"Okay, Horse," Bolan was saying, "start your move. Drop down to fifty ... good ... good ... one minute to interchange ..."
Washington saw the red Corvette squirt across two lanes of traffic and weave back into their lane several positions ahead. A huge van semitrailer, the vehicle referred to as the horse, was laboring along just ahead, in the far right lane. Three cars that had been following the horse reacted to its sudden slowing by whipping into the second outboard lane and passing. Washington caught a glimpse of the vehicle that was maintaining the "hole" between the two lanes of trafficit was Bolan's Corvette. He grinned. The two cars now between Bolan and Blancanales were the police vehicle, first, and the third Mafia car. The driver of the Continental was beginning to cast anxious glances to his left and right. Washington could visualize what was going to happen next, and his grin broadened.
"Backboard, on station!" Bolan commanded.
Blancanales stomped the accelerator and whipped the Mustang into Lane 3, pulled quickly abreast of Bolan, and stayed there.
"OkayZitter."
The Mercury wagon being piloted by Zitka moved almost sideways into the extreme inboard lane, and now the four of themZitka, Blancanales, Bolan, and the diesel horsewere pacing the traffic into the interchange at a leisurely fifty miles per hour.
The next few moments were tense ones and would have proved less anxious if one more vehicle had been available to maintain a two-car gap directly behind the horse. Split-second timing had made the insurance unnecessary, however, and they glided into the boxing zone with the trap perfectly set. The police car, seeing daylight between Bolan and the horse, and with the Giordano vehicle rapidly disappearing into the interchange, whipped over suddenly behind the horse. A puff of smoke belched from the twin exhausts as the Pontiac's passing gear kicked in and it leaned toward the hole between Bolan's right front fender and the left rear corner of the van.
The Mafia rear-guard Continental had swung into the Pontiac's wake, with the obvious intention of following right on through the slot. The slot, however, suddenly ceased to exist as Bolan eased forward with his front bumper directly abreast the horse's rear wheels.
Washington caught a fleeting glimpse of an infuriated face behind the wheel of the police car as tires squealed and the heavy car lurched back into position behind the horse, brakes grabbing in the abrupt forced slowdown. Washington heard but did not see the Continental smack the rear of the police car. It was a light tap, accompanied by more squealing of tires and the sounds of crunching metal and shattering glass.
The horse was now curving gracefully onto the cloverleaf, the two vehicles following in jerky confusion. The vehicles of the Death Squad, less horse, picked up speed and hurried to close on the quarry.
Bolan's elated voice came through the radio: "Beautiful, beautifulthat's playing it by the numbers."
"That's playing it by your quivering ass," Zitka shot back.
"Playing, hell," Harrington sang in. "Where the hell am I headed? How do I get this big sunabitch back on the track?"
"Follow the cloverleaf on around," Bolan snapped back. "Just follow the signs and come on around. We're taking the . . . yeah, the Santa Ana. Rejoin with all possible speed. How did our friends make out?"
Harrington was chuckling into the radio. They're out of the game. Locked bumpers, looks like. Madder... than... hell!"
"Better than we hoped for," Bolan replied. "Okaygood show, boys. Resume positions and tally-ho."
Washington grinned at Blancanales and shook his head. "Hell, this is some damn outfit, isn't it?" he commented quietly.
Blancanales nodded as he fell into formation several positions behind the Corvette. Zitka's Mercury was burning rubber up the inside lane to close on Loudelk.
"Light me a cigarette," Blancanales requested. I'm afraid to take my hand off the wheel. I'm afraid it'll shake off at the shoulder."
Washington guffawed, lit the cigarette, and shoved it between his partner's lips. "Yeah, man, it's some damn outfit," he repeated. "Sure glad I joined up. How "bout you?"
"Just wait," Blancanales murmured. "Do you know how close we came to having a twenty-jillion-car smashup?"
The big Negro was grinning merrily. "Wait for what, man?"
"Wait 'till we finish this mission. If I'm still alive then... well, yeahI guess I'm glad I'm in."
"If you're dead, man, you won't know the difference. You better be glad now, while you got time."
Blancanales flashed his companion a sudden smile. "You're right," he said. "It's a hell of a squad."
Chapter Six
The Ambush at the Buttes
"Has that station wagon been behind us all the way or hasn't it?" queried the nervous young man with the briefcase.
"Off and on, sure he has," Giordano replied smugly. "You just now catching on?"
"Well, I thought at first ... well, there was this Ford sedan back there for a while, and now the station wagon is back. It looks like the same one."
Giordano chuckled and slumped contentedly into the plush upholstery. "Games," he said. "They like to play games. Okay. Let 'em play."
They had left the freeway some minutes earlier and were powering smoothly through gently lifting countryside on a smooth blacktop road, the big cars eating the pavement at a steady eighty-mile-per-hour clip. Soon they would drop onto the desert-like flats bordering the city of Riverside and swing north into the rocky buttes. Giordano's groves lay in there, in a sheltered valley between the stark rock formations. Grapefruit, lemons, tangerines, and avocados were grown there, but hardly in sufficient quantity to support the rich Giordano appetites. Actually, the groves had proved to be an excellent deduction for income-tax purposes; Giordano made money by losing money in his farming operation. As a legitimate business venture, the farm was a minor item in the varied Giordano interests, but it tied in neatly with his more secretive activities, serving as a sort of central clearing house for an underworld empire.
The Rolls was slowing for the turn onto the backroad approach to the groves. Giordano frowned and punched the intercom button. "What happened to our hide-and-seek pals?" he growled.
"He kept falling back," the driver reported. "Lost sight of him about a mile back."
"Pull onto the back road and stop," Giordano commanded.
They made the turn. The heavy car came to a smooth halt. The black Continental proceeded on for several hundred feet, then halted also and backed down to within a few yards of the Rolls.
"Keep your eyes open," Giordano snapped. "Dumbhead can't even play hide and seek. Soon as you see him coming, start up again, but slow. We don't want him to lose us."
The driver poked his head out the window and shouted instructions to the car ahead. They waited. Giordano chafed. He lit a cigar after several minutes and growled, "Dumbhead! Dumbhead! How could he lose us on a country road?"
"Maybe he had car trouble," the young man ventured.