“Damn, I’m hit.” It was Rip’s voice in his ear, and he looked left, where the kid was rolling back and forth in the grass. The Korean who’d shot him was coming on fast to finish him off, but Spartan whipped around and shot him sideways in the head.
“Cobra!” Alex’s voice startled Morgan in his ear. “You better do something. That truck’s getting a hard-on!”
Morgan twisted around and looked at the truck. Something was rising from the cargo bay, a canopy of camouflage netting sliding slowly off toward the back. Launch tubes...Shit!
“Alex,” he said. “You got eyes on Collins?”
“Negative. He might be in the van.”
Morgan spun left again. But either he was out of ammo or his AK had jammed. He was coming straight for Diesel and pulling a knife from his chest rig. Diesel got up and looked at him. Morgan heard him say, “Nah, don’t feel like dancing tonight.” And he shot him.
“Pipe!” Morgan said over the comms. “Take that van!”
Pipe got up on his knees, pulled a LAW tube from the rig on his back, popped it open, dropped it on his shoulder and fired. A long gout of flame spat from the back and the rocket hissed across the field and blew the van into a roofless mess of flaming seats and hissing tires.
Morgan was already up, pounding across the field. His knee was screaming, and the heavy SOCOM was slowing him down, so he dropped it on the run and pulled a Browning Hi-Power from his thigh holster.
The eighteen-wheeler loomed in front of him. One last Korean burst from the left side of the cab and came running around the front. Morgan dropped him with a doubletap on the run. Then he saw Collins.
The general was hunkered down near the truck’s rear bumper, his back toward Morgan, gripping an MBITR module in his left hand and punching its keys. But as Morgan came on, Collins sensed his presence. He spun around with a .45 at the end of his arm, and both men stopped at ten paces, muzzle to muzzle.
“You’re getting to be a pain in my ass, Dan.” Collins was breathing hard, his flushed cheeks streaked with sweat.
“Feeling’s mutual, Jim. But it’s over. So put it down.”
“For what?” Collins scoffed. “A noose at Leavenworth?”
Morgan glanced to left and up. Conley’s bird was sliding broadside into position, hovering a hundred meters out. He could see Alex’s sniper barrel glinting, and the rotor wash was fluttering the grass. Then his eye caught something else. It was a red car, racing along Tang Avenue toward him. But he focused back on Collins as it crossed over the clay track and eased to a stop, facing him and Collins at twenty feet. The flames from the burning van flickered in its windshield.
The door opened, and Bishop got out. He was gripping a black .357 Desert Eagle. But he didn’t point it at Morgan. He was training the barrel on the car.
“Well, lookie here.” Collins grinned. “It’s the flip side of fate.”
“That’s me,” Bishop said as he walked slowly backward and aligned the handgun barrel with the trunk. “The grim stinking reaper. Now Morgan, drop the piece and send the general over to me.”
“Right, asshole.” Morgan snarled. “For what?”
“For your wife,” Bishop said. His smile was now triumphant.
Morgan glanced down at the license plate and a wave of nausea rushed up to his throat.
“Dad, that’s our car!” Alex’s desperation moaned in his ear.
“Bullshit,” Morgan to Bishop said. “So you jacked her car. Think I’m gonna fall for that?”
“Tell you what,” Bishop said. His barrel was now angled straight down at the trunk. “I’ll fire one round, and then you can decide if I’m bullshitting.”
Spartan, Diesel, and Pipe had appeared around the rear of the burning van. They all had their weapons trained on Bishop.
“You slimy traitor,” Spartan called out.
Bishop laughed. “That’s all you got, Spartan? I’ll be far away and filthy rich while you’re still trying to figure out if you’re a girl.”
“You’re bluffing,” Morgan called out to Bishop. “Show her to me.”
“Dad!” Alex pleaded in his ear. “I can take him!”
“No,” Morgan snapped to Alex as his gun still pointed at Collins. “His finger might twitch.”
“Fair enough,” said Bishop. “But first, guns on the ground.”
Morgan looked over at his team. He nodded. They reluctantly bent and put their SOCOMs on the ground. Bishop raised his chin at Morgan.
“You too.”
Morgan had no choice. He cursed and leaned over, letting the Hi Power fall. Bishop grinned wider and walked around to the Camry’s rear bumper. With Collins still pointing his .45 at Morgan’s head, and everyone else with their hands empty, he was top dog now. Alex wouldn’t try for a shot with him hovering over her mother. He tipped the barrel of his Desert Eagle up and thumbed the trunk button on the key fob.
It opened, and the last thing he saw was the gaping maw of a twelve-gauge shotgun. It exploded two feet from his face. He snapped back and went airborne in a spray of lead pellets and gore.
Morgan ducked as Collins fired the .45. The round singed his hair, but he dove under the gun and hit Collins with everything he had. The general went down on his back. Morgan gripped the barrel and wrenched it out of his hand, but it slipped from his fingers and went spinning off as Collins snapped his shin up and connected with Morgan’s groin.
Morgan grunted hard and collapsed as Collins scrambled out from under him, clutched the MBITR, and started sprinting away, across the clay track. Morgan struggled up and chased after him. To his right, he heard the launch tubes lock, and their nose doors clang open.
Collins was running, gripping the MBITR module in his left hand, punching his right fingers at the
