LITMIR.BIZ

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      McWilliams didn’t know if it was a first name or a last name. He did not ask. Carleton was maybe five-nine, five-ten, and nearly two hundred pounds. His hair was cropped close; his face was outlined by a severely trimmed mustache and beard. He was wearing a black button-down silk shirt, a subdued black-and-gray tie and black slacks under an expensive looking trench coat that might have been Armani. McWilliams didn’t know if Armani made coats, but he knew money when he saw it. This Carleton did well for himself and had a big Rolex watch on his wrist to show for it.

      “I was told someone would meet me,” Carleton said.

      McWilliams said nothing. He produced a large manila envelope and slid it across the table.

      “Next time,” Carleton said with a sigh, “slide it under the table.” He opened the folder while holding it out of sight between his body and the wall against which the booth was set. Looking up at McWilliams from behind small, round, wire-frame glasses, his gaze flickered left and right before coming to rest on the biker again. He said nothing.

      “What?” McWilliams finally asked.

      “I was just thinking that Kohler strikes me as a lot more professional than, well, you,” he said. “What’s a worm like you doing in his employ?”

      “I don’t work for him,” McWilliams said. “I’m with the Purists.”

      “I’m sure you are,” Carleton said, waving one black-gloved hand. His tone was clear. He didn’t know or care who or what the Purists might be. “Regardless, when Kohler contacted me he said he had a serious problem. If I had a serious problem, I would hardly send the likes of you to convey it.”

      “Now just wait a minute,” McWilliams began, finding his nerve. “Just who the hell do you—”

      Something jabbed him.

      “Ow!” McWilliams jumped in his seat. “What did you just do?”

      “Mr. Pick,” Carleton said, cutting off the biker before McWilliams could protest, “have you heard the expression ‘shoot the messenger’?”

      McWilliams started to go for the revolver in the back of his waistband, but his arms suddenly felt heavy and warm. He kept trying to reach for the gun, but his limbs wouldn’t obey. His head felt wobbly as he looked at Carleton, confused.

      Carleton smiled tightly. “Thank you for the information. Good day.”

      McWilliams could only watch as his visitor stood and strode out of the bar, the envelope in one hand. As the well-dressed man swept past a trash can at the entrance, he dropped something in it. McWilliams caught a glimpse of what he thought was a syringe.

      He was already slumping in his chair, his throat closing, his breath catching as he tried and failed to cry out. He struggled to draw air, feeling and hearing the croak that left his lips.

      Eventually, someone in the bar noticed him sitting there, flailing, and rushed over to try the Heimlich maneuver. By then it was far too late. Pick McWilliams was dead of anaphylactic shock before the EMTs were even called.

      Z IPPERS A RCADE WAS A strip club sprawled in a commercial-industrial area on the northern fringes of Syracuse, with an auto yard on one side and a custom upholstery shop on the other. The Executioner had contacted Barbara Price to cross-reference the local data Paglia had provided. Given the size of the city and the scope of the operation—neither of which was particularly significant in the grand scheme of things—there wasn’t much, but Aaron Kurtzman had managed to turn up a few morsels.

      The upholstery place, a family business in Syracuse founded forty years previously, was legitimate. The auto yard wasn’t. Tracing its ownership and the ownership of Zippers produced a common front company that was itself a placeholder for a trust that owned multiple other properties. Most of those properties had been connected to Purist-related violence. The trail went all the way back to something called the Diamond Corporation, headed by one Roger Kohler.

      Kohler would receive Bolan’s attention in due time. For the moment, the soldier needed to find whoever was killing the Purists—and anyone else who stumbled into the path of the killer’s bullets.

      Bolan left his SUV parked nearby, in the parking lot of a closed service station. Its windows were boarded over and bore faded paper signs proclaiming For Sale or Lease. He circled to the rear of the block of businesses and walked casually through the neighboring lot behind them. A dark, three-quarter-length windbreaker worn over his blacksuit covered his hardware from casual observers. Nothing in his manner was furtive or otherwise suspicious. He walked as if he belonged there, at a brisk but unhurried pace. He saw a few pedestrians. Traffic was moderate. It consisted mostly of delivery trucks, most likely headed to the assembly warehouse and lumberyard visible in the distance.

      The back door of Zippers was labeled and unmanned. Bolan spotted a closed-circuit television camera aimed in his direction and paused. He looked hard at the device, then resumed his course. Up close, he confirmed what he’d thought to be the case—the cable leading from the rear of the camera terminated directly against a four-by-four wooden post set in the asphalt overlooking the rear of the club. It was a good bet nobody had taken the time to hollow out the post in order to run a cable down its length. The device was a dummy, the kind anyone could buy from a novelty catalog. As he approached he noticed the generic warning sticker pasted to the back door, claiming the building was protected by an alarm system.

      Reaching out with his left hand, his right inside the windbreaker, Bolan tried the door handle.

      The metal fire door swung silently open.

      “Gotcha!” yelled the Purist in biker leathers and colors who stood just on the other side of the door. The twin muzzles of the sawed-off double-barrel shotgun in his fists looked very large as Bolan stared down their bores. He heard the metallic clicks of the weapon’s twin hammers being cocked.

      “Wait—” Bolan said.

      The roar of the shotgun was deafening at close range.

       4

      Bolan folded his knees beneath him as he spoke, dropping down and back in a controlled fall. The shotgun blast washed over him—he could feel the heat on his face. As he landed on his back, his chin tucked in to protect his head, he lashed out with a vicious kick that caught the gunman at the ankle.

      Bone snapped. The man dropped like a felled tree, screaming. He’d spent both barrels in the shotgun. Bolan was up and on top of him before he could maneuver to reload. The Executioner drew his Beretta 93-R from its custom shoulder holster. The sound suppressore was already affixed, and three flat slaps signaled the biker’s end.

      Ears ringing from the close-range shotgun blast, Bolan bent to pick up the fallen weapon. He dropped it into a nearby trash can, where it wouldn’t be quickly found and used against him. Then the soldier stepped over the corpse and made his way cautiously through the door, leading with the Beretta. He had lost the element of surprise with that 12-gauge detonation. He would have to rely on simple, brutal force. He shrugged out of his windbreaker and let it drop, giving him un-obstructed access to his combat harness and gear.

      The corridor was empty. Bolan’s combat boots were loud on the creaking floorboards. He stopped, listened. There was no sign that anyone within had heard the shotgun, which made no sense.

      He was staring down a dirty, poorly lit corridor lined in old wood paneling and cluttered with piles of old newspapers and a couple of stinking plastic bags of trash. The corridor terminated in a T leading left and right. Tattered posters for X-rated movies papered the far wall. From somewhere ahead came the muffled bass of dance music, obviously from the main area of the club. Bolan took another step and the floor creaked again. He froze.

      He heard the answering creak from around the corner.

      They were waiting for him, playing it smart, they thought. Bolan quietly plucked a flash-bang grenade from his combat harness. He triggered the little hockey-puck shaped device—one of Kissinger’s little helpers, as Cowboy called

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