Don Pendleton - Death Squad

"I, uh, don't like to bet on life and death," Braddock replied quietly.

Lyons scraped to his feet. "Me either. Well, it's past noon and all's quiet. I'm due back on the streets at six. I'm going home and get some rest, if that's okay."

Braddock gave Lyons an absent-minded nod. Obviously his mind was occupied with the information Rickert had just dropped. The sergeant's departure was hardly noticed. Rickert was toying with a paperweight. That kid will make a pretty good cop if he ever grows up," he said.

Braddock ignored the comment. "We're in trouble, Charlie," he declared.

"I know it."

"We are not one inch closer to Bolan than we were this time yesterday."

"I know that, too."

Braddock scratched his forehead and rocked back in his chair. "Gang war, eh?"

"Worse than that. Little Vietnam."

"We've got to stop it. Before it gets started. Today. Now."

Rickert smiled genially. "Sure, but how?"

"Let's go talk to the chief."

"What about?"

Braddock's breath whooshed out in a heavy sigh. If we can't reach Bolan, well just have to reason with the other side. It's roundup time, Charlie."

"Aw hell, Tim." Rickert's geniality had taken a rapid departure. "You're not talking about a Mafia roundup."

"Sure I am." Braddock rocked forward in the chair and depressed a button on the intercom. "See if the chief's in," he said tiredly into the interoffice communicator. "If he is, get me an open door. I have to discuss an urgent development in Hardcase, soonest possible."

A male voice acknowledged the instructions. Rickert was lighting a cigarette. "It's a useless exercise, Tim," he said heavily. "We don't have a damned thing to even book them on, and you know it. Their lawyers will be down here with writs before we can get the doors closed."

"So we'll bust them again an hour later, and we'll keep on busting them every hour on the hour until we can get Bolan on ice. At least it'll keep them off-balance and prevent them from launching any sort of armed offensive."

"But we'll be playing right into Bolan's hands," Rickert said nervously. "We don't have a line on every nephew in this town. The ones we don't get will be ripe meat for Bolan's butchers."

"Well, goddammit, I've got no great bleeding heart for Bolan, Charlie—but I sure as hell don't fancy myself as the Mafia's father protector, either, for God's sake. Bolan will get to a few of them. He's doing it anyway. So that's a hell of a sight better than having our streets running blood. Hell."

"I think it would be a mistake," Rickert persisted bitterly. "First thing you know, we will be hanging a Legion of Merit around Bolan's neck."

"One thing you have to learn, Charlie," Brad-dock snapped. "That's when to turn off the just-plain-cop and turn on the twentieth century." His gaze flicked past Rickert, to take in the lean figure of a man who had just stepped into his doorway. The man was deeply tanned, had very prominent cheekbones, and was neatly dressed in an opened-neck white shirt and slacks. "Yes?" Braddock asked, acknowledging the visitor's presence.

"Are you Captain Braddock?" the man asked.

Braddock nodded. "Yes, I am."

"They sent me up here. I was in Hollywood last night, and saw these men running out of this building, see. I saw in the papers this morning—*

"Right down the hall, please. First door on the left."

"Sir?"

"You want to make eyewitness report on the robbery at the Tri-Coast Studios, don't you?"

"Yes sir. They sent me up here."

"Please go into the large room just down the hall, first door on your left. They'll take your statement there. And thank you for coming in."

"Are you sure?" The man was peering uncertainly along the corridor, standing half-in and half-out of Braddock's doorway.

"What?" Braddock was becoming impatient.

"Well, I passed that room. There's radios and stuff in there. I just want to report..."

"That's the proper place to give your statement, sir. Just walk right in and tell the man at the desk why you're here."

The man smiled. "Well... okay."

"Thank you, sir," the captain said, forcing a smile.

The man moved uncertainly down the hall. Rickert was wearing a strained smile. "That's twentieth century, eh? Saying 'sir' to a wetback?"

"That's right," Braddock replied through tight lips. "A citizen is a citizen, and every one of them rates a 'sir' in this building—until they're booked, anyway. And he wasn't a wetback. I'd say Cherokee or Navajo. That's about as citizen as you can get."

"An Indian?" Rickert asked, slowly stiffening upright in his chair.

The two men locked eyes for a tense instant. Braddock half-rose from his seat, then settled back with an embarrassed grin. "Hell, Charlie, you made my blood run cold for a second there," he said.

Rickert chuckled. "Goes to show how subjective you can get on these twenty-four-hour cases," he replied. He leaned forward to crush out his cigarette. "What the hell would Bolan's Indian be doing up here at Hardcase Central?"

"Go ask him," Braddock suggested, grinning.

"Ask him yourself, you're the coordinator," Rickert replied, entirely satisfied with the change of atmosphere in the captain's office. He had over reacted to Braddock's decision for a Mafia drag, he realized, and he had needed that little diversion. Thank God for stumbling, wide-eyed, dumb-ass "citizens" who, lost or not, were determined to do their civic duty. Bolan's (ha-ha) Indian had pulled the twenty-four-hour cop's fat out of the fire. For the moment, at any rate.

Down the hall, a bronzed man with prominent cheekbones was performing a citizen's duty, filing a written eyewitness report of a crime—and mentally filing an unwritten eyewitness report on the plan and layout of Captain Braddock's control room. Bolan's Indian had plenty to do at Hardcase Central.

"A directional mike is out of the question," Schwarz reported glumly. "It's a hard building, any way you look at it."

"Internal security is a loose goose, though," Loudelk told Bolan. He tossed a small notebook onto Bolan's lap. "They call the operation Hardcase. The names of the detail leaders and their areas are in the notes there. Got that from a duty roster pinned to a bulletin board in their control room." He withdrew a three-by-five card from his hip pocket and waved it gently in front of Bolan's eyes. "And guess what this is. Phone numbers and radio frequencies on the front, code words on the back." He produced a folded paper from his shirt pocket and added it to the loot on Bolan's lap. "And this is an area map, showing zones of responsibility for the various details."

Bolan was wearing a broad grin. "Bloodbrother, you're a master craftsman," he said.

"Place was wide open. I just walked in and picked it up. This Braddock, the cop in charge, looks more like a judge than a cop. He's hard, though, and the other cops respect him. They call him Big Tim. Behind his back, anyway. His office adjoins their control room. Floor plan's in the notebook. They're running a military operation there, Sarge. I'd say they want us real bad."

Bolan nodded, the grin still in place. His eyes were traveling down the list of radio frequencies printed on the card. "Can you cover these frequencies, Gadgets?" he asked.

"Yeah, but I'll have to get some more gear. I'll need some cash. I'd say ... oh, about at least two thousand. If you want to cover all those at the same time."

"Money is no object," Bolan replied. "What better use for Mafia green, eh? Draw what you need from Politician. Need any help?"

Schwarz shook his head in a decided negative. "I shop better by m'self," he said.

"Okay, but play it cautious. Don't excite anyone's curiosity. Brother, you cover him, separate vehicles, SOP. From this moment forward, no one leaves base camp without a cover man."