Silver Linings, стр. 79

“He betrayed the team.”

“Betrayed you?” For the first Mattie really did look shocked. “How did he do that?”

Hugh shrugged. “He took the client's money, as usual, but he also took money from the opposition. The opposition was paying better, I guess. Or maybe they had something more valuable to offer. Who knows? Maybe Rainbird just wanted out of the business and thought he'd take the opportunity to cash out big. But the net result was that he set all of us up on that last raid. The opposition knew when, where, and how we were going to be coming in, and they were waiting.”

“Oh, my God, Hugh.”

“Silk, Paul, and I and a couple of other guys made it out alive. But we lost most of the team.”

“And Rainbird?”

“He vanished. Word was he'd been killed by the opposition after he'd pulled his little trick. That was a logical possibility. Silk and I and the others assumed it was probably true. After all, the guys who'd paid him off to betray the operation knew better than anyone else they couldn't trust him.”

“I suppose that's true.”

“The only thing a mercenary has to sell is his sword and his guarantee of loyalty. Both belong to the client for the duration of the contract. Once he gets a reputation for changing employers in midstream, business has a way of declining.”

“Yes. I can understand that,” Mattie said weakly. She sank down onto the couch. “So you all thought he was dead.”

“He knew he had better be dead as far as we were concerned,” Hugh said.

“I see. Because he knew that those of you who had survived his betrayal would hunt him down?”

Hugh's hand, which was braced against one of the window frames, bunched into a hard fist. “Yeah. He knew it.”

Mattie looked up. “You said Paul Cormier was also part of this…team of professional mercenaries?”

Hugh nodded. “Cormier was the strategist for the team. He'd been in the business a long, long time. Long before Rainbird was on the scene. Paul worked with me and Silk to set up the Rainbird operations. Like I said, he was one of the few who got out of that last operation alive. Hell, one of the reasons we did get out was because of Cormier. He believed in contingency planning. He told me later Rainbird wasn't the first team boss he'd worked for who had turned sour.”

“It's beginning to look like Cormier wasn't killed by some marauding rebel or houseboy who went crazy on Purgatory, isn't it?” Mattie noted quietly.

“It's a lot more likely Rainbird was behind the coup in the first place. He would have gotten to Cormier right at the start because Cormier would have recognized him.”

“And Cormier would have come looking for you and Silk and the others so that you could all go after Rainbird.”

“That's about the size of it. Looks like the Colonel decided to come back from the dead, and Cormier was in the way.”

“Now what happens, Hugh?”

“Now Silk and I have to take care of some old business.”

“I was afraid you were going to say that.” Her hands twisted together in her lap. “I don't suppose it would do any good for me to ask you not to try to hunt him down?”

“No.”

“I'm so afraid,” she whispered. “There's only you and Silk. Rainbird apparently runs a whole island now.”

“He won't have more than a few people around him. Five or six at the most. I know him. I know how he thinks. He never trusted anyone completely. Always said it was smart to keep the leader's inner circle down to a small number. The more people around, the more of a chance of betrayal. He ought to know.”

“But how can he maintain control of the island with so few people?”

“There were probably more at the beginning until he'd established himself. But now, according to Silk's information and the stuff Johnson pulled out of the computer, the guy behind the scenes on Purgatory is keeping a low profile. That means he's cut some deals with the people in charge.”

“You mean Rainbird's using money, not raw fire-power, to run the show?” Mattie asked shrewdly. “Makes sense.”

“Yeah. He's bought himself the perfect safe harbor out in the middle of nowhere. He can do just about anything he wants there, launder money, run drugs, organize mercenary teams, anything. And no one could touch him.”

“Why did he pick Purgatory?”

Hugh shrugged. “Things are a little loose politically out in the Pacific, but even so, there aren't that many islands you can just take over without some larger power noticing or getting annoyed. Purgatory was one of the few that nobody gives a damn about. No military bases, no tourism, nothing.”

“Damn. I don't like the idea of you and Silk taking him on yourselves. There must be some other way to stop Rainbird. Can't you tell the government or something? Let them handle it?”

“They have no interest in Rainbird or in Purgatory. Besides, as far as the government is concerned, there is no Rainbird. Just some joker named Jack McCormick, remember? A small-time strongman who may or may not be pulling the strings in a two-bit island government. Unless he gives them a problem somehow, he'll be ignored.”

Mattie's eyes narrowed. “Besides, as far as you're concerned, this is personal, isn't it?”

“It's personal, all right.”

“What is this Rainbird really like, Hugh?”

“Remember I once told you that no matter how fast a man was, there was always someone around who was faster?”

“I remember. You told me that on Purgatory.”

“Well, Rainbird is the guy who is always faster.”

Mattie's eyes widened. “What do you mean?”

Hugh shrugged. “Just what I said. He's damn good at what he does, Mattie. Fast, utterly ruthless, and smart. But most of all, fast. I've never seen reflexes like Jack Rainbird's. A natural fighting machine. Good with everything, his hands, a gun, a knife, a rock, you name it. He literally moved like greased lightning. Just like they used to say about those old