Iron Wolf by Dale Brown Read Free Book Online Page B

prompted.
    â€œWhich means you’re out,” Boomer told him. “Canned. Axed. Terminated with prejudice. Pick your own favorite phrase.” He sighed again. “Look, Brad, ordinarily I don’t do shit for someone I’m firing, especially not some jackass intern. But I respected your dad a hell of a lot . . . so I’m giving you a onetime severance package.” He tossed a manila folder across the desk. “There. Don’t waste it.”
    Brad flipped open the folder and found himself staring at his passport, a plane ticket to Mexico, and several thousand dollars in cash. Caught by surprise, he looked up at Boomer.
    â€œGo spend some time hanging out on the beach with the señoritas and get your head screwed on straight, before you restart school,” the other man said. “Just don’t plan on blowing the next forty years playing around in the sand, okay?”
    This time Brad caught the twinkle in Boomer’s eye. Forty years in the desert. EXODUS. Right. Now he knew who had relayed his father’s signal through the simulator program. He grinned back across the desk. “I’ll be a good boy, Dr. Noble,” he said. “I promise I won’t cause any more trouble.”
    â€œSee that you don’t,” Hunter Noble said with a wry smile. He cocked his head to one side. “But I hope you won’t mind if I don’t hold my breath on that promise of yours. Because I sure don’t hear any ice freezing over down in hell.”

TWO
    Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.
    â€” N APOLEON H ILL, A MERICAN AUTHOR
    O VER U KRAINE
    T HIRTY MINUTES LATER
    Two Russian Air Force Su-34 fighter-bombers in black, white, and light blue camouflage streaked west, flying low over the flat Ukrainian countryside. Precision-guided bombs, antiradiation missiles, and air-to-air missiles hung from their external hardpoints.
    The lead pilot, Major Viktor Zelin, caught sight of smoke from the wrecked helicopters rising on the horizon. He throttled back as he banked into a hard turn and climbed—a maneuver copied by his wingman, flying in loose formation aft and about two kilometers off his right wing. He craned his neck to get a quick look at the Starovoitove station as it flashed below, catching a fleeting glimpse of flashing blue lights on the highway and around the OSCE post. It looked like the Ukrainian police were on the scene, he thought. Nu i chto? Well, so what? What good were ordinary policemen goingto do against a murderous terrorist gang? Especially one that was probably made up of their bastard countrymen?
    â€œInform Voronezh Control that we have the attack area in sight,” he told the navigation and weapons officer in the right-hand seat.
    â€œSending now,” Captain Nikolai Starikov acknowledged. He transmitted the message using a series of short, three-figure Morse codes, and then checked the glowing multifunction map display in front of him. “We’re right up against the border,” he warned. “We’re going to stray across into Polish airspace.”
    â€œNo shit,” Zelin grunted, continuing the turn and bleeding off more speed. Even with its superb maneuverability and flying just fast enough to stay in the air, the Su-34 had a turning radius measured in kilometers. There was no way his flight could orbit close enough to the OSCE post to keep it in sight and stay entirely on the Ukrainian side of the frontier.
    Suddenly a warning tone sounded in both men’s headsets.
    â€œSearch radar spike,” Starikov said, studying his displays. “L-band. Single emitter. Computer evaluates it as a long-range Polish RAT 31DL radar. Strength is sufficient to detect us.”
    â€œNo surprise now that we’re off the deck,” the major commented. He showed his teeth. “But I bet some fucking Pole just crapped his pants when we popped up onto his