The 'federal agent's' voice was cautious in its own right now.
'No specifics yet. You'll have to trust me.'
'That's a rare commodity.' Wilson hesitated, thinking it over briefly. 'I'd like to take a look at what I'm walking into.'
'Fair enough.'
LaMancha briefed him quickly, sticking to the basics, but it was enough to put a sour taste in Wilson's mouth and set his stomach rolling. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, he had a hunch that blossomed into inspiration, revelation.
LaMancha was about to hang up, and the captain blurted out, 'Hey, Mack!'
A heartbeat's hesitation, barely noticeable, on the other end of the line.
'The name's still Frank.'
'Oh... right.' Wilson suddenly felt foolish, asinine. 'Uh... listen... thanks for the tip, okay?'
'No sweat. Just don't be late.'
The line went dead and Wilson cradled his receiver, puzzling over his hunch for a moment, finally dismissing it. He set about his business, waking people and making sure they would be exactly where he needed them, precisely when their services were called for.
Like Phil Sacco on the other side of town, Bob Wilson was calling in his forces, right, preparing for a good old-fashioned shooting war.
Toro's driver braked the Cadillac beneath some trees, partially sheltering the car from the nearest streetlight. Inside the car the faces of his troops were lost in shadows.
It was almost dawn, and yet the sunrise had not touched the northern part of Miami. It lingered on the ocean, painting beaches gray, then pink and gold, finally creeping in past the beachfront hotels, and only then descending on the residential districts with its warming touch, bringing the world to life.
This morning, in the vanguard of the dawn, Toro and his men had come not with life, but with death in their hearts. They were on a military mission and the setting made no difference, tactically, to their procedures or their goals.
They had come for Raoul Ornelas, and they would have him, or all six of them would die in the attempt.
The target was a ranch-style home in a fashionable part of the North Miami suburb. Sitting in the Caddy with a weapon in his lap, Toro reflected bitterly that Ornelas had not only betrayed the cause but he had also physically deserted his people, putting himself beyond their reach from the stews of Little Havana. Ornelas was a man apart, attempting to eke out a place for himself above the battle.
But this day, El Toro meant to bring him down.
The place was built for status and appearances instead of defense. A six-foot decorative wall surrounded the acre of grounds, and the house was set well back behind a manicured lawn, partially screened by trees. But this was not a fortress. They could encounter danger there, even death, but not before they made their way inside.
In seconds, all of them had left the Cadillac and scaled the wall, regrouping in the shadows and waiting for instructions from their leader. Toro went through all of it again, to be on the safe side, substituting hand gestures for words whenever possible, keeping his eyes and ears alert for the danger of dogs or watchmen.
He had deliberately timed the raid to coincide with sunrise, from knowledge of Ornelas's plans for the morning, and because the early morning brought a natural sluggishness to men on watch. A sentry's natural defenses lagged at sunrise, and with his meager force behind him, Toro knew he could use every single advantage available.
Ornelas had sentries posted, but they were all immediately around the house, and they were not alert enough to save themselves from death as it came creeping toward them through the morning mist.
Toro and his five warriors fanned out, moving low and fast across the lawn like silent shadows, gliding in the face of sunrise, closing on the house with lightning strides.
Emiliano took one sentry with his silenced Ruger automatic. One shot, with the bulky suppressor almost touching the base of the target's skull, and the little .22-caliber round cored through bone and muscle, clipping the stem of the brain.
Toro made the second kill himself, slipping a noose of piano wire over a young man's head and bringing it tight around his throat. The wire bit deep, cutting off his wind and releasing a Niagara of blood as the soldier struggled briefly in Toro's grasp, finally relaxing into death.
Toro's group circled back around the house, encountering no more resistance, and they found a service entrance in the rear. Ornelas was coming up in the world, the Cuban warrior thought. High time that someone put him back in touch with the grim realities of their unending war for freedom.
In a war you executed traitors, yes. But sometimes, given opportunity, a trial could be instructive.
They pushed on through the service entrance, barging into a combination kitchen and pantry with Juanito leading, his Uzi probing out ahead of him and seeking targets. He found them in the kitchen, three more pistoleros, chowing down on breakfast prior to relieving their comrades on the outside watch.
In the heartbeat before everything exploded into chaos, Toro recognized one of the men, a former follower who had defected to Ornelas, seduced by his promises of action and material rewards.
The guards were digging for sidearms, fanning out quickly, professionally. Juanito snarled and held the trigger down on his little Israeli stuttergun, raking the kitchen from left to right and back again, riddling pots and pans, puncturing the microwave oven and refrigerator with 9mm parabellum rounds.
He caught one of the guards retreating through a connecting doorway, helped him get there with a blazing figure eight that split his spine and blew him away. A second figure was peeling off to the left, crouching behind the dining table as he brought a gun to bear upon the small invasion force, but he was not quite fast enough. Another Uzi burst removed his face with something less than surgical precision, scattering his brains across a wall.
The third man actually got a shot off before the weapons of all six invaders bore down on him, opening fire as one and blowing him backward, a riddled, leaking straw man suddenly devoid of any life.
They swept on past the human ruins, robbed of their surprise advantage now, knowing that they might run into anything beyond the pantry door. What Toro had not quite expected was the sumptuous living room, complete with curving staircase leading to the upper floor and bedrooms. Everything was hardwood, dark, crushed velvet, carpet deep enough to hide in if you bellied down.
A shotgun boomed its greeting from the stairs, and Toro's squad scattered, going to ground behind the ornate pieces of furniture. Mano was slow, and the second shotgun blast caught him in midstride, lifting him off his feet and spinning him around before dumping him facedown on the carpeting. He was dead before he hit the floor, and from his place of bare concealment, Toro could already see the small
Above them and across the room, the shotgunner was getting overconfident. He showed himself, looking for another target. It was his last mistake. Toro raised the .45 he carried, sighting quickly down the slide and squeezing off a double punch, even as Juanito stroked a burst out of his lethal Uzi from the other side of the room.
The shotgunner was crucified to the wall, leaving long streaked traces of himself as he slid away, finally coming down head over heels, landing in an untidy heap at the foot of the staircase.
Toro and his survivors took the stairs in a rush, mounting them swiftly. They were alert to danger, but the final gunner took them by surprise, looming around the corner of the second-story landing, banging away almost in their faces with the nickel-plated revolver that he carried.
Juanito took a round between the eyes, another in the Adam's apple, dead before his trigger finger clenched, unloading the Uzi's magazine in one last, long ragged burst. He took the gunner with him, riddling the man right where he stood and sweeping him away. His job completed, little Juanito collapsed facedown on the risers, his Uzi trapped beneath his lifeless body as he fell.
They took the bedrooms one by one, crashing each in turn until they reached what was clearly the master's room. Toro gave the door a flying kick and they edged back from the open portal, waiting for a burst of fire that never came.
The room was empty, rumpled bed and scattered nightclothes bearing testimony to the fact that their quarry had been there only moments earlier. Without speaking, El Toro began a rapid search of the room, looking
