"Дон Пендлтон. The Libya Connection ("Палач" #48) " - читать интересную книгу автора

"I will see you in one hour then, Mr. Kennedy."
"Yes, sir. Goodbye, sir."
Kennedy replaced the receiver. He turned to confront the open question
marks in Doyle's eyes.
"Aujila oasis," Kennedy told him. "Keep everyone at their post for
right now. We'll have a quick pull out in twenty minutes."
Doyle was on his feet. He started from the office, but paused with his
hand on the doorknob.
"You didn't say anything about Rideout."
Kennedy's eyes narrowed. "You haven't figured it out yet?"
"I guess I have," said Doyle. "I'll set that up too, then."
Kennedy nodded.
"Use Bruner and Teckert. Tell them to watch their asses. I got that
damn feeling ."
"I wonder if we're right. About Rideout, I mean."
"Either way we'll find out soon enough."
"You want it, you got it," said Doyle. He snapped off a curt salute and
left the office, closing the door behind him.
Leaving Kennedy alone to his thoughts.
The boss merc turned to stare out the window. It was too dark to see
anything out there except his own reflection in the glass. But it would give
Doyle a few minutes in case the guy came back with any last-minute
questions. It would do no good for Doyle to return and find Kennedy gone,
with no one having seen him emerge from the office out front. That would not
do at all.
I've got to be real careful now, thought Kennedy. This damn thing has
been like walking on eggs. But these final minutes are crucial...
The world looked at Kennedy and saw unlined, youthful features that he
knew were attractive to most of the women he came in contact with. His eyes
sparkled. His smile could dazzle.
In other words, the horrors that he had perpetrated, and the
hellzones - Vietnam, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Rhodesia, Chad, Libya - where
he had spent his career soldiering amid the harsh realities of a world he
never made, could not be imagined from his outward appearance.
Kennedy was willing to concede that a few people over the years might
have guessed at the true limits of behavior that he was capable of, but not
many.
Even some of the men in his outfit here in Bishabia would be shocked to
know about the locked and boarded schoolhouse full of rebel kids near
Gatooma that Kennedy had burned to the ground some years ago. The job had
been on orders, sure, but some of the mercs here tonight would damn sure
have blanched at a thing like that and refused - because they never had
Kennedy's ambition and drive - to do anything that would establish him as
the toughest, baddest, best merc in the business. It was too bad about those
kids in Gatooma. It was too bad about a lot of things. But no, it was not a
world that Kennedy had made, to his way of thinking. It was a world that he
was trying to get ahead in. To accomplish that, you needed ambition and
drive and the knowledge that winning was everything.
It worked for Kennedy. It got him qualified enough to honcho a mission
like this for no less a vip than Mr. Leonard Jericho himself.