by Dale Brown
“I wouldn’t worry about any of that, Colonel Zakharov,” a man’s voice said in English—and U.S. Border Patrol agent Paul Purdy entered the bunker. He looked at Maria. “Is he okay?”
“He is unconscious.” She checked his pupils. “No concussion—I think he will be okay. His head is bleeding but not badly.”
“One lump on the noggin and maybe a slight career setback—a small price to pay to rid the world of you, Colonel,” Purdy said casually. He walked to the cell, withdrew an automatic pistol, and began screwing a sound suppressor to the muzzle. “Remember me, Colonel?”
“Agent Paul Purdy. I remember now,” Zakharov said. “You intend to kill me while I am locked in this cell? Is that how an American kills, Agent Purdy—from inside a robotic shell, or when his victim is behind bars?”
“I’ll give you as much as you gave Victor Flores, Colonel—and you don’t deserve none of it.” Purdy dropped into a shooter’s crouch, extended the gun, and aimed.
“I’ll see you in hell, Agent Purdy.”
“Don’t wait up,” Purdy said, and he fired a bullet into Zakharov’s one remaining good eye. Blood, brains, and bone splattered across the far side of the cell, and the almost headless corpse hit the concrete floor with a sickening thud.
Purdy casually unscrewed the suppressor from his gun, turned, and looked into Maria’s horrified face. “Sorry you had to see that, darlin’,” he said.
Maria tore her eyes off the grisly scene in the cell, looked at the Border Patrol agent, then stood on her tiptoes and gave him a kiss on the corner of his mouth. “Victor would have wanted me to give you that,” she said.
“Oh, I think Victor would have wanted you to give me a lot more’n that, darlin’.”
“Stop it, you old letch. By the way—this means I will probably need a new job somewhere, Purdy.”
“I told you, I got you covered,” Purdy said. “I found a nice business for you up in Stockton, good schools for your kids—trust me, darlin’.” He put an arm around her waist. “Now how about you and me head on over to the Joshua Tree Saloon and celebrate with a couple of tequilas? Then maybe take a drive out into the desert and celebrate the new spirit of peace and happiness between America and Mexico?”
“Shall I invite my husband to join us too, Purdy?” Maria asked with an alluring, mischievous smile on her face.
“Ouch. You did it to me again, darlin’—you went and mentioned the ‘H’ word,” Purdy said, putting a hand on his heart as he escorted Maria out of the bunker. “You done broke my heart again.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thanks to my friends Gene and Alison Pretti for their generosity.
Special thanks always to my wife, Diane, and to my editor, Henry Ferris. Writing a novel on a difficult topic is never an easy task, but these two caring persons made the task much less challenging for me.
About the Author
Former U.S. Air Force captain Dale Brown was born in Buffalo, New York, and now lives in Nevada. Edge of Battle is his eighteenth novel. He graduated from Penn State University with a degree in Western European history and received a U.S. Air Force commission in 1978. He was still serving in the Air Force when he wrote his highly acclaimed first novel, Flight of the Old Dog. Since then he has written a string of New York Times bestsellers, including, most recently, Air Battle Force, Plan of Attack, and Act of War.
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ALSO BY DALE BROWN
ACT OF WAR
PLAN OF ATTACK
AIR BATTLE FORCE
WINGS OF FIRE
WARRIOR CLASS
BATTLE BORN
THE TIN MAN
FATAL TERRAIN
SHADOW OF STEEL
STORMING HEAVEN
CHAINS OF COMMAND
NIGHT OF THE HAWK
SKY MASTERS
HAMMERHEADS
DAY OF THE CHEETAH
SILVER TOWER
FLIGHT OF THE OLD DOG
Credits
Jacket design by Richard L. Aquan
Jacket photograph by Dirk Anschutz /Nonstock/Jupiterimages;
Flames © by Wayne Aldridge / Imagestate; seal by AP Images
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
EDGE OF BATTLE. Copyright © 2006 by Air Battle Force Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books™.
ePub edition April 2006 ISBN 9780061741470
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brown, Dale, 1956–
Edge of battle : a novel / Dale Brown.
p. cm.
ISBN-13: 978-0-06-075300-9 (acid-free paper)
ISBN-10: 0-06-075300-5 (acid-free paper)
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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