M.I.A. Hunter: Miami War Zone

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Novels:

The Castro Directive

M.I.A. Hunter Series:

M.I.A. Hunter

M.I.A. Hunter: Cambodian Hellhole

M.I.A. Hunter: Exodus from Hell

M.I.A. Hunter: Blood Storm

M.I.A. Hunter: Escape from Nicaragua

M.I.A. Hunter: Invasion U.S.S.R.

M.I.A. Hunter: Crossfire Kill

M.I.A. Hunter: Desert Death Raid

M.I.A. Hunter: L.A. Gang War

M.I.A. Hunter: Back to 'Nam

M.I.A. Hunter: Heavy Fire

M.I.A. Hunter: China Strike

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"
Go with us as we seek to defend the defenseless and to free the enslaved
."

—from the "Special Forces Prayer"

S
omething was wrong.

Jack
Wofford
didn't know how he knew, but he did. It was as if he had developed an extra sense over the years, one that warned him of danger or impending disaster. The extra sense was working overtime tonight.

He felt it as a tingle at the base of his neck that stirred the short hairs growing on his nape. He felt it in the drops of sweat that crawled through his hair and along his scalp, drops that were not caused by the heavy humidity that made the night air thick and wet around him. He felt it in the hollow pit of his stomach.

No one looking at him would have noticed a thing out of the ordinary, however, because
Wofford
was trained in many things, both by practice and experience. One of those things was the concealment of his emotions. He could have been standing on a hill of ants or having a bamboo splinter rammed up underneath the nail of his ring finger and his face would have betrayed nothing.

Such an ability was an essential part of
Wofford's
job, and he knew it was one of the reasons he had been chosen by the D.E.A. for this particular mission. He had worked hard for his reputation, and he knew he deserved it.

He was one of the best drug buyers in the business.

He had been at it for more than twelve years now, ever since his brother, Gary, had died of a self-induced overdose.

Gary. For him, Vietnam had never ended, and his return to the States had been a hellish experience that he never quite comprehended. He had lost something in the green jungles, something that he had never regained. For a while he must have thought that drugs would help him find it, but they only made things worse, destroying his health and what was left of his mind until the day when a lethal speedball took him away from things forever.

Jack had found his body in the squalid room where he had gone to live and to die. At that moment, Jack made a vow to do what he could, to have some part, no matter how small, in ridding the world of drugs. His wife,
Kathi
, had understood and agreed with him. Whatever it took, she would back him up.

He had lived on the streets for nearly a year, hardly ever going home. He made small buys, then a few larger ones, using his own money and money that
Kathi
earned teaching second grade. He hoped that her school board never learned about what he was doing.

In establishing himself as a street character, he learned a number of things: who was hot and who wasn't; how to avoid the cops; how to avoid being ripped off by the con artists who wanted to sell you talcum powder laced with Drano, hoping you'd be dead before you found out what had happened; how to live in cheap rooms on cheaper food.

And he had developed that extra sense. It had saved him more than once during that year.

After he had gathered as much information as he could, he went to the D.E.A. with what he had. They weren't quite sure what to make of him, and it took them five days to decide whether or not to act on the information he provided.

When they did, they were more than pleased. The information was solid, and in fact, much of it was even better than Jack knew. Some of the smaller pushers squealed like pigs being eaten by the Big Bad Wolf, leading to bigger and better arrests. Major busts went down. The D.E.A. looked good, and Jack was offered a job.

He took it, knowing what it meant as far as his life with
Kathi
went. He would see her, but not often. Only when he was between jobs, and then not for very long. It also meant that his life expectancy was not of such a nature as to make an actuary leap for joy. He would be dealing with people who killed as casually as people in the straight world stepped on roaches, people to whom human life meant exactly nothing.

One of the first things he asked about at his interview with the D.E.A. was life insurance.

The interviewing agent looked at him. "You're kidding, right?"

Jack smiled. "Nope. I've got a wife, and I don't plan to leave her depending on teaching second grade for a living."

"It's not something we like to talk about," the agent said. He was a tall, heavyset man, with coarse graying hair cut into an unfashionable flattop.

"I don't blame you," Jack told him. "But it's something I've got to know. I took the first year's risk on my own, for my brother. But if I'm going to make a career of it, I've got to know that
Kathi
will be all right in case anything happens to me."

The agent ran a hand over his flattop. "All right," he said. "You deserve to know. It's a dangerous job. I wouldn't kid you about that. But the government will take care of your widow, if anything should happen. Not that it will. But if it does, you don't have to worry about money. Uncle Sam takes care of his own."

"That's good to know," Jack said, and then, like everyone else, he had promptly convinced himself that
Kathi
would never have to worry about collecting the money if he died because dying was something that happened to other people.

Over the years he had been in some tight spots. Once, in Houston, he had almost been thrown into the Ship Channel with his ankles wired together. In Atlantic City, he had been beaten and left for dead in a garbage Dumpster. And in New Orleans, he had received a knife cut that began at his navel and went up through his right pectoral.

Every time, he had survived, one way or another, usually because his extra sense had warned him just in time, had given him just enough of an edge to save himself. It had never failed him.

Now he was in Miami, a city where he had worked several times before, and the extra sense was telling him that something was wrong.

He hadn't wanted to work Miami again, especially since he had been there only a few months previously, but the higher-ups had insisted. It was a really important job, they told him, and he was the man to do it.

"I was just there in January," he said.

"Five months," the agent in charge said. His name was Williams, and he was a by-the-book man.
Wofford
would have bet that Williams could tell him the day and the hour that he had left the Miami city limits.

"These people have long memories,"
Wofford
said. "I don't like to work in the same city again so soon, especially a place where I've worked so much before."

"Three times," Williams said. "In 1978, 1983—"

"I know the dates," Jack said. "That's not the point. People down there know me. Too many people."

"Look," Williams said, "I know it's a risk, but this has been discussed at the highest levels. We think it's worth it. This one really matters."

"They all matter," Jack said, thinking that Williams hadn't been in the field in so long that he wouldn't know a risk if it bit him in the ass.

"Right," Williams said. "They all matter. But this one is special. If we pull this one off, we cut off the coke supply to half the dealers on the East Coast. I mean, this one goes right up to Mr. Big."

Jack hadn't realized that Williams thought in clichés, but he wasn't too surprised. A lot of people in the business did, talking all the time about such ridiculous things as "street value," and "Mr. Big," and "Colombian connections."

"I thought I got Mr. Big for you five months ago."

"This guy is even bigger," Williams grunted.

And that's the way it went
, Jack thought. There was always a new boy in town, a new guy who had bigger and better supplies, who could get it faster, sell it cheaper, and get you higher than the one before. Jack was beginning to think his job was like emptying the garbage. Every week, there was a new load to be hauled out.

In the end, though, he went, just as he always did. There was always the chance, no matter how slim, that this time really would be the big one, the one that shut down the supply, the one that took most of the rats off the street, the one that really mattered.

There was also the chance that he was never going to find out. His extra sense was tingling like never before. He was sure that he had been in Miami once too often, but he wasn't going to let the two men he was with know that.