Annabelle was not even aware she truly had no beauty, even skin-deep. She simply had a marvelous set of jugs and Vito Rapace wanted to get his hands on them. That night he did, and took the rest from her, too. After that, Vito became her "sponsor"; she dropped out of school and moved into a Toledo apartment Vito just happened to have vacant at the time. He paid her tuition to a "charm" school and the training gave her a certain superficial gloss—she learned to walk well. Vito dropped by the apartment on the average of three times a week, occasionally bringing another couple, usually Johnny, The Plumber Augurio, and some girl. The girls all looked like they could have been sisters and, Annabelle realized after awhile, a lot like herself. Within six months, after Vito tired of her and she had been passed on to Johnny, then Tonio, and Joe The Sapper, she was a "business girl" and knew it. After once attempting to leave and surviving the consequent beating, she accepted it. After a fashion, she actually did have a career in "pictures." Stills, which were taken by hidden cameras and highly compromised the other "actor"—a cop, or judge, or banker, or president of a labor union.
But Annabelle Caine had an almost feral instinct for personal survival, and she courted favor with her Vito until he let her out of the "business" and worked her into other operations. For awhile she handled the books in a numbers back office, then worked a phone drop, a telephone relay system. She was a sort of middlegirl, who took bets from runners, then phoned them to the bookie's back office. Even if arrested herself, as she twice was, she could tell the cops nothing but a phone number. The bulls didn't even get that much from Annabelle Caine, and Vito knew about it. He moved her up another notch, into a loansharking operation. Then Annabelle created a job for herself.
One evening she drove Vito to the airport. She got a porter to take care of Vito's baggage, and they went into the bar for a drink until the plane for Newark arrived. She saw her boss off, and this being an early evening flight, Annabelle saw that more than half those who deplaned headed directly for the lounge and a drink. She walked around to the baggage pickup and found it deserted. She watched for an hour. She went back five nights in a row and watched. The sixth night she dressed in large loose coveralls, tucked her hair up into a railroader's cap, wore gloves, borrowed a pickup truck, and twenty minutes after the plane landed, she cleaned out the baggage ramp. She did so again, the next night. The third night she went back, but this time in Vito's car and wearing a tight sweater. She had long since learned that men, and most women, could not identify her face after they had seen her in a tight sweater.
She spotted the plant five minutes after she began walking along the pickup, checking the tags. Two plainclothes bulls in a car parked in the shadows. She put on an act for them. Sure enough, one of the bulls got out of the car and came over, flashed the tin, asked what she was doing.
"I lost all my baggage on a flight three nights ago. I thought maybe it had come in by now."
"Well, I'll tell you, miss," the cop said, "I think maybe you can kiss the stuff goodbye. It was probably stolen."
Annabelle wailed, burst out crying, ran away, leaving the cop with egg on his face. After that she never made more than one hit a month when she wiped the pickup clean. On odd nights and days, she would drive up in different cars, and with a now-practiced-eye, pluck one large expensive bag or one set of luggage, stow it and drive away.
The first six months after she began her own little thing, she had fifty cameras of various values, what eventually turned out to be almost $10,000 worth of jewelry, and several thousand dollars worth of clothing and good quality luggage, even at dime-on-the-dollar selling to a fence.
Then she let Vito in on the scam, it having occurred to her that if the baggage was left unattended much of the air freight probably was also left sitting until shipped or picked up. She staked out the freight ramp and discovered she was right. Vito took it over then, and cut her a big slice plus a terrific bonus for getting on the scam. He was so pleased he started coming around again for a while, then tired of her again. When that happened, Annabelle felt herself in a position to ask a favor. She asked permission to leave town, and Vito agreed, seeing those dollar signs, all her share becoming his.
With the connections Vito gave her, Annabelle moved on to Cleveland, then Chicago, La Guardia, Idlewild, becoming a sort of "traveling instructor and advisor"; but it had gotten too hot, much too heavy by the time Idlewild became JFK, because virtually every theft was an FBI case, an interstate shipment case. It was time to fade, so Annabelle drew in her chest and after a six months vacation at Nassau, she went to work at Teterboro, still the best damn spotter in the business.
But she was getting dull-edged, and smart enough to know it. Plus one other thing. Since she no longer stole anything herself, she needed accomplices. And that's how your ass lands in jail, taking in other people, because you never know how strong they really are until the heat hits. And now that the feds and most states had the immunity law for cop-outs, she was scared and seldom turned anything but cinches, stuff she already had a buyer for, and she cut out the middle guy, letting the "buyer" pick it up himself. It lowered her take, but it also lowered her risks.
Now, on this particular gloomy, wet, gray, filthy day, she felt as out of sorts as everyone else. In fact, she thought, maybe it would be a hell of a good thing if she did whip a little on Teaf. She could use a good lay herself, maybe cheer her up. If the son of a bitch just didn't strut so! Like some 25,000-hour senior airline captain, when she knew for a fact Teaf was a TWA reject.
And then the whole world turned rosy for Annabelle Caine.
Mack The Bastard Bolan walked into the office. Just like that. God, ballsy guy, like a goddam cape buffalo! The word was already out, she'd heard it the night before from a contact she still maintained with the organization. Bolan had shot his way out of a trap at the hospital, then vanished.
Except, there he stood! Bolan. The man with $100,000 on his head! Her hands shook as she dialed. But her connection was out of pocket, Oh, the bastard, why couldn't he be shacked up with some—
Christ, they were already rolling out the long-range jet!
Answer the phone, you son of a bitch! I've got a hundred thousand fuckin' dollars standing fifty feet from me! Teaf came in and wrote up the charter, gave Anna-belle ten thousand in cash, advised her to call an armored car service immediately because it was risky having that kind of dough.
She could hardly breathe. She dropped the money. Scrabbled around on the floor gathering the bills up. She heard Teaf go out. She couldn't stand it. There he went, getting aboard, a hundred thousand dollars. Oh, God, no!
She jerked open the back door and screamed at one of the lineboys. He came running. She thrust the money into his hands and pointed, "Clean it up, call an armored car service, ten thousand," and shoved past him, running, almost tripping in high-heels. She stopped and jerked her shoes off and ran.
Mack Bolan became aware of another presence aboard the aircraft when he felt a slight change in the cabin air pressure. He did not move until he felt the pressure normalize, and heard a faint click!
Still lying back in his seat as though asleep, he eased his hand under his jacket and gripped the Beretta, then like a cat, he rolled out of the seat and flat on the floor, pistol aimed.
The girl shrieked: "No!" and shoved her hands out palms forward as though they would stop 9mm Parabellum sizzlers.
Bolan relaxed pressure on the trigger and got to his feet.
Teeth chattering, eyes sprung wide as saucers, the woman managed, "Mr. Borzi ... can I, can I bring you anything?"
Bolan sat down, motioning her forward. She stopped directly beside the seat. Never in his life had Mack Bolan seen such bosoms. Looking up he could not see her face, only the underside of a brown knit jersey jutting out. Then she leaned over and Mack saw an ordinary face, a few years on it, thin lips, muddy eyes, bad complexion not hidden by pancake. The only thing she had going for her was the tits and she knew it.
Her right hand dropped to Mac
k's left thigh. "Or anything I can do for you?"
"No, darlin,' I'm fine." Mack gestured toward a seat across the narrow aisle. "Sit down."
He noticed she wore a pants suit. Probably had legs as bad as her face, tits the whole show.
"When did you come aboard?"
"While they loaded your crate. Machinery, I believe it was stenciled."
Mack Bolan did not know for sure, quite yet, positively, but he believed he'd have to kill this girl. Her nose was much too long. He answered. "That's right. Machinery."
"What business are you in?"
"Well, ah, various. Actually, salvage and demolition are my main specialties."
"Of what?"
Mack knew then. He would have to kill her. She played it too clever. Possibly . . . hell, probably she had already been down into the cargo hold with a prybar.
"Is there any booze aboard?" Mack asked, as though the thought had just occurred to him.
"Anything you wish," the girl said, smiling. She had good teeth. "Not limited to drinks, I might add."
"So nice to know. If the mood strikes me, dear. What's your name?"
"Annabelle."
"Annabelle, who, what?"
"Just Annabelle."
"Okay, Annabelle no last name, I'll take a Bloody Mary and go very light on the hot."
"Right on, Mr. Bo-oh-orzi."
Well, The Executioner thought, that's a death warrant. My passport and visas and documents and the few travelers' checks he'd bought, all in the name Mike Borzi; but she damned near called me Bolan. And it took her too long to build the drink.
Bolan winked, faked a sip, reached up and touched, found a hard unyielding silicone stiffness and dropped his hand. She had dropped to her knees beside him, hand going to his belt the moment Mack touched her. He acted as though he understood nothing, unlatched his lap strap and rose to his feet and shoved past her.
In the cockpit Teaf lazed back in his seat, the aircraft on flight director, a highly sophisticated autopilot. Bolan shot a look at the altimeter. It showed FL 23: Flight Level 23,000 feet. He glanced past the pilot and looked out the window.
Bolan was not a pilot, though he had flown many hours in Nam and in the Army, in fixed wing aircraft and helicopters. He also had phenomenal eyesight and depth perception. He was not sure they were actually 23,000 feet above the ocean, but knew the airplane was tremendously high.
Laconically, Bolan said, "Christ, we're so high it looks like a calm lake down there."
Teaf roused himself, reached forward, rapped the altimeter sharply, and the big marker moved some forty feet higher. Teaf then twisted the knob on the instrument and set the tiny window marker on the left side of the altimeter to read 29.92 inches mercury, the standard setting for over-ocean flights so all aircraft had the same altimeter reading and would, theoretically, if conforming to assigned altitudes, avoid mid-air collisions.
"We're a little high," Teaf said, but did nothing. The extra forty feet did not seem to bother him.
"What about oxygen?" Mack Bolan/Borzi asked.
"Plane's pressurized, sir. No sweat."
"What if something busts open?"
Condescendingly, expert explaining to frightened novice, Teaf said, "Still no sweat. Get a might cold before we got down to lower altitude, but we have portable ox-bottles all over the ship. The green ones, stashed in niches, with a mask. Notice them?"
"Yeah, but what the hell, man. Like it goes, I mean all of a sudden?"
"You mean explosive decompression?" Teaf turned in his seat and grinned at Mack. "No sweat. If you can't reach an ox-bottle soon enough, you might hypoxia, oxygen starvation, and pass out."
Teaf pointed vaguely at the instrument. "But that would show up here instantly and I'd put her down on the deck. Like I said, Mr. Borzi, no sweat."
"Unless I happened to be standing next to a door or window that went, huh?"
With obvious and decided discomfort, Teaf sat up straight in his seat. He did not answer. He took the bizjet off flight director and began flying manually.
Bolan/Borzi jerked up the armrest of the right side pilot seat and sat down sideways so he could look directly at Teaf. Deliberately, he thumbed the pilot in the ribs.
"I don't remember an answer, ace."
Evidently knowing that both silence and lies had become worthless, Teaf shrugged, sighed, and said, "Okay, sure, at this altitude we are pressurized for eight thousand feet while flying at twenty-three thousand. If we had an explosive decompression—extremely unlikely, mind you! —then anything close to the leak would go."
"You mean ME?" Bolan/Borzi shouted.
"Oh, no, sir, unless a big, I mean big hole. Like a window or door. The chances of that are so remote, hell, I'd give you million to one odds."
"That's a bet," Bolan said, getting to his feet.
"What?"
Bolan did not answer. He returned to the cabin from the cockpit, and as he expected four of the aft seats had been lowered so they made a wide but not too long bed. Immaculately clean, smooth, pale blue silk sheets had been laid across the lowered bed-made seats. Anna-belle lay naked on the pale blue.
Bitterly, The Executioner smiled.
He stood at the forward end of the cabin, just outside the cockpit, and called to Annabelle, "Stand up so I can see you. Don't hide such beauty!"
She rose to her knees, incredible bosoms pointed like twin gunmounts straight at Bolan. "I can't stand up. The overhead's too low."
"That's fine. That's beautiful."
She smiled with a brittle, professional brilliance.
"What did you put in my drink, darlin'?" Mack said, "something to kill me, or only knockout drops?"
"What?"
"No, darlin', that's my question. What?"
For a moment Annabelle stood there on her knees, totally defiant. Without a word uttered she told Mack Bolan:
"I am one of them. I obey the rule. Total silence."
Bolan whipped the pistol from under his left arm, aimed past Annabelle, fired three shots so fast the sounds came as a single blend of noise.
The window behind her naked body vanished, explosively.
Bolan dived sideways to his right, landing on his knees, wrapping his strong long arms around the back of the seat, feeling the decompression whistle past him, carrying with it papers, dust, noise, seat cushions, pillows, seat covers, a candy wrapper, smoke and ashes and cigarette butts, and sucking Annabelle directly into the small window.
Bolan heard her screams.
Maybe if she had been standing upright instead of on her knees it would have made a difference.
As it was, the window lay directly behind her and she went out head first, screeching, stuck for a fraction of an instant, then the window sucked her through—the vast bosom and wide back, then her wide hips slowing movement for another fraction, and then she was gone. The silken blue sheets had vanished. Her clothing, underwear, stockings, shoes.
She might never have existed, ever.
Bolan clamped an emergency oxygen bottle on his face and walked into the cockpit, slipping the pistol out of sight. He sat down in the right seat and held out his open palm.
Teaf pulled his ox-mask from his face long enough to shout, "What the hell, Borzi?"
"You owe me a dollar. Pay up!"
7: EDDIE THE CHAMP
I am a man, Eddie Campanaro thought, without doing a thing to prove his manhood.
Stolidly, he stood, thick and wide, swarthy, a onetime United States Marine who'd earned a Bronze Star in Korea.
So, okay, he was getting along, close to forty. No matter. House captain, that was his job. He ran the whole friggin' show. No sumbitch got past the door of Don Cafu's pad without Eddie The Champ's okay, the old Mark I eyeball inspection. Day, night, frig it. Four o'clock in the morning, zero four hundred hours, they used to call it in the Crotch.
That's one of the things Eddie The Champ remembered most vividly about the Marine Corps. Salty bunch of dudes, men, but with a capacity to laugh
at themselves: USMC, Uncle Sam's Moldy Crotch. The outcasts. Hadn't Cinch himself said so, Truman. Commander In Chief.
That's what Eddie The Champ remembered, after twenty years. Champ of what? Okay, he had hands. Golden Gloves. A winner. Then the dough. Seventeen pro fights, then six main events. He won two. He drew two, both fixed. He got the crap kicked out of himself running in against a rawboned awkward redhead with freckled shoulders from some busher dump. Omaha? Where the hell was Omaha? Dumbass kid didn't have half Eddie's class, smoothness, style, moves. All he could do was hit like a mule kicking, even his awkward left jab, and Jeez-ussss … those right-hand shots to the body. Eddie caved in during the third, and the hick from Omaha splattered Eddie's fine, beaked Roman nose all over Eddie's face, and he woke up on the table with an ammonia inhaler under his nose.
Sure, lucky punch, everyone said so, crumbum from Hicksville. But, god, what a whanging right hand. Eddie felt sore and as though he breathed glass for three weeks afterwards.
The second Main he went against some long-limbed spade with a fancy monicker like Johno Bantuli, some such shit, a cause type. Eddie fancied him around a half-dozen rounds, flicking left, rocking the spade's head doubling, sometimes tripling combinations, so far ahead on points the judges got restless, yawning. Christ, Eddie The Champ thought, where's it been all my life, this kind of easy dough? Main event. He snapped three fast lefts into the spade's blunt nose, crossed with a right, dropped his shoulder and shoveled two fast left hooks, just a fraction low, into the black hide. Then Johno came up with that dynamite right cross and he went blind.
Sicilian Slaughter Page 4
