts that sailed inside the car. An anguish scream sounded from within the vehicle, indicating he’d injured or killed one opponent. That left three more shooters, one in the driver’s seat, two more positioned outside and behind the car, using it for cover.
With quick, sure steps, the pilot crossed the killzone, acquiring a new target on the run. One man, crouched behind the car’s front bumper, was drawing a bead on Grimaldi. A quick burst caught the enemy in the shoulder, chewing through fabric and flesh before knocking him backward. Grimaldi knew the man was down, but probably not out, particularly if he had a backup piece that he could fire with his one good hand.
Reaching a small alcove created by a doorway, the Stony Man pilot inserted his slender frame inside the cramped space, riding out a concentrated barrage of autofire as he did. Unzipping his leather bomber jacket, Grimaldi reached inside, snagged a fresh clip, reloaded his weapon. He inventoried his personal armory—one remaining clip for the Ingram, a .40-caliber Glock in a shoulder holster and a .44-caliber Charter Arms Bulldog snugged in an ankle holster, a last-minute gift from John Kissinger before leaving for the mission.
He was loaded for bear, sure, but so were the two men, and perhaps a third, trying to kill him. Death, Grimaldi could handle, but he was the barrier standing between these men and his old friend. If they wanted to get to Striker, they’d have to do it over the ace pilot’s dead body.
It sure as hell wasn’t the first time someone had tried.
Peals of gunfire echoed throughout the alley, intensified, telling Grimaldi that the men had seized on his pause to reload. Whipping the Ingram around the corner, he fired blind, emptying one-third of a clip in his attackers’ direction. Chew on that, you bastards, he thought. He followed up with a second, more intense burst. Judging by the pause in return fire, he’d driven them under cover, at least for a moment.
A slight shift in the building’s shadow caught his attention. Even before it clicked in his mind, instinct warned him of immediate danger. Still crouching, Grimaldi folded his body around the corner, saw a gunman slipping along the length of the building toward him. He triggered the Ingram. The stubby weapon roared to life, spitting jagged columns of flame, a cloud of acrid smoke. Rounds drilled into the approaching man’s chest and throat, stopping him cold and pushing him backward. The man’s assault rifle clattered to the ground as he crumpled in a dead heap.
Even as the dead shooter fell, Grimaldi was turning his attention to the hardman situated behind the car. A hand popped up over the trunk and Grimaldi saw that it clutched something.
Grenade!
Firing low, Grimaldi swept the Ingram in a tight arc, dispatching a swarm of .45-caliber rounds underneath the car. The way he saw it, this was his best bet. If he gunned for the hand, he had a better than average chance of hitting it. If he tried for the man’s crouching body, and more specifically, his legs, the pilot improved his own odds of survival.
He hoped.
As the Ingram clicked dry, he heard the man scream. Shifting back into the doorway, Grimaldi folded in on himself. If he was lucky, the guy had dropped the grenade, releasing the spoon and activating the explosive. The man and the armored vehicle would absorb most of the explosion and shrapnel.
If he was lucky. If not…
The weapon exploded, sending waves of heat and shrapnel buzzing through the alley. A grinding noise, metal on concrete, followed and Grimaldi had to assume the explosion had knocked the car up on its side.
Grimaldi reloaded his weapon and got to his feet. He peered furtively around the wall, trying to present as small a target as possible. He saw the vehicle on its side, corpses spread around it.
He felt something behind him, turned, his muscles tensing for another confrontation.
“Easy, Jack,” Bolan said.
Grimaldi relaxed, grinned. “Easy? Easy my ass. This is some of my best work.”
MINUTES LATER Mack Bolan shoved his POW hard into a chair, causing it to creak and slide back several inches. The man, a Pakistani dressed in jeans and a gray athletic sweatshirt, glowered at his captors. A few extra minutes of drawing breath apparently had emboldened him into thinking he was in the clear.
Bolan was about to show him the error of his ways.
“Shallallab. Where was he going?” Bolan asked.
The man sat mute.
“Was he going to see Ramsi al-Shoud?”
A flicker of recognition lighted the man’s eyes before fear doused it back out. He remained silent.
“Where