Dying Art

Bolan helped Diaz through the opening and then went through himself. First one in, last one out, as usual. Behind him, he could hear the sound of more explosions. He picked up Sergio’s bound body and ran for the LZ, hearing the man’s raspy breathing.

Martinez had his men count off as they made their way through the shrubbery toward the long expanse of beach.

The number verified that everyone was accounted for as they formed up at the predetermined location. The scream of the approaching helicopter’s rotors sounded like the beating of a thousand bat wings. The Black Hawk descended with perfect ease about thirty feet from them. A few shots sounded from the bodyguards, and the marines on the perimeter returned fire. Bolan got to the open door of the helicopter and tossed Sergio onto the hard metal floor.

Bolan turned and helped Diaz into the chopper, then jumped aboard himself. Positioning himself by the door, he swung the M60 machine gun on the swivel mount, adjusted the belt and pulled back the lever. The rest of the marines piled inside, followed by Martinez.

As the helicopter began to lift off, a few rounds skidded off the outer shell. Bolan fired a burst from the M60, and then heard Grimaldi’s voice come over his in-ear receiver.

“Those guys still want to dance? I got something for them.”

He used the mounted M240 machine guns to strafe the resort side of the beach again, and as they ascended Bolan could see the men below scattering like shell-shocked ants.

Bolan snapped the safety on the M60 and swung it back behind against the wall of the cabin. He pulled the door closed and turned to check on everyone. With the high-pitched roar from the rotors spinning at max speed, conversation was next to impossible. He flashed a thumbs-up to Martinez, who had rolled his mask up on his head. Sergio still lay on the floor, immobile, but quivering. Martinez gave a thumbs-up back. The Executioner went to the cockpit and sat in the copilot’s seat.

Grimaldi pointed to the headset, which Bolan then slipped on.

“We’ll be touching down on the Mexican side in fifteen,” Grimaldi said. “To make our deposit.”

Bolan acknowledged him.

Despite a few minor bumps, the op had gone pretty well. Still, they had to drop off Martinez, his marines and Diaz, before flying to US soil and delivering Sergio to the waiting DEA agents. Since this mission technically did not exist, Bolan assumed this second drop-off would be accomplished with minimal conversation and complications. Everything wrapped up nicely and tied off with a pretty bow.

Still, he worried about the young woman.

Should Sergio figure out that it was she who set him up, her life wouldn’t be worth a handful of pesos. There was no way to keep Sergio from his lawyers, and therefore the eventual communication with his father, Don Fernando, was inevitable. But Martinez had assured Bolan that the marines would protect her.

“That is all we have been doing lately,” Martinez told him. “Protecting reporters, informers and their families.”

This time they had their work cut out, Bolan thought.

La Fortaleza Diabla

Baja California, Mexico

Don Fernando de la Vega sat calmly behind his large teakwood desk smoking one of his Havanas and contemplating the recent turn of events. His rise to power as leader of Los Bajos Diablos had not happened overnight, and he prided himself on possessing an abundance of virtues, not the least of which was patience. He gazed about the empty room, plush in its opulence. Mayan statues decorated the walls, as well as paintings by some of Mexico’s greatest artists, alongside the works of Rembrandt, Van Gogh and Gauguin.

He drew on the cigar and savored the smoke in his mouth. It suddenly turned bitter tasting as he heard a knock on the door and his thoughts returned to Sergio.

“Enter,” he said.

The door opened and Gordo, his immense and extremely loyal bodyguard, entered along with Lupe Garcia, another of his lieutenants.

Don Fernando blew out a cloudy breath. Garcia stood at attention, Gordo looking down at him with the watchfulness that had endeared him to Don Fernando for many years. Nothing could get by the giant, no one could move to hurt his master... Gordo would give his life to assure that, and he had many scars of failed attempts.

“Has it been verified?” Don Fernando asked.

He could see beads of sweat beginning to run down Garcia’s cheeks. That told Don Fernando the answer even before the other man could speak. Prescience was another of Don Fernando’s virtues. He could read other men as clearly as a book.

“Yes, Don Fernando,” Garcia said. He swallowed hard, then continued, “He was taken from the resort in the dead of night.” He took a breath and seemed ready to say more, but stopped as Don Fernando held up his palm.

Sergio, his only son, taken... But by whom? The reports said that a military-style helicopter had been used in the abduction. Surely none of the other cartels had such equipment. So had it been the Mexican government? Doubtful, since he had heard nothing from his internal sources that they would be mounting such an audacious attack. There was only one certain answer.

“The Americans?” Don Fernando asked.

Garcia swallowed again, then gave a quick nod. “We believe so. He has vanished without a trace.”

Don Fernando took another draw on the cigar. If that were so, it meant both good and bad news. Good news meaning that Sergio was probably alive and unharmed, bad that he was most likely not in Mexico anymore. Looking up at Garcia, he frowned.

“Where were his bodyguards when this occurred?”

Garcia compressed his lips briefly. “Four of them were killed. The others, I am having brought here as we speak.”

“How many of them?”

“Six.”

Don Fernando raised an eyebrow. “So you are telling me that ten men, whose loyalty is supposed to be beyond question, could not protect my son from an abduction?”

“They were taken by surprise, sir,” Garcia said. “They fought back. Four of them died.”

“Silence!” Don Fernando slammed his hand on the desktop with such force that it snapped his cigar in two. He tossed the pieces away and opened his humidor to retrieve another.

Garcia said nothing. The sweat continued to cascade down his face.

Don Fernando snorted in disgust as he rotated the tip of the new cigar in the flame of his lighter.

“When you have them all here,” he said, “assemble them in the courtyard.”

Don Fernando felt a growing agony over this situation, but he immediately suppressed it. He placed his cigar into the antique, mother-of-pearl ashtray, pulled open his desk drawer and removed a stainless steel 9 mm Taurus semiautomatic pistol. Pulling back the slide slightly, he verified that a round was in the chamber, then set the weapon on the desk in front of him. “I shall attend to this personally. Show everyone the price of failure.”

“Yes, Don Fernando,” Garcia said.

The cartel leader waved his hand dismissively, and the other man scurried out the door. When Garcia had left, he picked up his cigar and spoke to the giant.

“Gordo, after I have dealt with the traitors in the courtyard, kill him. Slowly.”

The giant’s face showed no expression. He simply nodded and left.

Patience... Prescience...

Don Fernando drew on his cigar as he contemplated one of his other virtues: cunning. He thought about the plan that he already had in place, and how he could modify it to ensure that whoever had taken his son would pay a terrible price.

Yes, he thought as he exhaled a cloud of smoke. There will be a reckoning... There will be vengeance...

Two months later

Istanbul, Turkey

Clayton Tragg watched as the miserable little man used a jeweler’s loupe to inspect the two halves of the hand-carved ivory spheres. This professor, Higgins, the handpicked expert his employer had selected to accompany them, was almost as pathetic as Lucien Bruns himself had been when he was originally contacted about the artifact. How two grown men could get so excited about a pair of old hand-carved pieces of ivory, much less be willing to pay a fortune for them, was almost beyond Tragg’s comprehension. Still, it was what he was getting paid for, on two fronts if the truth be known, so who was he to complain? With things drying up in Iraq and Afghanistan, lucrative new work for the dark ops section of what remained of Granite Security, Inc., was getting more and more scarce. Plus, it beat the hell out of escorting some US-backed mullah and aspiring politician around a perpetual war zone worrying about snipers and IEDs.

He watched the Turkish art dealer, Hakeem Karga, who had “acquired” the artifact known as The Lion and the Lioness Attacking the Nubian, purported to be from the Islamic Period, and made even more valuable because it dared to show human figures when such depictions were considered idolatry by Sharia Law. Two corresponding circular spheres of hand-carved ivory and mother-of-pearl over twelve hundred years old...

Tragg reflected on that. The piece had been around for over a thousand years, the last several decades of which it had spent in the National Museum of Iraq, only to have been “removed” when American tanks rolled into Baghdad. From there it passed through various hands before ending up here, in the possession of one of the biggest crooks in Istanbul, who’d most likely bought it from ISIS or al Qaeda, or one of the other regional bands. Once the militants finally realized they could make themselves some money selling stolen stuff from the museums instead of getting their religious rocks off by destroying it, they quietly set aside their strict ideology of demagogy and covertly entered into the more profitable black market business. Maybe they were smarter than they looked. And then again, maybe not. Tragg was sure that Karga had paid them a fraction of what he figured he could get selling it on the black market to some rich American or European collector.

Or maybe even a Mexican one. Tragg silently chuckled at the thought.

The dingy little room had a sour smell to it and the four Turks were smoking those foul-smelling cigarettes with the extended filters that had been mashed one too many times. Tragg could hardly wait to get the hell out of there. His eyes went to his partner, Tyrone Dean, who stood by impassively with his hand in the pocket of his black shirt. His shaved head was gleaming with sweat, but Tragg knew it wasn’t from nerves. He’d been with Dean on too many missions. He was an iceman. No doubt he had his hand around the grip of his Walther PPK, ready in case the art dealer tried to pull something. Not that Tragg thought he would. He’d dealt with this Karga before, and the man always made a substantial profit on these black-market dealings. If word got out that he’d pulled a double cross during one of them, his reputation would take a severe hit.

Besides, Tragg felt confident that he and Dean could take them all out if it ever came to that.

The mousy professor squirmed in his chair, his tiny fingers rubbing the mother-of-pearl inlays with the care and tenderness of someone stroking a beautiful woman’s body, all the while murmuring under his breath, “Yes, yes, yes.” Tragg watched with amusement, figuring the little man’s reaction must be a good sign.

Karga brought his cigarette to his lips, drew on it deeply, and then said with a smoky breath, “See? Did I not tell you it was genuine?”

The professor gazed up, the loupe still in place over his right eye, his lips pulled back showing a row of small inward-slanted teeth. “I do believe it is.”

The art dealer cocked his head to the side. His features curved into a knowing expression as he winked at Tragg. “Then we have only to discuss the price at this time, correct?”

He snapped his fingers and then wiggled them back and forth, indicating that the professor should hand the item back to him. The little man complied with the utmost care.

“Now,” Karga said, placing the two pieces into a velvet-lined box and then placing that box into a metal briefcase that he secured with a special lock. He handed the briefcase to one of his big bodyguards, who stood close to him. “Are we ready to do business?”

“We need to phone our employer first,” Tragg said. “In private.”

Karga said something in Turkish to one of the bodyguards. “Very well. He will show you to a private room. But advise him that I am a very busy man.”

Tragg, Dean and the professor followed the big Turk down a narrow hallway. The professor was walking briskly at Tragg’s side trying to keep up.

“It’s authentic,” the little man said. “I’m sure of it. Of course, we’ll need some typing of the carbon thirteen to be absolutely certain, but I am ninety-nine percent convinced of its authenticity.”

“Good,” Tragg said. “You can tell that to the boss.” He took out his satellite phone and punched in the number. The big Turk stopped and pointed to a door. Dean disappeared inside for a few seconds, then stuck his head out.

“It’s clear,” he said as he stepped out into the hallway.

Tragg pulled the professor into the room and pressed the button to initiate the Skype call. He held the phone in front of him with his left hand and positioned the professor in front of him with his right. After completing the call and going through a series of underlings, Lucien Bruns’s round face came into view. His fat cheeks were somewhat distorted on the small flat screen, his eyes enlarged behind his thick spectacles.

“Professor Higgins has verified the item, sir,” Tragg said. “The L and L, A N.”

It was their code name for the artifact, which was no doubt on several Interpol and US Customs and Border Protection lists as having been stolen from the National Museum of Iraq.

Below Tragg’s chin, the little man’s head bobbed up and down like a yo-yo. “It’s definitely from the Islamic Period, and all the more rare due to the idolatrous aspects of its depiction of the human forms. I’d say it’s the genuine article, all right.”

Bruns’s eyes widened, and the tip of his pink tongue glided over his lips.

“That’s good news,” he said. “I assume the price is within the range as previously discussed.”

“Yes, sir.”

Like that would matter, Tragg thought. He knew how much Bruns coveted the damn thing. It had been all he’d talked about before sending Tragg and Dean on this special assignment to Turkey.

The Lion and the Lioness Attacking the Nubian... Two intricately carved little spheres of ivory that Bruns was willing to pay more money for than Tragg could ever hope to make in two decades. But if he and Dean played this one right, it would be a windfall for them that would set them up for the rest of their lives. And, there’d be enough left over to pay off the rest of the dark ops team, too. This wasn’t something the two of them could manage on their own. No, it would take a team effort, just like in Iraq, just like in Afghanistan. And it would require a whole lot of intricate planning, but what special ops mission didn’t? And this one would take them to the end of the rainbow.

“Good,” Bruns said. “Tell him it’ll be the same arrangement as the last time. As soon as the formalities are complete, we’ll make the transfer.”

“The formalities” meant the forged paper trail that Karga would create to “document” that the item was sold through proper and established channels. It was total bullshit, but Bruns had been burned before when he’d been ordered by US Customs and Border Protection to return a series of cuneiform stone tablets that he’d purchased without proper documentation. Now that things had settled down somewhat in the war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan, both the US and foreign governments were looking a lot closer at these transactions out of Geneva and Istanbul. The “transfer” referred to the actual exchange where the money would be wired to Karga’s special Swiss bank account, and the artifact would be turned over to Tragg for transport to Bruns. The mistake the rich son of a bitch had made the last time was transporting them directly to the United States. This time he’d arranged for them to come in the back door, via Mexico, which had in turn opened up the second, and secret, part of Tragg’s plan.

“There’s one more thing, sir,” he said as he placed a hand on the professor’s shoulder and pushed him toward the door. After the little man was shoved into the hall, Tragg closed the door behind him.

He studied the image of the fat man on the small screen. The twin creases between Bruns’s eyebrows were deep. “What’s going on?”

“It seems we may have a problem,” Tragg said.

“What?”

“There’s another bidder who’s interested.” Tragg waited a few seconds to heighten the tension. “And Hakeem seems to favor his offer.”

Chapter Two

Stony Man Farm Virginia

Bolan crouched behind a large metal mailbox and waited for Grimaldi to move to the next cover point, the shell of an old Lincoln Continental. This was the third time they’d worked the Hogan’s Alley portion of the shooting range in tandem, and each time the targets had varied.

Bolan caught a sudden flash of movement in the second-story window of the faux building about thirty yards away just as Grimaldi began his run. The Executioner brought up his Beretta 93-R, acquiring target acquisition in a split second, and fired a quick burst.

Three holes dotted the center of the cardboard target of a scowling man in a black mask holding an AK-47.

Grimaldi completed his roll, taking cover by the rear fender, and held his SIG Sauer P-220 with arms outstretched.

It was Bolan’s turn to move.

As he did so, he caught another target moving in a doorway.

Grimaldi’s weapon cracked three times.

Bolan saw that this target was another bad guy. He dropped to his knees beside Grimaldi, who grinned.

“See? Another terrorist bites the dust, courtesy of yours truly and SIG.”

They were wearing GunSport–PRO electronic earplugs that allowed them to converse in normal tones, yet blocked out any sudden noise over 500 decibels.

“Better do a combat reload before we move,” Bolan said. “By my count, you’re down to your last two rounds.”

Grimaldi dropped the magazine from his gun and verified that Bolan’s assessment had been correct. A solitary round sat atop the magazine. “How the hell do you do that? I can’t keep track of my own rounds, much less my partner’s.”

Bolan said nothing, but they both knew the answer was training and practice. He slapped Grimaldi’s shoulder, signaling him to move across the street. “Go.”

Grimaldi grunted and tore around the rear of the Lincoln, staying low as he ran, his weapon held close to his chest with both hands, ready to shoot as he moved.

Another target popped into the doorway. Bolan couldn’t take the shot because Grimaldi veered left into the field of fire. The Stony Man pilot’s SIG Sauer barked numerous times and a plethora of holes pierced the target’s chest, but this time it was a woman holding a grocery bag. Grimaldi groaned and shook his head at the rare mistake, and his pace slowed as he completed the last few steps to take cover on the right side of the doorway.

Bolan was already moving to his next position, keeping the Beretta trained on the various openings on the building’s front.

No new targets popped up, and the Executioner got to the opposite side of the doorway.

Before they could enter the building, the buzzer sounded, indicating the session was over, followed by a loud Bronx cheer over the speaker system from the range master.

Grimaldi swore and jammed his pistol into its holster.

“All right, all right, so I shot an alleged noncombatant. But I’ll bet you a ten spot she had a big, old .357 hogleg hidden in that grocery bag.”

The range master’s laugh sounded over the speaker. “Not hardly, Jack. But considering what a lady’s man you are, why don’t you give her a nice kiss to see if you can bring her back to life?”

Bolan allowed himself a ghost of a smile as he holstered his weapon.

Grimaldi shook his head and smirked. “Nah, she doesn’t look like my type.”

“Make that a lady-killer, then,” the range master said. “Anyway, Hal called. Needs to see you, guys, ASAP.”

“Good,” Grimaldi said. “Maybe he’s got something for us. All this training is giving me a case of the ass.”

“Careful what you wish for,” Bolan said as he headed toward the exit pathway.

“Hey,” Grimaldi called. “Hold on a sec. I got something neat to show you.”

Bolan stopped and turned around.

Grimaldi reached into his pants pocket and took out a black rectangular object that was about the same size as a stack of credit cards.

“I got credit,” Grimaldi said. He held up the object, then with a quick move he pushed a latch and the bottom section flipped down displaying a trigger and a handle. Grimaldi pulled a small rectangular section back and whirled, pointing at the target.

A subdued pop sounded, and Grimaldi turned back to Bolan with a sly grin. “Told you I had credit.”

He held his hand out, and Grimaldi gave him the weapon.

“Just picked it up. It’s called a LifeCard .22LR. Single shot .22 long rifle. Stores four rounds in the handle.”

Bolan checked the action and then handed it back to Grimaldi.

“Don’t leave home without it,” he said.

Fifteen minutes later they were walking into the War Room in the main building. The huge wall screen had been lowered and muted images from a cable news show danced across it. Hal Brognola, who was on the phone, indicated that they should sit with him at the conference table.

“Hey, look,” Grimaldi said, pointing at the screen. “There’s our buddy Sergio!”

An unlit cigar dangled from Brognola’s mouth as he emitted a series of nearly inaudible grunts. Grimaldi grabbed the remote off the table before he sat down and played with the buttons. The volume came on and Brognola shot him a dirty look. The pilot muted the sound, pressed a few more buttons, and enabled the caption function.

Bolan watched with interest as the white-on-black letters began appearing in a box at the lower right section of the screen.

...And security was extremely heavy this morning as reputed drug kingpin Sergio de la Vega was brought before a federal magistrate in downtown Chicago.

Sergio, in an orange jumpsuit, stood in front of a judge.

“Hey, I like his wardrobe,” Grimaldi said with a chuckle. “Looks like a leftover from Orange Is the New Black, doesn’t it?”

Brognola, who was continuing to speak quietly, snapped his fingers at Grimaldi, who stopped talking.

This was the first appearance de la Vega has made since his initial arraignment two months ago when he was mysteriously taken into custody at a remote location in Southern California by DEA agents.

“Ha,” Grimaldi muttered. “All those DEA guys did was score a touchdown with the ball we handed them at the goal line.”

De la Vega, who was accompanied by his lawyers, was once again remanded to custody without a bond being set due to his international ties and infamous reputation regarding the Bajos Diablos drug cartel. It was decided that the case will be held at the Dirksen Federal Building in Chicago, since the US Attorney’s Office filed an indictment at that location. De la Vega’s lawyers reiterated their claim that their client was illegally abducted from Mexico by clandestine government operatives working in conjunction with the Mexican authorities, and was therefore being detained unlawfully, having been denied the right of extradition.

“Extradition.” Grimaldi snorted. “Yeah, right. So his old man could’ve had time to bribe one of those crooked judges down there?”

The picture shifted to a clip featuring the US president shaking hands with the president of Mexico as the white-on-black letters kept scrolling across the bottom of the screen.

The presidents will both be in Nogales for the upcoming Unity Day meeting. When asked to comment on the lawyer’s charges during the White House press briefing, the assistant press secretary quoted the president as having said, “We will go to any length, cross any border, do whatever is necessary, to bring to justice the wrongdoers who continue to poison the youth of our country with the scourge of drugs.”