Shadow Strike

Her smile could have illuminated Broadway, but her eyes were dead, telling an age-old story that Bolan had encountered far too many times in his travels.

“No, thanks,” he replied. “I’m here to see Tiffany.”

Inhaling sharply, Shelly stiffened at the open use of the name, then forced a friendly smile back on her face.

“Part of the new security team?” she asked with a tilt of her head. Then, stabbing out a finger, she poked his duster and found the holstered Beretta underneath. “Yeah, I can see that you are.”

Bolan was impressed, but said nothing. New security team? Maybe something had recently happened here that had scared Mad Mike. Had somebody tried to ice the man, or had it been something even worse?

Looking about, Shelly leaned in closer. “You know, we’re all still kind of upset about that. So many of his people dead…” Suddenly, she looked frightened and took a step backward.

“Hmm, what did you say?” Bolan asked with a stone face. “I was looking at the dancers and didn’t hear a word you said, darling.”

Relaxing at the obvious lie, Shelly blessed him with a smile, a glimmer of the girl she had once been peeking out from the overlaying years of abuse. “Come on, the vault is this way,” she said, turning to briskly walk away.

Checking for any oddly placed mirrors that might be hiding a surveillance camera, Bolan stayed close, watching the crowd as much as the waitress.

But nobody seemed to be paying him any undue attention. Every gaze was locked on the Asian women, who were naked by now and oiling each other in a pretend wrestling match.

When they reached a curtained alcove, Shelly parted the black drapes, and Bolan observed that they were very heavy and thickly coated with a tan foam on the inside to retard the ambient noises of the club. Beyond them was a short hallway and another set of soundproof curtains. Past that in a small room lined with metal lockers, two large men were sitting at a table, playing cards. One had a beard, the other a Mohawk, and they were both openly armed, automatic pistols tucked into shoulder holsters, their jackets draped over the back of their chairs.

Keeping his back to the wall, Bolan read both of them as low-level guards, just some muscle to keep out the drunks. Next to them was a second door, made of solid steel and equipped with an alphanumeric keypad.

“Hey, Chuck,” Shelly said in greeting. “Meet the new guy.”

“No names,” Bolan said. “Not yet, anyway.”

Both men kept playing cards, but shifted position in their chairs for faster access to their weapons. Okay, they were big, Bolan noted, but not completely stupid. Too bad for them.

“You the mechanic from Detroit?” asked the man with the Mohawk, shifting the cards in his hand.

“Don’t ask stupid questions,” the bearded man said with a sneer, sliding a hand inside his jacket to scratch his stomach. “Whatcha want, Blackie?”

Bolan grunted. That was a not-so-subtle reference to him being a Black Ace, a professional killer. “I’m here to see Mad Mike,” he replied in a bored voice.

The two men broke into laughter, and Shelly went pale, as if just speaking the nickname could get you killed. Looking nervously at the three men, she abruptly turned and departed, closing the soundproof curtains in her wake. Soon the hard clicks of her high heels faded away.

“Okay, what’s your business with the boss?” asked the bald man, rising from the table. Something under his shirt jacket hit the Formica table with a metallic thump.

Bolan showed no reaction but immediately changed his tactics for gaining entry. These men were wearing military body armor, not a cheap bulletproof vest like the doorman. These weren’t guards, but street soldiers. Muscle for the boss.

“Don’t worry about it.” Bolan chuckled, drawing the Beretta and firing twice.

Each man jerked back as a 9 mm Parabellum slug slammed into his chest directly above the heart. As the slugs ricocheted away, the guards doubled over, gasping for breath and clawing for their own weapons. Stepping closer, Bolan swung the Beretta fast, clubbing them both across the back of the head, and they dropped to the floor like sacks of dirty laundry.

It would have been faster and safer to simply execute the guards. But since Bolan didn’t know for sure that they deserved death, he would allow them to live for the time being.

Removing a pair of 10 mm Glock pistols from their shoulder holsters, he tossed them into a wastebasket.

Checking the guards, he found a transceiver on the bearded man, along with a throat mike and earplug. Plus an access card. Tucking in the earbud, he switched on the radio, hoping it was already on the correct channel. There was only silence. Damn.

Going to the wall, Bolan searched alongside the door until finding a disguised access slot in the woodwork. He slipped in the card, and a panel slid back, revealing a glowing sheet of plastic with the outline of a human hand. He grunted at that. A biometric refusal system. That was pretty high tech for a Brooklyn gun dealer. Suddenly, he had a very strong suspicion that his tip from Leo Turrin was right on the money, and that something big had happened here yesterday, something a lot more dangerous than selling cheap Taiwanese revolvers to gangbangers.

Looking over the unconscious men, Bolan chose the one with the better shoes. That meant he was probably getting paid more, which translated as holding a higher position in the criminal organization.

Pressing the hand of the man against the panel, Bolan heard a soft chime, and the armored door slid into the wall. Directly ahead was a long hallway illuminated with bright halogen lights and lined with closed doors. The walls were brick, the floor terrazzo, and there were no security cameras.

Dropping the limp body in the path of the door to prevent it from closing, Bolan shrugged off his leather duster and drew both his weapons. The Beretta 93-R machine pistol rested comfortably in his left hand, while the right was filled with a .50-caliber Desert Eagle. Quantity and quality. A very deadly combination.

Easing along the hallway, he strained to hear any noises, but there was only the soft whir of the air-conditioning system blowing a warm breeze from hidden vents, then the radio earbud crackled.

“Chuck, we’ve got a reading that the damn door is wide open,” a man growled in annoyance. “Check it, and see if that idiot Bobby dropped something in the jamb again, will ya.”

Touching the throat mike, Bolan grunted in reply. Ahead of him a door opened and a man stepped into the corridor, a case of U.S. Army HEAT rounds cradled in his arms.

He gasped at the sight of Bolan and dropped the case to go for a mini-Uzi holstered on his hip. The Executioner stroked the trigger of the Beretta and the weapon fired, the sound suppressor reducing the report to a discreet cough. The man fell back into infinity, his brains splattered across the brick wall.

“The damn door is still open!” the voice said as the radio crackled. “What the fuck are you two morons doing up there?”

Up there, eh? Thanks for the directions, Bolan thought, stepping into the room. It was filled with wall shelves packed solid with cases of Glaser Sure-Kill, Navy SEAL Daisy Cutters, Black Talon cop killers and Army HEAT rounds, all strictly illegal for civilian use. Especially the high-explosive armor-piercing tracers. There was even an empty carrying case for an HK XM-25. Now, that was real trouble.

Pulling a cigarette pack from his jacket pocket, Bolan pulled off the arming strip, then slapped the disguised explosive charge against the middle case of HEAT rounds. Those would do the most damage when the plastic-wrapped wad of C-4 detonated.

Checking the next room, Bolan found it full of crates of U.S. Army M-16 assault rifles, M-79 grenade launchers, and several cases of mixed hand grenades. He primed a second pack of cigarettes.

Taking a couple of HE grenades, Bolan dropped them into a pocket. Turrin had been right, and wrong. This wasn’t just a supply depot for the local Mob, but a major league black-market weapons dealer. Now, Bolan was eager to find Tiffany and discover exactly what had happened that made him increase security to this level.

“If you two assholes are fucking the new girl instead of standing your post, the boss is going to feed your balls into a fucking woodchipper!” the voice on the radio said furiously. “Now, answer me right fucking now, you losers!”

Too late for that, Bolan thought, removing the safety tape from around the handle of a flash-bang stun grenade. He yanked the pin free and tossed the sphere up the corridor toward the strip club. It landed directly on the back of the unconscious guard and rolled into the alcove.

Turning away, Bolan sprinted for distance. A few seconds later there was a thunderous explosion and a blinding flash. Instantly, every fire alarm started to howl, then white foam gushed from sprinklers in the ceiling.

“Red alert,” a woman said calmly over a speaker inside the drop ceiling. “We have an explosion in section 12. Repeat, explosion in 12. Everybody topside clear the club and seal the doors. Allow nobody access. Nobody!”

“Mr. Tiffany, I sent Harry to get a crate of grenades,” a man said over the radio. “The blast might have been him, sir.”

“That old drunk?” another man growled. “If the asshole is still alive, shoot him in the head! Now clear the club and seal the doors! The last thing I want is a bunch of firemen charging in here!”

The voice was low and throaty, almost garbled, and Bolan couldn’t tell if it was from a man, a woman, or computer-generated. But that fit the description of Mike Tiffany.

“No problem, sir!” the man replied promptly.

Satisfied that all the civilians would soon be gone, Bolan sprinted for the end of the corridor. From this point onward, anybody else he encountered should be an employee of the arms dealer, and fair game.

Reaching the end of the corridor, Bolan paused before an elevator, frowned, then stepped through an open doorway that led to a stairwell. Even over the fire alarm, he could hear several people running up the steps. Pulling out another grenade, he left on the safety tape and simply dropped it over the railing. The sphere hit the metal steps below with a ringing crash, then started bouncing along, impelled by gravity and inertia. A few seconds later, the unseen men began shouting curses, then running away fast.

Pulling out a second grenade, Bolan started to remove the safety tape, then heard a sound from behind. Dropping the grenade, he drew the Beretta and pivoted at the hip.