"Well," Mustav mumbled, "what have you got up your sleeve, Kelly?"

"I went to the airport with an FBI man," she said, "and met three of the toughest guys I've ever seen. They were in that gunfight that caused our quick exit. They know we're gone. I'm not saying they'll find us for sure, but they're our best bet. Until they get here we obviously have to take care of ourselves."

"What were you doing with Feds?" Mustav asked.

Kelly's eyes misted over.

"I was at the gym training when these guys — these hoods — came in and tried to shoot Babette. They tried to kill Babette because she's a defector, I guess. They hit... they killed Tracy Shaw. Babette got away."

"Holy," Mustav muttered. "These guys are really playing for keeps."

"Mustav," another athlete said. "Why didn't you do something when you had that man's gun?"

"We'd have been slaughtered," Kelly answered for him. "He should have just let me pay the price for baiting that idiot."

"What happens if your men don't find us?" someone questioned.

"We take them out when they least expect it," Mustav answered. "We must prepare, plan together. No more back talk, no resistance. We have to help them relax."

"There's three of them out there that really scare me," a female athlete said.

"I know which three," Kelly said. "They're younger, harder looking. We'll have to be extra careful around them."

"The rest of them seem as nervous as we are," Mustav said.

"Let's soothe them," Kelly instructed. "Scared people are the dangerous ones."

The group agreed then lapsed into silence.

Sam Jackson was the last man to arrive at the school parking lot. He was swinging a small flight bag and swaggering. Lightning Sam Jackson was proud of himself; he had dramatically changed his economic standing. By selling out he had moved up in a world he believed conspired to keep him down.

"You're late," Boering snapped.

But the KGB mole did not look at Jackson. Instead, his eyes were fixed on a man who had been following the large boxer.

Jackson grinned at the mole. "I knew you wouldn't leave without me. I'm prepaid."

He slung his flight bag into the open trunk.

"Who's that behind you?" Boering asked.

"Damned if I know. Some wino who asked me for a buck."

The wino was a squat, roly-poly man whose body looked and smelled as though it had not benefited from a bar of soap or a razor in days. He was wearing an old suit that was a good tailor away from a good fit: in some places it was short, in others it was long. The wino was about to accost the boxer again. Boering stepped forward and the derelict veered toward him.

"Can you give me a buck for a bowl of soup?" the wino slurred. "I haven't had anything to eat all day."

Jackson stepped in front of Boering and gave the pudgy drunk a shove. "Beat it," he said, his voice dripping with contempt.

The wino staggered back a few steps and swayed. He looked at the boxer with loathing.

''No nigger treats me like that,'' he screamed. And then he charged. Fists flailing like windmills, the wino was inches from Jackson when the lightning-quick boxer showed off his reflexes, stepping easily to one side. The attacker went headfirst into the trunk of the car. Jackson laughed and grabbed the man's legs, stuffing the rest of his body into the trunk. He slammed the cover.

"What did you do that for?" Boering snarled.

"I couldn't hit the little shit," Jackson replied. "I'd have killed him."

Boering fished the car keys out of his pocket and unlocked the trunk. Jackson reached in, grabbed and lifted the drunk and deposited him on the ground. The wino curled up in a ball and began sobbing. Jackson gave a short snort of disgust and walked to the limousine, climbing into the front seat. Four of his teammates, three in the back and Zak Wilson in the front, were already in the car.

"Greetings, fellow traitors," he said as he hopped in.

No one answered.

Boering climbed in and started the car. The air conditioner blasted out a stream of cold air. Jackson, Wilson and another athlete looked back as the car pulled away. The lone figure still lay huddled on the parking lot.

Boering drove toward the San Diego Freeway. After covering two blocks he pulled over to the curb and stopped the car. He reached across his passengers and removed what looked like a cheap transistor radio with a short antenna from the glove compartment.

"What's that?" Jackson asked.

"A precaution," Boering replied.

Boering told the athletes to step out on the sidewalk. He approached them with the gadget and carefully scanned them, pointing the antenna at all parts of their bodies.

He came up empty. The KGB agent then turned his attention to the car. When he reached the back of the car, the instrument began to squeal. It took him only ten seconds to find the transmitter. It was fastened magnetically under the bumper. He removed it and opened the trunk. There were no squeals from the baggage or the inside walls of the trunk. However, a quick exploration under the car revealed another transmitter near the back of the vehicle.

"Those CIA types are stupid," Boering spat. "Your drunken friend left us one easy bug to find and then a hard one to find. Did he really think I'd be so stupid as to stop looking when I found the first?''

Cars were stopped nearby for a traffic light. Boering jogged over to one of the vehicles and attached the bugs.

When he returned, Jackson stepped in front of him.

"Wasn't my friend," he said.

"Are you sure?" Boering asked, looking almost amused.

"I'm sure."

Boering poked the transmission detector inside the car and probed around. There was no response. He straightened and retracted the short aerial. He put the device back in the glove compartment as the athletes got back into the car. The KGB man pulled the car back into traffic and onto the approach to the San Diego Freeway.

"Jackson," he said, taking his eyes off the road for a second. "I'm glad he wasn't a friend of yours. He's dead."

Hermann Gadgets Schwarz was lying on the asphalt of the school parking lot as the limousine disappeared from sight. Suddenly he heard three noises — the high-powered distant crack of a rifle, the lower-powered crack of a nearby gun, and the whip-snapping sound of a bullet tearing past his ear.

He didn't wait for other sounds. Rolling to his feet, he took off in a weaving run, hoping to make it to the wall of the nearest building.

There were two more cracks, one distant, one close. A bullet hit the tarmac by Gadgets's feet. It seemed to come from the building he was running toward, but there was no time to change direction. He moved faster, cursing the awkward clothing and padding he wore.

There was another distant rifle sound. No bullet came near Schwarz. He nipped around the edge of the building, cutting himself off from the other school buildings. He glanced up to see if a gun was poking over the edge of the roof. None, so far. Bringing his eyes down, he caught a flash of light from the parking lot between the school buildings and Sunset Boulevard. He threw himself flat just as a string of slugs chewed up brick and glass where he had been standing. Gadgets was thankful for the fool who had put an optic on the submachine gun. The flash from the evening sun had barely given him enough warning.

The distant gun boomed twice more. Gadgets was on his feet and running again to put a building corner between himself and the parking lot. As he ran, he tried to get under the padding to draw his Beretta.

The goon in the parking lot must have emptied his clip. The gun did not start barking again until Gadgets was nearly at the corner. As he pulled around the corner, brick chips stung one ear. He ran full tilt into a KGB executioner.