Enemy agents, p.10
Enemy Agents, page 10
“So, you’d say the Man’s at risk.”
“I’d say we should bust Halsey for the guns he got tonight. I take it they’re illegal?”
“AK-47s,” Bolan said. “But I have no idea where Axton stashed them, and you’d only bag a handful of the outfit.”
“Just the ones that matter,” Corwin replied.
“Too iffy,” Bolan said. “My way, it’s settled.”
“If you pull it off,” she countered.
“Maybe you should stick around,” he said, “and watch my back.”
MAKING HER SECOND EXIT from the Desert Palms Motel, Grace Corwin quizzed herself again on the insanity of what was happening. Forget about propriety, much less legality. It wasn’t just a question, now, of violating laws or breaking some administrative rules.
The President of the United States, for God’s sake!
If she dropped the ball on this one, if Matt Cooper couldn’t smash Clay Halsey and the NMM before the whole thing went to hell, she wouldn’t just be fired or thrown in jail.
Hell, no.
For the rest of her life, she’d be known as the moron who dicked around and let a pack of lunatics take out the President. Just what prospective employers want to see on a job application.
As if anyone would be hiring. If Cooper’s game fell apart on them, Corwin knew she wouldn’t even qualify as a shopping mall rent-a-cop. Maybe they’d let her serve fries at some burger joint or sweep up in the back, out of sight from the public.
Assuming she even survived.
At least Cooper had a plan, of sorts. It wasn’t all just going with the flow, either. He had a twist in mind, using the Comancheros angle, that could throw a righteous monkey wrench into Halsey’s works if it paid off. But it would mean more killing, more blood spilled.
The scary part, for Corwin, was that she had begun to justify it in her own mind, rationalizing the mayhem. But with a potential threat to the President, it seemed even more urgent to knock Halsey’s psycho-train right off its tracks.
Cooper was right, of course. Assuming they could find the automatic weapons that he’d retrieved from the Bakersfield bikers, anyone she arrested would likely make bail. Or, if Halsey and Axton were stuck in the jug for a while, their soldiers would go on without them. Into the valley of death, and all that.
If anything, jailing Halsey might provide him with an alibi, the final twist to get him off the hook.
But if she went along with Cooper, which she had already virtually pledged to do, then the militia would be crushed, its pieces scattered to the winds. Granted, it was a single group among the hundreds armed and seething in a stew of rage and bigotry from coast to coast, but it had been assigned to her, and so far she’d accomplished nothing toward her goal of shutting down the NMM.
She tried to picture Cooper, playing soldier with the weekend warriors under Halsey’s scrutiny. There was no question in her mind that he could pull it off, as far as acting like a general, but now he would have Luther Axton waiting in the wings, embittered, looking for a chance to stab him in the back.
We ought to take him out, she thought, and nearly laughed aloud at that. She was already thinking like an outlaw, when the action hadn’t even started yet.
But, then again, she knew of fifteen Comancheros up in Bakersfield who’d disagree on that, if they were still alive to cast a vote. How many more would die before their deadly game played out? Would she be one of them?
As long as no one tags the President, Corwin told herself. We need to get that right, at least.
But what if she was wrong about the target? What if they were focused on the speech in Lancaster, while Halsey’s goons went off to pull another Oklahoma City act in L.A., San Diego or some other city?
No, she decided. If they have a shot at taking out the Man, these yahoos wouldn’t pass it up. How else could they make history?
Corwin only hoped that there was time to stop them cold, prayed that Cooper hadn’t come too late to stop a damned disaster in the making.
Quit him now?
No way. No way at all.
“THA’ BASTA BOKE MA fuggen noad!”
“I oughta get you to the ER, Luther,” Jimmy Sundberg said.
“Nuh-uh! I ficket ub masep.”
“Okay, whatever man. But Clay’s gonna be pissed, I bet.”
Meaning at me, Axton thought through the haze of pain that filled his throbbing head. Pissed off at me for messing with the new guy, right.
“Lebbe wurra boudat.”
“Sounds like he knocked the English out of you,” Sundberg replied, but he was smart enough to wipe the grin off his face as Axton turned on him.
“Oo dink is fuddy?”
“Hey, man, no! But Clay’s not gonna think it’s funny either. You know what I’m saying?”
Axton knew, all right. He’d skipped the new boy’s party, stashed the guns, then gotten liquored up alone and drafted Sundberg for a personal surveillance mission. After Cooper saved his life, no less.
So, what the hell was up with that?
He didn’t trust the bastard. Bottom line, he felt something was out of whack with the major, and his duty as the NMM’s chief of security required Axton to use initiative in tracing and eradicating any threat to Halsey or the army that they’d built together.
Admittedly, the bit where he got lubricated with Jack Daniel’s whiskey was a tactical mistake, no doubt about it. After Halsey had sent him off to hide the AKs, a delayed attack of nerves had set Axton to trembling, thinking of the smelly biker with his fingers clamped on his throat, squeezing the life out of him, and he’d had a drink to mellow out. One didn’t do the job, exactly, so he’d chased it with a few more, getting nice and loose.
Before he had the bright idea.
Okay, so what if Cooper couldn’t be a cop, the way he’d started wasting Comancheros right and left? That didn’t mean he was a fit addition to the team. Halsey should know as well as anyone—better, in fact—that crazy people were attracted to their kind of operation like flies to an outhouse. Some were so far off the beam that they even scared Axton, and that took some doing.
Worse yet, in his view, was the risk of subversion by other so-called “patriots.” Competing groups wasted a huge amount of time reviling one another, trying to seduce members away from this or that assembly, burglarizing offices to rip off mailing lists, you name it. Axton knew one guy who’d wormed his way into a rival group, incited them to hit a synagogue on Yom Kippur to “teach the Jews a lesson,” then tipped off the law and skipped before his stooges walked into the ambush.
Not that he had anything on Cooper, yet. The prick was squeaky-clean and totally gung-ho, from all appearances. Too good, in fact, for Axton’s taste. Try telling that to Halsey, though, when he had no evidence to back it up.
So, he’d gone looking. Screw the whole he-saved-your-life thing. Cooper couldn’t very well go back to Halsey with the guns and two dead soldiers, could he?
Staking out the Desert Palms had been a fair idea. Seeing the broad traipse over from the Apple Valley Diner, Axton reckoned she might be some kind of contact, maybe come to check on Cooper’s progress with his infiltration.
How was he supposed to know she was a hooker, when she dressed like any normal secretary or…
Or, what?
Something was nagging at his mind, but even sobered by the pain, Axton still couldn’t put his finger on it. What he needed was aspirin and plenty of it, plus someone to steady him while he reset his broken nose. Axton had managed that before, but didn’t fancy falling down and breaking something else during the burst of agony that lay in store for him when he repaired the break.
A little something extra that he owed to Cooper.
First, though, Axton knew he’d have to kiss some ass, apologize to Halsey and to the so-called major, grin and bear it while some of the others laughed behind his back. But Axton meant to have the last laugh.
The Chevy coasted to a stop outside of his apartment building. “Okay,” Sundberg said. “If you won’t see a doctor, this is it.”
“Ya needa cub insigh,” Axton said.
“Come inside? What for?”
“We godda operay,” Axton informed him, pointing at his nose.
And soon, with any luck, he would be operating on that bastard Cooper. When the time came, Axton thought, the patient wouldn’t know what hit him.
BOLAN DECIDED THERE WAS no point waking Brognola again to brief him on the long, strange day’s events. He usually worked with minimum contact with the Farm, and the big Fed had never voiced dissatisfaction with the end results.
Thinking about the interlude with Luther Axton as he stripped again, this time for bed, Bolan took time to move the room’s one chair and wedge it underneath the doorknob. Just a little extra edge, in case Axton recovered and decided to come looking for some payback overnight.
Of course, the motel room still had a spacious window facing on the parking lot, with nothing to stop an angry, drunken patriot from firing through it, maybe lobbing in a grenade or a Molotov cocktail. With that in mind, Bolan considered sleeping on the floor, then scrubbed the notion.
Axton, in his estimation, would be using what remained of that night to sober up, repair his injury and prep himself for seeing Halsey the next day. There would be questions concerning his nose, and Axton had to figure that a lie would boomerang against him if “Cooper” complained of his drunken visit.
The smart play would be to confess, act contrite, plead exhaustion, whatever, and take the high road with apologies all around. Most likely, there would be no repercussions and the three of them could laugh it off.
While Axton planned his next, more subtle move.
Bolan never considered that a broken nose would get Axton off his back. Quite the opposite, in fact, if Bolan read the man correctly. Humiliation would increase Axton’s desire to get the dirt on Matt Cooper, whatever it might be. And when he did…
Bolan dismissed that thought, as well. He wasn’t underestimating Axton, knew the drunken-psycho factor was another threat he’d have to deal with and accommodate, but the soldier’s penetration of the NMM was not designed to be protracted. Undercover agents seeking evidence for prosecution might be forced to play a role for months or years on end. In Bolan’s case, he needed just enough for Brognola to justify the kind of blitz the Executioner was skilled at.
A threat against the President of the United States would qualify, hands down, but Bolan needed more than Corwin’s suspicion to confirm it. If he ruined his chance by clocking Axton, and the following day’s training exercises pleased the man in charge, Bolan might be invited to participate in “something big.”
And if he wasn’t?
There were other ways to find out what the NMM’s commanding officers had planned. Bolan could snoop around the office, unobtrusively, or take a more direct approach and grill one of the troopers close to Halsey. Maybe Axton, since it seemed he’d blown his last shot at establishing rapport with Halsey’s number two.
And if he faced a grilling of his own, Bolan meant to be prepared. He fished a telephone directory out of the nightstand drawer, thumbed through the business pages to the letter E, and found two listings under Escort Services. Compassionate Companions? Tiger Girls?
Both operated out of San Bernardino. Bolan dialed the second number from the landline in his room, leaving a record even though the time was off a bit, and got a quote of basic charges for the long round-trip. Tipping was optional. He thanked the operator, said he’d have to think about it and hung up.
If Axton tried to pin him down on details, Bolan would be ready. Meanwhile, nothing short of a subpoena would make anyone at Tiger Girls HQ cough up the confirmation of specific dates.
All bases were covered to the best of his ability.
The following day, Bolan thought as he lay down to sleep, would have to take care of itself.
9
“Are you a total idiot, or is there some way you can make this worse?” Halsey asked.
Beneath the burglar’s mask of purple bruising on his face, a hint of angry color rose in Luther Axton’s cheeks, but he maintained his temper with what seemed to be a Herculean effort.
“Clay,” he said, “I’ve told you that I had too much to drink. It got away from me. There’s no harm done, except to me.”
“No harm done?” Halsey felt his blood pressure increasing, touching off the first faint ringing in his ears. “You ever think that Cooper might decide to blow us off, because of what you’ve done?”
Axton bristled at that. “So what?” he asked. “Clay, honestly, you treat him like he’s John Wayne or something, like some kind of savior, but he’s just one soldier. And I still don’t trust him, for the record.”
“We only have one savior, son,” the third man at the table said. “And his name is Yeshua the Messiah. Jesus Christ, our Lord.”
The latest speaker’s voice was deep, with just a hint of rasp behind it, perfect for the sermons Dr. Noah Swift delivered as the NMM’s official chaplain. Halsey respected him, despite the knowledge that Swift’s PhD in theology came from a mail-order school in Missouri, run by an old Ku Klux Klansman.
“Yes, sir,” Axton replied. “I was using a figure of speech.”
“An unfortunate one,” Swift declared. “And why is it that you don’t trust the man who saved your life last night?”
“I wouldn’t say he saved my life,” Axton hedged. “He helped me out, okay? I’m glad he did. But there’s still something…. I can’t put my finger on it, but he smells wrong.”
“Maybe that’s your breath,” Swift said. “I’m getting buzzed just sitting in the same room with you.”
“Sorry, Reverend. I had some mints, but—”
“Never mind the mints!” Halsey snapped. “What possessed you, going out to his motel last night with Jimmy Sundberg? Can you tell me that?”
“Surveillance,” Axton answered simply.
“So, that was a stakeout? My chief of security shows up drunk for surveillance, then picks a fight with the subject and gets his ass whipped in the bargain.”
“Clay, I’ve already apologized. I don’t know what else I can say.”
“For starters, you can tell me more about this great stakeout. What made you break cover and knock on his door?”
“The woman,” Axton said.
“Explain.”
“Well, she came over from the diner.”
“So?”
“So, I was thinking maybe she’d been waiting for him. Looking out for him, you know? And when he pulled in, after just a couple minutes, there she went, straight to his room.”
“Which made you think that she was what?” Halsey spoke through his scowl. “Some kind of secret agent?”
“Well, she didn’t have the hooker look,” Axton replied. “Not with her clothes on, anyway.”
Halsey considered that. He’d seen the “hooker look,” of course. Who hadn’t, if they spent an hour in Los Angeles? But out-call girls weren’t forced to advertise their wares on street corners.
“I’ve got bad news for you,” Halsey told Axton. “Or, I should say, more bad news.”
“Oh, yeah? What’s that? You find out Cooper is your long-lost uncle?”
“This is not the time for you to be a smart-ass, Luther.”
“Sorry,” Axton said, almost convincingly.
“What I found out, using an ounce of brains, is that he made a call to Tiger Girls last night, from the motel. You ever hear of Tiger Girls, Luther?”
“Some kind of wildlife deal?”
“You’re close. An escort service in Berdoo.”
Axton looked queasy. “How in hell was I supposed to know that, Clay?”
“Same way I got it,” Halsey told him. “Made believe I was a cop and conned the motel’s manager to check it out. Something a chief of security might’ve considered, if he wasn’t stewed to the gills.”
“I hear you, Clay. How can I make it up to you?”
“For starters,” Halsey said, “you’ll need to eat some crow.”
“All right,” he replied, sounding disgusted at the prospect.
“Luther, no one says you have to love this guy, but you will have to work with him. I’m bringing him on board, unless you’ve ruined it already. And you need to bear in mind that if it wasn’t for Matt Cooper, we’d be short our guns. And you’d be lying in a hole with Bobby D.”
“Yes, sir. I get it.”
“I hope so,” Halsey said. “For your sake.”
BOLAN WAS PUNCTUAL AND then some, rolling up to Halsey’s headquarters at 8:53 a.m. The morning was already warm, with an option on scorching, and he wore a nylon bush hat to shade his face, with chin strap to prevent the Nightster’s speed from blowing it away.
The usual collection of SUVs and sedans sat outside the NMM’s blockhouse when Bolan arrived. There was no sign of the previous night’s Chevy Aveo, however, and he had to wonder how Axton was feeling with the combined effects of a pistol-whipping and a hangover.
As Bolan parked the bike, Halsey emerged from the building, trailed by Larry Mosier. Their bruises from the brawl at Scoots were easing toward the green-and-yellow stage that always made a fighter’s face resemble an experiment in camouflage.
“You came,” Halsey said with a cautious smile.
“You sound surprised,” Bolan replied.
“I am, a little. When I heard about last night, the stunt that Luther pulled, I wondered if we’d seen the last of you.”
Bolan kept it casual. “No reason one thing has to influence the other.”
“I’m relieved to hear you say that, Major.”
“Once again, I haven’t been a major since they showed me the door.”
“Their loss, our gain. At least, I hope so,” Halsey said. “And in that vein, please come inside.”
Bolan’s eyes were still adjusting to the dimmer light of the HQ’s interior when he saw Axton standing with an older, heavier man dressed in a blue denim leisure suit. Axton’s expression telegraphed discomfort. His companion’s florid complexion might have been due to exposure, booze, or a mixture of both.
