Oceans Of Fire. Don Pendleton

      James grinned. “Maybe we should go and have ourselves a Come to Jesus with this boy Kopeck.”

      “I wish you would.” Dr. Sokolova favored them with a predatory smile. “I weary of pulling coins from faces.”

      “We need to put together a snatch, then.” McCarter turned to James. “Get on the horn to the Bear, we—”

      A pair of orderlies entered the room pushing a gurney laden with a sheet-covered corpse. Dr. Sokolova gave the two orderlies a withering look and spoke in Russian. “I specifically gave orders not to be disturbed.”

      McCarter cleared leather. James shoved Sokolova to the floor and drew his weapon. The orderlies withdrew PP-2000 machine pistols from beneath their smocks as McCarter and James opened up. McCarter’s Browning Hi-Power “Detective” model was an Argentine weapon with a three-and-a-half-inch barrel for concealed carry. The 13-round magazine was “Dutch-Loaded” with 9 mm +P+ hollowpoints and Teflon-coated, armor-piercing ammunition. The high-performance ammo screamed from the shortened barrel in ear-splitting blasts of fire. An armor-piercing round punched a neat hole through the first assassin’s heart. A hollowpoint round exploded his throat and dropped him to the floor.

      James’s Heckler & Koch boomed four times in rapid succession. The big .45 smashed the second killer across the room and dropped him flapping to the floor. The man on the gurney sat up out of his shroud like the living dead, a sawed-off double barrel shotgun in each hand.

      McCarter and James emptied their pistols into him.

      The assassin jerked and shuddered under the fusillade. His right-hand shotgun boomed out of both barrels, and McCarter felt the sting of the hit in his left arm. He dropped his left arm and fired one-handed until his pistol racked open on an empty, smoke-oozing chamber. The killer lay back on the gurney in final rest with fifteen holes in his chest.

      James slapped in a fresh magazine and shot his slide home on a fresh round. McCarter ignored the burning in his arm and reloaded, as well. Out in other areas of the morgue people had begun to scream. Dr. Sokolova started to push herself up and McCarter put a hand on her shoulder to keep her down. “Wait.”

      James went to the double swinging door and kicked it open. He led with his pistol as he quickly scanned the corridor. “Clear.”

      Sokolova rose and touched McCarter’s arm. “You are hit.”

      James stayed in the doorway. “You all right?”

      The doctor took a scalpel and cut away the sleeve of McCarter’s jacket and shirt. Blood ran in a river down McCarter’s arm from a pair of ragged but shallow wounds. She took a pair of forceps from the tool tray and stopped. “My God.”