Backlash had been brewing in Miami, fueled by anger and frustration, seasoned with racial animosity. Gun sales were soaring, and old-line residents had started seeking safety in the suburbs, some abandoning the state entirely.

Dade County voters banned the use of public funds to encourage the use of any foreign language, burying a referendum that would make Miami an officially bilingual city.

An active fringe of anti-Castro terrorists had been adding to the violent toll in recent years with bombings, beatings and assassinations. Half a dozen groups were armed and organized at any given time, all plotting raids against the Cuban mainland, scheming toward the liberation of their homes.

Mack Bolan had enlisted in their cause at one time, welcomed the soldados into his own war as allies — but the times had changed for all concerned.

Today, embittered by American "abandonment" of Cuba since the missile crisis, some of the exiles saw their adopted country as the enemy. Attacks had been directed at the FBI and local law enforcement, airline offices and planes in flight, against the diplomats of nations that acknowledged Castro.

They had been linked to the assassinations of a U.S. President and a Chilean ambassador. The list was long and bloody, and it kept on growing.

Bolan knew the Cuban exiles — or he had, before the sealift — and the bitterness had poisoned everything they touched. In other days, another war, he had relied on them for assistance in the final stages of his grim Miami massacre. They had saved his life — not once, but twice — when he was wounded, cornered, and the Mafia hounds were snapping at his heels.

And one of them, the lovely Margarita, had provided Bolan with a very different kind of aid and comfort, laying down her life as a result.

The warrior owed them something, right, but circumstances altered cases. He had come to southern Florida in answer to reports of mounting terrorism, rumors of a KGB involvement somewhere. And if the exile movement that he once respected and admired had been perverted, twisted into something else...

The warrior checked himself, refusing to assume the worst. Some of the exiles had undoubtedly reverted to terrorism. Some of them might be in league with mafiosi, Cuban agents or the Soviets.

Some of them, right.

But in Mack Bolan's war, you did not slaughter herds of sheep to find the lurking wolf. The soldier made distinctions in selection of his targets. There were allies, enemies and bystanders — each of them indexed and filed away for handling under individual criteria.

There was no room in Bolan's everlasting war for indiscriminate attack, unreasoning response. In every combat situation certain steps were necessary for elimination of the enemy.

Penetration.

Target identification and confirmation.

Destruction.

The warrior had not yet achieved phase one of his attack plan. He possessed a code name, but without some further leads he could chase his tail around forever in Miami. He would have to find a handle on the puzzle, something....

Someone in Miami knew the true identify of Jose 99. It was a simple matter of applying some strategic pressure, rattling some cages, waiting for the proper answers to fall out.

And Tommy Drake had been a starting point. His death was not the end of anything. It was the opening gun of Bolan's new Miami war, and Drake would have a lot of company in hell before the Executioner's Florida campaign was finished.

He was carrying the cleansing fire to mafiosi, terrorists and traitors in Miami. Someone sure as hell was going to get burned.

The nightmare was familiar, worn around the edges like an ancient snapshot that is taken out and handled frequently. It never varied.

There was water, dark and silky smooth, a flat obsidian plane beneath the cuticle of moon. The boat was sleek and fast despite its load of canvas-covered crates. The pilot handled her expertly, threading in and out among the Keys, running without lights for fear of Prohibition agents.

And the dreamer rode up front, as always, Thompson submachine gun tucked beneath his arm. He tasted the salty spray and smelled the marshy soil of the surrounding hummocks.

They were almost there. Another hundred yards would see them to the drop, then they could ditch the cargo. Rum and whiskey, loaded on the Cuban docks, would bring tremendous profits in the gin mills of Miami. Cut and bottled under phony labels, twenty dollars' worth of rum could easily return a grand to the investor. All you had to do was make the drop on time, avoiding any interference.

Hence the Thompson.

He had used it once, not far from here, when the reception crew had sprouted sidearms, moving in to commandeer the load. And nothing could erase the memory of strobe-light muzzle-flashes in the darkness, heavy bullets slicing through the hollow men and toppling them like stalks of grain.

It had been terrifying — and exhilarating.

He was waiting, hoping for another chance to try his hand.

A flashlight winking in the gloom, and now the pilot had his heading, throttling back and easing in against the battered pier. A Packard and the usual covered truck were parked at shoreside.

Handlers, taking in the line and scrambling awkwardly aboard, were already moving toward the cargo. One of them hung back, a trifle slower than the rest. There was something....

As he turned an errant ray of moonlight fell on his face. The cold, familiar features still damp from the submersion, with the ragged, bloodless bullet scar across one cheek. The handler opened his mouth to speak, and seawater dribbled from between rubbery, lifeless lips.

The dreamer tried to lift his Thompson, found it leaden in his lifeless arms. He squeezed the trigger, but the frozen firing mechanism mocked him and the creature had him now. Its clammy fingers locked around his biceps, lifting him and shaking, shaking...

Someone was shaking him awake and into hazy semi-consciousness. He twisted, recoiling violently from the hand upon his shoulder, biting off a startled scream as he recognized the houseman, Solly Cusamano.

Philip Sacco sat up in the king-size bed and brushed the hand away.

"I'm sorry boss. I hate to wake you." Solly's voice was tight, anxious.

"What the hell time is it?"

"Quarter to four."

"In the morning? This better be good, Solly."

The housecock shuffled back a pace as Sacco scrambled out of bed and found his robe.

"I didn't want to wake you," Solly said again, "but I couldn't take the chance. You never know about these guys."

"What guys?" The mobster felt his irritation mounting, and he let it show.

"You got a visitor downstairs. He's waiting in the library. Says his name's Omega."

Sacco felt a prickling of the scalp, as if his hairs were slowly standing up on end.

"What kind of name is that, for chrissakes?"

"Well, he gave me this."

A card materialized in Solly's hand and he was offering it to Sacco, holding it between his thumb and index finger as if fearing further contact might contaminate him.

Sacco stared at it, recognizing it for what it was, reluctantly accepting it from Cusamano. It was fashioned like a playing card, but smaller, and the symbol printed on its face was staring back at Sacco like a solitary, disembodied eye.

It was an ace of spades.

The death card.

Symbol of the Mafia's own elite gestapo.

In the old days when the Talifero brothers, Pat and Mike, were alive and operating from the New York headshed, the black aces were a law unto themselves within the closed fraternity of Mafia. They answered only to the brothers, and the brothers answered only to La Commissione.