Silent Running. Don Pendleton

narrow bed against the wall in the corner of the single room.

      In the dim light, he didn’t have a clear, unobstructed line of sight, so his right hand whipped the Cold Steel Tanto fighting knife from the sheath on his assault harness. He was through the open door and across the room in three steps. The would-be rapist looked up from his work just in time to catch the blade as it slashed across his jugular.

      The thug gurgled his death as Bolan grabbed him with his free hand and pulled him away from the motionless woman. She was unconscious, but breathing and didn’t appear to be badly hurt. He laid his fingers against the side of her neck and found a strong pulse, so he just covered her.

      Dragging the corpse outside, he closed the door behind him before taking the body to a hiding place behind what looked to be a tavern. If there were other wandering thugs loose tonight, he didn’t want someone to stumble over it and raise the alarm. From there, he continued on his way.

      HAL BROGNOLA was still keeping to his sleep-when-ever-he-could regimen. The world might be going to hell in a hand basket, but there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. Yet. He’d been awakened for the first meal his captors had provided in the late afternoon, wolfed down the beans and soft tortillas, used the urinal, crawled into bed and gone right back to sleep.

      It was after dark when he was awakened by voices coming down the hall outside his cell. His watch had been taken away during the search the first night, so he had no idea what time it was, but it didn’t really matter. He sat up, swung his legs over the side of his bunk and got mentally prepared to greet his visitors.

      Two black-clad Latino gunmen entered the cell followed by a swaggering Diego Garcia. “How do you like your accommodations, Mr. Brognola?” he asked. “It’s not quite your usual fancy D.C. hotel room is it?”

      Brognola patted his narrow bunk. “Not bad for a Mexican jail.” He shrugged. “I’ve seen a lot worse. The food’s not quite up to Cancun’s usual standards, though. I expected to eat much better here.”

      “You’re eating what the people of Cancun eat on a daily basis,” Garcia said. “They might be able to find work in your hotels, but they can’t afford to eat the food they prepare for you.”

      “I don’t think you kidnapped me to lecture me about the local cuisine, Garcia. There’s not much I can do to improve the diet of your ‘people.’”

      “Your government has had a chance to improve the lives of the people of Latin America for years,” the Cuban shot back, “but they have done nothing except to work hard to make it worse. Now that the people have taken things into their own hands, they will improve their lives for themselves.”

      “By invading the United States?” Brognola laughed. “And stealing what we Americans have created by our own ingenuity and our hard work? That’s very original. I’ve never heard that one before.”

      “The people are only taking back what was taken from them in the first place,” Garcia stated. “California, Texas and Florida rightfully belong to the Mexican people you Yankees stole them from.”

      “Don’t forget Arizona and New Mexico.” Brognola couldn’t help himself. “We won them, too, when we beat your sorry asses in the Mexican War.”

      Brognola didn’t even try to duck when Garcia swung at him. This guy wasn’t too tightly wrapped, but as long as he could get him fired up every now and then, he wouldn’t start asking the questions Brognola didn’t want to answer. He took the blow without flinching.

      “Your arrogance is going to cost you dearly, Brognola.” The Cuban almost spit the words. “I know that I could get a good ransom from your Washington friends for you, but I think that I’ll turn you over to a People’s Revolutionary Court instead to be tried for your crimes again humanity. The punishment will be to face a firing squad.”

      “Oh, please!” Brognola said. “Put me on trial in a kangaroo court and charge me with what? Being an underpaid career government employee?” He shrugged. “If I worked for the State Department, you might be able to make a case for my having repeatedly committed Crimes Against Common Sense, but I’m just a midlevel federal cop.”

      “A cop, as you say,” Garcia replied, “who has the ear of the President. But your President is missing much more than just one of his many overpaid advisers. As of today he has also lost his source of cheap labor and a dumping ground for his toxic waste.”

      Brognola frowned. He was no stranger to the incomprehensible ravings of would-be, socialist “saviors of the people,” but this was a completely new one on him. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

      “The president of Cuba has just announced his recognition of the newly formed People’s Republic of Mexico,” Garcia said proudly. “The Mexicans will now follow on the glorious path of the Cuban peoples to attain their true freedom from Capitalistic exploitation.”

      Brognola wanted to laugh but he knew better. This guy was rapidly descending into true paranoia. “In case you missed it,” he couldn’t keep himself from saying, “we’re in the twenty-first century now. Che was the heart of the Revolution, and he’s been dead for years so, for God’s sake, get over it. After spilling his guts to the CIA, he got stood up against a shit house wall and was shot like a diseased dog.”

      Hearing the name of his personal hero spoken of so disrespectfully, the Cuban went berserk. Brognola’s head snapped back from two blows to the face. The first strike opened a cut over his left eye and the second felt as though it had chipped a tooth. He’d been through worse and didn’t react.

      Garcia suddenly stopped and stalked out of the cell. One of the goons reversed his AK and smiled as he made as if to jab Brognola in the gut with the butt before following his boss out and locking the door behind him.

      Brognola hid a smile as he laid back down again. Once more he had managed to deflect the conversation to lesser topics. But how much longer he could keep getting hit in the head remained to be seen. So far, though, he was taking it without incurring any permanent damage. Barbara Price was always saying that he was a hardheaded bastard, and now he was getting a chance to test that statement.

      QUICKLY MOVING through the reminder of Cancun village, Bolan intersected the main paved road and followed it to the bridge that crossed the lagoon. As the photos had shown, the causeway was being guarded from the opposite end. A pair of open-top SUVs with mounted machine guns and searchlights were parked at the far end, and a dozen gunmen loitered nearby. It would be no problem for him to simply take out the security force, but this wasn’t the time to make a lot of noise and leave more bodies behind. Someone was bound to notice sooner rather than later.

      His only other choice was to make a half mile swim across the bay, which wasn’t the option he would have chosen. Nonetheless, he headed south down the village side of the lagoon, separating it from the resort area, looking for an alternative to a swim.

      A half a mile downshore, he came across a beach shack with several personal watercraft pulled up on the sand in front of it. A couple more small water-craft were under the roof of a lean-to in a state of disrepair; this, apparently, was a repair facility.

      A quick check showed that all of the machines had been disabled by having their spark plugs pulled, but that was okay with him. The sound of an unmuffled two-stroke engine in the still night would attract a little more attention than he wanted. The watercraft would still float, however, so he looked around the shack until he found an aluminum paddle. Back on the beach, he chose a dark-colored Jet Ski, dragged it down to the water’s edge and into the surf.

      Straddling the saddle, he bent over the handlebars and paddled out into the lagoon at an angle away from the bridge. With few lights showing, there wasn’t much chance of his being spotted against the dark water, but he kept low and paddled strongly, but carefully, so as not to raise ripples. The tide was with him and the trip across the quarter mile of open water went quickly.

      On reaching the other side, he pulled the watercraft well up onto the sand and tipped it over so it would look as if it had been abandoned. He took cover above the