plane.'
He accelerated through the gears, speeding the Chevy down the dirt road they'd been driving along for the last ten miles. Abruptly, he started to slow down, at the same time punching the lights off As they neared the crash site, he killed the engine. The sound of the gunfire grew louder. He eased the car to the side of the road.
'Paul,' he said to Rubenstein. 'You want one of my pistols or the rifle?'
'Let me try the rifle.'
'Fine.' Rourke reached into the back seat, removed the scope cover and showed Rubenstein where the safety lever was. He worked the bolt and introduced a round into the chamber. Fishing in his pockets, he found the two spare five-round magazines for the SteyrMannlicher 550 that he had brought along and handed them to Rubenstein. 'Just look through the scope. When you see the image clearly-with your glasses on-it should pretty much fill the scope. Get the crosshairs over your target and squeeze the front trigger. You'll be a terror with it. Come on.'
Rourke threw open the driver's door and started for the rocks, Rubenstein behind him. The sound of the gunfire was dying now, and above it, they could hear muted voices calling back and forth to each other. By the time both men had climbed up into the rocks and looked down onto the flatland below, the gunfire had totally ceased.
Rubenstein, beside Rourke, rasped, 'Oh my God-we were too late!'
'Yeah,' Rourke said, reaching under his coat and stripping a Detonics from under his left shoulder with his right hand. He had two more full magazines with him. 'They're starting to move out,' he said, peering toward the campsite. As best as he could tell, all the passengers had been killed. The bikers-nearly two dozen of them-were going through the baggage, which they had spread on the ground. He watched as they came to the body of a woman-from the distance, Rourke couldn't be sure, but the blue skirt and the blonde hair made him think it was the stewardess, Sandy Benson. He saw one of the bikers bend over her and take his own glinting Metalifed six-inch Colt Python from the ground beside the woman.
'Give me the rifle,' Rourke whispered to Rubenstein.
Taking the SSG, spreading his feet along the ground, and snugging the butt of the stock into his shoulder, Rourke squinted through the telescopic sight, settled the crosshairs on the biker standing by the stewardess, and pulled the first of the twin, double-set triggers. The man stood and whirled around toward the exploding dust behind him. Settling the crosshairs on the biker's forehead, Rourke pulled the rear trigger. He touched the first trigger, the SSG rocked against his shoulder, and the .308's 165-grain boat-tail bullet split the biker's forehead like it was a ripe melon. The man's body fell back in a heap on the ground.
As the other bikers started to react, Rourke speed-cocked the bolt and leveled the SteyrMannlicher again. A biker wearing a Nazi helmet was sitting on a three-wheeled bike. Rourke felt he didn't need as much finesse on this shot-he worked the forward trigger all the way through, without using the rear trigger. The helmeted biker threw his hands to his chest and fell back, his bike collapsing to the side as his body hurtled over.
Rourke worked the bolt again. There was a woman biker, her arms laden with belongings of the dead passengers. She was running across the camp. Rourke swung the scope along her path. A bald biker, riding a big, heavily chromed street machine, was waving frantically for her.
Rourke followed her with the scope as she crossed the camp, past the bodies of the murdered passengers. As she reached out to touch the hand of the bald biker, Rourke fired, killing the bald man with a round in the left temple. He speed-cocked the Steyr's bolt, and swung the scope to the woman. He couldn't hear her above the sounds of the motorcycles revving in the camp area now, but through the scope he could see her mouth opening and closing. He imagined she was screaming. She dropped to her knees, and he shifted the scope downward a few degrees and pulled through on the first trigger. The rifle's gilding metal-jacketed slug skated over the bridge of the woman's nose smashing a crimson red hole into her forehead. Her body snapped back, then her head lolled forward, as though in death she was somehow still praying not to die.
Rourke swapped magazines on the sniper rifle, worked the bolt action, and clipped a biker with bright hair in the right side of his neck. His bike half-climbed a small rise, then rolled over. Rourke worked the bolt again. He swung the scope onto another biker. Like one of his earlier kills, this man was wearing a Nazi helmet. Rourke fired. The Steyr's 165-grain boat-tail soft-point splattered against the right side of the helmet. The biker threw his hands up and fell from his motorcycle. He rolled over and then lay still.
Rourke worked the bolt, swinging the scope along the ground. He spotted another biker in a sleeveless denim jacket with a gang name across its back-the only thing, Rourke thought, that distinguished him. The biker crawled along the ground, then got to his feet and broke into a dead run for a group of bikers to Rourke's left. Rourke fired and hit the biker in the back. The impact threw the man's body forward on his face into the dirt.
Rourke swung the scope, working the bolt action fast and ripping the last three shots into the group of bikers whom the last man he'd killed had been running toward. Three bodies fell. The other three jumped onto their machines. Rourke swapped magazines on the Steyr and brought the rifle back to his shoulder, firing twice more, killing two more of the bikers as their machines moved out of the campsite.
He brought the rifle down from his shoulder and clicked the safety on.
Rubenstein, lying on the rocks beside him, said, 'You just killed twelve men!'
'No,' Rourke said. 'Eleven men and one woman. Come on, let's see if any of the passengers are still alive down there.'
Chapter Thirty-two
Rourke tossed the rifle to Rubenstein and started running along the rocks down toward the campsite. The wind started to whip up from the lower ground, catching the dark Stetson he wore and blowing it from his head. He ran the long fingers of his right hand through his hair, then reached under his coat and snatched out one of the Detonics pistols-in case any of the bikers had survived his fire and decided to return it. As he reached the flat space beneath the rocks, he broke into a crouching run toward the lifeless form of Sandy Benson.
He dropped to his knees beside her, rolled the body of the dead biker away, and leaned over the girl. He raised her head in his hands. She opened her eyes. Her blonde hair fell back from her face, as she looked up and smiled at him.
Rourke said, 'Like I told you before-you got a pretty smile, Sandy.'
'I knew you'd come-I knew it, Mr. Rourke.' Her head fell back, and after a moment, Rourke bent over and kissed her forehead. He closed her eyelids with the tips of his fingers, then rested her head back down on the ground. He found his Python beside her in the dirt, picked it up, and opened the cylinder. All six rounds had been fired.
