Don Pendleton - Enemy Arsenal

WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER

A massive black-market weapons bazaar, where someone with enough money could outfit a small nation, becomes Stony Man’s highest-priority target. And Mack Bolan is determined to be on this year’s guest list. Setting out undercover into the African desert, he’s about to close in when U.S. aircraft and armored vehicles—operated by men in American uniform—annihilate the crowd.

The truth soon becomes clear. A growing syndicate struck the site in disguise to behead the smaller crime organizations and absorb what was left. While all eyes are on the U.S. to explain what happened, Bolan goes on the hunt for the real power behind the bloodbath. And the trail leads to the South China Sea, where a mysterious billionaire has launched an assault on the world’s major ports. Hijacked cargo ships are heading for international cities. Unless Bolan can stop them...

Bolan tossed the device into the backseat

“Damn, that thing is handy,” James said. “Stony Man ought to license it to the cops to stop speeders.”

“Yeah,” Bolan said, “and it also fried the vatos’ cells so that they can’t call for help. Who knew EMP could be so helpful?”

“Uh, how are we gonna catch all these guys?”

“We’ll have to round them up the old-fashioned way....” Bolan trailed off as he felt a warm circle of metal press into the back of his neck hard, pushing his head forward. He froze.

“All right, putas. Move just an inch and I’ll splatter your brains all over the car.”

Enemy Arsenal

Don Pendleton

www.mirabooks.co.uk

Weapons are an important factor in war, but not the decisive one; it is man and not materials that counts.

—Mao Tse-Tung

A weapon is not evil in and of itself—it is merely a tool, one that can be used by evil men against the innocent, or by good men to protect the innocent. When I take up arms against evil, it is with the sole notion to protect the innocent and punish the guilty.

—Mack Bolan

Special thanks and acknowledgment to Travis Morgan for his contribution to this work.

Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

A glass of chilled champagne dangling between his fingers, James Barrett leaned on the luxury yacht’s polished teakwood railing and watched the golden-red sun sink into the deep blue waters of the glass-smooth South China Sea.

Sure is a far cry from Nebraska, he thought. Indeed, he’d never imagined seeing this much water in his life, not counting a family vacation to the Great Lakes when he was ten years old. Barrett glanced back at the receding Philippine Islands, where he’d just spent three intoxicating days. He was living the life he’d always dreamed of, but every moment, every second of pleasure he tried to enjoy was colored by the faint, niggling feeling that he didn’t deserve any of it, that he was, quite simply—a fraud.

But he knew that was just his father talking again. Barrett had worked harder than anyone he knew to achieve what he had, beginning with working two jobs to scrape up the money to attend the state university; suffering the ribbing of his redneck coworkers for studying during his lunch break at the slaughterhouse; going home after a full shift just four hours before class started and standing in the shower for thirty minutes, trying to wash the blood and dead meat stink out of his skin and hair; fighting to stay awake in his classes, knowing he had to work another twelve-hour shift that night, and somehow bull through a full class load of homework and papers, as well, week after week, month after month.

It had taken him five years, but at the end, he had graduated not only with a diploma, but also with a partial scholarship to Yale, thanks to an endowment from one of Lincoln’s founding families. The scholarship had the unusual stipulation that the winner had to attend a school outside the state, and Barrett wondered if whoever had set it up had hated the endless, flat plains as much as he did.

Compared to getting through college, law school was easier, at least on his body. His mind was taxed to the limit, but Barrett relished the purely intellectual challenge after years of backbreaking labor. He excelled there, interning at the Yale Law Journal and matching wits and legal expertise with some of the finest minds in the nation.

“A peso for your thoughts.”

As always, the sound of that sultry voice behind him made a frisson of delight course through his body. He turned to see a goddess-made-flesh walking toward him, dressed in a bikini that barely covered her slender body. Her bronze skin glowed in the fading rays of the tropical sun, under a long, silky mane of honey-blond hair that cascaded down her back and shoulders. Over the tiny swimsuit she almost didn’t have on was a sheer, silky white hip-length peignoir that fluttered in the gentle ocean breeze, revealing tantalizing glimpses of long leg and the delightful swell of her breasts. Barrett shifted his stance, letting his loose cargo shorts hide the sudden tightness in his groin.

“Just had to come out and watch the sunset again.”

She smiled, revealing even white teeth. “I figured as much. Dad and my brothers can get to be a bit much after a few drinks.”

“Hey, it wasn’t them. I like your father, really. He accepts me for who I am, just like his daughter.”

“Mmm, I like the sound of that.” She stepped close to him, the scent of jasmine and coconut body lotion almost overpowering him. Slipping her slim arms around his neck, she leaned up and kissed him, her lush lips tasting like a combination of sweet guava, rum and mint. Her tongue teased his, drawing it out, then darting back and forth. James wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her close, his love-fogged brain barely remembering not to crush her to him, the way he wanted to do every time she came near.

He’d first met Rachel Kirkall during his junior year, at a frat party he had wrangled an invitation to for no good reason he could think of at the time. Later, he had wondered more than once if it was fate. Spying a blond-haired vision across the raucous living room awash in loud music, body shots and pot, he had homed in on her as if in a trance. Upon arrival, however, he had interrupted a drunken fraternity brother’s clumsy advances by “accidentally” spilling his beer on the guy, then ducking his clumsy swing and burying a fist that had seen its share of fights into the blue-blood’s stomach, leaving him retching on the floor.

He’d expected the blond beauty to be shocked, but instead she’d said, “Thanks, now let’s get out of here.” Grabbing his hand, she had pulled him into the rainy night. They had found a nearby Starbucks, and spent the next four hours deep in conversation.

He’d learned she was a local from Connecticut, and was attending architect school, but he hadn’t found out that she was part of the Kirkall family until he had idly searched her name after their second date. After a brief, terrifying few minutes scrolling through the family’s public business holdings, including a sizable stake in a major league baseball team, he’d wondered if he’d ever see her again, or if he was just a passing fancy she was amusing herself with for a few weeks or months before moving on to someone more in her stratum. But that thought was immediately replaced by an even scarier one—that he might already be falling in love with her.