Chicago Wipe-Out

the direction of his explanation. 'I changed the battle plan a little — and now it's their offensive, not mine. And, yeah, they'll be searching.'

'Well, what are we going to do?' She emerged from the bath and went to the parcels Bolan had brought in earlier. Her eyes collided with the Beretta and Bkipped hastily away.

He slipped into his shirt and muttered, 'Does the gun bother you?'

'That's the first real gun I've ever seen,' she said. 'I had no idea they looked so... so menacing.'

'The word is deadly,' he told her. 'And this one's a jewel. I picked it up in France. Worked in the trigger for a four-pound pull, which means she blasts if you breathe hard on her. She'll target eight rounds into a two-inch grouping from thirty yards, and it takes less than a second to reload. Carries nine- millimeter Parabellum hi-shockers, and she'll put a crease in a guy that would make a tommy-gun green with envy.'

'Why are you telling me all this?' she asked quietly.

'Just want you to know what you're traveling with. If I suddenly yell down, that means you dematerialize and reassemble yourself on the ground or on the floor, wherever you happen to be. It means that the Beretta Belle is leaving her leather behind, and she comes out blasting, and we don't want any beloved flesh getting into her path. Understood?'

Jimi murmured, 'Understood,' and withdrew a scruff of silk from a paper bag. 'Oh wow,' she said. 'Heart shaped panties. Where'd you say you bought these things?'

He said, 'Don't change the subject. I want you to...'

'I liked that part about beloved flesh,' she told him impiously. 'And don't worry about me getting in your way. If you yell down, I'll just faint. Would that put me out of the way quick enough?'

Bolan said, 'Not hardly. I could be working on the second load before you could topple over. When I say down, I mean this.' He showed her what he meant, going from full perpendicular to flat horizontal in a heartbeat.

The girl's eyelids fluttered. She sank to her knees and showed him a teasing smile. 'Now I know where you got your boudoir prowess,' she said. 'You learned it on the battlefield.'

He got to his feet and barked, 'Do it!'

Her eyes fluttered some more and she replied, 'You're really serious.'

'I've never been more serious in my life. It's a jungle out there we have to get through, Jimi. You have to know how to survive it.' He pulled her upright and said, 'Okay, now show me. Down.'

Jungle Jimi went down, then she rolled onto her back and lay there laughing. 'I can't wait to show the Foxy Ladies,' she giggled. 'How'd I do?'

'Okay,' he growled. Again he pulled her upright, turned his back on her, said 'Get dressed, dammit,' and took two steps across the room. Then he cried, 'Down' and flung himself to the floor in a lightning scramble, rolling back towards the girl with the Beretta out at full extension.

She was standing where he'd left her, frozen, the heart-shaped panties in her hands, gaping at him.

'Dammit, I just cut your legs off at the knees,' he told her.

'I — I wasn't expecting you to say it,' she explained.

'That's the whole point.' He got up and found his trousers and put them on. 'That's the way it happens, when it happens.' He snapped his fingers. 'Like that. And you better be flexed to react like that, if you mean to stay alive.'

The seriousness of the situation was beginning to impress itself on her. She carried the clothing to the bed and began dressing. Her hands trembled, and she was having other difficulties. Bolan went over to help her. 'What a rotten end to such a lovely honeymoon,' she said miserably.

'It beats dying,' he pointed out.

Tears sprang to her eyes. 'Oh Mack, how can you live this way?' she wailed.

He dug out a bra and hung it on her. 'If I don't live this way,' he softly explained, 'I die quick.'

'But on and on and on. Isn't there any end to it?'

He fastened the bra and told her, 'Sure, there's an end. But I'm in no hurry to get there.'

'It's like the law of the jungle,' she whispered. 'Survival of the fittest, kill or be killed, no quarter, damn the torpedoes, all that.'

'That,' he whispered back, 'is exactly what I've been trying to tell you. Now listen to me. The storm has hit. All the airlines are grounded. The highways are closing. Trains have stopped running. There's no way I can get you out of this town. And we can't hole up, that gives the mob all the advantage of the hunt. We have to go out there, and we have to keep moving, and we have to keep alive. Out there, Jimi, in that jungle. Are you fit to survive?'

Bolan had achieved the desired effect. The soft shoulders stiffened and fiercely she said, 'You're damn right.'

'Then stop shaking and start dressing. Every minute could be vital.'

'I'm in your way, aren't I,' she declared quietly. 'I'm really just jeopardizing you.'

'No,' he lied. 'You're giving me a better reason to stay alive.' And maybe it wasn't all lie.

She pulled a pants-suit from the boutique box and held it to her. 'It's lovely,' she said. 'Everything you do is lovely, isn't it.'

He grinned and told her, 'Sure, I even kill lovely.'

'But only in the jungle,' she said, trying to sound cheerful again.

'That's right.'

She lunged forward suddenly and planted a wet kiss on his lips. 'Caught you, you're dead,' she whispered.

'Huh uh,' he replied. 'Alive. Totallyalive.'

She pushed him away and watched him from beneath lowered lashes as she stepped into the clothing. 'Girls have jungles too, you know,' she said. 'Just wait 'till I get youinto mine.'

'Hell, I've been there,' he said, grinning.

'Well, just wait 'till I get you backin there.'

Bolan turned quickly away to conceal the emotion surging into his eyes, covering with a noisy inspection of the Beretta. He hoped with everything he had that he would walk Jimi's beautiful jungle again one day. Right now, though, he had to safely escort her through his own.

And that, he knew, was going to take some doing.

6 And into the night

Larry Turk leaned forward to pat his wheelman's shoulder and to instruct him, 'Pull up over here, Gene.'

The driver nodded and eased the big car to the curb, halting diagonally across from the entrance to the Town Acres Motor Lodge. Visibility in the swirling, wind-driven snowfall was practically zero, and even the glittering neon tower of Town Acres was no more than a phosphorescent-like glow hovering in the sky.

Another vehicle nosed in behind Turk's car. Seconds later, crew chief Bernie Tosca blew into the rear seat beside Larry Turk, bringing in a puff of snowflakes with him.

Turk brushed delicately at his pants leg and growled, 'What a night to be out, eh?'

'Yeah.' Tosca wiped the freezing moisture from his face and blew into his hands. 'That's the place over there, huh?'

'That's it. Homer Peoples has the girl concession here. You know Homer?'

Tosca smiled nastily and replied, 'Who doesn't. Is this a sure make, boss?'

'Not all that sure,' Turk told him. 'Homer saw this white Ferrari in the parking lot. He went to the desk to