do my best,” Burnett said. Bolan marched off. The two men started rapping on doors, both of them staying well clear of the doors themselves. Bolan had been on the receiving end of more than a little gunfire through locked doors before. Burnett either had experienced some of the same, or he was just good at his job. Either way, Bolan was glad not to have to hold his hand; the man was a veteran officer and knew his way around.
Bolan was on his third door, having received no answer and hearing no movement at the first two, when the hollow-core door flew open.
“What the hell is it?” The woman who answered was slim and not unattractive, despite the heavy black eye makeup she wore. Her bottom lip pierced by several silver rings. She wore shorts and a halter top, her bare midriff covered in Celtic tattoos. Bolan, his gun held low behind his right leg, nodded to her.
“Miss,” he said. “I’m looking for someone.”
She smiled up at the Executioner. “What a coincidence,” she said, one hand sliding idly up and down the door frame as she leaned in the doorway and eyed Bolan up and down. “So am I.”
Bolan produced a small photo from the inside pocket of his windbreaker. “I’m looking for this man,” he said, letting her get a good look at the photo of Jonathan West. “He might not look like this. He may have changed his hair color, or grown a beard or done something else to disguise himself.”
The woman frowned through a lip full of metal. “You a cop?”
“No,” Bolan said truthfully. “It’s very important—”
Several shots rang out two doors down, as bullets peppered the thin wood of the apartment door on which Burnett had been knocking.
Burnett jacked the pump on his Remington 870, pressing himself against the wall beside the door. “Police!” he bellowed into the corridor. “This is a lawful entry!”
The door practically disintegrated under a withering full-auto blast, peppering the plaster of the opposite wall. Bolan tackled the woman before him, throwing her down through the doorway onto the scarred hardwood floor of her apartment. He stayed on top of her until the shooting stopped. Burnett’s shotgun sounded like a cannon in the narrow corridor outside as the lawman fired back.
Bolan checked the woman beneath him, who looked at him with a mixture of fear and excitement. The Executioner nodded to the large windows at the end of the small studio, beyond which he could see a fire escape.
“Does that go all the way across the front of the building?” Bolan asked sharply.
She thought about it for a second. “Yes,” she said, as Bolan got to his feet, his Beretta in a low two-hand grip. “It connects all the apartments on this side.”
“Stay low,” Bolan told her. “Don’t go out until the shooting stops. And call 9-1-1!” He was moving before she could say more, throwing open the window and stepping outside. Wind tugged at his hair as he crept along the rusted metal fire escape. From the apartment two doors down, more gunfire erupted. It was the unmistakable chatter of an Uzi, punctuated by more of Burnett’s shotgun blasts.
Wincing as his combat boots rang on the metal fire escape, Bolan slowed and dropped to his knees as he neared the window he wanted. Then he threw himself on his back, using his legs to shove himself forward as he stared skyward, concealing himself between the window ledge and the floor of the fire escape. Below him, New York City continued to bustle, temporarily oblivious to the slaughterhouse within the unassuming fifth-floor walk-up on the Upper West Side.
There was another lull in the automatic gunfire. Bolan popped up, his pistol held compressed against his chest in both hands. He fired twice, punching spidery holes in the window glass, then lowered his shoulder and dived through. He came up, still targeting the shadow he’d seen through the glass—a single, relatively small man with a submachine gun in his fists. The gunman was shoving another stick magazine into the grip of the weapon.
“West!” Burnett called from the hallway. “Stop!” The small man charged the door. Bolan dived aside as a shotgun blast from the doorway peppered the rear wall of the apartment. Then Burnett was down, tackled as the Uzi fell to the floor. The two rolled into the corridor. Bolan closed on the doorway, his Beretta leading, unable to get a clear shot.
“Cooper!” Burnett called, wrestling for his shotgun.
As Bolan approached he could see blood soaking the khaki shirt the small man wore. Burnett’s blast hadn’t been a complete miss. The cop used his size advantage to muscle his way to his feet, shaking the smaller man back and forth as the pair fought each with both hands on the Remington.
Bolan aimed the Beretta two-handed, trying and failing to acquire his target. He lowered the weapon, then raised it again as first Burnett, then the small man moved into his line of fire. “Down!” he shouted.
Burnett took the cue and dropped onto his rear, falling back and slapping his arms. The small man, who had been pushing against Burnett’s resistance, flew forward with the shotgun in his hands. Bolan fired once, low, catching the gunman in the thigh. The man grunted and stumbled over Burnett down the corridor, out of Bolan’s view. The shotgun fell from his fingers.
“Stop!” Burnett called. From the floor he clawed for the gun holstered on his hip. Bolan reached the doorway as the wounded gunman rammed the door of the woman’s apartment two doors down. It opened and the woman screamed.
“Shit,” Burnett cursed, pushing to his feet with a .40-caliber Glock in his fists.
“Back! Get back!” the gunman shouted. He reappeared in the corridor, one arm around the young woman’s neck. He held a folding knife to her face, the serrated S-curved blade just barely below her right eye. His face was ashen. A pool of blood was forming where he stood.
Bolan advanced, the Beretta high in his line of sight. Burnett backed him as the two men crept forward.
“I said stop, damn your eyes,” the small man said. He spoke in a clipped, British accent. “Come any closer and, I swear, I’ll carve this bird’s eye out.”
The woman’s eyes widened at that, but to her credit she remained still. Bolan’s gaze found hers and her expression hardened with resolve.
“You’re going into shock,” the Executioner said. “You won’t be on your feet for long.”
“Get back, I said!” the wounded man shrieked. “I’m walking out of here, you lot, and little missy here is coming with me. If I start to go, I’ll cut her throat as I do. Now, drop the hardware!”
Bolan nodded, almost imperceptibly.
The woman jerked her head to the side, away from the knife. It was just enough. Bolan’s shot drilled through the man’s eye. The body collapsed, a puppet with its strings cut, the folding knife still clutched in one dead hand.
The woman screamed.
“Easy,” Burnett said, holstering his Glock. He went to her and put one arm around her shoulders as she started shaking. “Easy,” he said again. “It’s okay. We got him. We got him.”
Bolan stepped around them and leaned over the corpse. There was a lot of gore, but most of the face was still visible. He took his phone from the inside pocket of his windbreaker and checked the photo viewer, examining the small image
