War to the Knife (Brannigan's Blackhearts Book 9)

by Peter Nealen

  Engines roared on the far side of the block. “Angry Ragnar, lock down the streets for two blocks south of the plaza. Galvez has gone to ground.”

  “Roger.” With another growl of engines, a green-and-white police Hilux surged into the intersection.

  Brannigan, Javakhishvili, and Pacheco had quickly crossed the street to the same side as the shop that Galvez and his companions had retreated into. They hurried along, keeping close to the buildings. So far, it appeared that the Green Shirts were only aware of Flanagan, Gomez, and Hank. Flanagan and Gomez were closing in from behind the Hilux. Hank was on the corner, barricaded on the building, exchanging sporadic fire with the gunmen inside.

  The front of the store had been covered by large picture windows. Bullets had shattered the windows and the glass door. Most of the shop—which appeared to be a grocery store—was now deep in shadow on the other side of the broken glass, shards of which reflected the scene on the overcast street.

  Brannigan held just before the first window, briefly wishing he had some grenades. He didn’t know much about this Galvez, but he’d seen enough that he knew that those were no longer really men in there. They were cornered animals, and therefore they were more dangerous than they’d ever been before.

  He momentarily locked gazes with Hank, across the intersection. He didn’t have to say anything. His son just nodded, lifted his rifle, and mag-dumped into the storefront.

  The Green Shirts’ fire ceased as they sought cover. Brannigan made his move as soon as Hank’s mag went dry.

  He didn’t bother trying to get to the door. Instead, he kicked out the last of the broken picture window and stepped over the low wall and into the store, his rifle up and ready.

  One of the Green Shirts was crouched behind a standing rack of baskets holding corn and beans that had been half shot to bits. Shattered corncobs and scattered beans littered the floor. The Green Shirt saw the shadow moving in the window and pivoted toward it, but Brannigan and Pacheco shot him before he could get all the way around. Bullets punched through his chest and neck, and he collapsed next to the rack.

  The second stood up to try to engage the two of them with his M16, but Hank shot him through the side, and he crumpled.

  The store fell silent.

  Brannigan advanced carefully, Pacheco and Javakhishvili in tow, broken glass and dried beans crunching under his boots. Flanagan and Gomez entered from the other side, keeping pace as they swept the store.

  There was no sign of Galvez. But there was a stairwell going up to the apartment on the second floor, and as he neared it, Gomez suddenly froze, threw up a fist, and then pointed up.

  Brannigan and Javakhishvili finished a cursory sweep of the very back, but it was empty, a police Hilux beyond the back door with half a dozen of Quintana’s volunteers in the back. And they could hear some scuffling upstairs, along with what sounded like a faint, frightened moan, quickly cut off.

  The Blackhearts fell into a practiced stack as they mounted the steps, rifle muzzles shifting to cover the opening angle on the top of the stairs as they padded up to the second floor. The landing ended in a single door leading into the apartment. The plaster on the walls was cracked and dingy, the door scuffed and ill-fitting.

  Gomez had reached it first. He put his back to the narrow wall, got the nod from Flanagan, and kicked the door in.

  Flanagan raced through the doorway, his weapon leveled. A bullet smacked splinters off the door just above his head, and he kept going, even as Galvez, a young woman clasped to his chest in front of him, his arm around her throat, tried to track him with a Jericho 9mm.

  Brannigan went in behind him, took two steps to the wall, and leveled his own rifle, his finger already on the trigger.

  Galvez saw the movement and hesitated, just for a split second. It was enough.

  He might have cursed, but the word was drowned out by the deafening thunder of the Galil in the enclosed space. Galvez’s head snapped back under the impact and his pistol fell from a suddenly nerveless hand. The girl screamed as Galvez fell to the floor behind her, and Gomez moved to pull her away from the corpse.

  The rest of the Blackhearts spread out to quickly clear the rest of the apartment, but as Brannigan looked down at what had once been Diego Galvez, alias El Verdugo, he knew that, at least for the moment, it was over.

  Epilogue

  Cole Hauser stood by the plane with his massive arms folded across an equally massive chest. “Well, this is fucking embarrassing.” He eyed the filthy, tired mercenaries as they got out of Pacheco’s truck and headed for the white, unmarked Casa. Half a dozen tough-looking men in plainclothes, but carrying themselves in that way that unmistakably identified them to anyone who was looking that they were soldiers, were loading equipment cases from the plane into a pair of SUVs nearby. “We finally get the spare manpower and the authorization to come down here and play, and you boys have already cleaned house.”

  Brannigan shrugged. “What can I say? We were hired to do a job.” He looked up as Van Zandt himself stepped out of the plane’s door. “Mark.”

  “John.” Van Zandt waved them up into the plane. They’d already handed off their weapons upon reaching the airfield. Pacheco had taken them, accompanied by a Colombian officer who treated the old Search Bloc operator with noted deference. Brannigan wasn’t too concerned about him. “Job well done.”

  Brannigan waited until the rest of the Blackhearts had gotten aboard before he trudged up the steps into the plane. He sank down onto one of the jump seats, running a hand over his face. He was desperately tired. As uncomfortable as the utilitarian interior of the Casa was, he was probably going to be asleep within minutes of takeoff.

  The handover with the Colombians had gone surprisingly smoothly. Lara had stepped into the leadership role immediately, addressing the crowd of San Tabal citizens who’d come out of their homes as the gunfire died away. Lara had immediately tapped Quintana to lead the new police force, and with Pacheco’s help, Quintana had set about securing the important parts of the city right away.

  When the Army had showed up, Pacheco, Lara, and Quintana had gone to meet them while the Blackhearts had kind of faded into the background. Pacheco had spoken with the officer who was now standing next to him, and a few minutes later had come to pick the Blackhearts up, quietly, on a presently abandoned street near the edge of town. Things had been a little tense at first, until Pacheco had assured them that there were Americans at the nearest airstrip, with the approval of the Colombian government, and they were not heading for prison or a firing squad.

  They’d still wondered, up until they’d stopped, gotten out, and seen the Casa with Abernathy’s mysterious operators unloading it.

  Van Zandt sat beside him as the door shut. Brannigan, leaning back against the padded wall of the plane’s interior fuselage, turned to look at him. “So, are we going back to a quiet paycheck, or an investigation?”

  “A quiet paycheck.” Van Zandt nodded toward the exterior, where Abernathy’s operators were mounting up and joining the Colombians. “We had a bit of a chat with the client.” He looked a little chagrined. “Turned out that Abernathy had a lot more information about this little situation than my office even thought existed. The client won’t be messing with you for the foreseeable future.”

  “Who was the client?” Brannigan had closed his eyes, but his voice was a low, hard growl.

  When Van Zandt didn’t answer, he opened his eyes and fixed his old superior officer with an icy, pitiless stare. “Who was the client, Mark?”

  “Senator Briggs.”

  Brannigan snorted. “Figures.”

  “It wasn’t as much the corruption that we expected as it was political naivete.” Van Zandt grimaced a little. “Dumbass thought he could score some points by getting behind a ‘reformer.’”

  Brannigan eyed him narrowly. It was pretty clear that while Van Zandt mostly believed what he’d just said, he was leaving part of it out. And he thought he knew which part. “Given the
fact that Ballesteros apparently screamed that Galvez was trying to kill him just before he died, I don’t think there were any real ‘reformers’ in that bunch. That leaves two possibilities. Either he got played by a thug trying to off another thug, or he lied to save his own skin.” He dug into his pocket and produced a small envelope. “And it ain’t the first one.”

  Van Zandt’s eyebrow lifted as he took the envelope. “What’s this?”

  “It’s a ledger found in Clemente’s office.” Brannigan turned to watch Flanagan come up the ramp and give him a thumbs up that everyone was aboard. “Well, a copy of it. It has their whole cocaine distribution plan in it.” He met Van Zandt’s eyes coolly. “I think you’ll recognize one of the names on it.”

  “Briggs’s cousin Hatteras?”

  Brannigan nodded as he sat down and buckled in. The Casa’s engines were spooling up. Van Zandt joined him. “Thought that name seemed familiar. Probably not enough to put the Senator away, though, knowing how things work in DC.”

  “Either way.” Van Zandt shrugged. “He’s had the fear put in him. Abernathy’s a scary son of a bitch when he wants to be. I don’t think he’ll be causing us any problems in the near future.”

  “Maybe not the near future.” Brannigan shut his eyes again. Damn, he was tired. “But people like him rarely forget and never forgive.” He snorted again. “But who am I kidding? We’ve been looking over our shoulders since those Humanity Front bastards went after Sam. Nothing’s really changed. We’ve just got a couple new enemies to add to the list.

  “Let ‘em come. They’ll regret it if they do.”

  Look for More Hard-Hitting Action Soon, in:

  Brannigan’s Blackhearts

  Blood Debt

  Mercenaries strike a hidden base…

  …But it’s a trap.

  Now they have only one hope – Brannigan’s Blackhearts

  When Mitchell Price’s black bag team hit a mysterious former Soviet military base in Kyrgyzstan, they thought they knew what they were in for. They’re professionals, and they’ve been on this hunt for a long time.

  But things can go bad in a heartbeat.

  Now with the team dead or captured, one man knows where they are, and he’s going to have to convince Brannigan’s Blackhearts to help. He’s not just going to hire them, though. He’s coming with them.

  Dan Tackett is coming out of retirement.

  And he and the Blackhearts are about to venture into the heart of darkness in Central Asia.

  AuthoR’s Note

  Thank you for reading War to the Knife. I’ve had something like this one in mind since I started the series. A bit of old-school Jagged Alliance-style mercenary liberation of a captured population. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

  To keep up-to-date, I hope that you’ll sign up for my newsletter—you get a free American Praetorians novella, Drawing the Line, when you do.

  If you’ve enjoyed this novel, I hope that you’ll go leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Reviews matter a lot to independent authors, so I appreciate the effort.

  If you’d like to connect, I have a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/PeteNealenAuthor. You can also contact me, or just read my musings and occasional samples on the blog, at https://www.americanpraetorians.com. I look forward to hearing from you.

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