San Diego Siege

hits and splits, and when he's gone, there ain't nobody around to tell what happened.'

'Exactly.' Lucasi tossed the medal again and deliberately let it fall to the floor. 'So who's got my goddamn hundred thou, Diver?'

'It sounds fishy, all right,' the captain agreed.

'You go out and help talk to Sammy.'

The large man grinned sourly and went out.

Lucasi lit a cigar and worked furiously at it until the tip was glowing fiercely, then he walked stiffly out of the room, along a short hallway to his sleeping quarters.

He went directly to the bed and whipped the covers away from the nude woman who was sleeping there. He yelled, 'Outta that rack, you lazy bitch!'

Dorothy Lucasi sleepily sat up, swinging the long Vegas-showgirl legs over the side of the bed. 'Are you crazy, Bennie?' she inquired in a practiced monotone. She often asked him that, in the same tone of voice.

His wife stood a full head taller than Lucasi. He glowered at her as she lurched to her feet and looked about dazedly for her dressing gown. Instead of helping her find the wrap, he yelled, 'Yeah, I'm crazy to have married a floozy like you!' Lucasi often said that, also.

'You get some clothes on that million dollar meat and hustle it into the kitchen. It's seven o'clock and I goddammit want something to eat!'

She was sleepily complaining, 'Why can't Frenchy fix … ?' when her chin dropped and the words quit coming.

Lucasi thought at first that she was looking at him in some new way he'd never yet seen, then he knew that her transfixed gaze was going beyond him and onto something behind him.

A chill seized his spine and shook it, and he turned slowly to find the object of his wife's rarely undiluted attention.

A big tall guy was just standing there against the wall, next to the window — and he must have been there all the while. He was dressed all in black, with guns and belts and things strapped all over him, and that face was like carved out of Mount Rushmore, except for the peculiarly hot-icy eyes that smouldered out of that deepfreeze.

Yeah. Bolan had come to town, all right.

Lucasi felt himself crumbling inside.

His voice sounded high and squeaky to himself as he told the impressive apparition in black, 'So. Sammy had it straight.'

The guy wasn't even holding a gun on him ... the wise cock. He was just standing there, sort of relaxed, staring a hole through Ben Lucasi.

The seconds ticked away, silently. Dorothy sat back down on the bed and modestly covered her lap with a sheet. It was the first act of modesty on her part that Ben Lucasi had ever been aware of. He found himself wondering about the effect this guy had on the dames.

Presently Lucasi cleared his throat and said, 'Uh, what do you want, eh?'

'Harlan Winters,' the guy replied, and it was a voice straight out of hell.

'Who?' the Mafia chieftain nervously inquired.

Dorothy giggled, like some nut. 'Harlie Winters,' she said, very helpfully.

'He ain't here,' Lucasi declared quickly, wishing he could bust that broad right in the nose.

'He's dead,' the big guy said.

Lucasi whispered, 'God I'm sorry, I didn't know that.'

'Friend of yours?'

The guy sure didn't use many words.

'Uh, well... in a way. We, uh ... met once or twice.' He snapped a quick glance toward his wife. She was wearing a shocked face. He hoped to God she'd keep her flannel mouth shut and he kept right on talking to edge her out, just in case.

'Winters was a nice man, God — that's terrible. How'd he die?'

'The hard way,' the cold voice intoned. 'Scattered all over his study.'

Lucasi shivered. What kind of cat and mouse game was this? Why God why had he sent Diver and the other boys outside to ask dumb questions of poor Sammy?

So, he had to stall the guy as long as possible, that was the only thing left. God, he didn't even have a gun in here.

He took a deep breath and said, 'Look, I don't know why you're coming telling me this. Uh ... you're Bolan, right? I knew that, I knew it right away. Look man, you're barking up a hollow tree this time. I got no beef with you at all, nothing. So you knocked over one of my messengers, okay. Hell with it, easy come easy go, that's the way I look at it. I mean, I got no beef. So you hit this Harlan Winters, okay, like I said, I met 'im once or twice, no big deal. No beef. Now, way I see it....'

Bolan said, 'Save your breath.' The cold gaze flicked to a watch at his wrist. 'You've got twenty seconds.'

'For what?' Lucasi cried.

'I'm looking for tracks, Bennie.'

'What kind of tracks?'

'Who wanted Winters dead?'

'What? You mean you didn't ... ?'

'I didn't,' the icy bastard clipped back. 'Who did?'

Lucasi passed a shaking hand over his face. He sighed. Then he said, 'Hell, I can't imagine. Why don't you ask Thornton. Maxwell Thornton, the big shot. Yeah. Ask him.'

Bolan assured him, 'I will.' Another quick glance at the wristwatch, then, 'You and the lady get out of here. Close the door behind you.'

'You mean that's ... ?'

'Yeah, that's all for now.' Something that might have been a smile flickered across those cold features. 'Be seeing you, Bennie.'

Lucasi muttered, 'Yeah,' in a choked voice as he grabbed Dorothy and shoved her out the door. He followed quickly and pulled the door firmly shut, then he left her standing there stupid naked in the hallway and ran shouting into the main part of the house.

Then he saw them through the sliding glass doors to the patio — all his boys — with their tails on the cement and their hands clasped atop their heads.

A couple other guys, dressed just like Bolan, were just then disappearing over the wall... and Ben Lucasi knew that he had been very neatly had all the way.

The son of a bitch had just walked in and taken over!

And for what?

For what tracks?

His goddamn khaki Mafia, for God's sake!

But what tracks?

5 The mission

They had departed the Lucasi neighborhood on diverging routes and regrouped ten minutes later on a bluff overlooking Mission Bay Park, the city's most popular water playground.

Blancanales still drove the bread truck he'd used in scouting the Winters home. Schwarz had coverted Bolan's 'warwagon,' a Ford Econoline van, into a mobile electronics workshop — and this remained as his base of operations.

Bolan himself was driving a 'hot scout' — a speedy, high-maneuverable, European sports car.

This was their first chance to regroup and report since the hit on Sammy Simonetti at the airport. Each man