Читать книгу: «Edge Of Hell»

1

Mack Bolan was nearing the end of the night’s grisly work. The iron grip of his hand clenched tight around the sentry’s throat, his Hell’s Belle Bowie knife plunging deep into the viscera of the mobster, all eleven inches of razor-sharp steel perforating and carving organs with ease. The man gurgled as the Executioner twisted and pulled the knife through his aorta, blood bubbling through half-dead lips before he was lowered, still twitching, to the ground.

There was never anything pretty about the work the Executioner did, but when it came to using a knife, that was some of the ugliest work of all. Even with the opened chest and belly of the guard facing away from him, Bolan could smell the hot, coppery scent of blood mixed with the stench of opened bowels. He concentrated on wiping the blood from his knife to prevent rust and stink sticking to the war blade, ruining its cutting strength and stealth fighting ability.

Sonny Westerbridge had mobbed up hard. The Bolan Effect was going according to plan—a series of skirmishes that raised the heat, forcing the enemy to draw all his resources together to protect himself. It was an old tactic, so tried and true that the Executioner could have plotted the maneuvers in his sleep.

“Hell!” came an angered cry off to his left, an unnecessary reminder to the soldier that while he could run a strategy like clockwork, all it took was one wrong glance at the wrong time to send things awry.

Stealth flew away on the wings of the guard’s cry, but Bolan’s sound-suppressed Colt spoke anyway. The lack of muzzle-flash from the weapon, and the muffled sounds would at least make the man in black that much harder to spot. A triburst of 9 mm slugs tore open the British gangster’s chest and throat in a straight line going up his breastbone. An unfired pistol clattered from the corpse’s unfeeling fingers just before he tumbled facefirst into the ground.

“They’re coming in from the west! Move in!” Westerbridge’s voice crackled from the dead sentry’s radio.

Bolan was caught between cursing the big London gangster and giving him a greater helping of respect. The soldier always respected that his enemies could kill him at any time. He never thought of himself as immortal or bulletproof. And Westerbridge had been prepared for him, springing a trap.

Bolan grabbed the radio off the dead man and stole into the darkness behind a couple of cargo containers as men moved with precision, covering one another as they began to swarm the lot. Crouching, the Executioner disappeared into the shadows, checking the odds against him.

“It’s just one man,” someone spoke up over the radio, and Bolan spun, diving from his hiding spot. Bullets sparked on the steel of the container he’d crouched against moments before. Leveling the 9 mm submachine gun with one hand, he triggered a burst from hip level, driving the two mobsters back behind their own cover.

Around him, gunners cut loose, their weapons speaking in the dark. He counted muzzle flashes, getting up to fifteen.

“Is that positive?” Westerbridge asked.

“Just one man,” came the answer.

Just one man, Bolan thought. Keep thinking that and lose your advantage.

“I don’t care, keep up the pressure,” the mobster said. “He’s done enough damage for a small army.”

Bolan decided to punctuate that statement with a special delivery from an attachment under the barrel of the submachine gun. Bolan had chosen the 9 mm Colt for two reasons—one was his familiarity with the line the Colt was descended from—the other was the weapon’s forearm was identical to the short-barrel M-16s favored by Special Forces. This made mounting the M-203 grenade launcher easy.

He triggered the first 40 mm shell at a point where a heavy concentration of muzzle-flashes originated. Six ounces of explosive core burst a shell of notched razor wire with terrifying effect. Once the thunderclap faded, screams of agony could be heard from wounded men.

Confusion coursed over the radio’s speaker, and the Executioner burst from the shadows, racing to the cover of another cargo container. Gunfire lapped at his heels, sparks rebounding off steel and concrete as he made a final, desperate dive for the protection of the huge trailer.

Two more gangsters swung around the area where Bolan had been moments before, but instead of finding their prey pinned down, they realized they had exposed themselves too soon. The Colt burped again, two salvos of slugs smashed into Westerbridge’s men, sending them into the next life.

“Everyone, switch to the alternate channel!” Westerbridge called desperately. The radio suddenly went dead.

Bolan knew Westerbridge was smart and he was scared. Most of the time, the Executioner could count on scared being more powerful than smart, mistakes giving him an easier path to victory. That was in an ideal situation, though.

Gunfire hammered the container he was behind, keeping him from popping out on either side to fire off another grenade. It was obvious that the gangsters didn’t really like the idea of being blown to shreds.

The Executioner slung the Colt, braced himself, then sprung for the top of the container. He gripped the edge and hauled himself up, looking for signs of other shooters who took to elevated fields of fire. There were two, at separate corners of the warehouse roof. Swinging the Colt around, he targeted one through his Aimpoint sight. Holding high against bullet drop, he stroked the trigger and planted a burst into the head of one gangster. Considering he was holding for center of mass, he was glad for any kind of hits. He swung toward the other gunner, who jolted at the sight of his partner going down.

Bolan’s night-black penetration clothing had made him nothing more than a dark smear against the roof of the container, one more shadow against other shadows. Westerbridge had radios and automatic weapons, communications and coordination, but he lacked night vision for his men.

A wild spray of gunfire rained on the container, but Bolan targeted the muzzle-flash, held slightly lower this time and drilled the other shooter.

The sound suppressor on the Colt made the signature of his kills imperceptible above the sporadic suppression fire clanking off the rolled steel construction beneath his feet. He stuffed a fresh 40 mm shell into the M-203, gave the Colt itself a fresh stick of Parabellum rounds and worked to the middle of the roof.

Westerbridge didn’t have night vision, but as the Executioner rose to his feet, staring down from the high ground at the London hardmen who had doubled in number, he did find that Westerbridge had lights.

Suddenly, everything was bathed in the yellowed, tired glow of dozens of lamp units. Two groups of men were caught out in the open, trying to flank what they thought was Bolan’s position, but the Executioner himself was instantly bathed in the harsh illumination, a tall, terrifying figure in black, festooned with lethal weaponry and grim resolve.

Bolan triggered the M-203 into the group on his left, then swinging the Colt to his right and holding down the trigger, ignored the blast that hammered into the heart of the squad of shooters. Body parts and weapons flew, chunks of shattered asphalt also raining on the containers around him, rattling like a brief hailstorm.

The Executioner held down the trigger, fanning the stunned and shocked second group, peppering them with a different kind of hailstorm—a barrage of high velocity, copper-jacketed hollowpoint rounds that punched and tore through flesh and bone, swatting bodies off their feet. The gunmen below struggled to regain their footing, scrambling for their lives, trying to avoid the lethal marksmanship on display.

The Colt finally locked empty, and the ragged troop of mobsters gathered themselves. Those who escaped the grenade blast with minor wounds and the effects of the concussion were already turning toward Bolan, weapons brandished, ready to give the man in black some payback now that he was empty.

The Executioner simply let his weapon drop on its sling, hands diving for the Beretta 93-R and Desert Eagle in a practiced double-draw that had carried him through countless such fights. In three steps, he was airborne, dropping off the edge of the cargo container. The handguns hammered out 9 mm and .44 Magnum missiles as the shooters aimed where he’d been only a heartbeat before. It wasn’t the most accurate use of his handguns, but Bolan was at close range, and he was working on instinct and a lifetime of practical experience. Whenever the muzzle of one of his handguns intersected the body of a fighting enemy, he pulled the trigger, dropping the gangster in a heap with a high-powered bullet through a vital organ.

The Executioner wasn’t standing still. He was charging his foes, moving among them and between them, so that when they turned to shoot at him, they would also catch themselves in their own cross fire.

The Desert Eagle locked open empty and he let the big hand cannon fall to the ground, snaking his arm around the throat of one gangster. With a shrug, Bolan swung the mobster across the front of his body, a living shield that was instantly greeted by a burst of gunfire.

Bolan jammed the still-loaded Beretta down the front of the dying gunman’s waistband, shifted his grip on the would-be killer and clutched the Englishman’s right hand, which was holding an Uzi. His trigger finger pressed down his shield’s finger, and the Uzi opened up on another gunman who pumped round after round from a heavy revolver into the mortally wounded man. Bolan could feel the spent energy of bullets sieving through his shield’s bloody torso into his armor.

The soldier spared the shooter a second burst of 9 mm slugs from the borrowed Uzi, then heaved the dead man aside, using the handle of his Beretta as leverage to spin the corpse into the arms of another gangster charging into the fray. The man dropped his weapon to catch what was left of his partner in crime, then looked in horror down the 9 mm muzzle instants before a single shot sent his brains vomiting out the back of his skull.

Bolan pivoted and dropped to one knee, dumped the almost empty magazine from his Beretta, slapped home a fresh one and continued to look for targets. He flicked the 93-R to burst mode, swatting two more mobsters off their feet with triple-shot salvos of supersonic slugs.

And then it was over.

The silence was deafening.

Bolan reloaded the guns he had on him, then went to retrieve his Desert Eagle from where he’d thrown it down. He checked the battlefield which was the cargo container yard, eyes surveying the carnage. Each body was checked to make sure it was dead and out of the fight. Using the partially spent Beretta, Bolan finished off those who were wounded and suffering from his grenade attacks, giving them a final pill to release them from their pain.

Westerbridge wasn’t among them.

Bolan picked up a new radio and listened to the mobster barking orders. What was left of his hardforce was bracing themselves, getting ready to repel the Executioner when he came for them in the warehouse.

The warehouse that an Interpol agent had lost her life trying to locate. Her murder had drawn the Executioner’s attention. Inside, Westerbridge was trafficking in everything from heroin to enough small arms to equip a small army. That traffic had cost a fellow warrior her life.

Bolan hadn’t known her personally. Neither had Hal Brognola. But Westerbridge was a vermin the Executioner had been intending to visit with a torch of cleansing flame. Other missions had popped up, delaying his actions.

And now, a cop was dead.

Bolan thumbed a 40 mm antiarmor shell into the breech of the M-203, targeted the loading dock doors and fired.

The explosion was sudden and violent. Two mobsters standing near the doors were thrown aside, a third almost cut in two by a quarter ton of steel slamming into his torso.

SONNY WESTERBRIDGE WAS pulling open the crate when the dock doors were hammered off their hinges by an invisible freight train of force. He was startled, but the surprise didn’t leave him flat-footed or numb.

Westerbridge hadn’t fought his way to the top of his organization only because he was six foot eight and 320 pounds of pure muscle. He was a man who fought for every bit he owned, learning every angle, his brain as formidable as his physical form. He wasn’t going to let some asshole in black take everything he had and flush it into the sewers.

Ham-sized hands wrapped around the grips of two Ultimax light machine guns. Built in Singapore, they resembled beefy Thompson submachine guns, just like in the old American gangster movies. Except, instead of holding pistol bullets, their big, fat round drums held one hundred rounds of high-powered 5.56 mm NATO ammunition capable of slicing a person in two.

Westerbridge slung two of the machine guns, then pulled out two more. These were on top of the big Smith & Wesson .44 Magnum revolver he wore in a shoulder holster.

“By God, you fucking son of a bitch, you’re not going to take me down without a fight!” he shouted at the phantom fighter.

Gunfire rattled as two more of his shooters opened up on the shattered entrance. They swept the dock with automatic fire, making it inhospitable for any living creature trying to get through. Westerbridge’s instincts, however, warned him something was wrong.

The regular access door beside the opening suddenly kicked open, and the bastard in black stepped through, his weapon spitting a red pencil of flame, barely visible in the backlighting from the lot. Westerbridge watched another of his men spasm, pierced in a half-dozen locations.

“Eat shit and die!” Westerbridge snapped, lifting one Ultimax in his beefy hand and spraying an extended burst at the doorway. Sparks flew, chunks of wall and crates exploded in puffs as the mysterious attacker dived out of harm’s way.

The massive gangster sidestepped on the platform, held out his other hand and pulled the trigger on the other Ultimax, hosing the area where he thought his assailant was going to be with a stream of 5.56 mm slugs. Instead, he chewed up empty floor.

A round object sailed over the crates as his men took up firing positions. The gang boss bellowed a cry of warning, but the ball bounced and disappeared in a flash of thunder, smoke and chunks of shattered humanity. Westerbridge swung both guns back to where the grenade originated, holding down the trigger and shooting through the crates, splintering wood and denting metal with his firestorm of slugs. Even his thick, powerful arms ached from controlling the weight and recoil of the light machine guns. Sweat soaked through his suit as he cut loose with a throat-ripping roar of fury.

A shadowy form flashed around one aisle and Westerbridge sidestepped, taking cover behind a column of stored military supplies. He checked the load on both Ultimaxes, realizing that he was almost empty. He dropped the near empty guns and snatched a fresh one from its sling.

This time, he wasn’t going to grandstand and waste ammunition like an amateur. Just because he had four hundred rounds of firepower didn’t mean that it would find its target on automatic pilot. Both hands on the weapon, he stalked, keeping tight against the crates or anything that would stop a bullet.

Westerbridge didn’t have the benefit of the smaller attacker’s fleetness of foot and agility to dart between shelters from automatic fire. He poked slowly around one corner, spotting another gunman coming around the other way. The gangster’s mind flashed quickly on the fact that this guy wasn’t dressed in street clothes, and his face was smeared with black grease paint.

The massive gangster pulled the trigger a heartbeat before the man in black, pressing himself flat to the corner. A fireball from the front of the Ultimax burned like the inferno of hell just where he intended the mystery man to go.

THE EXECUTIONER HIT the ground as Sonny Westerbridge’s torrent of machine-gun fire exploded. The big man may not have been able to beat Bolan in a footrace, but with his finger on the trigger, and at eight hundred rounds per minute, he had the advantage, Kevlar body armor or not, with the deadly weapon. Bolan rolled hard to keep out of sight and out of the way of the blistering fusillade.

From behind the sheltering concrete of a support column, Bolan weighed his options. The distance was too short for a 40 mm grenade to prime and explode. One of his conventional fragmentation grenades would likely take him out as well, if the shrapnel and shock wave weren’t both deflected by the rows of shipping crates.

“You’re gonna die, little man,” Sonny Westerbridge said with a chuckle. “Your choice how—”

The Executioner wasn’t a man who was afraid to die. Whether it was in the terrorist wars of the Middle East, stopping a Chinese spy plot threatening world peace, or just locked in battle with gangsters in Soho, he knew that one day his luck would run out, defending the weak and helpless on any scale. He wasn’t, however, going to give up.

“Was that the same choice you gave Brenda Kightley, Westerbridge?” Bolan called out. This fight wasn’t going to be won with mere bullets and brawn. The giant gangster was too savvy, too tough for a simple slug in the brain box.

“Kightley, Kightley… I don’t remember no whore named Kightley, mate,” Westerbridge answered. He was moving. Trying to home in on the Executioner’s voice.

“An honest cop, ended her days with her head twisted 180 degrees, floating in Surrey Water,” Bolan returned. He shifted his position after speaking, getting ten feet away from where he’d hidden. Neither man could see the other, though Bolan heard the indefinite scuffle of Westerbridge’s heavy tread.

“Oh her. Fiery little minx… She really kicked when I gave her pretty little head a turn. You her partner? Naw, you’re a Yank, and packing way too much firepower to be a London cop. Boyfriend?”

Bolan paused. The row he was heading toward was composed of cardboard boxes filled with contraband electronics. They’d provide some protection against a salvo of 5.56 mm military rounds, but hardly enough. Westerbridge was herding him toward a position of weakness. The Executioner cursed himself for not being fully aware of his battlefield. It was a small detail, but it could mean the difference between a crippled arm and full protection.

A minor, hairbreadth mistake could put him at a disadvantage in a serious, up close conflict. Bolan pulled one of his fragmentation grenades off his harness and cupped it gently. He rolled the mini-blaster on the floor, making sure it clattered and skittered on the hard concrete.

Westerbridge spotted it and bounced into view.

Bolan opened fire, but the big gangster’s light beige suit only registered blackened tears as Parabellum rounds struck and were stopped by a layer of Kevlar. He went for a “failure drill,” swinging from center of mass to the head, ripping off another burst, but the big man’s skull and shoulders were back behind the protection of metal-skinned containers. Hollowpoint rounds sparked off steel, and the soldier stopped shooting.

The London giant was not going to be easy.

The Ultimax’s barrel of the Ultimax poked around a corner, flaming, but Bolan was as well entrenched as Westerbridge. This would keep up until the law responded to the gunfire and explosions.

With his back to the hard concrete wall the warehouse’s office stood on, Westerbridge was hard to approach.

Bolan’s eyes narrowed, and he stuffed a new 40 mm shell into the breech of the grenade launcher. The stubby little M-576 round held scores of buckshot pellets, making the M-203 the equivalent of a sawed-off shotgun.

The Executioner stepped into the open, figuring his angles like a pool player, and triggered the blast from the rifle-grenade launcher combo, spitting out pellets in a sizzling barrage at the concrete embankment at Westerbridge’s back. The big gangster might have been unapproachable, but the swarm of round projectiles struck stone hard. Some embedded in the concrete, others bounced and sprayed back in a fan of peppering projectiles.