Echo of the Reich by James Becker Read Free Book Online Page B

the cheap and cheerful option, this week’s special offer.”
    He returned the box to the backseat and this time reached into the pocket of his jacket. He pulled out a small black pistol, pressed the release, which dropped the magazine out of the butt, and then worked the slide. A small cartridge flew out of the weapon and landed in his lap; clearly the pistol had been loaded. Then he passed it over to Bronson.
    For a few moments, he didn’t recognize it. Although it was small and compact, the pistol bore more than a passing resemblance to the venerable Colt Model 1911, for many years the standard sidearm of the American military, albeit scaled down.
    “What is it?” Bronson asked.
    “It’s a Spanish-made Llama XV, chambered for twenty-two Long Rifle.” Weeks held up the ejected cartridge so Bronson could see it, then fed it into the top of the magazine. “It’s not exactly a man-stopper, but it’d probably be enough to win any argument you’re likely to get involved in. Most people who own these guns seem to like them. And it’s cheap, so if you have to throw it away, it won’t matter.”
    Bronson nodded. The fact that it was Spanish didn’t bother him. Decades earlier, Spanish pistols had been something of a joke, badly made Astras and other makes proving unreliable and sometimes as lethal to the person firing the weapon as to whoever it was pointed at. But all that had changed, and modern Spanish pistols—and, okay, the Llama was a few years old—were as good as anything available anywhere. And the Spanish also made one of the best pure combat pistols ever designed, the SPS.
    The .22 Long Rifle cartridge was a little small, certainly a lower caliber than he had hoped to find, but in the right hands it was still lethal. Bronson knew that Israeli assassination teams routinely used weapons in that caliber, because it could be silenced more effectively than full-bore weapons—meaning those of nine-millimeter caliber and above—and as long as the target was engaged with a head shot, the bullet was as deadly as anything else out there.
    He looked across at Weeks. “How much?”
    “For you, my friend, a century, and for that money I’ll throw in a couple of boxes of ammo as well. Bring it back, and I’ll give you sixty for it.”
    Bronson hefted the weapon and racked the slide back a couple of times, checking the tension in the spring and getting the feel of the pistol. He could easily hide it in his clothing—he’d had breakfast with Weeks and walked around the streets for several minutes, and he’d never even guessed the man had the weapon in his pocket—and it was certainly cheap enough. And, he hoped, he wasn’t going to get involved in a firefight. What he needed was a weapon to get him out of trouble, to end a confrontationthat he wouldn’t otherwise be able to walk away from. And for that, almost any working pistol, of any caliber, would probably be enough.
    He looked across at Weeks. “I’ll take it,” he said.
    Weeks nodded. “Good choice. It’s clean, as far as I know, and for that money you can ditch it if you have to and walk away.”
    Bronson pulled out his wallet and handed over five twenty-pound notes, which Weeks slid into his jacket pocket before handing over the fully charged magazine.
    Then Weeks gestured to the dashboard in front of Bronson. “The boxes of ammo are in there.”
    Bronson opened the glovebox and looked inside. There were two boxes of twenty-two-caliber cartridges there, along with boxes for a number of other calibres, all the way up to 357 Magnum.
    “That’s kind of my ready-use locker,” Weeks said. “Never know when I’ll need a box of something.”
    “I’m sure,” Bronson replied.
    Keeping his finger outside the trigger guard, he slid the magazine into the butt of the Llama, pulled back the slide and chambered the top round. He pulled it back again, ejecting the cartridge onto his lap, and repeated the sequence of actions until the magazine was empty