Blood Play (Don Pendleton's Mack Bolan)

by Pendleton, Don

  Colt was making his way to the repainted Camry when Mikhaylov mustered a semblance of sobriety and stood up, drawing his Makarov. By then, his would-be prisoner had reached the car and was about to climb in. Before he did so, Colt turned toward the farmhouse and screamed at the top of his lungs. For once, the tables were turned on Mikhaylov and the other Russians scrambling to prevent his escape, because Colt’s cry was in a language they’d never heard before.

  “Hokahey!” Colt roared. “Hokahey!”

  AFTER BEING SERVED BREAKFAST, Gwen had been ordered, at gunpoint, to clean the farmhouse kitchen, a chore clearly shunned by the SVR agents to the point where the sink and half the counter space had been cluttered with an assortment of piled dishes, unwashed pans and food-encrusted silverware. Gwen had undertaken the denigrating task without complaint, grateful in some respects to have something to do other than pace the locked bedroom worrying about what her captors might be doing to her husband. She was thankful, too, that their son had become engrossed enough watching television so as to not create a disturbance. She could see Frankie while she worked; he was curled up in blankets on the overstuffed sofa in the adjacent room, which was separated from the kitchen by a counter where Zhenya Ilyin sat on a bar stool, a Bizon 2 straddling his lap as he supervised Gwen’s efforts between sips of coffee.

  “Where do you want the pans?” Gwen asked Iylin.

  “The cupboard over the stove,” he told her gruffly. “Clean the shelves first.”

  “I can barely reach them.”

  “Use the step stool,” Ilyin said, pointing. “It’s right next to the refrigerator.”

  Gwen withdrew the stool and was unfolding it when the first shots were fired outside the farmhouse. The only window in the kitchen faced away from the direction of the gunfire, and Gwen’s heart sank with fear, thinking her husband had been the target. However, when the blasts were followed by a chorus of shouts and Ilyin rose to his feet, readying his carbine, she realized there had to be another reason for the outburst. Across the room, Frankie screamed and bolted from the sofa, running past Ilyin into the kitchen. He clasped himself to his mother’s leg and bawled into her hip.

  “Shut him up!” Ilyin shouted, moving to the screen door. He peered out, then suddenly kicked the door open and fired out into the clearing between the farmhouse and the javelina pen.

  Gwen patted Frankie’s head and pulled him away, then crouched to his level and held him by the shoulders. She was about to plead with him to stop crying when, during a lull between gunshots, she heard her husband cry out. “Hokahey! Hokahey!”

  It was a prearranged signal, one they’d discussed the previous night while Frankie was asleep, inspired by the Sioux warrior Crazy Horse, who’d spurred his warriors on to victory with the same incantation during the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Some took the phrase to mean “It’s a good day to die!” Others translated it more simply as “Let’s roll!” Either way the war cry galvanized Colt’s wife.

  Without hesitation Gwen coaxed her son aside and grabbed the unfolded step stool by one of its lower legs. Clutching it the way she’d hold a bat, she charged past the counter and was halfway to Ilyin before he turned from the doorway and whirled his carbine her way. He fired wildly, missing both Gwen and Frankie before the top edge of the metal stool crashed into his right cheek. Gwen had swung the makeshift weapon with all her might and the blow dislocated Ilyin’s jaw while shattering his cheekbone. He let out a muffled howl and reeled off balance, lowering the Bizon 2. Gwen stayed on him and moved in closer, plowing her knee into the man’s groin and butting his wrist with the stool’s base. The subgun fell clear and Ilyin went down, doubled over in pain.

  Gwen cast aside the stool and snatched up the submachine gun. She hadn’t gone hunting with her husband since Frankie was born but there was little to forget when it came to firing a rifle and with unflinching certainty she took aim at the downed Russian and put a bullet through his head.

  Frankie had gone silent in the kitchen and when Gwen looked back at him she could see that he was in shock, standing before the stove as if frozen in place, his eyes wide. Still clutching the Bizon, she rushed to her son and scooped him up in her other arm and held him tight as she charged back toward the doorway.

  “It’s going to be all right, Frankie,” she whispered to him. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

  AS COLT HAD HOPED, the keys had been left in the Camry. Tossing the subgun on the seat beside him, Colt started the engine and shoved the gears into Reverse, then turned in his seat and looked behind him as he pressed on the accelerator, speeding backward toward the farmhouse. He veered around the body of Yuri Reinhart and flinched when someone fired a slug through the rear windshield, missing him by inches. Through the shattered glass he saw Mikhaylov standing alongside his Humvee, readying his Makarov for another shot. Colt jostled the steering wheel and swerved slightly as he neared the house. Mikhaylov’s next round glanced off the trunk. Colt pulled to a stop in front of the house and grabbed the Bizon 2, driving Mikhaylov to the ground with an autoburst. When he saw the screen door swing open, Colt swung the weapon around but held his fire. It was Gwen, rushing out with Frankie in her arms. She yanked open the car door and hurriedly eased Frankie into the backseat, then slid in beside him, exchanging a look with her husband that spoke all at once of pride, love and desparation.

  “Stay down,” Colt told her. Gwen nodded and dropped low in the seat, pulling Frankie down with her. Staring up at his father, the boy snapped out of his catatonia.

  “Paparoni looks like Batman!” he cried out.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  Dmitri Vishnevsky had just deployed his parachute when the gun battle had erupted at the javelina farm. He was unaware of the skirmish, and by the time he’d stabilized himself enough to survey the terrain below him, he’d drifted considerably west of his target and was concerned primarily with finding a safe place to land. It was only after he’d guided himself toward an open field that he glanced back toward his intended destination. He saw two vehicles pull away from the compound, one a Camry, the other a Hummer SUV. They were both speeding his way, heading down the same road he was about to land next to. Vishnevsky was heartened; it seemed that Mikhaylov had decided to send men to pick him up after all. He hoped it was a sign that he would be treated with more respect than the other man had shown him during their phone call. Things would go much easier if they could put aside their differences long enough to ride out a few setbacks and put Operation Zenta back on track. Once that was done, hopefully Mikhaylov would wise up and bow out gracefully so he could take full rein over the territory without a fight. If Mikhaylov resisted, Vishnevsky hoped that fight would be man-to-man like it’d been back in Moscow at the Royal Splendor. This time he’d be the one beating his adversary to a pulp.

  MIKHAYLOV FELT HE WAS sober enough to keep the Hummer on the road as he barreled past his minions in pursuit of the fleeing Camry. There was no way he was about to be denied the vengeance he had in store for Colt and his family.

  The Toyota had a sizable lead. Mikhaylov tried to gain ground by cutting the first corner he came to but was slow to compensate and overshot the bend, drifting across lanes to the far shoulder and almost plowing into a drainage ditch that ran parallel to the road. He corrected course and the Hummer rumbled back onto the wet asphalt. He’d managed to close the gap despite his blundering, but the Camry was still a good fifty yards ahead. In Mikhaylov’s favor, Colt was unfamiliar with the road while the Russian had traveled it numerous times since. There would be other opportunities to overtake the Camry before it reached the highway.

  It was when Mikhaylov rounded the next corner that he caught his first glimpse of Vishnevsky’s parachute. The Russian’s archrival was closing in on an open field a quarter mile away. Mikhaylov had all but forgotten about the man and he soon found himself at cross-purposes. He knew the sensible thing would be to pull over and pick up the bastard, as having a gunman on board would give him an extra means by whic
h to prevent Colt’s getaway. On the other hand, stopping would lose him what little ground he’d gained. And, too, there was the matter of not wanting to indebt himself to Vishnevsky by drawing on the man’s help.

  As he drew near, Mikhaylov realized the point was moot, as Vishnevsky’s parachute had been slow to collapse after he’d landed and had taken on wind, dragging him far from the road. By the time he’d wrestled free of his harness, Vishnevsky was eighty yards from the passing Camry. He waved frantically, trying to get Colt’s attention. When that failed, he turned toward the Hummer and began gesturing at Mikhaylov.

  Mikhaylov ignored his rival and kept his eyes trained on the road. As he passed the spot where he most likely would have stopped to wait for the other Russian, Mikhaylov muttered, “If you’re so brilliant, why couldn’t you land a little closer to your mark?”

  SOMEONE HAD DONE A reasonably good job of cleaning the interior of the Camry before painting the body, but there were remnants of Jeffrey Eppard’s blood on both the dashboard display and steering column. Colt finally noticed them as he continued to speed along the back road, keeping a safe distance ahead of the pursuing Humvee.

  “What’d they do with Jeff and Leeland?” he asked Gwen as he rounded another bend and came to a long straightaway. A mile up the road he could see a railroad crossing and, beyond that, a short stretch leading to the highway and the increased likelihood of escaping from the hell that had been the javelina farm.

  Mindful of Frankie, Gwen told her husband, “We can talk about that later.”

  A few miles back Colt had asked Gwen to remove the hood of his armored suit, as its weak link was the extent to which it muted the sound of his surroundings, particularly in the distance. Now, freed of that restraint, he had little trouble hearing the sonorous blare of the train engine that soon appeared to his left, heading toward the same crossing Colt needed to pass to reach the highway.

  “Are you buckled up?” he called back to his wife.

  “As best as we can without a car seat,” Gwen told him. Frankie was too small for a seat belt, so she’d put the boy on her lap and drawn the strap across his shoulder as well as hers. She’d heard it was unsafe, especially in the event of an accident, but it seemed a better option than leaving him without any kind of harness.

  “Well, hang on,” Colt warned her, “because there’s a chance we’re going to be cutting things a little close.”

  Colt tightened his grip on the steering wheel and eased down on the accelerator, racing toward the railroad crossing. The train was picking up speed as well as it pulled away from the Glorieta train yard. How ironic, Colt thought. It hadn’t been that long ago that he’d hoped that riding the rails might somehow prove to be their ticket to freedom. Now, as he glanced in his rearview mirror and saw the Hummer keeping pace with him, he wondered if it might turn out that a train would thwart his escape and place him back at the mercy of his captors.

  MIKHAYLOV SAW THE TRAIN, TOO. He was also familiar with its running schedule and always avoided the road at this time of morning because it was common to have trains running in both directions, often with loads more than a hundred boxcars long. He smiled faintly as he saw the long procession of cars trailing behind the engine as it rolled toward the warning lights flanking either side of the road where it intersected with the rail line. He knew Colt would never beat the train past the crossing. In fact, the Camry was a good thirty yards from the light fixtures when the adjacent swing arm wavered from its perpendicular position and slowly dropped to a point where it blocked the road.

  “Thank you,” Mikhaylov murmured, reaching across his seat. He popped open the glove compartment and pulled out a spare ammo cartridge for the Makarov. Once the Camry was forced to stop, he’d pull up behind it and put the gun to use. Yes, it would be a little more impersonal to have to gun down Colt and his family rather than carve them open with his skinning knife, but sometimes one had to be flexible.

  HAD HE BEEN THE ONLY one in the car, Colt knew what he’d do. But as he saw the wooden barrier begin to lower, he suddenly balked at the prospect of having his wife and child crushed by the oncoming engine. His foot was still on the gas and he could see that the Hummer was still hot on his tail. There might still be time to slam on the brakes and hope he could stop in time to avoid the train and take his chances going up against Mikhaylov with however few rounds were left in the Bizon 2. He knew he had to make a decision, but he was still conflicted.

  “What do I do?” he cried out to his wife.

  Gwen could see Colt in the rearview mirror. In his eyes there was fear and uncertainty. It hadn’t been fear and uncertainty that had gotten them this far.

  “Hokahey!” she shouted back at him.

  Frankie Jr., oblvious to what was going on around him, smiled and took on the cry. “Hokahey, Paparoni!”

  Colt held his breath and pressed the accelerator until it touched the floorboard. Seconds later, there was a splintering snap as he crashed through the barrier. Gwen glanced to her left and saw the engine bearing down on them. She held Frankie tight and closed her eyes, thankful that at least they would die quickly. And free…

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Mikhaylov pulled to a stop well short of the passing train. Littered on the road before him were the splintered remains of the barrier Colt had just crashed through. Gun in hand, he slowly strode forward, his head throbbing from the vodka still left in his system. The deafening rumble of the passing boxcars made the pain worse, but he did his best to ignore it and moved still closer to the tracks, inspecting the rail bed for remains of the Camry and its occupants. All he could see was a scattering of weeds and litter. There was a lone hubcap lying in the gravel of the rail bed, but when he moved closer he saw that it was layered with rust and bore no resemblance to the caps on the Camry.

  Standing this close to the rails, Mikhaylov could feel the boxcars rolling past, and the noise made it feel as if his skull had been placed in a slowly closing vise. The Russian holstered his weapon and put his hands to his ears as he crouched and tried to stare past the ever-moving wheels. It was like watching an old silent movie where the projector was out of sync, flashing not only images but also the glimpses of the lines between each frame.

  Less than twenty yards away, just off the road on the other side of the tracks, Mikhaylov saw the Camry. It rested almost perpendicular to the road and seemed totally intact except for the right rear end, far behind the backseat, which had been partially sheared off and partially crushed on impact with the engine’s cowcatcher. From his compromised perspective, it was hard for him to tell if anyone was still in the vehicle, alive or dead.

  Mikhaylov roared with frustration and staggered away from the rail bed, his hands still clamped over his ears. When he reached the Hummer he glanced eastward, hoping to glimpse the train’s caboose. All he could see were more boxcars, dozens of them, stretching all the way back to the bend leading to the train yard. The Russian retreated inside his Hummer and slammed the door, welcoming the relative quiet. He stared numbly out the windshield, watching boxcar after boxcar clatter by, barring his way to the other side of the road. There was nothing for him to do but wait for them to roll by. It would take more than a mile to come to a stop after the accident, if indeed it came to a stop at all.

  Lulled by the rhythmic clatter, Mikhaylov licked his lips and shook his head, struggling to remain awake.

  “I need a drink,” he said.

  FRANKIE WAS THE FIRST to come to.

  Miraculously, he was still strapped in place, his mother’s arms around him. His shoulder ached where the strap had bit into him during the collision and he whimpered slightly as he turned and looked up at Gwen. “Mommy?”

  After Frankie had called to her a second time, Gwen stirred and opened her eyes. She instinctively hugged her son as she looked around her, trying to make sense of what had just happened. She could see the train still rumbling past but realized they were on the other side of the crossing. Looking over her shoulder, she sa
w the mangled rear end.

  “Mommy, my shoulder hurts.”

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart,” Gwen whispered. She grimaced as she unclasped her seat belt, then kissed Frankie’s shoulder and gently moved him off her lap onto the seat. “We’ll take a look at it in a minute, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Gwen leaned forward, waving away the faint, whitish cloud that had been unleashed when the front air bags had deployed. Franklin was slumped to one side in the front seat and she lightly touched his neck, seeking out a pulse, already grateful his skin was warm to the touch. When she could feel his heartbeat she whispered, “Franklin? Franklin, honey?”

  “Wake up, Paparoni!” Frankie called out.

  Colt groaned faintly. Gwen leaned closer and kissed the back of his head, then whispered in his ear, “We made it, Franklin. You did it.”

  It took Colt a moment to orient himself and his surroundings. Once he did, he took Gwen’s hand and kissed it, then unfastened his seat belt and pushed the sagging air bag out of his way so he could turn to his son.

  “You okay, Frankie?”

  Frankie nodded, repeating, “My shoulder hurts.”

  Colt suppressed a grin, knowing full well how much worse it could have been. “Next time we do this, I’ll make sure you’re wearing the armored suit.”

  Frankie shook his head. “I don’t want to do this again.”

  “I like that idea better.”

  Colt reached for his door handle and told Gwen, “Stay put.”

  The Bizon 2 subgun had fallen to the floor in front of the passenger seat. Colt grabbed it, then got out of the car. He glanced back at the ravaged rear end, then looked toward the train, which was still passing. A few pieces of the Camry lay scattered in between him and the tracks. He had the same shifting view of the other side of the road Mikhaylov had had, and when he saw the Hummer idling near the barrier he’d crashed through, Colt realized it wasn’t over yet. He looked the Toyota over again. Both rear tires were flat. Even if they hadn’t been, he doubted that the car was drivable. There was no other traffic on the road and it was a long walk to the highway, with little in between in terms of places to try to hide once the train passed and Mikhaylov resumed his pursuit.