Fire Zone

Fire Zone
Don Pendleton

After the leader of an African rebel group hijacks the shipment of enough gold to fund a revolution, Mack Bolan must retrieve it before the killing starts. But the military commander is elusive, and with oil, minerals and political clout at stake, it's going to take more than guns and bombs to bring him down.Tracking the gold to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Bolan is determined to win the battle. Unable to trust even the CIA, he has to put his combat and survival skills to the test in order to infiltrate the rebel base and destroy the key players. In a region filled with danger, deceit and government conflict, there is only one man who can stop the revolution–the Executioner.

The Executioner slowed and looked back at the American Embassy

Kinshasa might be boiling with political intrigue, but something Bolan had seen or heard in the CIA observation room had put him on edge.

The instant he stepped outside the gate, Bolan knew what it was. No fewer than three different factions watched the front of the embassy. By entering and leaving so openly he had become a target.

Quinn had let him become a new pawn in a game of political intrigue that he neither wanted nor had the time to deal with.

Bolan was diving for cover when the first bullet tried to find a home in his flesh. He rolled behind a burned-out car and came to his knees, reaching for his pistol. He scanned the area where the shots must have come from, but saw nothing. A quick glance in the direction of the embassy showed the marines were alert but not willing to come out to his aid.

The Executioner was on his own. As usual.

Fire Zone

The Executioner

Don Pendleton

www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)

Fire is the test of gold; adversity of strong men.

—Seneca

c. 3 BC-AD 65

All that glitters isn’t gold. Nobody can put a price on justice.

—Mack Bolan

THE MACK BOLAN LEGEND

Nothing less than a war could have fashioned the destiny of the man called Mack Bolan. Bolan earned the Executioner title in the jungle hell of Vietnam.

But this soldier also wore another name—Sergeant Mercy. He was so tagged because of the compassion he showed to wounded comrades-in-arms and Vietnamese civilians.

Mack Bolan’s second tour of duty ended prematurely when he was given emergency leave to return home and bury his family, victims of the Mob. Then he declared a one-man war against the Mafia.

He confronted the Families head-on from coast to coast, and soon a hope of victory began to appear. But Bolan had broken society’s every rule. That same society started gunning for this elusive warrior—to no avail.

So Bolan was offered amnesty to work within the system against terrorism. This time, as an employee of Uncle Sam, Bolan became Colonel John Phoenix. With a command center at Stony Man Farm in Virginia, he and his new allies—Able Team and Phoenix Force—waged relentless war on a new adversary: the KGB.

But when his one true love, April Rose, died at the hands of the Soviet terror machine, Bolan severed all ties with Establishment authority.

Now, after a lengthy lone-wolf struggle and much soul-searching, the Executioner has agreed to enter an “arm’s-length” alliance with his government once more, reserving the right to pursue personal missions in his Everlasting War.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Prologue

It was a perfect day to start a forest fire.

The weather in Idaho had been dry all summer long, the result of an overly aggressive La Niña drying up the usual rains that made the mountains come alive with greenery. What was, in good years, a hillside covered with ponderosa pine and juniper now stretched as dry as a tinderbox, not quite brown but far from the vibrant green that the Boise National Forest usually enjoyed. The camo-dressed man moved swiftly through the woods with his twenty-pound pack, heavy footsteps crunching dried pine needles.