Mack Bolan pushed his Firebird eastward, the satchel full of cash on the seat beside him as he left the Club Uhuru, rolling through the heart of Liberty City toward his next target destination. The numbers were falling now, with half a dozen stops to make and no time left to waste.

Liberty City was Miami's ghetto, tucked away just south of the Opa-locka airport, out of sight for most of white Miami, and largely out of mind. On many city maps it was a blank space, the streets ignored as most of the neighborhood's population had also been ignored until very recently.

Black rage had torn the neighborhood apart in recent months, and the scars of that explosion were still visible. The fuse was still sputtering, and every public official in Miami knew that it was only a matter of time until more violence rocked the area. Suspicion, hatred and paranoia on both sides had made the area a pressure cooker, and the lid was ready to blow if someone turned the heat up, even fractionally.

Bolan's target was a numbers countinghouse some six blocks over from the Club Uhuru. The Executioner knew that all the front men and the players would be black, but it was still a Mafia franchise, run behind the scenes by one Dukey Aiuppa.

Aiuppa's real name was Vincenzo, but he won his street name from a string of welterweight bouts he fought professionally before discovering that punching men — or women and children — outside the ring brought higher pay.

Instead of knockouts now, he had a sheet of thirty-five arrests behind him, without a single conviction. A Brooklyn transplant who had worked his way up through the local ranks, Aiuppa ruled his ghetto fiefdom like a colonial warlord, surrounded by stormtroops of all nationalities and colors, reaping sky-high profits from a people mired in poverty and filth.

Aiuppa's countinghouse was tucked away above a pool hall frequented by pimps and pushers. Bolan found his target and parked the Firebird a half block down, unable to get closer because of the Cadillacs and Lincolns lined against the curb on either side of the street. He walked back, feeling hostile eyes upon him as pedestrians turned to stare at his expensive tan-colored suit, dark-brown silk shirt and white silk tie. He drew grim comfort from the Beretta 93-R, which he wore beneath his left arm in a shoulder harness.

He reached the pool hall, pushed on through the swinging doors in front. The pool hall proper was in semidarkness, but he was still able to pick out the scattering of players grouped around two tables on his left. They were watching him, whispering among themselves, but Bolan ignored them, moving between the other deserted tables and on to a flight of wooden stairs set against the back wall of the long, narrow room.

A black man stood on guard at the base of the stairs, watching Bolan approach. He stood with arms crossed, back against the banister, prepared to block the Executioner's progress.

"What's happenin'?"

"I'm looking for the Duke," Bolan told him.

"He ain't expectin' any visitors."

Bolan flashed a stony grin.

"Well, let's surprise him."

"He don't like surprises, man."

The Executioner shrugged, the smile softening.

"In that case..."

He moved as if to push on up the stairs past the strong-arm, then pivoted with lightning speed as the guy tried to block him. Bolan ducked beneath a looping right cross, driving the rigid fingers of one hand deep beneath the black man's rib cage, punching the wind out of him and doubling him over.

The Executioner seized an arm and twisted it behind the slugger's back, high up between his shoulders. Then Bolan put his full weight behind the movement as he drove the man into the wall beside the stairs. One hard knee rocketed in, found a kidney once, twice, and the muscle slid to the floor in a boneless sprawl, leaving a blood smear along the wall where his face had made bruising contact with the plaster.

Bolan mounted the stairs, three at a time, barging on through an unguarded door at the top of the landing.

Five startled faces turned to face him, only two of them black. The men were ringed around a small desk piled with money — both bills and coins — and several thousand crumpled betting slips. Bolan quickly recognized the Duke of Liberty City by his broken nose and cauliflower ear.

The soldier nearest to the door was in his shirtsleeves, wearing iron exposed beneath his arm. He was already moving out to intercept Bolan, but the Executioner brushed past him, not giving any one of them a chance to think coherently.

"Hey, what's this crap?" he demanded, managing to sound outraged as he gesticulated toward the betting slips and cash. "You were supposed to have it packed and ready."

Aiuppa glanced at the closest of his aides, scowling as his eyes returned to Bolan.

"Pack what? Where's Jackson? Who the hell are you?"

Bolan knew that Jackson would be sleeping off their brief encounter at the bottom of the stairs.

"You didn't get the word?"

"What word?"

Bolan glared at the Duke. He sounded both suspicious and confused, but he was talking now instead of shooting, and that meant Bolan had a chance to pull it off.

A slim one, yeah — but still a chance.

"The Feds have got a raid lined up," Bolan snapped, checking his watch for emphasis. "With any luck, you may have twenty minutes."

Aiuppa raised a hand, as if asking permission to leave a classroom.

"Hang on there, slick. You can't just waltz in here and..."

"You wanna dick around and flush this bankroll down the crapper?" Bolan asked him furiously. "You think you can afford it, Dukev?"

Aiuppa bristled.

"I guess you'd better tell me just exactly who the hell you are, guy."

Bolan reached into his suit coat, seeing all of them tense, hands edging toward their holstered weapons. He brought out the black ace and skimmed it across the desk at Aiuppa. It landed on a pile of twenties and fifties, directly in front of the welterweight.

Aiuppa stared down at it for a moment as if trying to make sense of what he saw. Looking at Bolan now, Aiuppa seemed hesitant, a touch of fear behind the burning eyes.

"It's been awhile since I saw one of these," he said at last, his voice a bit subdued.

"They're back in style."

Aiuppa's right hand slipped down out of sight, below the lip of the desk top, and Bolan was braced for him to make a move — but now the hand was coming up, still empty, resting palm down on the desk among the bills and coins.

"I'm gonna need authority for this,'' the mobster said.

"You're looking at it."

Aiuppa straightened up, his shoulders flexing.

"It ain't enough,'' he said flatly.

Bolan tried to put a touch of sympathy into his mocking smile.

"Okay. You wanna tell the man you pissed away — what is it there, a quarter mil? "

Aiuppa hesitated again, but found the guts to call Bolan's supreme bluff.

"I'll have to take the chance.''

Bolan spread his hands in a helpless gesture.

"You called it, Duke," he said. "You live with it — if you can."

Bolan was turning to leave the crowded little office, one hand already sliding toward the open flap of his jacket, when the office door banged open and the black sentry reeled into the room.

There was a pistol in his hand, and he was spluttering with rage, mumbling through battered lips in confusion.

Bolan did not let him have the time to polish up his speech. He chopped down on the man's gun hand with his own hard right, seizing the hood's arm simultaneously and whipping him around. The human projectile hurtled across the room, impacting on the desk and scattering men, money and betting slips in all directions.

The battered gunner ended up atop the desk, his bloody face almost in Duke Aiuppa's lap, driving the Mafia capo backward, hard against the wall.