Fatal Combat. Don Pendleton

      Somewhere in the distance, police sirens could be heard. The firefight had finally drawn the attention of law enforcement. Davis hadn’t had a chance to call for backup, at least not while within the range that Bolan could overhear. No doubt the gunfire itself had generated frantic calls from citizens near this abandoned zone.

      “Stay down,” Bolan said.

      Bolan retrieved a fragmentation grenade from his war bag. He pulled the pin, let the spoon pop free and waited, counting in his head. Davis caught the movement and eyed him curiously from his vantage point, covering the top of his head with his folded arms as he lay on his stomach. Bolan nodded once and then tossed the grenade.

      The bomb exploded just as it hit the lip of the concrete barrier. The men not caught by shrapnel from the grenade absorbed the spray of concrete fragments the explosion kicked up. Guns clattered to the pavement. As the boom echoed from the nearby brick buildings, nothing else moved.

      Davis pushed himself to his feet.

      Bolan moved from cover. He walked over, weapon ready, listening and watching to see if another ambush would be forthcoming. They had been attacked too many times already for him not to expect it at any moment. The sirens continued to close, but they were still some distance off.

      “They’re going to take a few minutes to find us,” Davis said.

      “Do I look that excited?” Bolan asked.

      “You’re a one-man war, Cooper,” Davis said. “And I’m willing to bet this won’t be the first time you catch hell for walking into someone’s jurisdiction and setting the place on fire.”

      “You catch on fast, Detective,” Bolan said. In his pocket, his secure satellite phone began to vibrate. He snapped it open.

      “Cooper,” he said. Using his cover identity would inform the Farm that there were others present.

      “Striker,” Barbara Price said. “I hear police.”

      “Yeah,” Bolan said. “You do. I’ve just engaged targets comprising a hit team. Armed professionals, mixed kit. Civilian clothing on the formal side. You caught me before I could send you pictures. I’d actually like to take those before company gets here.”

      “Do so,” the Farm’s mission controller told him. “We have a database pulled up. I’ll explain when you’re ready.”

      Bolan made a fast circuit of the dead men closest to him and Davis. The ones on the other side of the abandoned building would have to wait. He said as much to Price when he reestablished the connection.

      “You may not need to,” Price said. “We’re working on a theory, and Bear has some preliminary, rough matches pulled up. It looks like we’re right.” Aaron “the Bear” Kurtzman was Stony Man Farm’s resident computer genius.

      “Why?” Bolan said. “What’s the theory?”

      “Your gunmen,” Price told him, “are old school Mafia. Hit men for the Mob.”

      Bolan took that in for a moment. He had, over the course of his war, been on the receiving end of Mob guns before, even had a price on his head. It was among the Mafia that the Executioner had first become known, then famous, then infamous.

      “I thought something seemed familiar about all this,” he said, deadpan.

      He could sense the smile in Price’s voice. “I’ll bet,” she said. She went on more seriously. “We’ve checked the pictures you sent first, and checked them thoroughly. Each one of those men has a rap sheet. Most of them are career criminals. A few are young enough that they haven’t quite reached the majors, but they were headed that way before you got to them. Each and every one has ties, directly or indirectly, to Detroit-area underworld figures.”

      Davis, unable to hear Price’s side of the conversation, shot Bolan a quizzical look.

      “But that doesn’t scan at all,” Bolan said, considering her report. “Unless…”

      “Unless your cover has been breached and the whole of the Michigan Mafia wants your head?” Price said. “We thought of that. Your cover is secure. There’s been no chatter from the usual sources that we would see if word about you got out. There’s no reason to believe anyone’s targeting you for any reason other than the obvious—you’re an interloping federal agent looking into these serial killings.”

      “Something’s not right where that’s concerned, either,” Bolan said. “But I need to see where that takes me before I offer any theories of my own. So why would Detroit’s Mob be involved?”

      “The most obvious reason is that they’re the prime employee pool for a job like this.”

      “Guns for hire,” Bolan supplied. “You need a hit man or a lot of them in Detroit, a city notorious for its corruption, then you go see the Mob. Something like that?”

      “Exactly,” Price said. “Somebody with serious money, a lot of clout, or both is behind this. Somebody with enough resources to throw that many Mafia gunners at one man.”

      “Or two,” Bolan said, looking at Davis, who continued to watch him curiously.

      “There’s one good thing about all this,” Price said.

      “And that is?”

      “You’ve made a serious dent in the local crime syndicates,” Price said. “We’ll continue to work up the other identifications you sent. I’ll let you know if anything pops up.”

      “I’ll stay after it on this end,” Bolan said.

      “Striker?” Price said. “Be careful. And good hunting.”

      “Thanks,” Bolan said. “Cooper out.” The sirens of the approaching police cars had become louder. Cruisers were pulling up around the abandoned buildings and closing on both sides. Bolan frowned. He shut his phone and looked at Davis. “Our boys—” he jerked his head at the dead men “—were all Mafia hit men. Hired to kill me, or to kill both of us.”

      “Cooper,” Davis said, his face lurid in the red and blue lights of the approaching cruisers, “what’s really going on here?”

      “Murder, and covering up murder. It isn’t the what that concerns me most,” Bolan said. “It’s the who.”

      5

      Reginald Chamblis worked the blades through the air, feeling them move, feeling them sing, feeling them speak to him. Each was a custom bowie knife the exact length of his forearm. Each was razor sharp and handmade. As the cutting edges cleaved the air, as the needle tips of the blades thrust here and there, in and out, he saw the targets he was striking on a succession of phantom opponents.

      He moved as he worked. The man was light on the balls of his feet, his knees slightly bent, his entire body coiled with dynamic tension. He stalked his way from one end of the training hall to other, the polished hardwood floor silent beneath him. In the corners, wooden kung fu dummies stood at mute attention, the sticks of their “arms” pointing at specified angles and heights. The rankings and awards arranged neatly on the far wall lent the place an air of respectability.

      Not one of the certificates was less than ten years old.

      Chamblis had spent his life working to find new and greater challenges. In high school, everything had come easily to him. He was well-liked, good-looking, athletic and smart. He excelled in his classes. He played football and basketball, though not quite at the level of those who earned scholarships for doing just that. He majored in business and minored, simply because he enjoyed it, in philosophy. He graduated with a 4.0 GPA and spent three of his four years at university as the editor of the school newspaper and president of half a dozen student organizations. He conquered it all—and at least a dozen of the campus’s most desirable young women—and never appeared taxed in the slightest by any of it.

      The truth was that even