Firestorm

Special thanks and acknowledgment to

Tim Tresslar for his contribution to this work.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Prologue

He was sure his heart would explode.

Javier Montesinos thrashed his way through the latticework of vines and branches that covered the jungle floor. Greens and browns rushed at him in a kaleidoscopic flurry. He sucked for air, felt it burn the insides of his overtaxed lungs. Blood thundered in his ears and his arms pumped wildly at his sides as he tried to gain distance from the monster on his trail.

The sound of an engine’s growl intermingled with the crash of branches and foliage being ripped from the ground, snapped and crushed beneath something big. Motorcycle engines whined, the insistent buzzing nearly swallowed up by the unseen vehicle’s thunder.

Montesinos wanted to stop, wanted to rest, to hide.

He could do none of these things.

He could only run. He needed to escape, to call Maria and let her know what’d gone down. That they were coming for her.

A motorcycle’s whine grew louder. The CIA agent tightened his grip on the Uzi he carried, but kept his pace steady. He’d stolen the weapon from one of the camp’s guards, snapping the man’s neck in return.

He’d covered a couple more yards when something hurtled from the brush. In a blur of black and silver, it shot past him into a large clearing that lay just ahead.

The driver whipped the motorcycle into a J-turn and brought it around 180 degrees. The biker paused, the black shield that covered his face locked on the exhausted agent. He revved the engine, but kept the bike stationary. One hand drifted from the handlebars and slid for a pistol clipped to his belt.

Montesinos jerked to a halt. His chest heaved as he sucked greedily at the exhaust-tainted air. He felt light-headed and the sudden stop caused him to stumble. He caught himself and raised the Uzi. He knew the magazine was nearly empty, depleted by his spraying his pursuers with volleys of gunfire.

The agent heard the rumbling of the big machine as it closed in from behind.

In the instant that he pulled the trigger, the motorcycle blasted forth and bore down on him. The gun chugging out a line of fire, he thrust himself sideways, narrowly escaping the bike’s onslaught. When he struck the ground, he ignored the sharp ends of branches that poked into his body. He focused on his target.

Steel-jacketed slugs struck the frame and sparked against the metal, etching a line along the vehicle’s side. The bullets punched through the rider’s leather boots. An anguished cry exploded from the man on the motorcycle. Frenzied by the sudden onslaught of pain, he twisted the handlebars more than ninety degrees and turned the front wheel into a brake.

Montesinos watched as the bike’s rear tire rocketed off the ground until the vehicle toppled over. The force launched the driver from the bike and sent him airborne. When he struck the ground, his shooting hand broke the fall, and the impact snapped bone, eliciting another cry from the wounded man.

Montesinos hauled himself to his feet. His breath still ragged, as much from rage as exhaustion, he lumbered across the clearing toward the downed biker, who scrambled to unsheathe the pistol holstered on his hip. The Uzi barked again and a tightly grouped burst pounded through the rider’s face shield and into his skull.

The Uzi’s clip emptied, Montesinos hurled it aside.

The whine of additional motorcycles swelled in his ears. He whipped his head left, spotted three of them crashing from different directions through the trees and brush that ringed the clearing. He knelt next to the dead man and snagged the handgun still holstered on his hip. It was a .50-caliber Desert Eagle.

Crouched behind the motorcycle, he waited for the riders to close in, rather than chance a long-distance shot through a web of tree limbs and other obstacles.

The nearest reached a point about fifteen yards away. A figure seated on the back of the motorcycle pointed a black object at him. A heartbeat later it began to spit flame. Bullets whizzed out from the forest, buzzing past him like unseen insects.

At about ten yards, the Desert Eagle thundered three times. The driver jerked as a round drilled into his torso. Suddenly flaccid arms detached from the handgrips and the bullet’s velocity pushed the driver into the second rider who was scrambling to shove the corpse from his bike and get hold of the handgrips. The second motorcycle launched into a zigzag pattern, apparently to evade any further shots.

Montesinos rose, shoved the Desert Eagle into the waistband of his torn blue jeans and grabbed the handlebar of the fallen motorcycle that lay before him.

But before he could straddle the machine, he saw a big black vehicle lumbering toward him, pushing down small trees, crushing greenery.

He muttered an oath, then let the bike fall to the ground.

You know what’s back there, damn it. You know it will kill you! Just go, he thought in a panic.

The mechanical growl filled his ears. As he tried again to mount the motorcycle, he felt something fiery sear the flesh of his calf. He smelled the burned flesh even before he felt the hot lancets of pain coursing up his leg. His lips parted and a sudden scream broke forth, driven as much by shock as pain.

The heat quickly traveled up his leg, even as he dropped his weight onto the motorcycle’s seat, leaving a trail of charred flesh in its wake. Adrenaline and terror overwhelmed all rational thought. He knew he needed to get the hell out before it left him nothing but charred flesh and bones.

Like all the others.

Gripping the accelerator, he felt the bike lurch forward underneath him. Thirty or so yards away sat a line of trees. If he could burst through those, lose himself in the surrounding jungle, perhaps he’d make it.

The heat seemed to intensify throughout his body. It traveled beyond his leg and began to burn through his torso and arms. Skin that first became warm heated almost instantly to unbearable temperatures. Within heartbeats, flesh reddened to an angry scarlet, then began to bubble and blister. Montesinos screamed again as the pain overwhelmed him, blinded him. Fingers uncurled and released the handlebar grips and the Colombian began to grab at himself, as though besieged by thousands of unseen insects. In the flurry of activity, he fell from the bike. It shot ahead a few yards before it rolled to a stop and tipped over.

He lay on the ground, curled protectively into a ball. Within moments, paralysis set into the parched flesh of his throat. The skin of his face and lips blistered, grew taut, emitted small curls of smoke. The orbs that had been his eyes sizzled, their remnants oozing from their sockets like tears. His mind, overloaded by pain, had begun to shut itself down, to shield him from the countless lancets of pain that coursed through his body, tearing away at him like parasites. There will be more, he thought. His body shuddered one last time before a blackness swallowed the last bit of consciousness.

M ARIA S ERRANO, A SUITCASE in either hand, rushed to her car. She popped open the trunk, slipped the bags inside, shut the lid and started back for her apartment. She cast furtive glances as she closed in on the building. Ascending the stairs, she reentered her apartment and moved from room to room, checking to make sure she’d left behind nothing important. She’d packed her calendars, phone books, laptop and a stack of spiral-bound notebooks. She didn’t want to leave anything that would provide clues about her true identity or her mission in Colombia.

It had been twenty-four hours since she’d lost contact with Javier and the others from her crew. The longer she waited, the more isolated and worried she felt. A knot of fear formed in her stomach and tightened as she mulled the situation. Javier never missed a check-in call. That he suddenly was incommunicado was scary; that she’d been unable to contact her own handler troubled her even more.

What the hell was going on? she wondered.

Serrano was operating under nonofficial cover and, therefore, had to tread lightly as she maneuvered through Colombia. She could visit the U.S. Embassy only infrequently and then only for mundane reasons. She had to studiously avoid anyone even remotely connected with the Company who could implicate her as an intelligence agent.

Her cell phone vibrated on her hip. She grabbed it and put it to her ear.

“Yes?”

“You know the situation?” Serrano immediately recognized the voice as that of her controller, a man she knew only as Fletcher.

“I know enough,” she said.

“You need to get out.”

“Obviously,” she said. “Tell me what’s happened.”

“Is this a secure line?”

She considered lying for a few seconds but decided against it. Fletcher could hear a lie in her voice in a heartbeat.

“No,” she said. “It’s not secure.”

“Then I have no information.”

“Fine. I’m leaving.”

“You should. Go to contingency B.”

“But I have a flight in three hours.”

“Fuck it. You have no flight. Don’t risk it. We’ll have an executive jet waiting for you when you arrive. Go to contingency B. Miller will come and get you. Go downtown, to the office and leave your gun in the car.”

“What?” she asked, startled.

“You heard me. We’re going to take you to the airport. But there’s been a lot of chatter from FARC about a kidnapping at the airport. The locals are nervous, and they’re going to be inspecting every car that comes or goes to the airport. We can’t risk them detaining you for any reason.”

“What about Miller?”

“He won’t be carrying either,” Fletcher replied.

Her brow creased with confusion and distrust boiled up from inside. Even on its best day, Colombia was a big slice of hell. The idea that she was to move around without a gun—to possibly force her way out of the country—was unfathomable. She couldn’t even wrap her mind around the idea that her escort also would be unarmed.

“You’ll be fine,” Fletcher said. “Really. I have two choppers at my disposal. We’ll track you from the air, give you an armed escort. If anyone tries to harm you, they’ll get vaporized from the sky. They’re private contractors, so they have more, um, flexibility when it comes to dealing with these situations.”

For reasons she didn’t understand, gooseflesh broke out on her arms.

“Do it, Maria,” he said. “We’re bending the rules by trying to get you out of there. There’s no time for debate. Just do this and in a couple of days we’ll hook up in Mexico to talk this through.”

“Fine,” she said. “Give me the details.”

S ERRANO DROVE HER CAR downtown. When she reached a skyscraper of mirrored glass, one that served as the headquarters for a local bank, she circled the block once to get the lay of the land. When none of the bystanders immediately tripped any alarm bells, she turned onto a ramp that led into a parking garage located beneath the building.

She maneuvered the car down two more levels until she reached the appointed floor. She found a space between two other cars. She put the car into Park but left the engine running.

Turning in her seat, she looked over her left shoulder, then her right to see what was behind her. She saw only more cars and an occasional passerby, but nothing that seemed out of place.

She reached beneath her jacket and drew her 9 mm SIG-Sauer from a hip holster. Holding the gun in her open palm, she examined it. A flurry of questions flashed through her mind as she weighed her options. With the relentless political and drug-related violence constantly rocking the country, she’d never been without the weapon since she’d arrived six months earlier. And, considering what she’d found the previous night, the thought of leaving her weapon behind seemed insane.

Something hammered against the passenger window. Serrano gasped, but reacted quickly. Her motions a blur, she transferred the gun to her right hand, gripped it and drew down on the interloper at her window. The guy outside gave her a pie-eyed stare that, under other circumstances, might have amused her. At the moment she just felt mortified.

“Hey!” Miller snapped. When he realized that she wasn’t going to blow his head off, an angry expression flashed across his pudgy features, replacing the terror that had been there a moment before.

She stowed the weapon and stepped out of the car.

“Lord, woman,” he said in anger-tinged whisper, “you damn near blew my head off.”

“Sorry,” she said.

“Just be careful,” he said. He scratched at the exposed skin on the crown of his head and composed himself. From what she knew, Miller wasn’t a field agent. Rather, he worked in Colombia’s main station as a political analyst where he studied opinion-poll results, newspaper stories and think-tank reports.

As she came around the vehicle, she thumbed a button on her keyfob and the trunk lid popped up. She reached inside the trunk, grabbed her bags by their handles and jerked them free from the compartment.

“Need help?” Miller asked.

She shook her head.

“Suit yourself,” he said. He walked away from the car and gestured ahead of himself. “Car’s two rows from here,” he said. “It’s the red Jeep Liberty.”

“Fine.”

Minutes later, her luggage stored in the rear of the vehicle, they sped from the garage. Miller punched the gas to make a yellow light. Serrano saw the shadows cast by the choppers that flew overhead.

“You were supposed to ditch the gun,” Miller groused.

“Go to hell,” she snapped. “Last thing I need is some fucking analyst telling me how to conduct myself.”

“No skin off my nose,” he said. “You want to buck the boss, that’s your business.”

“Then why are you even talking about it?” Serrano said.

“Just making conversation,” he replied.

“Then talk about the weather. Besides, why do you know anything about my orders?”

He grinned. “Because they told me you’d disobey them. The gun part, anyway. Listen, I’m cleared to know the conditions of this transfer, okay? I don’t know why you’re leaving, why you were here or where you’re going. But I do know that you were supposed to ditch the gun.”

“You didn’t say anything back there about it.”

“You almost blew my damn head off!”

“Occupational hazard,” she replied.

A stream of cigarette smoke wafted into her eyes, stung them. She waved a hand in front of her face to clear some of the smoke. When that didn’t work, she cracked a window to let in some fresh air.

“Damn it!” he yelled. With his left index finger, he jabbed a button to raise the window. “They stay closed. That was an order.”

Serrano started to say something but held her tongue. She could tell he was anxious, and agitating him would probably just make him worse.

Serrano stared through the windshield at the sunbaked stretch of road. Within an hour, they left behind the city limits and continued to follow the road to a small military airport that lay several miles outside Bogotá. Heat rose from the road, shimmering like water as it wafted up and eventually disappeared. On either side, they passed a few shacks, but eventually those structures became fewer until they disappeared altogether.

The road sloped downward. Serrano saw a trough at the end of the decline was blotted out by an impenetrable shadow that looked like a puddle of oil, but actually was a trick of the light.

Something on the road glinted, catching Serrano’s attention.

She opened her mouth to say something, but Miller stomped the brakes before she uttered a word. Hot rubber squealed beneath the car, but the tires grabbed hold of the road. The car slowed.

Serrano felt herself forced back in her seat by the sudden braking.

They hurtled several more yards and the objects in the road became visible. The SUV rolled over the road spikes and the tires were shredded. Farther up the road, a line of vans rolled across their path and blocked them.

“What the hell?” Serrano yelled.

Why weren’t the helicopters doing anything? The question raced through her mind. The answer came almost the same instant, and it made her stomach clench.

She looked at Miller, whose eyes were riveted on the road. He stomped the brakes again and the SUV launched into a sidelong slide at the vans. A panel van mushroomed up against the passenger side of the Jeep and the vehicles collided. The force of the crash tossed Serrano side to side. Her teeth clamped down. A side-impact air bag burst from the door panel and kept her head from slamming against the window. In the same instant, the front air bag exploded from the dashboard.

Her ears rang, and powder from the air bag deployment burned her eyes.

Your gun, Maria! her mind screamed. Grab it! Now!

Working her way around the air bag, she slipped her hand inside her jacket. Her fingers scrambled for the SIG-Sauer’s butt, found it and jerked the weapon free.

With her thumb, she turned off the safety.

A sidelong glance at Miller showed his limp body hanging forward against the seat belt harness. Blood streamed from his nose, over the curve of his upper lip, down his chin before it dripped onto his white dress shirt. She saw that his chest continued to rise and fall. Thank God, she thought.

She released her seat belt and leaned across the console. Her arms strained to reach the door handle. The whipping of the helicopter’s propeller blades grew louder. She opened the door and shoved it hard enough to keep it from swinging closed again. A glance over the seat showed her that the helicopter was landing on the road behind her, its blades kicking up boiling clouds of dust.

She released Miller’s seat belt. To get free of the vehicle, she figured she’d have to climb over him, then drag him free of the vehicle. Without knowing what kinds of injuries he’d suffered she couldn’t risk pushing him from the car first and making them worse.

Figures decked out in black SWAT-style uniforms ran up on either side of the Jeep, guns held high. They formed a ring around the vehicle. One of them, his submachine gun poised at shoulder level closed in on the wrecked vehicle.

“Hands up,” he shouted. Fear swelled inside Serrano, caused her throat to tighten until she swore she’d suffocate. She weighed the situation and realized she was boxed in. Setting the handgun on the dashboard, she raised her hands. The man who’d yelled at her stepped aside and allowed a second man to approach the vehicle. He reached inside, grabbed Miller by the arm and dragged him from the SUV.

“Let’s go! Let’s go!” the lead gunner shouted. Serrano climbed over the console. Another thug stepped forward, grabbed her by the bicep and dragged her from the vehicle. He ordered her to lay facedown on the ground. She complied and almost immediately regretted it when the heat from the asphalt burned her skin. She squeezed her eyes shut against the sunlight.

Someone from the swarm of black-suited men searched her, but found no weapons.

A shadow fell over her. She opened her eyes, looked up and saw a thick-bodied man stalking toward her.

“Sit up,” he said.

She did. She looked him over and saw he had a ruddy complexion and dull green eyes that emitted a thousand-yard stare, as though he was human in form only. A portion of a tattoo—a scorpion’s tail—peeked out from beneath his shirt collar. He nodded at one of the men beside her. The man knelt.

A small sting in her left arm caught her attention. She jerked her arm away, but it was too late. The man next to her was back on his feet, a syringe in his grip. Within seconds, she began to feel light-headed. Black spots swirled in her vision and noises began to sound far away. Darkness fell over her.

S EVERAL MILES AWAY , Albert Bly stood at the edge of the clearing and stared at the smoking remains of a body. A satisfied smirk played over his lips. The smell of burned flesh filled his nostrils. He welcomed it, inhaling deeply.

The camouflage fatigues Bly wore hung loosely from his thin body. His black hair was combed straight back from his forehead, exposing a sharp widow’s peak. His skin was red, as though blood might burst from his pores at any moment.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the man next to him shake his head vigorously, heard him make a disgusted noise. “My God,” Milt Krotnic said, “that smells terrible, like cooked garbage or something.”

Bly turned his head and looked at the other man. His lips peeled back into a smile. “It’s the smell of money, Krotnic,” he said, scolding the other man. “You remember that.”

The other man shrugged. “Sure.”

Two men brushed past Bly. Surgical masks covered the lower halves of their faces. Their hands were sheathed in rubber gloves that stretched well up their forearms, but stopped short of their elbows. They angled toward the corpse, knelt beside it and stretched it out on a black plastic body bag on the ground. One of the men reached gingerly for one of the dead man’s ankles. With a pair of scissors, he began cutting at the fabric of the man’s trouser leg and peeled back the fabric. Bly caught a flash of the charred flesh and felt a surge of excitement.

“Hold it,” Bly shouted.

As he advanced on the two men, he withdrew a digital camera from his pants pocket. When he reached the body, they rose and moved away to give him ample room to perform his grisly ritual. He aimed the camera at the remains and snapped several pictures, making sure to zoom in on the puckered black flesh that still clung to the bones. When he finished, he lowered the camera a foot or so from his face and, using his thumbnail, manipulated the dial that advanced the pictures. Satisfied with the results, he turned and headed back to Krotnic, who was talking into a two-way radio, while the two medics resumed their work. Bly pocketed the camera.

“Sure,” Krotnic said into his radio. “He’ll be glad to hear that. You know where to put her? Good, then do it.”

The former colonel in the Serb military clipped the radio to his belt and nodded at his boss.

“They found her,” he said. “They have her back in Bogotá.”

“Good,” Bly said.

“She put up a hell of a fight from what I understand,” Krotnic said. “We’ve got a couple of casualties.”

“The laptop?”

Krotnic shook his head. “No, she was empty-handed. Couldn’t get her to say shit, either.”

“A temporary condition,” Bly replied.

“Of course.”

1

Mack Bolan was seated at the conference table in Stony Man Farm’s War Room. The soldier was freshly showered and clad in blue jeans, a flannel shirt and black sneakers. Even within the secure confines of the Farm, America’s ultra-secret counterterrorism center, he wore his sound-suppressed Beretta 93-R in a leather shoulder rig. His eyes felt gritty and sore from lack of sleep.