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  Nothing untoward happened. Byrne lowered the rock, and although feeling pressed for time, he placed empty sandbags and spread a thick wool blanket over the perimeter of the opening to be certain of a complete light seal.

  He carefully lowered the rope end to a predetermined depth and lightly wedged it there. Knowing its position, he could again enter from the lower tunnel. That might happen because there was a second way in and out, and he might use either entrance.

  For the first time in years, Don Byrne felt his Alpha persona rising, and he liked it. As Alpha he had done dangerous and violent things. He had been a young man then, quick and lithe—and obviously immortal. Now he was slower, not so much out of shape, but very out of practice.

  The proper mind set, he believed, was more important than the ability to move fast and do a hundred pushups. He could feel himself sliding into that once familiar kill or be killed mode.

  Byrne believed he could do what he thought he might have to do, and his lips twitched as he realized he almost looked forward to whatever again becoming Alpha might bring.

  The mine hideout was furnished and equipped like a survivalist's bomb shelter. Here, Doctor Don Byrne had packed away the supplies, equipment, tools, and weapons needed for a life he had hoped never to revisit. Byrne supposed he could remain inside for more than a year—if he chose to, but that was not his plan.

  From a wooden clothes closet he chose hiking boots and a camouflaged "Boonie" hat. From a gun rack he selected his custom 1BA Remington .338 Lapua Magnum. The scoped rifle used eight-round magazines that fed through the bottom of the action.

  Alpha fully loaded the magazine kept in the rifle, chose an empty magazine, and began loading it with 250-grain hunting bullets. It was a mistake to keep magazines fully loaded. Springs could weaken and cause failures to feed the next cartridge into a rifle's chamber. Loading the magazines when needed took time, but it was safest.

  Alpha slung Bausch and Lomb laser, range-finding binoculars around his neck and felt ready. He switched off the lights and went to a wall covered by a thick hanging curtain. Fumbly in the dark, he pushed the curtain aside and felt his way across a small and narrow room. Filled sand bags were stacked against a far wall, and he moved them aside. Outside light began to filter in, but there were large stones to be moved before he had a clear if slitted view of his home and most of the land around it.

  Byrne adjusted sandbags under his chest so that his supported arms could lie across them. His binoculars were seven power and brought everything in close. There was nothing to see, and he was pleased by that.

  Like Marine Corps snipers, Alpha had been taught to avoid bipod rifle rests that could make a sniper choose a position that might fit the bipod but not provide the best cover or concealment for the shooter. He shouldered his rifle and shifted it about improving its position across a sandbag.

  Enemies might be close, but they were not there yet. He could use the time to arrange his thoughts and adjust to the dramatic change in his life's direction.

  Doctor Don Byrne, MD, was the majority partner in a family medicine, two-doctor clinic. As a general practitioner, Doctor Byrne treated what he could and referred the tougher stuff to appropriate specialists—mostly in local or regional hospitals. Byrne worked reasonable hours. He liked his patients and enjoyed his far-spread farm and ranch community. He kept distantly abreast of the faster moving world and never forgot what might be coming his way.

  Now, with scarcely a warning, killers had arrived. Charlie might doubt, but when he checked on who had been released from prison, or a hundred other details the agency could discover, he would change his mind. Byrne hoped Charlie's enlightenment would not be too late.

  — — —

  From his hide near the military crest of the ridge above Alpha's unsuspected position, the sniper/team leader had a clear view of Byrne's home and outbuildings. The range was only six hundred and fifty yards. When their target tramped from his house toward the privy, the sniper believed he could make the shot with little fear of missing. Still, the target was moving at a nasty angle, and the shot was rather steeply downhill. They had a foolproof plan in place. Why give up a sure thing for a risky solution? He would not chance it.

  He kept his crosshairs more or less on their target, and when the man entered the flimsy and completely exposed outhouse, the sniper knew his decision had been the right one. Perched on the throne with his pants around his ankles, Byrne would never know what had hit him.

  The sniper touched his send button and spoke softly into the miniature microphone fastened to a lapel. "He's inside his outhouse. Close on him fast and shoot the hell out of the building. Aim high and aim low. Take no chances. Riddle him; we'll do the necktie afterwards."

  Alpha saw the four men leave the woods behind his house and march on the innocent looking outhouse. God, he had barely gotten out in time. If the person who had called had delayed a slim half-hour longer . . .!

  Byrne had reviewed attack and defend scenarios for years. The speculating and planning had been enjoyable mental exercises, and he doubted this team would have many surprises for him.

  The bad guys would have come through the mountains in pickups or perhaps on four-wheeled all-terrain vehicles, which could account for their delay. They had almost certainly left their machines a mile or so back to avoid alerting their quarry, and Alpha knew just about where that transport would be.

  He knew because most of the old roads had grown over, and the mountains were not filled with convenient routes to approach his place quietly and unobserved. Even fewer clearings would be handy to park and return to after their ambush attack. Byrne had scouted and hunted his mountains for years, and he expected that he knew where the killers' transportation would most likely be waiting.

  Could they have come on horses? Alpha discounted that idea. These four did not look, walk, or act like out-of-doors men, and their weapons were long barreled sub-machine guns.

  Holy hell! The killers were carrying WWII .45 caliber grease guns—with sound suppressors.

  The M3s, as the stamped-out sheet metal machine guns were more properly called, had been used in WWII and Korea. Then that model gun had simply disappeared. Few arms collectors had managed to find a grease gun, and criminals never had them—until now.

  Alpha wondered how effective silencers could be on the blow-back-actioned submachine guns? Installation was simple enough. All that was needed was threading at the muzzles of the short barrels. The usually handy machine guns looked too long and awkward with the lengthy silencers, but if the suppressors actually did hold down the ear-catching racket of full automatic gunfire, they would be worth their extra weight and shifted balance.

  Alpha almost envied his enemies their weaponry. The heavy .45 caliber bullets fired from grease guns hit like pile drivers, and they tended to drop in place almost anything they hit. At short ranges the M3s were almost perfect. If a fight in the open developed, however, the short range M3s would be the wrong weapons, and this battle could still end up like that.

  There was more to Alpha's study of probable enemy attack schemes than vehicular trans­portation. With all the high ground around, only a fool would send in his troops without having an observer up on one of the ridges. The best spots were directly above his own crack in the earth, and Alpha's range cards showed the distance from there to his house as about six hundred and fifty yards.

  At that range, a hot sniper might place his first shot within two inches of his point of aim. Even an ordinary hunter with a good rifle might place his bullets in an eight-inch circle at that distance—although a moving and downhill target added difficulty. That was why Alpha's skin had crawled all the way to the outhouse and had not quit wriggling until he was in the pit and could not be shot at through the privy's thin planking.

  The machine gunners were already closing on the outhouse, so someone with a radio, and probably a bolt gun, was watching. If Alpha had commanded, he would be up high and watching with great interest. He would also be
checking the surrounding woods and the house itself to re-determine that he and his men had not stepped into a trap that was about to be sprung with enemy shooters boiling from the woods or firing down into his four out-in-the-open killers.

  Alpha tucked his binoculars inside his shirt and began edging through the narrow earth slit and into the cover of the forested mountain. He would not hear the shooting because of the silencers.

  After they checked the outhouse—and that checking out he would hear—there would be a race back to the motor park. Alpha planned to win that contest. The trick would be to get there first, be in the best hide, and be waiting for whoever made it back to the vehicles.

  Out in the open, the submachine guns would be almost useless, but the scout, if there was one, and it could be a conventional two-man sniper team, would be armed with a rifle that could reach out. Extreme ranges would be rare within the open forest, but shots could be expected at two or even three hundred yards. Alpha resolved to be hard to spot.

  The sniper saw his men move within ten yards of the silent wooden outhouse. There were two gunmen facing the door and two at one side of the flimsy structure. He hoped his idiots did not fire into each other. The four had fought before, but combat drove IQs to moronic levels, and men did stupid things.

  Wire stocks extended, his killers shouldered their grease guns, and the coordinated blast of their .45 caliber full automatic fire reached his eyes almost instantly. The building shuddered, and splinters flew. Smoke enveloped the muzzles of the machine guns, and one shooter dropped his empty 30-round magazine and reloaded. He held his fire, covering his companions' reloading. Decent technique, the sniper conceded. As they paused, one bullet-blasted wall of the privy slowly collapsed, and the roof tottered, threatening to follow. One hundred and twenty .45 caliber bullets could do that.

  The ridge sniper smiled coldly and was glad it was over. No one within the outhouse could have lived through the barrage. He quickly examined the destroyed building through his powerful scope then ordered the team's assistant leader forward. Because he knew the outcome, the sniper did not watch. A veteran mercenary of a number of small wars, he kept looking out, but nothing moved on the flat land beyond their target's house, and they had encountered nothing more dangerous than startled birds while passing through the woods.

  He saw his man slam through the battered door with another close by to offer supporting fire that would not be needed. He raised his shoulder to bring the lapel mike closer and ordered that the body be brought out and hauled to the house front porch where it would be given the Colombian Necktie and left on display. He would allow his men to do that unsavory part.

  The first killer entered the savaged building expecting to find a dead man slumped on the shattered toilet seat, but he was not there. There was a sign shot through and through, but the killer did not read English. Dead or alive, their target could be only one place—in the pit. He shouted to his backup, and together they poured fire through the seat platform and into the pit.

  Although sound-deadened, the leader on the ridge involuntarily jerked at the unexpected and lengthy burst of suppressed machine gun fire from within the ruined outhouse. Somehow, the target must have survived. The sniper smiled grimly. Well, he lived no more.

  It was surely done, but a third shooter waited at the door, and the fourth stood close by, his eyes studying the suddenly threatening surroundings. The man had to be dead in there, but until they found him . . .?

  Unhesitatingly, the lead killer reached for the thoroughly shattered seat lid, but it was screwed down. Cursing, he grasped the edge of the entire top covering the pit and heaved mightily. His companion kept his grease gun pointing down, ready for the slightest hint of movement.

  The thunderous explosion blew the outhouse and the four killers lurking there into unrecognizable atoms and barely identifiable body parts. The almost incomprehensible blast roared through the toilet pit tunnels collapsing ceilings before expending itself within the mine's many levels and shafts.

  The explosives buried in the pit had been tripped by a pull on the wire Alpha had connected to the toilet seat. Almost mortar-like, the charge blew nearly straight up obliterating the men above but spreading only slightly sideward. Doctor Don Byrne's house stood little damaged, and high on the ridge the sniper suffered only a small buffeting from the explosion's shock wave.

  What in hell . . .? There was no way to discover, but somehow his men had set off a huge explosive stash and had died along with their target. Even the gunman furthest from the blast had been nearly dismembered. A booby trap? Possible, but a big one.

  Although astounded, the sniper did not deeply care. Men came and went, and as the only survivor, full payment for finishing Byrne would be all his.

  What he had to do now was disappear leaving no traces of his presence. He sanitized his hide, disguising any marks he had made and leaving nothing to indicate anyone had ever been there.

  Investigators should believe that everyone had died in the blast.

  He glassed the open country a final time, but if anyone had heard, they were slow to investigate. The explosion's cloud of dust, smoke, and probably mercenary atoms drifted and settled.

  Along the main road a car moved past without change in speed. The sniper began an easy trot to the safety of their vehicles. He would take the Kawasaki four-wheeler in the bed of his pickup, and there would be no abandoned vehicles for the law to scratch heads about.

  Still, he stayed alert as he traveled. He believed the forest to be empty, but he intended to see before being seen. A short mile now, and he would be free and clear.

  Alpha examined the two vehicles through his binoculars. They were only one hundred and fifty yards away, and he was hidden behind a downed tree that allowed him to observe from beneath the trunk. His position could not be much better.

  He had passed around the parked vehicles so that he would have clear shooting into the drivers and not have to work his big bullets through passengers. After the surprise of the outhouse explosion, it was possible the leader—that Byrne expected had been hidden on a high overlook—would come in cautiously and might even circle as he had.

  Alpha kept all approaches in his mind, in his eyes, and even in his ears. Although its camouflage paint would make it very hard to spot even if laid out in the open, his rifle was down out of sight. He would have time to get the big .338 into action when the raiders returned.

  In fact, Alpha had only one source of discontent. To shoot comfortably, the powerful .338 required a muzzle brake. Without a reducer, the big rifle kicked like a mule. The recoil brake blew gasses left, right, and upward. Grass moved, dust flew, and searching eyes would find him quickly. He would have to move—probably after each shot—or suffer through a ton of return fire.

  Alpha had chosen the powerful rifle over weapons that were silenced but used smaller bullets. He had expected that he might be shooting at moving vehicles, and smaller bullets did not often do the job. A hit from a .338 Lapua would shatter an engine or plow through all sorts of obstacles that thwarted lighter and skinnier bullets. If hit by a .338, neither man nor beast (or motor vehicle) moved much thereafter.

  The mercenary leader approached the parked vehicles with utmost care. It was hugely unlikely that an enemy ambush lay waiting, but he took few chances and therefore had lived longer than most of his companions.

  As soon as he could see the vehicles he went to ground and used his binoculars for a thorough glassing. He observed slowly, working from close in to further out, left to right, then back again. He sought shadows that lay wrong for a forest, colors that did not fit, any movement that appeared unnatural, and any shape that did not feel right. He listened and he smelled. Doctor Byrne, he had been told, had been some sort of special operative, but that had been long ago, and Byrne, along with his attackers, was now dust blowing east with the prevailing breezes.

  The hired killer supposed he should circle the parked vehicles and observe from the far side. If he had a survivin
g companion, he would have ordered just such scouting while he covered with his long gun, but he was alone.

  A small doe appeared at the edge of his vision and worked her way down to the vehicle park, the sniper watched carefully. The breeze was blowing west to east, and he lay to the south and would not be detected. The doe sniffed at the pickup and did not like the smell. She snorted and shook her head but continued to browse as she moved along the old logging trail they had used coming in.

  The sniper kept glassing, but nothing disturbed the park's tranquility. In time, the doe was gone, and nothing had changed. The hunger to be away overcame what he suspected was excess caution. It was enough. He was alone. His rifle held ready with his scope on its lowest power for fast and close-in shooting, the sniper rose and made his way to the vehicles.

  Watching with only one eye showing, Alpha saw the sniper materialize from a spot he had believed empty. Alpha's gut tightened because the skilled fighter might not be alone, and equally expert woodsmen and scouts might still be hidden waiting for an unnatural movement.

  How many, if any, had the booby-trapped outhouse put out of action? Certainly the one who had checked the pit, but maybe more. All of them? Alpha might hope so, but could he risk revealing his presence? He would wait. If his enemy began to leave and no others appeared, he could accept that no one else was coming. Then he would shoot.

  The team leader wasted no more time. He closely circled the silent vehicles, studying the ground for different boot prints or tossed aside cigarette butts but saw nothing. He placed his rifle and pack on the pickup's seat and hurriedly dragged aluminum loading ramps from the truck bed and locked them into place. The 4-wheeled ATV started smoothly, and he ran it into the truck bed, slid the ramps in alongside, and closed the tailgate.

  The mercenary experienced a certain irritation that they had not turned the vehicles around for a swift getaway. That oversight had been unprofessional and the neglect sharpened a distant but nagging sense of something else not right or perhaps overlooked. He had learned to attend to even the vaguest of mental agitations, but the thing to do right now was to get out of Dodge—the quicker the better. Distance would bring safety.