The King_A Black Force Thriller Read online

  The King

  Black Force Shorts Book Eight

  Matt Rogers

  Copyright © 2018 by Matt Rogers

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Onur Aksoy.

  www.liongraphica.com

  Contents

  Reader’s Group

  Books by Matt Rogers

  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

  Announcement

  Books by Matt Rogers

  Reader’s Group

  About the Author

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  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)

  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)

  1

  Somewhere in Northern Mali

  Africa

  Dressed in nothing but his compression underwear, Jason King awoke to the stench of festering sweat and the sight of a crude Kalashnikov gun barrel pointed squarely between his eyes.

  One look at the weapon’s owner proved he was dealing with amateurs.

  Not amateurs in a general sense. These men would be cruel, capable of endless atrocities — and King imagined they’d carried out many over the past few months. Mali’s current political climate allowed all kinds of horrible acts on these lawless plains. Armed bandits thrived. They raped and pillaged as they pleased. King had seen many instances of it first-hand.

  So he had no qualms about utterly destroying every single one of these men.

  They were bandits. And they were all tall and rail-thin and rippling with sinewy muscle, their frames soaked with sweat, their eyes bloodshot and rabid. Maybe hopped up on chemicals. Most likely, given the brazenness with which they’d charged into the dark room.

  King lay in the bottom bunk of a rickety wooden contraption, his back pressed to a thin damp mattress. He’d hung his clothes up to dry overnight, lathering himself in insect repellent before drifting off in the early hours of the morning. He’d been loaded to the gills with the requisite shots to prevent infection, but one could never be too careful.

  So when he opened his eyes and saw the AK-47 aimed at his head, he knew what to do.

  Thankfully, there was a world of difference between armed bandits looking to intimidate, and a U.S. black operative deep in enemy territory ready to kill at the slightest indication.

  That world of difference unfolded in the blink of an eye.

  King grabbed the gun the second he opened his eyes and tore it free from the man’s grip by twisting his entire body to the side, applying two-hundred and twenty pounds of bone-wrenching torque to the Kalashnikov. The guy let go of the weapon without resistance, opting to lose the rifle instead of shattering the fingers clutching it, shocked at how fast King had moved.

  There we go.

  That was all I needed.

  It’s over.

  Still lying on his back, King twisted in the other direction, returning to his original position, and smashed the AK-47’s stock into the side of the guy’s head. Maybe in the movies a minute-long fistfight would unfold, but in reality a man with Jason King’s frame launching a heavy weapon into the side of a skull like a baseball bat put any opposition down for the count.

  The guy’s skull caved in and he folded over like a lawn chair, his legs giving out from underneath him as his brain waved goodnight to the rest of his body.

  King planted one hand on the man’s shoulder as he went down and used it to lurch to his feet in one fluid motion, leaping over the unconscious bandit and landing on the dusty floor beside the bunk beds. He glanced at the gun and saw the safety resting in the highest position. It was on. Instead of wasting time fiddling with the tiny lever, he simply hurled the AK-47 end over end toward the doorway.

  There was little chance of missing his target.

  The barrel struck the bandit standing in the doorway in the throat, punching into his trachea with all the force you’d expect from a near Olympic level athlete behind the throw. If it didn’t pierce the skin, it certainly tore his sensitive tissue to shreds, so before the man could even raise his own AK-47 in protest his legs buckled and he slumped against one side of the doorway, barely able to prop himself upright, gasping for breath, eyes boggling in his skull.

  King would have almost felt sorry for the guy if he hadn’t seen his face plastered all over a board in the previous town, wanted for over a dozen counts of rape.

  Which, in Mali’s current condition, wouldn’t have been a notable incident, had the man not targeted one of the daughters of an important general in the National Committee for the Restoration of Democracy and State.

  Otherwise his picture never would have been up there in the first place.

  But King recognised him, so instead of showing the guy mercy he broke into an all-out sprint and lined up a head kick and let it fly with everything he had in his body.

  Which was a lot.

  Caught between the door frame and King’s shinbone, the guy’s head almost popped. An awful sound rang through the room and his corpse hit the dirt outside — King didn’t even need to check to know the guy was dead.

  He gathered up the new AK-47, noticed the safety of this weapon was off, and barely hesitated before putting three unsuppressed rounds into each of the two bandits standing guard a dozen feet away from the low hut.

  They jerked like marionettes on the spot, tugged by invisible strings, and thumped into the dust.

  Done.

  Four men lying dead in his wake, King wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead and dropped the rifle. He had no need for such a bulky weapon on his travels. He had places to be, and deadlines to meet. So he hurried back to the bunks, dressed in the clothes he’d hung at the foot of his bed, swung a thick weatherproof hiking backpack over his shoulders, and slipped out of the living quarters before anyone in the neighbouring village could investigate the source of the commotion.

  He disappeared into the countryside, and as soon as he was surrounded by dead arid plains
he slipped a small electronic device into his right ear canal and thumbed the surface of the earpiece.

  ‘Lars,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Anything to report?’

  ‘Nothing important. I’m on the move again.’

  2

  He trudged almost aimlessly along the dusty road, surrounded by nothingness, heading north.

  Always north.

  There was no reprieve from the heat. Not out here. Not this far off the beaten track. After three days in-country the sweat had become part of him — he no longer noticed the perspiration flowing from his pores, drenching his clothing, running in rivulets off his chest. He just fished packets of electrolytes out of his backpack at regular intervals and dropped them in half-gallons of clean water he purchased at the various towns dotted across the Mali countryside. They always charged a ludicrous fee, but he paid it. It was better than having to deal with a militia rounded up by the townsfolk stopping him on his journey, provoking him, demanding a toll fee for even daring to venture into Northern Mali.

  Most people he came across simply stared at him in disbelief.

  A white man voluntarily hiking through Mali, right as the country plunged into anarchy.

  It took a madman.

  King didn’t mind what they called him.

  He had a job. And he would do it. It didn’t matter if it was the streets of New York, or the slums of Mexico, or the northern plains of a country in the midst of a political mutiny.

  Chaos reigned out here. The country’s constitution suspended by rebels, the president ousted from office. It had all gone to hell.

  In fact, the ground beneath King’s feet had been labelled “Awazad” by the mutinous CNRDR, now apparently a separate country. He paid it no attention whatsoever. The country could tear itself apart around him for all he cared. It was simply the nature of the occupation.

  Tunnel vision.

  If he let his attention drift in all directions at once, his entire purpose would be rendered obsolete, forced to lurch this way and that at the slightest whim. Long ago, he’d learnt that the best way to deal with his job was to put one foot in front of the other.

  Follow orders.

  Your superiors know best.

  If you can prevent injustice along the way, great.

  But it can never interfere with the operation.

  His business concerned a camp of regional Islamists a dozen miles north of his current position. The exact details concerning the situation were sparse, but that mirrored any order he’d ever received.

  That was the world he operated in.

  That was the career he’d signed up for.

  Walking into the dark, turning on the light, and seeing what he found on the other side.

  It had always been that way. And it always would.

  This incident, however, had all the signs of an absolute shit show.

  Still on the same call, King said, ‘I’m going to need more details. Now’s the time. You’ve been holding things back for too long.’

  ‘How many times do I need to say it?’ Lars Crawford hissed. ‘There’s nothing else.’

  King had formed a symbiotic relationship with his handler over the years. They were now one and the same. Everything that touched Lars’ ears, he fed to King. Lars was the singular access point to the murky world of black operations. King didn’t allow himself to get bogged down in the bureaucratic slog. He let the men in suits decide his fate, and he went where they pointed. Lars was the messenger. And a damn good one at that.

  Which made it awfully uncomfortable when King thought the man was hiding something.

  ‘Who gave you this intel?’ he said. ‘Name names. Or I turn around and walk straight out of here.’

  ‘You do that and you let six American citizens die. Brutally. You want that hanging over you for the rest of your life?’

  ‘I want you to give me more information about the job before I do it. You have to know more than what you’ve given me.’

  ‘That’s all we know.’

  ‘Why does this whole thing reek of bullshit?’

  ‘King…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’d be very careful about what you choose to say next.’

  ‘Or what?’

  ‘You know what.’

  ‘You’re going to kill me?’

  ‘You clearly underestimate the gravity of the division you work for. I expect more from its founding member, to put it mildly.’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  ‘You know the rules. You know the game. You do what we tell you to do. How many times have I fed you bad intel?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘You think I’m about to start?’

  Drenched in sweat, shielding his sunburnt face from the scorching sun, King paused in the middle of the badlands and surveyed the road ahead. Nothing. No traffic. No landmarks. No signs of human civilisation whatsoever.

  ‘There’s always more,’ he said. ‘Always. You’ve never given me this little to work with. You’re telling me there’s six aid workers held hostage out here by an unknown Islamist group. Is that right?’

  ‘That’s right. You know this.’

  ‘You’ve got their position.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And that’s it?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  ‘How many hostiles?’

  ‘We don’t know. We’ve been over this.’

  ‘And this just fell across your desk?’

  ‘I’m not at liberty to discuss how—’

  ‘Where are you right now, Lars? In an air-conditioned office? Probably sipping a coffee? Wearing a suit? Sounds like you’re pretty comfortable.’

  ‘Would it matter if I was?’

  ‘No. That’s your job. And this is mine. But—’

  ‘That’s why your undisclosed earnings have hit eight figures in the last two years while I sit here earning absolutely fuck-all telling you what to do.’

  ‘Uh…’

  ‘Weren’t expecting that, were you?’

  ‘You really aren’t compensated well?’

  ‘I’m doing alright. But I don’t take the risks the operatives do. So it’s understandable.’

  ‘Regardless…’

  ‘I don’t have anything for you, King. We can go around in circles for as long as you like. But that’s the information, and you have to work with it. You’ve got the co-ordinates?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then do something with them. Looks like you’re making good time. Based on the ground you’ve covered over the last few days, our computers say you’ll be at the camp by sunset. You know the orders?’

  ‘Strike two days from now — is that right?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Any reason for that?’

  ‘Nothing I can disclose.’

  King felt like removing the earpiece and hurling it into the desert, going radio silent for the rest of the operation, but common sense prevented him from having such an emotional reaction. He compartmentalised it, as he always did, and said through clenched teeth, ‘You’re full of shit, Lars.’

  ‘I love you too.’

  ‘I’ll be in touch.’

  ‘I certainly hope so.’

  King double-tapped the earpiece and left it in place — it was barely noticeable in his ear canal.

  He concentrated on the road ahead, tuning all other thoughts out.

  One foot in front of the other.

  Forever.

  3

  Lars kept true to his word, and King crept up to the outskirts of the desert encampment as the sun melted into the horizon, casting deep orange hues across the sand, accentuating the alien landscape. He burrowed himself into the ground, stomach pressed to the hot earth, and dragged the quarter-full plastic bottle of water in front of his face. By now the sun and unrelenting heat had turned the contents warm, but they provided the same relief to his body regardless. He sucked down a long string of gulps, taking in the pale blue liquid, feeling it replenish his
energy reserves.

  He had a feeling the electrolytes contained certain substances that wouldn’t pass a drug test, but he was not a competitive athlete.

  He was a competitive killer, and in this business one took any advantage they could find. He skewered the bottle into the sand alongside him and gently touched the earpiece.

  ‘I’m here.’

  ‘See, that didn’t take too long, did it?’ Lars said. ‘You were whining for days about the hike.’

  ‘I still don’t see why it was necessary.’

  ‘And you never will. That’s none of your concern.’

  ‘Why the secrecy? Why the weird commands? Why all this bullshit?’

  ‘You want the truth?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Because it’s not in our best interests for the operatives to become prima donnas.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You don’t like an order we give you. Okay. We explain it in detail, giving you sensitive information you shouldn’t have in the first place so you can be at peace of mind. Great. But then we’ve set a precedent, haven’t we? And now every time you don’t like something we’ll need to spoon-feed you an explanation of exactly why you need to do things that certain way. And that’ll add up over time. And then you’ll be carrying around a cocktail of information you shouldn’t have. That’s a ticking time bomb just waiting for the day you’re too slow to react, and you get caught by the enemy, and they torture you until you finally reveal all that juicy information you didn’t need to know in the first place. It’s none of your business knowing why things need to be carried out at a certain time. You just do them. Understand?’