LITMIR.BIZ

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have been tracking this person for a couple of years,” Brognola said, “ever since we confirmed their existence really. At first, we only caught small whiffs. Our intelligence agencies would hear a drug kingpin or a terrorist bitching because a bank account came up empty. The first few times, we wrote it off. We figured they were getting ripped off the old-fashioned way, either through an inside job or by a rival. The more analysts put the pieces together, though, the clearer it became that someone was picking their pockets.” A smile played on his lips. “And that someone was getting away with it.”

      “How much did they get away with?”

      Brognola shrugged. “It’s hard to say. Estimates run into the tens of millions of dollars. But they’re just that, estimates. A lot of the countries where the thefts occurred, well, the record keeping is for shit. And in Switzerland and some of the Caribbean countries? Not exactly bastions of transparency.”

      Bolan looked at Kurtzman and cocked an eyebrow. “Since when has that stopped you?”

      “I’m working on it,” Kurtzman said. “I’m working on it.”

      The Executioner turned back to Price.

      “You said this person—”

      “Or persons,” she said.

      “—or persons, could be in trouble. What makes you think that?”

      Brognola pushed a thin stack of photos across the table to Bolan. The big American picked up the pile and studied the one on top. It was a picture of a man sprawled on the floor. His face was so pale from blood loss it seemed to glow. Dead eyes stared skyward. The flesh of his torso was shredded. The soldier glanced up at Brognola.

      “Bear mauling?”

      “Shotgun blast, smart-ass,” Brognola said. “Very close range. Gutted the stupid bastard.”

      Nodding, Bolan peeled the photo from the stack, set it facedown on the table and studied the next one. The next photo depicted a man laying in a hallway, his chest torn open. He glanced up at Brognola.

      “Shotgun?”

      “Bravo, Columbo. These two were found in a London residence, which based on the little evidence left behind, we think may have most recently been inhabited by Nightingale.”

      “Any IDs on them?”

      “Russian, both of them,” Brognola said. “The names are in the case file. Frankly, they’re inconsequential. Couple of hired hands. Interpol had listed them as suspects in a couple of murders, one in France, a second in the Netherlands. Not a couple of Boy Scouts. But they’re hardly supervillains.”

      “But you don’t know who they’re working for?”

      Brognola shook his head.

      “I’ll get to that. But, in short, we believe it’s someone Nightingale stole from. From what we’ve been able to scrape together, they flew into London a couple of days ago. Bought their airline tickets under false names, with fake credit cards. Nothing in their luggage was of any use. If they hadn’t been busted for petty crimes along the way, it’s possible we never would have made them.”

      “They leave anything behind?”

      “Couple of cell phones. The London authorities are tracking them. We’ll see how far it takes them. Their weapons, obviously. Night-vision goggles. A rental car.”

      “Most likely they didn’t fly into London with all that stuff,” Bolan said. “They must have had someone on the ground supplying them.”

      “We thought of that,” Brognola said. “Solid theory. We don’t have the intel to back it up, though. But we have someone working that angle.”

      “That someone is?”

      “David McCarter.”

      “McCarter’s in London? My apologies to the queen.”

      Brognola grinned. “David was already over there, buying a Jaguar that had been buried under some tarps in a garage somewhere. We thought it might help having someone on the ground to act as—” Brognola made quotation marks with his fingers “—a liaison between MI5, Scotland Yard and the U.S.”

      “God help us.”

      “Yeah, we needed a diplomat, but we got McCarter. Imagine.”

      “The Brits will appreciate his deft touch.”

      “Look,” Brognola said, “here’s the upshot of all this. As you can imagine, the U.S. government finds itself in a unique position here. Officially, the government doesn’t condone vigilantes. We don’t condone stealing money from people, even if they’re criminals and terrorists, unless it’s part of a sanctioned intelligence operation.”

      “There’s a ‘but’ coming.”

      Brognola downed some coffee and nodded. “Absolutely. What this person has accomplished is pretty damn amazing. As best we know, she or he has no governments backing her.”

      “Which means no government-imposed constraints.”

      “As I said, what Nightingale has been able to accomplish is nothing short of amazing,” Brognola said. “This person has acquired account numbers and pieced together complex financial networks. He or she knows lots of things, and we want to know how.”

      Bolan’s eyes narrowed and he leaned forward. “Look, if you want someone to plug a leak.”

      “Hardly,” Brognola replied, shaking his head vigorously. “Frankly, we want to recruit this person. Nightingale could fill in gaps in our knowledge. There’s a place for those skills.”

      “Off the books, of course,” Price interjected. “But we can offer full legal protection, a new identity, the works.”

      “What leads do we have?” Bolan asked.

      Kurtzman gestured at the stack of photos in Bolan’s hand.

      “Look through those,” he said, “stop when you find a picture of a white-haired guy.”

      Bolan found a close-up of a round-faced man with pink cheeks, pale green eyes and white hair trimmed down to stubble. He studied the photo for a couple of seconds, then tossed it, face up, on the tabletop. “This the guy?”

      “That’d be him,” Kurtzman said. “His name is Jonathan Salisbury. He’s British by birth, but moved to the United States in the early 1970s and eventually became a citizen. Did a lot of computer work for the Pentagon, all highly classified. Guy was a genius.”

      “Was?”

      “He’s dead,” Kurtzman said. “Poor bastard asphyxiated himself in a garage. Neighbors found him in the car while it still was running. Hadn’t been dead long. I have a file I’ll give you with some clips about him. It was big news in the Beltway when he died.”

      “I’ve never heard of him. He famous in computer circles?”

      “More like infamous,” Kurtzman said. “Technically, he was in deep shit with the Feds.”

      Bolan sipped his coffee. “Isn’t that like being a little pregnant?”

      “I knew the guy,” Kurtzman said. “We weren’t friends, but I knew him. I knew his work. To say he was brilliant would be an understatement. His depth of knowledge when it came to computers and cybersecurity was nearly unmatched.”

      “Except by you.”

      “There are maybe three dozen people with this guy’s chops. Me and thirty-five others.” Kurtzman allowed himself a grin, though it faded almost immediately. “That said, the guy was branded a traitor.”

      “Because?”

      “He tapped into the Defense Intelligence Agency’s computers, dug up some records on a Russian guy, Mikhail Yezhov, and passed it along.”

      “Passed

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