Diplomacy Directive

Guadalupe La Costa knew a break when she saw it.

It wasn’t every day the director of the local Associated Press affiliate in Puerto Rico handed out juicy assignments to reporters—especially to a young woman who refused to sleep with him—let alone a rookie reporter with a penchant for being a might too ambitious. In any case, some might have viewed covering the upcoming election to appoint a new governor as one of the more mundane assignments. La Costa saw it as a challenge with a gem of a story behind it: a human interest story that focused on the two opponents.

The director had issued an order that La Costa not broach personal issues with the candidates, and keep the parameters of her story confined to the issues. La Costa got the gig, which would include a two-minute live segment on the nightly news channel feed out of Miami. And if she played her cards right, she’d get an exclusive with each of the candidates during the little soiree being held later that night. That last detail had cost her plenty, namely a Gucci leather handbag she was still sure was a knockoff and some very expensive French shoes. The gifts went to the respective PR chiefs of the two candidates, both of whom happened to be women, and felt like cutting a sister a break if it meant she could get ahead. They had required her to present her questions in advance, and to her surprise the candidates agreed. The campaign had become as much a race of personalities as it was one of competent leadership.

Then again, many elections founded on basic democratic principles were more of a popularity contest than about the election of someone who might actually be able to do the job.

La Costa shook her head every time she thought of that. Well, she didn’t give a rip who got elected. Her only connection to Puerto Rico was she’d been born there while her father, an American career diplomat, was assigned to the area. The family headed back to the States, and her father continued his career in various posts.

Securing a job with the Associated Press as a foreign affairs journalist posed no challenge. La Costa’s Masters in journalism certainly helped, and she hadn’t minded using her father’s connections, either.

The man seated next to her in the van didn’t come up quite the same way. No, definitely no silver spoon in Julio Parmahel’s past. Parmahel had been raised the hard way in Little Havana, scraping and fighting his way into a decent college where he could study photography. Journalistic photography had a limited scope, though, since most reporters were also expected to be decent photographers. With a lack of work, Parmahel turned to camera operations. It wasn’t his first love, but at least he got to use some of his creativity.

“Man, I am bored out my skull,” he said in his heavy, Cuban accent. He leaned back as best he could manage, given the size of the driver’s seat of a studio van. He yanked a toothpick from his mouth and pointed it at La Costa to make his point. “And sweet Mama, why do the nights always got to be so damn hot?”

La Costa shook her head and laughed. “Julio, I’m going to assume that’s a rhetorical question, since we’ve been together down here almost a year. I’d think you’d be used to it by now.”

“I’ll never be used to it. Guess I’m just homesick.”

The appearance of a sponsorship member on the platform they had erected for the speeches diverted her attention from making a reply. As he introduced the first candidate, La Costa and Parmahel transferred to the back of the van and began checks on their equipment. They weren’t there to cover the actual speeches; somebody else had that part of the assignment. La Costa was there only for the interviews and to present her live recording after the speeches were concluded. They’d already gone through their checks twice, but she insisted they do it one more time.

Parmahel responded to her obsessive-compulsive whims without grumbling, which was one of the reasons she liked to work so much with him. By the time they finished running through the checklist, the second candidate had stepped up and was about halfway through his speech. The sponsors had allotted each candidate a total of fifteen minutes to present.

La Costa helped Parmahel unload the equipment from the back. They did a quick test run of the remote feed, then stood by as the second candidate completed his speech. As the cheers went up from the crowd, they locked the van and moved into position near the dais, where they would begin the segment once things started to break up. The crowd started dispersing shortly after the announcer concluded with the sales pitches for each sponsor.

The production supervisor showed up at the last minute, just like he always did—about the only thing in which the guy seemed consistent—and shortly thereafter the countdown began. The supervisor began a countdown from five, then used his fingers to silently tick off the last two seconds before the lights came up, the dome on the camera went red and he pointed to La Costa to begin her spiel.

“Thank you, Cassandra. We’re here tonight in beautiful downtown San Juan, where the candidates have just completed their speeches and are now shaking hands with their constituents. The city is afire with the pending vote to elect a new governor, and you can feel the excitement here. Later this evening we’ll have the unique privilege of getting to chat personally with each of the candidates, who have graciously granted us exclusive interviews. You won’t want to miss these interviews as the candidates will be talking candidly with us about their individual views of the upcoming election. The huge show of support here tonight was impressive. We—”

The area around them exploded in sounds of shouting, screaming and gunfire.

The stage lit up like a fireworks display, and the podium where the two candidates had stood just minutes earlier exploded. Pandemonium erupted and people scattered in every direction. Security and police officers nearby rushed the stage, struggling to pick their way past the dead or dying bodies, and debris littered the explosion site.

More shooting ensued as law-enforcement officials began to trade fire with a small band of armed men who rushed the wall of people surrounding the two candidates. The aggressors wore assorted military-style fatigues and bandannas of red, white and blue—colors of the territorial flag—while triggering semiautomatic pistols and assault rifles. The paramilitary police force split up, some staying to move the candidates out of harm’s way behind the dais and into the adjoining government building, while others fanned out to form a defensive perimeter.

La Costa dived for cover and shouted at Parmahel to follow her lead, but the cameraman kept shooting footage. She screamed at him, but her objections were overridden by the crazed crowd looking to escape death and the production supervisor, who yelled at Parmahel, “Keep rolling! Keep rolling!”

The new arrivals in fatigues appeared to be indiscriminate in their shooting, seeming more intent on terrorizing anybody in their path than at actually assassinating one of the candidates. La Costa glimpsed Sallie Manzano, the Popular Democratic Party’s candidate, go down as rounds ripped open her belly. La Costa emitted an involuntary scream and felt tears gush from her eyes and her face flush. The shooters weren’t firing even close to them and yet La Costa couldn’t extinguish the fire of terror in her gut.

The battle continued to rage for several minutes before the few remaining gunmen spent the last of their ammunition, then turned and ran in the opposite direction. People were still scrambling over one another—some had been trampled nearly to death—while others stayed frozen behind whatever cover they could find.

In less than five minutes it was over.

But for Guadalupe La Costa, it would never be over. It would be something she’d remembered for the rest of her life.

CHAPTER ONE

Mack Bolan deplaned from the Gulfstream C-21 belonging to Stony Man Farm, one of America’s top covert special operations units.

The vulcanized neoprene soles of his combat boots held firm on the rain-slickened tarmac at Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport. Balmy winds off the North Atlantic tugged at his black hair and filled his nostrils with its salty scent.

Jack Grimaldi poked his head out of the cabin and took a deep breath. “Ah, there’s nothing like the tropics.”

Bolan looked up the steps at Grimaldi and produced a half smile. The two men had been friends for what seemed like an eternity, their initial meeting more fate than chance for both of them. Grimaldi had been working as a chopper pilot for a Mafia casino boss, and meeting the Executioner had created a paradigm shift in his life neither of them would soon forget. Now Grimaldi served as ace pilot for Stony Man and served Able Team and Phoenix Force—Stony Man’s elite counterterrorism teams—with the occasional “loan out” to Bolan’s officially sanctioned missions.

“You need help with the equipment?” Bolan asked.

“Naw, but if you can get our wheels that would be sweet.”

Bolan nodded and headed across the tarmac toward a solitary hangar close by. Inside he knew he’d find everything he requested: a sport utility vehicle, a briefcase containing assignment information, military uniforms, credentials and official-looking military orders. Since Puerto Rico was a commonwealth and protectorate of the United States, and there was no official military presence here other than a contingent of National Guard, any potential acts of terrorism fell under the jurisdiction of the Department of Defense. Bolan had used the alias of Colonel Brandon Stone many times, and would do so again.

“You’ll have the full cooperation of the governor’s office,” Hal Brognola had informed him.

While Bolan had maintained a strictly informal alliance with his government, Brognola was a friend and wouldn’t hesitate to call on him in the direst circumstances. The violent attack on political candidates perpetrated by a paramilitary guerrilla unit qualified, and the president had agreed when Brognola brought that fact to his attention.

Bolan drove the SUV to the tarmac and, despite Grimaldi’s protests to the contrary, helped offload equipment into the back. Normally, Bolan would have preferred to operate alone and leave Grimaldi with the plane, but he needed the time to review the paper and electronic files provided by Stony Man, so the pilot agreed to be his chauffeur.

“So what’s the gig, Sarge?” Grimaldi asked as he left the airport and headed for the downtown area. The ace pilot was the only person from the Executioner’s past who called him that.

Bolan’s eyes never left the file he was reading by a red interior lamp. “Unknown aggressors engaged police and civilians at a political rally two days ago. Total of nineteen victims, four were fatalities.”

“Terrorists?”

“Not sure,” Bolan replied. “Although if this were a terrorist group I’d have trouble buying politics as a motive.”

“Why’s that?”

“There are easier ways, Jack. Politically motivated terrorists don’t usually operate so openly. They tend to favor well-placed bombs or hit key targets. This was entirely random. To march into a crowd and simply start shooting doesn’t sound political.”

“I thought I heard Hal say they blew something up, too,” Grimaldi replied.

“Yeah. They threw a grenade at the stage. It wasn’t a bomb.”

Grimaldi sighed. “Grenades and automatic weapons. Sounds like a paramilitary group, maybe militia or rebels.”

Bolan nodded. “Exactly.”

The drive to the hotel took less than thirty minutes. Once they checked in, Bolan traded his civilian garb for a class B army uniform. As Bolan emerged from the bedroom bedecked in olive-drab trousers and a light green, short-sleeve shirt adorned with military decorations and the appropriate rank insignia, Grimaldi returned from the restaurant with two cups of coffee and a half-dozen cheese Danishes. Bolan gratefully took the coffee, but shook his head at the pastries.

“Just leaves more for me,” the pilot said.

“Which I’m sure you had planned,” Bolan replied.

Grimaldi nodded with a wink as he stuffed half a Danish in his mouth. Around a mouthful of the food he said, “Don’t you look dapper.”

“I have a meeting first thing this morning with one of the governor’s security advisers.”

“You need me for that?”