Don Pendleton - War Against the Mafia

"The game," Bolan replied slowly, "is that I can identify your killer for you. And suddenly I realize that's the last thing you want. You don't want any identification. Look-I have no argument with you. I know how these things go. I don't know anything about the beef between you and Laurenti, but I do understand discipline. If Laurenti was trying to pull a fast one, then you only did what had to be done. I just want you to understand that I'm no blabbermouth. Not around cops. So-the price is changed. There is no price. There is no eyewitness story. I saw nothing and I say nothing."

Plasky's jaw had dropped. He turned surprised eyes onto Seymour and grunted, "This guy thinks-"

"I know what he thinks!" Seymour snapped. "It's been obvious all along." His gaze had not strayed from the faintly amused face of the soldier. "There was no beef," he informed Bolan. "Regardless of what the newspapers said, Laurenti and his people were not killed by any criminal organization. So you're wasting your time and ours with your little game. If you'll just-"

"How about playing the game with the cards face up," Bolan suggested.

"What are your cards, Sergeant?" Seymour asked, eyes twinkling at Plasky.

"I'm job hunting. Five of your people stopped living yesterday. I figure you have a vacancy."

Turrin shifted uneasily. "What does a soldier need with a job?" Plasky asked faintly.

"I've been twelve years in this uniform," Bolan replied. "I've learned a trade, but it hasn't made me any money. I don't have a dime, and I'll never have a dime, not from what this uniform will bring me."

Seymour was beginning to warm up. "What sort of a trade?" he inquired. "Guns are my business."

"Guns?" Seymour laughed softly. "You think guns are our business?"

Bolan ignored the parry. "I can build them, I can modify them, I can repair them, I can make the ammo for them, and I can shoot them."

Seymour was still clucking. "Even supposing that we are what you think we are, you have your eras confused. This isn't Chicago of the twenties and thirties. This is Pittsfield of the sixties." He shook his head. "You've got us all wrong, Sergeant"

Bolan nodded his head toward a background man who was positioned in the shadow of a poolside cabana. "He's wearing a gun," he said, then stabbed his finger toward the diving platform, and added, "so's that one. I counted five gun-bearers the instant I stepped onto this property. You've got a civilian army here. And you've got vacancies. And I need a job."

"You planning on deserting from the Army?" Turrin put in.

The soldier soberly shook his head. "You know what an ROTC billet is, Turrin? It's a cream-pie duty."

"Tell us about it," Seymour said interestedly.

That's my humanitarian reassignment. To the ROTC unit out here at Franklin High. The Army supplies instructors for these programs. It's cream-pie duty for any soldier. We get a housing allowance, we work regular hours, just like any teacher, and we live like any civilian."

These regular hours-how do you figure to work two jobs at once?"

Bolan grinned. "I'm not the regular instructor. I'm just padded on to give me an official duty station. There's already a guy out there. I'll just be an odd hand. Maybe I'll give a few lectures on gun handling, maybe I'll help out a little on the rifle range. But I was given to understand that I'd be more or less free to come and go as I please."

"Don't sound like the Army to me," Turrin said, smiling.

"Me either," Bolan agreed. "But I'll be up for re-enlistment at the end of the year. And there's this responsibility for the kid brother, see. They're giving me until the end of the year to make some provisions for him. I guess they figure by then I'll either have to return to full duty or just get the hell out of the Army."

"I should think you'd be quite happy with the arrangement," Seymour observed.

"Well, I've got the kid now," Bolan pointed out. "And like I said, not a dime in any bank. I figure I'll take the discharge in December. And I can't see any sense in wasting any time getting phased into civilian life." He smiled broadly. "And then, you've got this vacancy."

"I think the sarge is a conniving opportunist," Seymour said, to nobody in particular.

"We need opportunists-that's what we need, isn't it?" Turrin said.

Seymour sighed. "Yeah, yeah, that's exactly what we need. Well-get those girls over here, Leo. And roll that bar over here. It seems we have a new employee to welcome." He smiled sourly at Bolan. "This is your day of golden opportunity, Sarge. Don't let it turn to brass."

Bolan grinned and picked up his drink It had become tepid and flat. Who cared? Hell, who cared? He gulped it down. He was in. And from the looks of things he was about to get into something else. Her name, somebody told him, was Mara; her function was entirely obvious. She settled into his lap without an invitation, handing him a fresh drink, and wriggled the bikini-clad-or almost-clad-bottom about in an apparent striving for comfort, at the expense of Bolan's own. "I like soldiers," she confided softly, running a hand inside his shirt. The bikini barely topped the swell of her lower abdomen, a thin stretch of elastic traversing the centerline of belled hips and plunging in back well below the pronounced cleft of swollen buttocks. The halter of the bikini was no more than an elasticized scrap of overlaid "now you see it, now you don't" netting. Bolan's free hand found a natural resting place on the silky torso at a point about midway between the upper and lower edges of the "swim" suit, fingers splayed down across the soft indentation of the navel He flicked a glance around in a brief survey of his companions, noted that they were comparably burdened and preoccupied, then let his fingers travel on southward.

The girl giggled and captured his hand, raised slightly off his lap to gaze beneath her, and murmured: "You haven't been around women lately, have you?" She then resettled, again agitating herself into the closest possible conjunction and moving Bolan's hand up and onto her breast. "Have you forgotten what those feel like?" she asked whimsically.

Bolan nudged the net aside and assured her that he had, indeed, not forgotten. She giggled, took the drink out of his hand, set it on the nearby table and slid off his lap, then playfully tugged him out of the chair. "We need to get you into a pair of trunks," she told him. She moved close alongside and beneath his arm, maintaining a tight, lock-step embrace, and steered him to a cabana. She entered with him, locked the door, and moved immediately into his arms, raising her mouth to his. He took it hungrily, suddenly aware of how long it had been since a vibrant American girl had been in his arms. Her breath was sweetly alcoholic, hot and wanting, altogether pleasant, an active tongue probing for effect. Spring-tension hips were thrust high and forward and moving rhythmically for an even more disturbing effect His hands fell onto bunched buttocks, then he hooked his thumbs into the hips and flipped her away, breaking also the hot conjunction of mouths.

She swayed back in for more. He evaded her, the thinking part of his brain seemingly numbed and reacting instinctively. "Afraid you'll mess up your pants?" she murmured. One of her hands moved between them, and she said, "Uh-huh. You've been too long without, Sarge." She moved away from him then, swinging her attention to the far wall of the small hut. An assortment of male swimming trunks hung from pegs there. Her eyes returned to his midsection, sizing him, then she selected from the swimwear. "Put these on," she suggested, tossing the trunks onto a low bench behind Bolan.

Bolan was still feeling somewhat mechanical in his actions. His fingers were already at his shirtfront, working the buttons. She moved back to him and went to work on the tie. A moment later she carefully hung shirt and tie on a peg, pushed him onto the bench, and took off his shoes and socks.