Twisted Path (2 page)

Almost as though they had crossed into another country, the character of the street changed, even as it narrowed to a mean little avenue. Now there were only small vendors and fruit sellers, tiny dress stores that sold rough woven shawls and ponchos.

The Indians housed their weapons. They were back among their people.

"Tell me, General Palma, what would you have me do? Let me guess. You think that the time has come when I should give up my position and turn the country over to a military dictatorship in other words, to you." President Alan Garcia sat back in his chair, idly tapping a pencil on his desktop.

He knew that random noises irritated the general.

General Arturo Palma, chief commander of the Peruvian military police, didn't bother to protest. He was well-known as the strongest advocate of law and order in the country. His ferocity and outright brutality in suppressing political unrest had made him many powerful friends.

There were enemies, of course, but the general dismissed them as either jealous or part of the bleeding left.

Palma had risen through the ranks rapidly, and now thought of himself as the best man to save his country from the increasing trend to violence of the warring political factions. He didn't trouble to conceal his good opinion of himself.

"Mr. President, these are difficult times, as we both know. The radical left is ready to cause trouble any time. Incidents of violence are escalating rapidly. Two days ago the Shining Path killed nearly fifty people and wounded five times as many in those two attacks. Now not even your own ministers are safe. There can be no accommodation with these terrorists. They seek only one thing: the overthrow of the state by force. Only a strong central government can prevent this, one that is prepared to meet violence on its own terms. National security cannot be compromised for the sake of personal freedoms, which would certainly disappear if the terrorists ever took power." Palma paused, pleased with his own rhetoric.

"Very touching, General. Quite suitable for the presidential campaign. One might think that if the Shining Path did not exist, you would have to invent them." Garcia held up his hand at the stormy look clouding Palma's aristocratic face. "No disrespect intended, of course, General. But tell me, why are you sure that it was the Shining Path?"

"I am positive that they are behind this outrage. The four terrorists killed were Indians, who, as you know, comprise the majority of the group. Bloody, senseless attacks are their trademark. The only new feature was the use of some modern weapons."

"General, have you obtained any further information on those weapons they used? It would be catastrophic if the Shining Path was able to obtain that kind of firepower in quantity."

Palma consulted some notes stretched before him.

"The M-16 we recovered was part of a shipment from the U.S. for Turkey that never arrived. It was diverted while en route. We believe that the attack on the minister of the interior involved a U.S.-made rocket called a Stingshot. How the Path got one is anyone's guess." Garcia, disturbed by this information, got up from his desk and began to pace restlessly, hands clasped behind his back, chin thrust toward the floor.

"The CIA, General. Could they be behind this? I have never been very popular with the Americans, especially since I limited repayment to those damnable foreign banks and nationalized our own. Some say the Americans hate a man who costs them money more than one who disagrees with them over ideology. I have heard rumors that the American president calls me another Castro. Could he be supplying the Shining Path to oust me?"

Palma considered his answer before replying. Would it be better to play on the president's well-known paranoia? If he harped on this theme, possibly with some false evidence he could concoct, it might have the president seeking an American behind every bush. Could he turn that to his advantage? Or was Garcia just probing to see how far Palma would push his presidential ambitions? He decided to take the safer course at present.

"I don't think that is likely. What would they have to gain by replacing you with a group still farther to the left? Anyway, I don't think the CIA has much stomach for foreign intrigues of that kind these days. They are still hurting from the Nicaragua affair."

"I'm so glad that you agree with me, General Palma," Garcia said with ill-concealed sarcasm. "I have asked the Americans to look into this weapons matter as a personal favor. Nothing promised in return, of course, but just enough of a hint to send some very powerful people digging extremely hard. I think they might have some information for us very soon."

Palma was angry, a sudden blaze that showed in a stiffened jaw and carefully enunciated words. "I wish you had consulted me, Mr. President. I would have advised against it. This is a Peruvian problem, and it should be solved by Peruvians."

"I wish that was possible, General!" Garcia shouted, angered in turn by his subordinate. "I wish that you could solve the problem without assistance. Instead the Shining Path grows stronger, not weaker. You are the general in charge of the military police. There are thousands of troops and police scouring the highlands, and still you have not been able to crush this rebellion. Guzman, an old philosophy professor, and his ragtag band of Indians are crippling my government. And let me remind you that I am still president, and I will not have you questioning my decisions. Good day!" Garcia studiously pretended to read a memo as Palma got up and stormed from the room, not bothering to close the door.

The president wondered for the thousandth time how best to remove the thorn in his side that was named Palma.

Mack Bolan crouched behind a palm tree at the edge of an open field forty-five minutes north of Miami.

Clad in a snug black-quit, face and hands covered by combat camouflage cosmetics, the big man blended into the shadows. He held a sleek Beretta 93-R, the barrel fitted with a custom silencer, and a .44 Desert Eagle rode at his hip. Black military webbing held spare magazines and a wicked Ka-bar knife for close work. Fragmentation and thermite grenades completed the warrior's weaponry for the upcoming hit. NVD goggles covered his eyes, giving the field a spooky illusion of daylight.

Bolan was here to meet Delmar "Big Deal" Jones, one of the main distributors in the area.

Jones ran roughshod over the street-level dealers and the shooting galleries of the roach-infested slums.

He dealt whatever made money, everything from crack to smack. Anything a buyer could swallow, snort or shoot, Del's boys would be happy to provide. Del was becoming a very rich man.

A Justice Department informant had whispered that the dealer would be restocking tonight, receiving a shipment from a factory located somewhere in the Bahamas.

Bolan's aim was to make sure that the chemical death never hit the streets. Delmar Jones was about to discover that he wasn't such a big deal after all.

This wouldn't be the first time he'd met Jones. Ten days ago the dealer had been in a courtroom, facing charges that ran the gamut from conspiracy to commit murder to possession of an unlicensed firearm.

Bolan had been there at the invitation of Dale Givens, an acquaintance in the district attorney's office who was sympathetic to the warrior's objectives but skeptical of his methods.

"Come down for the trial. You'll enjoy it. Jones is going to go so far down that he'll be lucky to see the sunshine on alternate leap years." The prosecutor had been confident, obviously holding an ace.

The courtroom ritual was very impressive. The judge, a hardjawed man in his fifties, retained an air of solid competence. His mouth was pursed in a sour expression, the product of years of trying to separate the half-truths from the outright lies, of dealing with an unending string of lowlifes and their sometimes equally criminal counselors.

The orderly progression of events, the American flag, the symbols of law and justice all gave Bolan pause. He wondered yet again about the lonely course he had chosen for himself. His enemies accused him of subverting the system he was trying to protect, saying that he was no better than the men he destroyed. They said that if more people did as he did and played the roles of judge, jury and executioner, the fragile fabric of society would collapse into a horror of vengeance and retribution.

Maybe they were right.

Occasionally Bolan worried that he might be on the wrong track; perhaps he should let the law take care of things in its own sweet time. Did his means justify the end?

He didn't have all the answers, but in the final analysis he did know this: he destroyed so that others might live. The people who had faced his judgment had lost any right to live long ago. Bolan was only carrying out the sentence they had written on their own foreheads with the blood of their victims.

The courtroom scene had had one disturbing detail: Delmar Jones hadn't acted like a man who expected to go to prison.

Jones was in his late twenties, and had an arrogant attitude that seeped from his pores. He hadn't bothered to dress to impress. Clothed from head to toes in flamboyant white, Jones dripped heavy gold, with multiple chains at his throat and wrists. A single large ruby shone in his left earlobe. He looked every inch the wealthy thug he was.

He paid no attention to the prosecutor's righteous denunciation of the many crimes he had committed, the sorrow he had sown, the lives he had ruined.

Instead, Jones studied a racing form, doodled on a pad, turned around in his chair to ogle and smile at a couple of beauties among the spectators.

The reason for his confidence became apparent when the prosecution's star witness took the stand, a former lieutenant in Jones's ring. The D.A. expected that the man's testimony would put Jones away for life.

It didn't go down that way.

When on the stand, the pusher changed his story. In a voice almost too low to be heard, he denied everything. He claimed that the confession and the carefully transcribed testimony were lies of his own fabrication, made out of envy for his boss. Delmar Jones was an honest and good patriotic citizen who gave to charity and wouldn't hurt a fly.

A few sarcastic comments in reply from Jones's high-powered attorney and it was all over. The judge, looking as though he had swallowed a quart of lemon juice, had no option. Jones was a free man. His former lieutenant went to jail for perjury.

Before he left, Jones had a few parting words for Givens. "Don't look so surprised, dude. There's no lawyer yet been born who can keep Delmar Jones down. Hey, you want a real job? I can afford you. Why, I've got so many girlfriends that I spend more than your little salary on condoms. Come on, baby." Jones departed with a roar of laughter, his attorney in tow.

Bolan hit the streets to start digging.

Later, Bolan had a word with Givens over Jones's acquittal.

"I don't know what happened, Mack." The attorney had been angry and puzzled, his voice weary with the fatigue of endless sixteen-hour days spent in preparing a case that had vanished in minutes. "He was in a safehouse. He was watched every minute. No one could have gotten to him."

"Somebody obviously did. Anytime more than two people know something, it's only a matter of time before a man as rich and nasty as Jones finds out. The old carrot and stick. Offer some underpd cop fifty grand to carry a message and threaten to tear off his children's heads if he doesn't. How many people can resist that kind of pressure?"

Givens didn't bother to answer. Bolan was right, and there was nothing he could do to change the facts.

He pressed his fists into red-rimmed eyes, rubbing them to try to remove the sting. "My father-in-law has been asking me to join his civil law practice in Maryland. Easy money. Good clients. Short hours. I've said no. Until now."

Bolan didn't say anything. He couldn't give anyone else the motivation to fight when it looked as if it was against his own best interests. It had to come from inside, or all the coaxing and rationalising in the world wasn't worth a damn.

Shell shock didn't only happen in shooting wars. The trenches of downtown Miami had their casualties, too.

Bolan just rested a hand on Givens's shoulder, a salute from one soldier to another, and left.

He had business to take care of.

The business deal would go down any minute now, but Jones wasn't going to like the price the Executioner would make him pay.

A line of three cars was kicking up dust, traveling slowly down the dirt road that ended in the open field where Bolan crouched. The first and last vehicles were inconspicuous American sedans.

The middle car was the Porsche 911 that Jones favored.

Three gunners got out of each sedan to establish a defense perimeter. Jones hadn't lived this long by taking chances. The guards spread out, four making a slow examination of the area around the cars, shining flashlights into the pockets of tangled underbrush. The other two men walked the length of the field, checking for any newly erected posts or wire. The authorities had been using drastic measures of late to try to discourage the dealers from using vacant fields as landing strips. This one was still clean.

Bolan tensed as one of the gunners approached his hiding place, thirty yards from Jones's car. He recognised the silhouette of an Ingram Model 10, a short-barreled machine pistol that could spray 1100 rounds a minute like water from a hose.

He held his breath, easing the Ka-bar from its sheath.

The hardguy played the beam to Bolan's left, as the rustling of some night creature attracted his attention. Then he disappeared into the bush as the warrior exhaled slowly.

After a shouted relay of all clears echoed from the end of the field, Jones and another bodyguard emerged from the Porsche. At the far end of the field, two red flares were placed forty yards apart to serve as guideposts.

A few minutes of silence passed, broken only by the croak of frogs and rustle of palm fronds in the light evening breeze. Bolan could smell the burning cigar that was clamped between Jones's lips. The warrior could have dropped him then, but the timing wasn't right.

Bolan, a master sniper, could've shot Jones's eyes out a dozen times during the past week. But he was waiting for the moment when he could not only take out Jones, but could also intercept the drug shipment. The informant had specified that the street value of the drugs would be between thirty and fifty million.

Several minutes passed before the droning of a small airplane engine became audible from the east.

Bolan spotted the plane flying low above the treetops, hugging the ground to avoid radar detection. The Cessna skimmed the low palms at the end of the field and touched down in front of the flares.

Jones and five of his gunners converged on the aircraft, which had halted a hundred yards from the parked cars. The flares were abruptly doused.

Bolan moved out from the shadows, confident that any noise he made would be covered by what was taking place down by the plane, as the cargo was pitched onto the ground for Jones to inspect. The nearby guards were less than professional, paying more attention to the lights and action in front of them than to any potential threat from the rear.

The two gunners stood twenty feet apart, one about five feet closer to the plane than the other.

Bolan decided to first take out the man who was casually leaning against the right fender of a Cutlass Ciera.

The Executioner padded forward, edging between the parked cars with all the stealth of a prowling jungle cat. The gunman never suspected Bolan's presence, until he felt a callused hand clamp over his mouth, muffling the scream that ended stillborn as six inches of cold steel sliced into his back. The tip pierced the heart in an instant, and the big muscle was torn to shreds. The enforcer died without a gasp.

Bolan eased the body to the ground between the cars, so that the man appeared to have abruptly vanished. The warrior went to the ground by the left door of the Porsche.

The second gunner, aware by some sixth sense that his partner was no longer listening to his chatter, turned to probe the darkness. "Hey, Dixie. Where are you, man? The boss is gonna skin you." The gunman advanced slowly, the Ingram nosing the shadows ahead of him.

Bolan didn't want to give himself away but the problem was how to silence the alerted guard without giving him a chance to loose a warning burst. The warrior slid a magazine from a pouch and held it in his left hand. His right still grasped the Ka-bar, slick with Dixie's lifeblood.

The triggerman had reached the front of the Porsche. Another few feet, and he was sure to see the body of his companion. Bolan flung the magazine overhand above the roof of the car. When it bounced off the hood of the far sedan with a metallic ring, the gunner spun toward the sound.

Bolan catapulted into action.

The timing was split second. In a quick step he was behind the gunman, thrusting hard with the Ka-bar into the guy's left kidney. Bolan knew that this was supposed to be so painful that the victim wouldn't have the strength to cry out. The warrior's right hand flashed to the trigger guard, a strong forefinger pushing behind the gunman's trigger finger, jamming the trigger forward as a spasm jerked through the dying gunner.

The machine pistol slipped from the dead man's hand and into Bolan's as the gunner fell backward, his eyes and mouth open in a silent scream.

Bolan wiped the knife on the fallen man's shirt and sheathed it before starting off toward the knot of men clustered around the plane. Only a little more than a minute and a half had elapsed since Bolan started to make his move.

The warrior ran forward in a combat crouch, determined to make the most of his surprise visit now that he had secured his retreat.

When Bolan was still seventy feet away, he booted a stone that rustled through the low grass. The slight noise attracted the attention of the pilot, who was idling near the nose of the plane, thinking of how he would spend his bonus in the fleshpots of Miami.

Bolan let loose with the little subgun, spraying twenty manglers a second at the men unpacking the plane. The pilot went down first, four rounds churning his guts. Three more ripped into the chest of the nearest guard, who slid to the ground leaking blood.

Two more collapsed by the door of the plane, one with half his skull missing.

Bolan flung away the empty Ingram and dived to ground, rolling to his left as he depressed the safety spoon of a thermite grenade. The remaining gunners opened up in short bursts, probing the area where Bolan had last been.

On a two count Bolan hurled the grenade, sending it tumbling under the fuselage of the Cessna.

He hugged the ground as the bomb detonated, sending coals of thermite scorching into the backs of the gunmen. A few blazing chips penetrated the fuel tank, and a moment later the plane exploded, incinerating the remaining cargo. A foul stench of burning flesh combined with the reek of oxidizing chemicals.

Bolan unfeathered the Beretta before moving forward to inspect the damage. Only one body was still twitching, a gunner whose left leg was nearly severed.

The guy was screaming from the pain of thermite nodules scorching their way through his flesh. He wouldn't last long, but Bolan helped him on his way with a mercy round. The twitching stopped.

The big man swore under his breath. The one body he wanted to see most was missing. Jones must have run at the first shot, using the plane for cover and leaving his men to bear the brunt of the Executioner's wrath.

Delmar Jones had escaped judgment once. It wouldn't be as easy this time.

Bolan moved away from the killzone and edged through the undisturbed grass looking for the dealer's trail, using the combat skills that had kept him alive through dozens of campaigns.