Target America: A Sniper Elite Novel Read Online Free

the concrete. Gutierrez and another agent went down at the same time, exposing three more agents to enemy fire. These three were also cut down before ever firing a shot. The seven remaining ICE men hit the deck and opened up with their MP5s.
    The two groups blasted away at one another with automatic fire at 50 feet, nearly point-blank range for any automatic weapon.
    The Castañedas’ ammo was old and corrosive, a mark manufactured in Korea during the midseventies, so the tunnel quickly filled with an acrid smoke, obscuring everyone’s vision. To make matters worse, a number of lightbulbs were shattered by ricocheting spall.
    When the guns finally fell silent, there were only four men still left alive on each side.
    Zakayev remained hunched behind the RA-115, with a death grip on the trigger mechanism.
    “ Deja de disparar ! ” Agent Gutierrez screamed. “Cease fire!”
    “Regrésate ! ” Javier shouted from where he lay on his belly. “Go back!” He was amazed to still be alive and didn’t want to risk another hideous exchange of gunfire.
    “We’re going back!” Gutierrez said. “Just give us a chance to pick up our wounded.”
    “I give you one minute,” Javier shouted. “Then we fire again!”
    “ Cálmate ,” Gutierrez said easily. “ Cálmate, amigo. ” Calm down. He couldn’t see much through the smoke but could hear the Castañedas switching out their magazines over the ringing in his ears. There wasnothing to be served by continuing the battle. Besides, he was pretty sure he was bleeding to death, hit in the brachial artery of his right arm.
    “We’re throwing away our weapons!” he called. “Just give us time to get the fuck out of here! De acuerdo ? ” Agreed?
    “Okay. De acuerdo ,” Javier replied, satisfied the fighting was over and the Americans were leaving.
    Gutierrez told his men to throw away their weapons and struggled to his feet, bleeding profusely from the right arm. “I’m gonna need help,” he said to the others.
    The ladder was more than twelve hundred feet back the way they’d come.
    “Motha’fucker,” muttered the only unwounded ICE man, stepping over the bodies of their dead compatriots to slip Gutierrez’s good arm over his shoulders. “We just got our asses handed to us.”
    “Hitch was an idiot,” Gutierrez grumbled, glancing back at the body.
    “Goddamn glory hound,” added one of the others in disgust.
    Gutierrez saw one of the agents still gripping a pistol. “Put that weapon down!” he ordered. “You trying to get us killed?”
    The agent dropped the weapon as if it had suddenly burned his hand.
    “This fight is over— we lost! Now let’s get outta here while we still can.”
     • • •
    JAVIER REMAINED CROUCHED near the wall, bleeding from a shoulder wound. All things considered, he didn’t feel too bad about the firefight. He had just led a battle against the supposedly unbeatable Americans, and he had driven them back with their tails tucked. Now all he had to do was get the crazy Chechen to put away the bomb’s detonator so he could shoot him in the head. He waited five minutes after the gringos were out of sight, and then ordered his men to their feet. He walked up to Zakayev and stood looking down at him, where he remained hunched behind the bomb.
    “It’s safe now,” he said harshly. “You can put the detonator away.”
    Zakayev didn’t reply—didn’t even move.
    “Did you hear what I said?” Javier nudged him with the muzzle of the pistol. “It’s time to go. Put the detonator away!”
    The Chechen keeled over on his side, a single bullet hole in the center of his forehead. The dead-man switch clattered against the concrete.
    Before Javier could even blink, the RA-115 suitcase nuke detonated with a force of nearly two kilotons, vaporizing the Castañedas and the ICE agents—who were just arriving at the foot of the ladder—within a single microsecond. A microsecond later the surrounding rock was vaporized, the