Outlaws Read online

  Outlaws

  The King & Slater Series Book Four

  Matt Rogers

  Copyright © 2019 by Matt Rogers

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Onur Aksoy.

  www.onegraphica.com

  Contents

  Reader’s Group

  Facebook Page

  Books by Matt Rogers

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Announcement

  Afterword

  Books by Matt Rogers

  Reader’s Group

  About the Author

  Join the Reader’s Group and get a free 200-page book by Matt Rogers!

  Sign up for a free copy of ‘BLOOD MONEY’.

  Meet Ruby Nazarian, a government operative for a clandestine initiative known only as Lynx. She’s in Monaco to infiltrate the entourage of Aaron Wayne, a real estate tycoon on the precipice of dipping his hands into blood money. She charms her way aboard the magnate’s superyacht, but everyone seems suspicious of her, and as the party ebbs onward she prepares for war…

  Maybe she’s paranoid.

  Maybe not.

  Just click here.

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  Expect regular updates, cover reveals, giveaways, and more. I love interacting with fans. Feel free to send me a private message with any questions or comments. Looking forward to having you!

  Books by Matt Rogers

  THE JASON KING SERIES

  Isolated (Book 1)

  Imprisoned (Book 2)

  Reloaded (Book 3)

  Betrayed (Book 4)

  Corrupted (Book 5)

  Hunted (Book 6)

  THE JASON KING FILES

  Cartel (Book 1)

  Warrior (Book 2)

  Savages (Book 3)

  THE WILL SLATER SERIES

  Wolf (Book 1)

  Lion (Book 2)

  Bear (Book 3)

  Lynx (Book 4)

  Bull (Book 5)

  Hawk (Book 6)

  THE KING & SLATER SERIES

  Weapons (Book 1)

  Contracts (Book 2)

  Ciphers (Book 3)

  Outlaws (Book 4)

  LYNX SHORTS

  Blood Money (Book 1)

  BLACK FORCE SHORTS

  The Victor (Book 1)

  The Chimera (Book 2)

  The Tribe (Book 3)

  The Hidden (Book 4)

  The Coast (Book 5)

  The Storm (Book 6)

  The Wicked (Book 7)

  The King (Book 8)

  The Joker (Book 9)

  The Ruins (Book 10)

  Prologue

  California

  Quinn Chapman had a good life.

  He wasn’t quite sure how he’d got here, or what he’d done to deserve such blessings, but he chalked it up to the simple explanation that sometimes the stars aligned. They were out tonight, shimmering above the Port of Los Angeles, casting a wide net over the dark swirling water of the harbour. He wore dark clothing in turn — a black short-sleeved shirt tucked into slate-grey slacks — because that’s what had been requested.

  When requests were made, he had to abide if he wanted to continue reaping the blessings.

  It allowed him to maintain the Cali lifestyle.

  Take today, for instance: a morning surf at a hidden cove to the south of Laguna Beach, followed by lunch at the Coyote Grill overlooking the Pacific (an appetiser, an outlandishly expensive main course, and a trio of Coronas back-to-back-to-back, all glistening with condensation like you see in the commercials.) Then back to the house in Emerald Bay for a little admin with his business partners, prepping for the gig tonight, but that wasn’t anything to complain about.

  The jobs were always simple, straightforward, never too complicated. Find the right container, load it up, pay the respective port officials to look the other way, coast smoothly off Terminal Island, deliver the cargo to its intended destination.

  Never — under any circumstances — look inside the containers.

  Because that would make it complicated.

  Then he’d have to worry about all those tricky feelings he’d rather avoid — guilt, doubt, fear.

  Why would you deliberately let yourself feel like that?

  Why not ignore where the cargo ends up, or what happens to it, or what you’re contributing to, or what kind of people you’re aiding, and just focus on the money that comes rolling in, allowing you to surf and drink and eat and play to your heart’s content?

  To Quinn, that was the obvious choice.

  There were doubts, of course. He’d been raised a libertarian by hippie parents whose primary hobby involved shouting the horrors of capitalism from the rooftops, so when he had time alone to really think about it, his mind went down the obvious route.

  This money you and your friends are using to live in a multimillion dollar house facing the water has to come from somewhere. You know bad people are paying you for your services. Every day you spend ignoring that fact is another day you’re complicit. You don’t look in the shipping containers, but you know what’s in them — roughly speaking. How much suffering are you contributing to? How much longer can this go on?

  For obvious reasons, he didn’t spend much time alone with his thoughts. If he ended up dwelling on the morality of it, he ju
st told himself he wasn’t the ringleader and left it at that. His boss (and oldest friend) was a generous man, and Quinn was fortunate for the privilege of working for him.

  Questioning how much immorality he was contributing to the world made no sense.

  That’s not what life was about.

  So, broadly speaking, Quinn Chapman had a good life … as long as he didn’t think about what he’d done to get it.

  Now he stood alongside his brothers, his friends, his colleagues — all of them dressed similarly. There were six of them in total, and together they ran a smooth operation.

  There was an elephant in the room but Quinn ignored it, as did the rest of his co-workers. Namely, the fact that Roman — the seventh member — wasn’t around anymore. Their boss had told them he’d run off. Quinn didn’t believe that. Roman wasn’t the running type. If he’d fucked up, he would have stayed and faced it like a man. Which is probably what he’d done — faced their boss like a man — and that explained why he wasn’t around anymore.

  Quinn didn’t like to think about that, either.

  You have a good life.

  He said it to himself, over and over again.

  The longer he masked the truth, the better.

  The crew took up their established positions within the cargo zone. Two of Quinn’s buddies peeled off to settle into scouting locations by the entrance so they could keep an eye out for witnesses. It used to be a three-man gig, before … well …

  Quinn watched the boss locate the specific container and nod to the remaining men. Quinn and the last two guys set to work manoeuvring the tractor-trailer truck in the concrete bay, backing the empty trailer into the correct position. Then they used a giant yellow shipping container handler — like an oversized forklift — to lift up the refrigerated container, detach it from its plug, and guide it into the gaping maw of the open trailer.

  Quinn watched all this from a dozen feet away. They’d streamlined the process. Cal handled the forklift, and Kurt shouted directions.

  This time, there was a slight difference. Quinn’s gaze wandered over the ridged exterior of the container as it caught the moonlight. He noticed a small cylindrical hole cut into the metal, maybe the size of a golf ball, no larger. There was something solid and grey on the other side of the hole, but Quinn watched it peel away before his very eyes, and realised it was packaging tape.

  Then a wide eye pressed to the hole from within, barely illuminated by the moonlight.

  It spotted him.

  He saw primal fear in the pupil.

  The eye vanished, replaced immediately by the tape.

  Quinn shifted from foot to foot, his stomach churning. He knew he was breaking out in an uncomfortable sweat, but there was nothing he could do to prevent it. The night was humid and clammy, and as soon as adrenaline fired, his system did the rest. He wiped his brow and hoped nobody noticed his discomfort. He gave thanks that they were skilled enough as a crew to do this by moonlight alone. He’d hate for his face to be lit up for all to see.

  The container disappeared into the semi-trailer — out of sight, out of mind.

  He repeated it, over and over.

  Out of sight, out of mind.

  Out of sight, out of mind.

  Out of sight, out of mind.

  You saw nothing.

  They beckoned him up onto the tractor unit, and he leapt onto the step below the closed passenger’s door, attaching himself to the outside of the truck. He looped an arm in through the open window and gripped the inside of the door lining for stability. Kurt, now behind the wheel, accelerated out of the cargo zone, and the two scouts came running out of the darkness. They leapt aboard too.

  With all six of them either inside or outside the tractor unit, Kurt steered the truck toward the opposite end of the gargantuan berth.

  A couple of seconds later, headlights hit them front-on, fully illuminating the trio hanging off the doors. It didn’t automatically incriminate them, but it sure looked suspicious. The oncoming truck barrelled past, heading further away from shore, toward distant berths.

  When it was out of sight, they all sighed with relief.

  It was a clear oversight on the scouts’ part.

  Kurt drove all the way to the edge of Terminal Island in the dead of night, passing three separate officials they’d paid off. He slowed the truck alongside an open-topped jeep parked alone in shadow, and Quinn leapt down. It was his ride out of here. Only Kurt and Vince would stay with the truck.

  The boss leapt down off the same door and landed on the concrete alongside him. He was a tall man, with blond dreadlocks and a tanned wiry frame.

  Your typical California surfer on the surface.

  Underneath, not so much.

  The boss said, ‘That was close.’

  Quinn said, ‘Yeah.’

  ‘We might need a seventh member for the next gig after all. We worked better with three scouts. What do you think?’

  Quinn tried to steady his racing pulse.

  He thought of Roman’s unknown whereabouts.

  He thought of the eye in the container, bloodshot in the moonlight.

  He said, ‘Yeah, maybe.’

  He climbed aboard the jeep, realising he didn’t have a good life after all.

  1

  Moscow

  Jason King heard his employer order a murder through the closed door.

  Their hotel resided within the Garden Ring, overlooking the Moskva River. The suite had unobstructed views of both the Kremlin and St. Basil’s Cathedral across the water. King stared out at the landmarks from an antechamber within the suite. It was a circular space, ornately furnished, that led through to a huge private office currently occupied by the man he had come to Russia to protect.

  Sam Donati.

  The head of an American conglomerate that ran transportation and shipping for half the globe.

  Outside, it was grey and overcast. Rain drizzled — not enough to qualify as a downpour, but enough to put a considerable dampener on the mood within the suite. He already had a dozen reservations about being here, but the weak light in the antechamber and the dreary conditions outside combined to churn his gut. The rain was all he was paying attention to when the muffled voice resonated through the wood, coming from within the office.

  He figured he wasn’t supposed to be within earshot.

  Which didn’t matter.

  He heard what he heard, and the rest of the world fell away.

  Donati said, ‘You’re sure she’s alone?’

  Silence.

  Donati said, ‘Okay. Do it. Make it quick.’

  King stopped. He’d been pacing, restless after a long flight from New York and a considerable lack of sleep, but now all of that became superficial. He zoned in, listening for anything that might indicate he’d misinterpreted what he’d heard.

  Donati said, ‘I don’t care. You know what this is worth. Be discreet. Get it done.’

  What this is worth.

  King knew.

  He reflexively reached for his appendix holster. Milliseconds later he remembered it was empty, and his hand froze along its trajectory. He glanced at the other end of the antechamber, through to the main room of the suite. The six-man team from Veloce Security Services were somewhere out there, out of sight, probably pacing too. They comprised the entirety of Donati’s personal security crew.

  Like King, all of them were weaponless.

  They’d flown in privately, but it wouldn’t have been prudent to try to smuggle an arsenal of firepower past customs. Not without the governmental stamp of approval, which King knew he’d never get for a civilian gig.

  Now, an arms dealer was en route to the hotel from further north, in tow with all the weapons they could ask for. One of Donati’s team had found him on the dark web and exchanged the particulars.

  But the guy wasn’t here yet. That’s what they were all waiting for.

  So King didn’t have a gun.

  Doesn’t matter. You can’t let this s
lide.

  The rigidly moral voice in his head. It had followed him his whole career. He knew the stakes. Fail to listen to it once, and you open the floodgates. Obeying it put his wellbeing at risk, over and over and over again. But the alternative was losing his soul, and that wasn’t a sacrifice he was willing to make.

  He stepped forward, twisted the door handle, and stepped into the office.

  Donati looked up, surprised. Frazzled. A little angry.