"Have you in sight," he reported to Blancanales. "Drop back some, Pol. You're crowding them."
"Right. Didn't want to chance losing them going through town. I am easing off now."
A moment later Bolan was running-up onto the rear of the Corvette being piloted by Blancanales.
"Coming around."
"Roj, man — go."
Bolan was burning rubber alongside the Mafia convoy, slumped into the racing backboard of the hot car to conceal his own face but reading occupants as he whizzed past.
"Here's the head count," he reported, when he was well ahead. Rear car, five. Lucasi and bodyguards, looks like. Middle, eight — gun car with jumpseat. Lead car, six. They look tough."
Schwarz immediately checked in. "I'm just dragging down here. Want me to run up to Barrett and pick up on it there?"
Bolan was a full mile ahead of the convoy now. He told Schwarz, "Affirm. Assume station running slowly southward. Make them pass you, then tag along. Pol, you swing ahead at that point. Maintain with their lights just in view behind you."
Both men acknowledged the instructions and Bolan went on to scout the road ahead. He went through Jamul and, six minutes later, the tiny community of Dulzura. Just below that point he passed the warwagon, tooting at Schwarz and receiving a return salute, then burned on southward toward Barrett.
This was rugged country, desolate but pretty in the moonlight, appearing abandoned and hardly touched by the human hand or foot.
A little side road running off eastward a few miles below Dulzura came up in his headlamps. He slowed, overshot the junction, then squealed about in a U-turn and returned for an inspection.
A weathered sign proclaimed that this was the road to Barrett Reservoir.
Bolan found the spot on his area map and closely studied the surrounding countryside. Then he descended from the Ferrari for a closer look at some other kind of signs.
The hunch seemed to be right on-target. Heavy-wheeled vehicles had turned onto that road not too much earlier. He found a place on the turn where a set of double-wheels had slipped off the roadbed into the soft shoulder.
He stood there in the cool night air, allowing his senses to flare and absorb the lie of that place, then he spoke into the shoulder-phone. "Road running east off 94, couple of miles above Barrett. It smells. Map shows possible connection over to U.S. 80. I'm checking it out. Let me know if track runs beyond this point."
Schwarz told him, "It might be hot, Sarge. They've been moving those rigs every few days. And listen, watch it. Guy at a truck stop down near Barrett told me those rigs are not being handled by teamsters. Says it's two guys in each cab and they look mean as hell."
Bolan replied, "Roj, thanks." He returned to the Ferrari and sent it in a dangerously fast acceleration along the little back road.
If it had looked like no-wheres-ville out along the state highway, then this area was strictly twilight zone. Rugged, hilly, wild — with road to match.
It would be rough going for a couple of big semi-trailers. And Bolan's "combat feel" was flowing strong in his veins. If Lucasi had just ordered those rigs a'moving again, after hearing Tony Danger's report, then … yeah, that could be blood he was smelling, for damn sure.
And if Lucasi was in the panic which Bolan had programmed for him then, yeah, he had those rigs rolling while he raced with a gun-convoy to protect the movement.
A few minutes later Bolan knew that he had scored. His heart shifted into combat-pump as he spotted the twin set of headlamps on a curve far ahead, running bumper to bumper, two big diesel rigs laboriously navigating that back-country road.
He announced into his shoulder-phone, "Bingo. I have the target in sight. About ... halfway to the reservoir. Fall in close and protect my rear."
Schwarz reported, "They just passed me, running hell-bent. Pol is coming around now. Do we hit them out here or allow them to close some first?"
"Let them close," Bolan commanded. "Just stay on their tail. From the moment you hit the turn-off, run dark. There's plenty of visibility out here without lights."
"Affirm."
"Watch it, Sarge," Blancanales growled.
"Name of the game," Bolan replied.
"I'll run on down about a half-mile beyond the junction, then double back."
"Okay," Bolan agreed tightly. "Watch this road.
It's a bitch."
He surged forward then, sending the Ferrari into a hot run-up on those lights ahead, then he fell back, tracking at about ten car-lengths.
"Target knows I'm here," he announced. "Report into the junction."
"Roj," from Schwarz.
"Wilco," said Blancanales. "Running past now."
A moment later Schwarz reported, "Convoy turning east."
"Have them in sight," Blancanales muttered. "Coming about and re-closing."
"Tracking eastward," Schwarz said seconds later. "Are you running dark, Pol?"
"Affirm."
"Let's mark positions. Landmark ahead. Falling-down cabin, off to right. Large boulder, scraggly tree in front. Passing ... right ... now, mark!
Ten seconds later, Blancanales reported, "Mark. I'm off you ten seconds."
"Run it there," Bolan instructed.
So there was the line-up. Two diesel rigs, moving slowly hardly a car-length apart, Bolan pacing them ten car-lengths back. About two miles back and moving up fast, the three crew wagons, bearing a total of nineteen guns. A few seconds to their rear and running dark, Schwarz in the war-wagon; ten seconds behind him, Blancanales.
Tight numbers, yeah ... damn tight.
Bolan waited until the lights of the crew wagons were showing behind him. They would be spotting him now, running just off their precious cargo, wondering and fuming ... "Didn't that damn sports car pass us back there a few miles?"
He was watching also the terrain ahead and to either side of the line of travel. A most advantageous spot was coming up, just ahead, where the road threaded low ground between pressing hillocks.
He released a fragmentation grenade from his combat belt, pulled the pin, and announced into the shoulder-phone, "Going!"
The Ferrari surged forward and up along the left flank of the mobile targets. He leaned across the seat and waved at the guys in the rear truck then moved smoothly on to run abreast of the lead tractor, tensely counting his numbers, pacing the targets into the needle, sliding far to the right and steering with his left hand ... and then the numbers were all used up.
The driver of the target vehicle was shouting something at him as he flipped the grenade, out and up, right into the guy's lap.
At that same instant he swung back to the controls of the Ferrari and sent her screaming ahead, putting three seconds of distance between himself and that doomed semi.
One of those frozen instants of time descended, a stretched-out and seemingly infinite present, with past forever behind and future looming threateningly and yet unapproachable.
The driver of that leading crew wagon had already gotten the smell and was pressing forward, leading the other two cars into a wild pass around the rear truck.
The flash of the explosion illuminated Bolan's cockpit and cast red streamers into his rear-view mirror. Something metallic whizzed past his open window and showering glass overtook him and rained on him.
The big rig weaved and veered off to the left, tried to climb the high ground over there and failed, jack-knifed, slid along on screaming rubber, overturned with a crashing-roaring-grinding and burst into flames.
The immediate aftermath of that event was sheer pandemonium. Two crew wagons and another big rig plowed into that mess, with a whole new ball game of screaming rubber, crumpling and rending metal, shoestring explosions, fireballs, the screams and shouting of men trapped in that immovable present.