Point Blank

The dwellings gave him pause. If this had been the hit team’s destination from the start, there would likely be more men, more guns, waiting at whichever house they pulled up to. Conversely, if this was a trap, they could be drawing innocents into the line of fire. It was a problem either way, but one he’d have to work around. Retreating now, leaving the woman to her fate, was not an option.

He was considering a run-up toward the lead car, something that would force their hand, when the sedan stopped short and turned to block both lanes. Its doors flew open and disgorged four men with guns in hand. They left the woman in the backseat, pale face peering out at him with frightened eyes.

The four ’ndranghetisti fanned out in a skirmish line, advancing toward the Alfa like gunfighters in a spaghetti western. Bolan weighed his options, drawing the Beretta 93R from its holster, then thumbing the selector switch to go with 3-round bursts. Its magazine held twenty rounds, with one more in the chamber, and he trusted that would be enough.

But first, a little something to disorient the enemy.

He gunned the Alfa’s engine, charging toward the staggered line of gunmen in his path. Their faces told him they’d expected something else—perhaps that he’d retreat or step out of the Giulietta with his hands raised in surrender. What they hadn’t counted on was some two thousand pounds of steel accelerating toward them with a hungry snarl.

They scattered, running for their lives. One slower—maybe more courageous—than the rest, stood his ground just long enough to rake the Alfa with a burst of automatic fire. Bolan ducked below the dash, pebbles of glass raining over him, and held his charger steady on its course. A solid thump denoted impact, then the tardy goon was airborne, glimpsed in passing as he soared over the car and fell somewhere behind it.

Braking short of contact with the lead car, Bolan cranked his steering wheel hard left and veered off pavement toward the nearest cultivated field. A moment later, he was out and moving, ducking bullets as the three men who were still upright laid down a screen of fire.

* * *

CORTALE SAW THE speeding car clip Terranova, launching him into a somersault that carried him over the Alfa Romeo and dropped him behind it. He landed with an ugly crunch on the pavement. From his cries and jerky movements, Terranova clearly was not dead, but there was no time to assist him now—Cortale was busy hammering the gray car with a burst from his Kalashnikov.

Where was the driver, damn it? The man was down below his line of fire, so Cortale ripped another burst across the left-hand doors and hoped the bullets reached him, while the Alfa left the roadway, plowing into a nearby field. He strafed the car with another burst, Malara and Aiello joining in, before a rising cloud of dust obscured the vehicle.

Somewhere amid that cloud, the driver rolled out of his seat and started firing back. He had an automatic weapon, rattling 3-round bursts that sounded like 9 mm rounds. Cortale ducked and veered to his left, putting the bullet-punctured Alfa between himself and whoever it was that seemed intent on killing him.

And why?

He had no time to think about that, only to flank the son of a whore and kill him before they lost any more men. If they couldn’t—

The woman!

Remembering her in the midst of chaos, Cortale risked a glance toward his sedan, its four doors standing open, and saw no one left inside. Snarling obscenities, he almost went to look for her but realized he couldn’t take that risk. The woman mattered less now than disposing of their enemy.

And if she got away? What then?

Cortale could not bear to think about it. He was focused on surviving in the moment. He would deal with Aldo in his turn, explain as best he could, and—

To his right, Malara cursed and ripped an empty magazine out of his Uzi’s pistol grip, fumbling inside his jacket for another. He retrieved it and was about to load the little submachine gun when a triple-tap from their opponent ripped into Malara’s left shoulder and spun him like a ballerina through an awkward pirouette. Malara sat down hard, a red mist from his wound painting his startled face, trying to raise the SMG one-handed from his lap.

Cortale fired another long burst at the bastard who was slaughtering his men, and then his own damned magazine was empty. Running for the nearest cover, a weed-choked roadside ditch, he dived headlong into its dusty sanctuary, the Kalashnikov digging into his ribs. Cortale rolled onto his back, feeling the seconds slip away as he released the empty magazine, discarded it, replaced it, and then jacked a round into the carbine’s chamber.

Ready!

But for what?

Out in the open, Ruggiero Aielo was stalking their prey, shouting taunts and insults to provoke him. Terranova and Malara were still alive, after a fashion, though Cortale could not count on either one of them right now. The woman could be anywhere, escaping while he lay there in the dirt, his Armani suit a filthy mess of dust and briars.

“Curse her rotten soul,” he muttered.

And what about the neighbors? They had telephones, no doubt, but would they risk a call to the authorities? Speaking to the police was dangerous in Italy, but some high-minded citizens still clung to what they thought of as their civic duty. If the cops turned up with the firefight still in progress, Cortale was prepared to kill them, too.

Why not? They should know better than to interfere. If they hadn’t learned that much from history, or on the job, they were too stupid to survive.

Cortale raised his head, risking a glance across the roadway, looking for his enemy. Instead, he saw Malara rising slowly, painfully, using his Uzi as a prop while struggling to his feet, blood drizzling on the pavement from his wounds. Behind him, fifty feet or so away, Terranova was crawling toward their car, dragging one limp and twisted leg behind him, teeth clenched in a snarl of agony. Aiello was still hunting, edging closer to the Alfa, his slacks now pale with dust from the knees down. He’d stopped calling to their enemy and clutched his pistol in a good two-handed grip, ready to fire at the first glimpse of movement.

Suddenly embarrassed, Cortale rolled out of the ditch and rose, moving to join his men.

* * *

THE FOUR ’NDRANGHETISTI were legitimate tough guys; Bolan conceded that. One shot, another knocked ass over teakettle at fifty miles per hour, and they both had fight left in them yet. The other two were coming on as if they didn’t have a worry in the world: no fear of bullets, witnesses, police, nothing. Some mobsters he had known—and killed—would have been running for their lives by now, but the Magolino goons were going out with style.

So let them go.

First, Bolan focused on the soldier who’d been stalking him, trying to lure him out with insults, firing random shots to cover his approach. That method had a fatal flaw, which the mobster discovered when the slide locked open on his pistol’s empty chamber and he had to swap magazines out in the open, with nowhere to hide.

Bolan rose and hit him with a 3-round burst at center mass, knocking him backward. This one was a solid kill, no doubt about it from the thrashing of his legs, then the stillness as he lay sprawled on his back.

And that left three.

The other one still fit to fight was coming hard at Bolan, firing from the hip with a Kalashnikov. No one who’d ever had an AK fired in their direction could mistake its sound or minimize the danger of exposure to its raking fire. Bolan went down as if he’d been hit, lay prone and fired from that position, knowing he might not score a fatal shot but doing what he could with what he had.

Two of his three rounds ripped into the shooter’s pelvis, drilling guts and shattering the heavy bone to break him down. Legs folded, and the screaming mobster slumped into his line of fire to take the next burst through his jaw and throat, face shattered, brain stem severed as he dropped.

Two down and out.

Bolan had fired five bursts, which meant he still had six rounds left to go. Rising, he saw the gunner he’d wounded moments earlier trying to raise an Uzi with his one functioning hand. Barely functioning, apparently, because it wasn’t working out for him. The skinny gangster saw death coming, cursed it and went down as Bolan shot him in the chest.

Last up, the man who wasn’t quick enough to dodge his Alfa at the start of their engagement, crawling like a crippled beetle on the blacktop. Bolan sent him mercy from a range of thirty feet and watched him slump facedown, no longer dangerous to anyone.

Reloading on the move, Bolan surveyed the battleground and couldn’t see the woman. She’d escaped, and he could let it go at that, if it was what she wanted. He retreated to the bullet-riddled Alfa, knew it wasn’t going anywhere and got his bags out of the car. Bolan turned back to the undamaged black sedan still idling where its passengers had bailed to start the firefight.

“I’m going now,” he called out, speaking in Italian. “Good luck.”

He made it to the mobsters’ car and had stowed his guns and settled in the driver’s seat before she called out to him from behind a bristling roadside hedge. “Please wait!”

He waited while she made her cautious way to the sedan and peered in at him through a window. Overcoming fear at last, she asked, “Can you take me somewhere?”

Bolan holstered the Beretta as he said, “All right. Get in.”

Catanzaro

ALDO ADAMO LISTENED to the caller’s words, feeling his stomach clench. “What do you mean, you haven’t seen them yet?” he asked.

“Just what I said,” his man aboard the Mare Strega answered. “There’s no sign of them, and Cortale hasn’t called.”

“They should have been there—” Aldo studied his Movado TR90 watch, scowling “—almost an hour ago.”

“It’s why I’m calling.”

“All right. Wait there. I’ll call you back.”

Adamo cut the link and tried Cortale’s cell phone, waiting through five rings before it went to voice mail. Knowing that his number must have been displayed on Cortale’s phone and that his soldier was not fool enough to miss the call deliberately, Aldo switched his phone off without leaving a message.

Something was wrong.

Adamo began to consider reasons why his people had not reached the boat. The first that came to mind was logical enough: they might have stopped somewhere along the way to play a little with the woman. He had not forbidden it, specifically, but Cortale should have been intelligent enough to do his business with her after they were all safely aboard the Mare Strega, out at sea. They would have privacy and all the time they needed.

But even if his soldiers had been stupid and had stopped along the highway leading south, Cortale would not turn off his phone or dodge a call from his superior. A santista, Cortale was on call around the clock. His time—indeed, his very life—was not his own.

Adamo’s cell phone chirped at him, a soft sound, but it almost made him drop the instrument. Recovering, he answered on the second ring. “Hello?”

“Signore Adamo? This is Lieutenant Albanesi.”

One of their men within the Guardia di Finanza, Albanesi never called unless there was some trouble in the offing—an indictment, for example, or a raid pending against some Magolino enterprise.

“Yes, Lieutenant. How may I assist you?” Aldo was going through the motions, as if they were simply friends and he was there to serve the fat little policeman.

“I’m afraid I have bad news,” Albanesi said. “We have found four of your men outside Le Croci. They’re dead.”

“Dead? All four?”

“Regrettably. Yes, sir.”

“What happened?”

“They were shot. It also seems that one of them was struck by a vehicle.”

Adamo knew he must be careful with his next question. “Were they alone?”

“Yes,” the officer confirmed. “Were you...expecting someone else?”

“No, no. I only thought, if there was shooting...”

“Ah, of course. They did return fire, but we’ve found no evidence so far that it accomplished anything. I wonder, sir, if you could say what sort of car they had?”

“Their car?” Adamo had to think about it for a moment, thrown off base by Albanesi’s unexpected question. “It was a black Lancia Delta.”

“And would you know the number of its license plate by any chance?”

“I couldn’t say. It’s registered commercially,” Adamo answered. “To our winery, if I am not mistaken.”

“Never mind,” the lieutenant said. “I can check that myself.”

“Why do you ask about the car?” Adamo pressed him.

“Ah. Because we found one at the scene, damaged by gunfire. It’s a rental, from the airport at Lamezia Terme. It was hired out today, in fact, to someone named...um...Scott Parker. Is that name familiar to you, sir?”

“It is not,” Adamo said. But it will be, he thought.

“An American, it appears, if we may trust his operator’s license and the credit card he used to hire the car. We will be tracing both.”

“Of course. Please keep me informed of any progress, and advise me when the bodies may be claimed for burial. Their families...”

“Under the circumstances,” Albanesi said, “I’m afraid the magistrate will certainly demand autopsies. The delay in their release may be substantial.”

“Do the best you can,” Adamo said. “Your efforts are appreciated, Lieutenant.”

Meaning that he owed the little troll another envelope of cash, with more to come if Albanesi could identify the killer and deliver him to the family.

But the main headache for Adamo now was the missing woman.

A headache he was about to share with his padrino.

Bracing for the storm to come, Adamo made the call.

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