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The Executioner slowed and looked back at the American Embassy
Kinshasa might be boiling with political intrigue, but something Bolan had seen or heard in the CIA observation room had put him on edge.
The instant he stepped outside the gate, Bolan knew what it was. No fewer than three different factions watched the front of the embassy. By entering and leaving so openly he had become a target.
Quinn had let him become a new pawn in a game of political intrigue that he neither wanted nor had the time to deal with.
Bolan was diving for cover when the first bullet tried to find a home in his flesh. He rolled behind a burned-out car and came to his knees, reaching for his pistol. He scanned the area where the shots must have come from, but saw nothing. A quick glance in the direction of the embassy showed the marines were alert but not willing to come out to his aid.
The Executioner was on his own. As usual.
Fire Zone
The Executioner®
Don Pendleton
Fire is the test of gold; adversity of strong men.
âSeneca
c. 3 BC-AD 65
All that glitters isnât gold. Nobody can put a price on justice.
âMack Bolan
THE MACK BOLAN LEGEND
Nothing less than a war could have fashioned the destiny of the man called Mack Bolan. Bolan earned the Executioner title in the jungle hell of Vietnam.
But this soldier also wore another nameâSergeant Mercy. He was so tagged because of the compassion he showed to wounded comrades-in-arms and Vietnamese civilians.
Mack Bolanâs second tour of duty ended prematurely when he was given emergency leave to return home and bury his family, victims of the Mob. Then he declared a one-man war against the Mafia.
He confronted the Families head-on from coast to coast, and soon a hope of victory began to appear. But Bolan had broken societyâs every rule. That same society started gunning for this elusive warriorâto no avail.
So Bolan was offered amnesty to work within the system against terrorism. This time, as an employee of Uncle Sam, Bolan became Colonel John Phoenix. With a command center at Stony Man Farm in Virginia, he and his new alliesâAble Team and Phoenix Forceâwaged relentless war on a new adversary: the KGB.
But when his one true love, April Rose, died at the hands of the Soviet terror machine, Bolan severed all ties with Establishment authority.
Now, after a lengthy lone-wolf struggle and much soul-searching, the Executioner has agreed to enter an âarmâs-lengthâ alliance with his government once more, reserving the right to pursue personal missions in his Everlasting War.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Prologue
It was a perfect day to start a forest fire.
The weather in Idaho had been dry all summer long, the result of an overly aggressive La Niña drying up the usual rains that made the mountains come alive with greenery. What was, in good years, a hillside covered with ponderosa pine and juniper now stretched as dry as a tinderbox, not quite brown but far from the vibrant green that the Boise National Forest usually enjoyed. The camo-dressed man moved swiftly through the woods with his twenty-pound pack, heavy footsteps crunching dried pine needles.
He held up a GPS unit to better see the display and adjusted his path according to the satellite-sent information until he came to an area that looked like any other at the edge of a meadow. But this was the spot. The Spot.
He shrugged off the backpack and let it fall to the ground, placing the GPS beside it to verify the exact location. Even with the enhanced number of satellitesâhe needed at least three for a proper fixâhe couldnât get closer than three yards to the spot. For what he intended, this was good enough. Dropping to his knees, he rummaged through the pack and pulled out two plastic-wrapped boxes the size of bread loaves. He carefully placed each on the forest floor in a pattern he had practiced until it was second nature. Drawing out the last box required more finesse, since it contained the PETN detonators.
As he stripped off the plastic wrapping from the det cord laid into the packages like snowy white intestines, he froze. The wind had died, but his keen hearing picked up sounds from a hundred yards away.
Laughter. Snippets of a bawdy song wailed by a man with a baritone voice, followed by a higher-pitched womanâs complaint. The complaint disappeared suddenly, replaced by a baritone laugh and girlish giggles. He was not alone.
Tipping his head to one side, he homed in on the two hikers moving across a meadow in front of him. Fading back into the forest and letting them pass was out of the question. A quick check of his watch showed that the deadline was rushing down on him. He touched his earbud and considered calling Red Leader. The thought passed as quickly as it had come to him. He knew what Red Leader would sayâand it would scorch his ass.
Leaving his partially unwound det cord and blasting caps where he had placed them on the ground, he stood and reached behind to the small of his back. His fingers closed on a sheathed KA-BAR knife. He watched the hikers steadily approaching. As he had thought, a boy and a girl, maybe not out of their teens, intent on an afternoon communing with nature and each other.
The girl saw him first and tugged at her boyfriendâs
