Border Offensive. Don Pendleton

said, interrupting. “What we’re talking about is likely treason on some level. Then, so is running undocumented workers or Nicaraguan gunmen into Santa Fe or Dallas. And, if it’s tweaking your shriveled little patriotic impulses, need I remind you that every redneck for a hundred miles of the border has a small armory in his basement? It ain’t like we’re escorting these fellows into the Promised Land. They might blow up a department store or erase a preschool, but at the end of the day, they’ll die in the dust same as every other bad man. And we’ll be sitting pretty with a nice chunk of cash.”

      “Yeah, but what about the next time, Sweets?” James said. “We get these guys through and the border is going to close up tighter than blazes.”

      “Probably, but not for long,” Sweets said confidently. “People got short memories. And we provide a necessary function.”

      Bolan thought that Sweets was kidding himself. There would always be cracks in a border as long and as crooked as the Mexican-American border, but if this scheme succeeded it would mean a death sentence or life imprisonment for every man of Sweets’s ilk. Looking around the room, he saw not a few faces that reflected his opinion back at him. None of them, however, were speaking up. Greed could put iron in even the most pliable spine, it seemed.

      “Look, I ain’t going to force nobody. Give it a minute, talk it over. Have a drink. Let me know,” Sweets said, filling up his glass again.

      The meeting broke up a moment later. Two or three men stood and wandered outside, lighting up cigarettes as they went and speaking quietly. Bolan stood. “Toilet?” he said. Eddie grinned at him.

      “Nervous?”

      “Something like that.”

      “Up them stairs there,” Henshaw said, gesturing. Bolan nodded and shot a look at James. The other man inclined his head. Bolan turned toward the stairs, satisfied that the younger man had understood him. He needed to scout the area.

      Instincts honed in countless undercover operations prickled in warning as he made his way up the stairs. Like as not, the bulk of the terrorists were waiting for an “all-clear” signal to come into town. But there would have to be someone here to give that signal. And if Bolan were any judge, that man would be the one called Tuerto.

      At the top of the stairs, Bolan let his fingers drift toward the pistol clipped to his belt. It wasn’t an ideal situation, but he couldn’t let pass the opportunity to take the head off the snake first thing, even if he’d have to shoot his way out of town after the fact. His partner wouldn’t like it, but Bolan was damned if he was going to let a hundred armed terrorists get anywhere near the American border, sting operation or no sting operation.

      The corridor was narrow and there were four doors, two to either side, plus a bathroom that Bolan smelled well before he spotted it. Stepping lightly down the hall, he let his senses drift in such a way as to catch the smallest sound. If you tried to listen for one thing, you almost always missed everything else. But experience had taught him that listening to everything was a sure way not to miss anything.

      There was a low buzz of what might have been conversation coming from one room. But from another... Bolan’s nostrils wrinkled. He smelled blood and lots of it. He pulled the pistol and went to the latter door, a wordless warning siren pealing in his head as he turned the knob. The door opened on darkness and Bolan stepped through.

      It took a moment for his eyes to adjust. The blinds were pulled tight and only a thin drizzle of orange Sonoran light was available to see by. Head cocked, he looked around. There was a bundle wrapped in red-stained sheets on the bed, and the abattoir smell was getting worse for every moment he stood there.

      “Who are you?”

      Bolan spun quick as a cat, but not quickly enough. A meaty paw slammed down on his wrist and the Executioner found himself jerked into the air and slung back the way he had come before he could do more than blink.