They had, of course, returned to check their score.

He should have seen it coming, known that on the second hit they would not risk another near-miss foul-up.

Hannon tugged at the Magnum. Its front sight snagged in the material of Evangelina's bloodstained blouse, digging into a lifeless breast. He tried to curse, but at the moment he could muster nothing louder than a whimper.

The hitter raised a weapon — Hannon recognized it as an Uzi — and he racked the cocking lever back to chamber up a round.

"It's checkout time," the hitter told him, grinning.

Hannon closed his eyes and let the darkness carry him away.

Bolan saw the flashing multicolored lights ahead and started braking, letting other traffic pass him by, already looking for a place to park the dark, unmarked sedan. He had exchanged the car for Evangelina's conspicuous sportster an hour earlier, meaning to return her car later, but now he feared that he would never have the chance.

He had been drawn there by a shooting broadcast over the portable police-band monitor he carried in the car. The dispatcher named John Hannon as a victim, fate unknown, and there was mention of an unnamed female in the car.

It was enough.

He drove now with a lead weight sitting in the center of his chest, precisely where his heart should be. He found a place on the grassy shoulder of the highway and scanned the scene up ahead: an ambulance, the back doors standing open; state police cars and other unmarked vehicles belonging to the men from Metro Homicide. The uniforms and plainclothes officers were mingling on the shoulder of the highway, watching as two paramedics carried a sheet-draped figure toward the open rear of the meat wagon. Inside, another body was visible, already strapped to a stretcher and ready to go.

Bolan felt the life drain out of him. His pulse was pounding in his ears. Across the narrow span of manicured grass a nondescript Chevrolet was buried nose into a hedge, and from where he sat the Executioner could see the shattered windows, the bullet holes that pocked the fading paint job.

A motorcycle cop in helmet, shades and jackboots was approaching him, one hand raised in warning as Bolan alighted from the car, his face carved into a scowl.

"I'm sorry, sir, you'll have to move along. This is official business."

Bolan let him see the fake credentials briefly, snapping the wallet shut and returning it to an inside pocket before the officer could study it in detail.

"LaMancha, Justice," he snapped. "It's as official as they come. Who's in charge here?"

"That's Captain Wilson, sir." The motor officer pointed through the little crowd of shifting bodies. "Over there."

Bolan followed his aim to a man in a gray three-piece suit. He was standing slightly apart from the rest, staring at the bullet-ridden Chevy. The name touched a bell in his memory, calling up fragmented images of another time, another Miami.

Wilson had worked under Hannon in Homicide, if he recalled correctly. And now he was in at the finish.

A finish for which warrior Bolan was at least partly responsible, yes.

Bolan moved toward Wilson, brushing past a pair of uniformed patrolmen. He passed the ambulance, refusing to look inside at the bloody shrouded figures.

At his approach, the captain turned, his reverie interrupted. He greeted the new arrival with a frown.

"Help you?"

Bolan waved the spurious credentials past his face and pocketed them again.

"Frank LaMancha, Justice."

Wilson's frown remained in place; if anything, it deepened.

"Bob Wilson, Metro," he replied. "Something here that interests you?"

"I caught the bulletin about your man."

When Wilson spoke again there was suppressed emotion in his voice.

"Not mine," he said at last. "He was retired."

"But working."

Wilson looked and sounded wary when he answered.

"Strictly private."

"Looks like someone made it public."

Wilson did not respond immediately. He was looking past Bolan now, back at the bullet-punctured car that had taken John Hannon on his last ride.

"I guess."

"You make the girl yet?" Bolan asked.

Wilson shook his head.

"Latino, probably a Cuban. Young. She had a gun, but no id. We're checking on it."

"Maybe you should try the federal building," Bolan told him.

The homicide detective raised an eyebrow. "Yeah? What was she, an informer?"

"It's not for me to say. I'd ask for SOG."

Wilson's stern face registered an immediate reaction, quickly covered by the frown. It was obvious to Bolan that the captain was familiar with the federal Sensitive Operations Group. Once headed by Hal Brognola, it was still closely supervised by the big Fed from Washington Wonderland, dealing in cases too sensitive for other federal agencies to handle comfortably.

"So," Wilson said, "it's like that, is it?"

Bolan kept it cryptic.

"Could be."

"Is that your interest?"

"Oh, I'm interested in a lot of things — like trucks and guns." He paused, letting that sink in before" he dropped the second shoe. "Like Jose 99."

Another reaction from Wilson, this one harder to conceal.

"You know the name?" Bolan prodded.

"I've heard it."

It was obvious to Bolan that the officer was holding something back.

"Know where I can find him?" he asked, probing.

Wilson made a disgusted face.

"If I did, he'd be downtown right now." He hesitated, clearly reluctant to say more, but finally continued, as if against his own better judgment. "The FBI says it has something on him from a routine wiretap on the Cuban embassy. He calls the cultural attache there from time to time. They haven't traced him yet."

"You tie him in with this?" Bolan asked.

"I wouldn't rule it out," the homicide detective answered. He cast an almost wistful glance in the direction of the ambulance. "It looks like John was really onto something after all."

"He never knew the half of it," the Executioner said.

"And you do?"

"I'm getting there."

But even as he spoke, Bolan knew he was no closer to solving the puzzle now than when he had first started. So far all he had were scattered, scrambled pieces of the puzzle, and collecting them had proved a very costly process. Someone would have to pay dearly for Bolan to break even.

And he was looking forward now to the collection of that debt.

"You ready to coordinate?" the homicide detective asked him, breaking in on Bolan's train of thought.

"It's premature," he answered.

"I see." Bob Wilson stared at Bolan. "I don't take well to being frozen out, LaMancha. This one cuts too close to home."

Mack Bolan read the emotion in his voice and realized that it was genuine.

"If I were you," he said, "I'd take a look at Tommy Drake."

"You're late," the officer replied. "He's history."

"He had connections," Bolan responded. "Some of them were interested in Hannon's work."

"I know about the Stomper," Wilson said.

"Then you know that he was acting under orders."

Wilson feigned incredulity.

"Really? What was your first clue?"

"No offense, Captain. It never pays to overlook the obvious."

"We won't be overlooking anything," Wilson answered, but his voice and face were softening already.

Bolan shifted gears, taking off along another tack.

"You know a Cuban activist named Raoul Ornelas?"

Wilson raised an eyebrow at the change of pace.

"Everybody knows Ornelas. He's Omega 7. Are you connecting him to this?"

Bolan shrugged again. "Omega 7 needs the hardware. Hannon might have been too close."

Wilson shook his head, a discouraging expression on his face. "You're drifting. First the Mob, then Cuban exiles. What's the angle?"