Pirate Offensive

by Don Pendleton

  Bolan heard startled cries from the guards, then silence engulfed the man as a wave of heat shoved him forward. Stumbling, Bolan hit the wall hard but managed to stay erect. Everything depended upon what the guards would do next.

  Drawing the Beretta, Bolan fired random shots into the ceiling of the tunnel until the magazine was empty, hopefully slowing down any possible pursuit. If the border guards returned fire, he had no way of knowing. His ears were ringing loudly—the man could not even hear himself breathe.

  Trapped in silence, Bolan concentrated on moving as fast as possible on reaching the curve in the tunnel. As the BMW came into view, he redoubled his efforts, then threw himself to the pavement behind a particularly large dead pig.

  Crouching low, Bolan saw an Albanian border agent appear around the curve. In the glow from the guard’s flashlight, Bolan saw tears streaming down the man’s flushed face, and his hair looked like he had just been in a hurricane. But the Glock 9 mm pistol was steady in his fist, and his expression was grim as death.

  Bolan stayed in the shadow of the dead pig, hoping his boots weren’t visible. His hearing was starting to return, the ringing noticeably lower, but his vision was a little blurry.

  Slowly, time passed. It seemed like hours to Bolan, but in reality it must have only been a few minutes. And then the guard’s flashlight beam locked on Bolan’s face.

  Chapter 17

  “Hey, Yankee,” the guard growled.

  “Svekta Dorvorka,” Bolan said.

  That made the guard pause,

  “Svekta Dorvorka,” Bolan repeated.

  Scowling darkly, the lieutenant muttered something out of the corner of his mouth, then reached behind his back to produce a set of steel handcuffs.

  “Svekta Dorvorka.” Bolan continued saying her name as he was cuffed and escorted out of the tunnel.

  Once outside, all pretense of civility vanished. Bolan was expertly frisked, disarmed and frog-marched to a battered Citroen sedan. Unmarked. The border agents unceremoniously stuffed Bolan into the rear seat and took off in a spray of loose gravel.

  The light bar on top of the car started to flash and a siren began to wail from under the hood as the Citroen rapidly accelerated, returning into Albania through the tunnel. The agent at the wheel banked hard as they approached the wreckage of the pig truck.

  “Svekta Dorvorka,” Bolan continued as the Citroen exited the tunnel and sped through the Albanian mountains.

  Podgorica, Montenegro

  THE DOUBLE DOORS to the operating room of Berane Hospital automatically cycled apart at the rapid approach of the wheeled gurney.

  Surrounded by armed guards, doctors and nurses, Captain Ravid Narmada shivered under a thin blanket, tubes running in and out of his body. Covered with bandages, his right hand was in a cast, his left eye swollen shut. He was missing several teeth.

  “Cold...” Narmada whispered hoarsely.

  “That’s better for the machines,” a nurse replied, adjusting his IV.

  “F-fuck the m-machines...” Narmada growled. “How...b-bad...did I...”

  “I think that we can save one of your testes,” a doctor replied curtly, pulling on surgical gloves.

  “F-find...oth-other...”

  “That’s long gone,” another doctor stated, expertly snapping his gloves into place.

  “Search!”

  “Your people did, captain, and thoroughly,” said the doctor, pressing a plastic mask to the man’s face. “Now calm down and breathe.”

  Despite his growing fury, Narmada felt a soothing warmth spread outward from his lungs, and soon he was gone beyond the pain.

  Moments later, the cutting and the sewing began.

  Durres, Albania

  RATHER THAN BRINGING Bolan to a police station or holding center, the Citroen had pulled up in front of a tidy bungalow in a quiet suburb.

  During the drive, the border agents had spent a long time on the phone, arguing and cursing in Albanian. Finally, they settled into resigned silence, occasionally shooting glares at Bolan through the rearview mirror.

  Now the agents removed Bolan’s handcuffs and roughly pulled him from the car. Pointing to the bungalow’s front door, they gave him a final, disgusted look and drove off.

  Bolan knocked, and a thickset man opened the door a crack, one hand resting on something inside his jacket. Bolan showed he was unarmed, and the man nodded once and stepped aside.

  Bolan found himself in a well-appointed living room. Across from him, Svekta was sitting in a green leather chair. She was dressed in a flowing white dress, the hem just high enough to show off her long legs. Her hair was a controlled explosion of curls, jewelry flashed on every finger and a decorative gold chain hugged her left ankle.

  “Hello,” Bolan said.

  Svekta smiled at him. “At last. I trust your mission was a success?”

  Bitterly, Bolan cursed. “Narmada has escaped into Montenegro.”

  “He still lives?” she asked, displeasure loud in her voice.

  “Yes.”

  Her pretty face twisted into a snarl, and the woman cut loose with a long string of muttered words, none of which sounded even vaguely like Christmas blessings.

  “Agreed,” said Bolan. “However—”

  “How could you not kill him?”

  “Tried my best.”

  “Did you?” snapped Svekta, then relented. “Yes, of course, you did. As did he, I assume.” She smiled. “It was very clever of you to keep asking the police for me. It got you the attention of our people. Otherwise, you would have gone to jail for carrying illegal weapons, assaulting officers.... Our jails are nowhere near as nice as those in America.”

  “So I would assume,” Bolan said.

  “Colonel Stone,” Svekta said, stressing the word to let him know she was fully aware it was fake. “As far as I know, you are the first person to nearly kill Narmada.”

  “The key word is nearly. I didn’t.”

  “True. But if you are for hire—”

  “I’m not.”

  “My grandfather does not believe that.” She smiled again. “But I do. I want him dead, and you want him dead. Perhaps we can hunt for him together...as equals.”

  Hunting was not necessary. Bolan had a very good idea where Narmada was. At least temporarily. The problem was a matter of time. The Fifteen Families could help enormously in that regard, and Bolan had done this sort of thing before. Cut a deal with a warlord or criminal syndicate to get needed assistance to destroy a much larger threat. Sometimes the only way to fight fire was with fire. But there was always a price.

  “What would the Family think about such an arrangement?” Bolan asked.

  “They understand that this has gone beyond business and now is a personal matter,” she stated, straightening her legs to lean forward. Her voice was something less than human, and her dark eyes flashed with hatred. “When he...I...” The woman shook her head in frustration, unable to find the correct words.

  Bolan understood. He had felt the exact same way about the Boston mob when he first started on his strange journey toward justice. She wanted revenge; he wanted justice. On this rare occasion, the two radically different goals joined on the same nexus—the death of Ravid Narmada.

  “All right,” Bolan said, offering a hand. “We take him down together. But afterward, all bets are off.”

  “Ha Mut? I do not understand the expression.”

  Bolan smiled slowly. “Yes, you do. Stop acting stupid. I don’t believe that you are, and it’s wasting my time.”

  “Mine too,” she growled menacingly, then spoiled the effect by flashing previously unseen dimples. “Where do we start? Narmada has many friends in Montenegro, but the Family has a few spies there, perhaps—”

  “He’s in Hong Kong.
”

  Her face froze. “Where?”

  “Hong Kong.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “When we were fighting, I ripped his shirt and saw a Chinese tattoo on his left arm. Resembles a bear claw.” Bolan saw a flicker of recognition on her face. “Sound familiar?”

  “Then the rumors are true,” Svekta said, collapsing back into the chair. “He really is a member of the Sun Nee On Triad.”

  “Possibly. But it would certainly explain why he chose to operate in this area. The Fifteen Families and the Sun Nee On have been fighting each other for years over control of the drug trade in this territory.”

  “Our territory!” snapped Svekta. “The tattoo, were there any...I do not know the English word...”

  “Hash marks? None. He’s a member in good standing, if the term can be used for that organization.”

  “Then this is far from being over,” she sighed. “Soon Narmada will return with more men, and another pirate fleet, to harass my Family...”

  Bolan said, “Not if we move fast.”

  “And do what—attack him in Hong Kong?” She laughed, spreading her arms wide. “The entire population of Albania could be swallowed in that city and never be heard from again. How do we find one lone man?”

  “I know a way,” Bolan assured her.

  Chapter 18

  Hong Kong

  Smuggling a team of armed Albanians into Hong Kong without alerting the authorities, or worse, the Sun Nee On Triad, proved to be much more difficult than either Bolan or Svekta had expected.

  Gathering in the Philippines, then using Mako as a staging area, it was a full two weeks before Bolan and Svekta finally reached the main island. They carried Canadian passports, their trunk of weapons protected from the prying eyes of the customs inspector by a French diplomatic seal.

  “How much did that cost?” asked Bolan as they entered the main concourse of Hong Kong’s massive airport.

  Dressed as a tourist, he was wearing a nylon windbreaker, a loud Hawaiian shirt, chinos and new sneakers.

  “Cost? Nothing, of course,” said Svekta, pretending to smile. “The Family has many friends in diplomatic circles.”

  “Any in Hong Kong?”

  “Sadly, no. Here we are unwanted foreigners.”

  Bolan did not even bother to shrug. “Fair enough.”

  Bolan and Svekta proceeded to the food court and waited for the rest of her crew to arrive. Over the next few hours, they joined them individually and in pairs as planes landed from different countries.

  As per instructions, the Albanian street soldiers also were dressed as tourists, with old-style cameras around their necks and new street maps stuffed into rear pockets. Still, their muscular build, tattoos and scars kept drawing the unwanted attention of the airport security guards.

  “We’re getting noticed,” said Svekta, shifting her handbag from one shoulder to the other. “Time to leave.”

  “Not a problem,” Bolan stated.

  Exactly on cue, a fistfight between several men erupted in a sushi bar down the concourse. Voices rose, chairs went flying, a window smashed and a woman screamed. As the security guards scrambled to control the situation, Bolan and the others casually breezed out of the food court, down the walkway and out of the airport.

  “Nicely done,” said Svekta, holding open the exit door.

  “I have a lot of friends,” said Bolan, adjusting his sunglasses.

  “Obviously.”

  Waiting outside the airport for them was a trio of black British Land Rovers, the windows darkly tinted, engines purring. Bolan approved of the crew wagons. The vehicles had four-wheel drive and plenty of room for the fourteen people and their luggage.

  Once they were far away from the airport, Svekta had the drivers stop at a deserted construction site. They opened the sealed trunks and distributed the weapons and body armor.

  Svekta slid a Glock 9 mm automatic into a tailored shoulder holster. The weapon seemed to magically disappear under her loose denim jacket. Spare ammunition went into her alligator handbag, along with a grenade, a knife and spiked brass knuckles.

  Bolan tucked a Remington .22 derringer inside his sleeve. A switchblade knife went into his hip pocket, a military garrote into his shirt. The Beretta went into a shoulder holster, and the massive Desert Eagle into a cushioned holster behind his back underneath his Hawaiian shirt.

  The rest of the Albanians made do with less exotic weaponry—grenades, knives, Glock 9 mm automatics and MP5 submachine guns. Short guns that could be quickly hidden and easily disposed of when necessary.

  Properly armed and armored, the group got back into the Land Rovers and started driving across the island.

  Near the airport, traffic was light at this time of the day, the morning rush hours away. A thin crowd of people strolled on the sidewalks, mostly locals going home from night jobs, along with a handful of early risers. Then they reached the highways. Those were new and in excellent condition, the streets clean but jammed with traffic, even at this early hour.

  A “vertical city,” Hong Kong had more skyscrapers than anywhere else in the world, the downtown and business districts tightly packed rows of glass-and-steel monoliths, glittering dominoes of industry and commerce.

  Boasting a population of almost eight million, Hong Kong was one of the most densely populated areas on the face of the Earth. Private helicopters filled the sky, the sidewalks and streets always vibrated from a passing subway train underground, and the air was almost tangible from the countless animated conversations, passing cars, rumbling trucks, buzzing electric scooters, bicycles and the occasional rickshaw. Hong Kong was alive in ways that almost defied description. Which was probably why Narmada and the triads liked it here so much, Bolan thought. Anything was possible in Hong Kong, especially crime.

  Leaving the congested downtown area, the group now headed for the eastern hills. Victoria Peak was where only the richest people lived—in soaring mansions of teak, granite and marble, with gull-wing gables and golden eaves in the classic Chinese tradition.

  “He lives there,” said Svekta, her voice neutral.

  “On paper, under the name Wolfe, but it’s a dummy house,” Bolan replied. “Nobody actually lives there. Not enough electricity or water is used. Narmada has several of these scattered around.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “To fool assassins?”

  “How do you know this?” growled one of the Albanians, checking the edge of a knife by running it along his forearm. The shaved hairs fell off like black snow.

  “I have a good hacker,” Bolan said.

  Svekta scowled but decided not to inquire about the matter further. Everybody had their secrets.

  Reaching the bottom of the hill, the Land Rovers turned onto Merchant Street and immediately slowed to a crawl. Traffic was light, but teams of young men were everywhere pushing racks of designer knockoffs through the busy streets, closely followed by the real designer clothing, most of it worth more than a new luxury car.

  Checking the GPS on his cell phone, Bolan directed the driver of the lead Land Rover through the maze of streets and alleys until he reached a busy corner. Set between a millinery shop and a dressmaker was a small shoe store.

  Impatiently following a trundling street sweeper, the drivers of the Land Rovers finally parked at the freshly cleaned curb, one directly in front of the cobbler’s shop, the other two across the street in flanking positions.

  “Can’t believe we’re doing this,” Svekta muttered, pulling the strap of her handbag over her head to make sure it did not slip off. “There must be another way to find Narmada.”

  “Had any luck so far?” Bolan asked, studying the nearby rooftops for any sign of guards or snipers.

  “No.”

  “Then we go with my
plan.”

  “But—”

  “Svekta, there are thousands of tailors in Hong Kong,” Bolan replied. “Any of which can make that giant comfortable clothing. But unless he’s a fool, Narmada would at least try to get his shoes made by the very best cobbler in town.”

  “Why?”

  “Stress. Never heard of a man that large who did not have trouble with his feet, especially the arches.”

  “I see. And this man is the best?”

  “Absolutely. His shoes cost more than one of these vans.”

  “Impossible!”

  “But true.”

  A tiny silver bell jingled overhead as Bolan opened the door. The interior was well-lit with recessed lighting, the carpet thick and spotless. Tables around the shop displayed premade shoes—women’s to the left, men’s to the right. Casual in the front, evening wear in the back. Children’s shoes and boots on the walls. An old-fashioned iron cash register, a relic from the past century, sat on the rear counter along with a credit card slide and a large Chinese abacus.

  “Are those the prices or astronomical distances?” muttered one of the men in heavily accented English as he fingered a pair of soft leather slippers.

  “Yen?” asked another man incredulously.

  “Euros,” the first man replied in disbelief. Just then, a bead curtain parted at the rear of the store. A large man, noticeably bigger than almost anybody else Bolan had seen on the island nation, stepped out from behind the counter. He had the barrel chest and narrow waist of a professional weight lifter. Dressed like an American cowboy, the man sported a mullet and was draped with a stained leather apron full of odd-looking tools.

  “Yes, please,” he said, giving a small bow. “How can this humble purveyor of fine leather goods assist...you!”

  “Chung!” Svekta snarled, reaching inside her jacket.

  Before Bolan could react, Svekta and the aproned man both drew weapons and fired. The double retort merged into a single noise, and they were both thrown backward, blood gushing from wounds.

  As they fell, a group of burly men in peacoats and Navy watch caps poured from the back room brandishing AK-101 assault rifles. The pirates cut loose, but Bolan was already rolling under the display tables, firing the Beretta on full auto. The stuttering stream of hardball rounds stitched a line of destruction across the decorative wooden counter, and two of the men dropped.