by Ty Patterson
Death Club
Warriors Series, Book 9
By
Ty Patterson
Copyright © 2016 by Ty Patterson
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Table of Contents
Books by Ty Patterson
Acknowledgements
Dedications
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
Coming soon
Bonus chapter from Trigger Break
Author’s Message
About the Author
Books by Ty Patterson
Warriors Series Shorts
This is a series of novellas that link to the Warriors Series thrillers
Zulu Hour, Warriors Series Shorts, Book 1 (set before The Warrior)
The Watcher, Warriors Series Shorts, Book 2 (set between The Warrior and The Warrior Code)
The Shadow, Warriors Series Shorts, Book 3 (set before The Warrior)
Gemini Series
Dividing Zero, Gemini Series, Book 1
Defending Cain, Gemini Series, Book 2
Warriors Series
The Warrior, Warriors series, Book 1
The Reluctant Warrior, Warriors series, Book 2
The Warrior Code, Warriors series, Book 3
The Warrior’s Debt, Warriors series, Book 4
Warriors series Boxset, Books 1-4
Flay, Warriors series, Book 5
Behind You, Warriors series, Book 6
Hunting You, Warriors series, Book 7
Zero, Warriors series, Book 8
Warriors series Boxset II, Books 5-8
Warriors series Boxset, Books 1-8
Death Club, Warriors series, Book 9
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Acknowledgements
No book is a single person’s product. I am privileged that Death Club has benefited from the inputs of several great people.
Sylvia Foster, Charlie Carrick, Pat Ellis, Dori Barrett, Simon Alphonso, Dave Davis, V. Elizabeth Perry, Ann Finn, Pete Bennett, Eric Blackburn, Margaret Harvey, David Hay, Jim Lambert, Terry Pellman , Jimmy Smith, Theresa, Mark Campbell, who are my beta readers and who helped shape my book, my launch team for supporting me, Eliza Dee for her editing, and Donna Rich for her proofreading.
Special thanks to Gwen Samson, Arthur Livingston, Michelle Rose Dunn, Chazmim Benton, Misty Vassar Stockton, Sylvia Foster, Eric Blackburn, David Prudhomme, Charlie Carrick, Blair Nicholson, Ralph Phares, Lyn Fox, Peter Polny, Coleen Robbins, Cathy Silveira, Mary Ellen Garza, Jennifer Anderson, Angel Siemer, Tammie Pearcy, Claire Forgacs, Lucy Pearson, Bryan Licsko, and Debbie Bruns Gallant for participating in a competition to name Cherie, Morgan, Dalton, and Privalov.
Dedications
To my parents, who taught me the value of a good education. My wife for her patience, and my son for listening to my jokes. To all my beta readers, my launch team, and well-wishers.
To all the men and women in uniform who make it possible for us to enjoy our freedom.
Chapter 1
Mike Klattenbach knew he wouldn’t last long. His mind had stopped working, conserving the last of the available oxygen, trying to survive. His body had long given up on him and was ready to curl up and die.
Klattenbach knew he was going to die, and very painfully. Several of his ribs were broken and one eye felt like it was permanently damaged. Bones were sticking out of his left hand and his whole body was one giant mass of pain.
He stood swaying, blinking sweat away from his eyes as a figure danced in front of him. The dull roar assaulting his ears wasn’t just the blood pounding in his head. It was the voice of a blood thirsty crowd who had paid top dollar to witness a killing. They wanted bloodshed. They got it.
They wanted a death. Mike Klattenbach knew they would have it.
The dancing figure came closer, a man of enormous proportions, almost six feet five inches tall, all of it muscle and hard bone, his head clean shaven, ink all over his body, his face an impassive mask.
The man was bare-chested, as was Mike Klattenbach. He was dressed in jeans and sneakers, and on his hands were a pair of boxing gloves. Klattenbach had the same attire, though his gloves hadn’t offered much defense to him.
The approaching man jabbed and caught Klattenbach flush on his chin. Klattenbach staggered back but managed to stay on his feet. Hands shoved him back against his opponent who punched again, low, hard, wicked, and another rib broke.
The attacker rained more punches on his face and abdomen, each of them bringing out groans from Klattenbach. The losing fighter didn’t put up any resistance, his body too far gone to defy the punches. His hands lay limply by his side, his uninjured eye blinking rapidly.
The taller man spun in the air and brought Klattenbach to his knees with a spinning kick. His knee crashed into the fallen man’s face. Klattenbach sprawled on his back and his last sight was that of his attacker looming over him.
Nothing moved in the sand and brush of Oregon’s High Desert in the morning hours, except for the sun continuing its relentless journey and for a few fleecy clouds moving in the sky.
The desert covered five counties in the state and was one of the most sparsely populated regions in the country. There were a few large ranches, but the chances of coming across a rattler or a bighorn were higher than encountering human life.
The first sign of life came when the sun was directing its light straight down and shadows were the smallest. A small blob appeared over the horizon and over time, resolved into a human figure.
The person moved steadily, stopping every now and then to wipe sweat and take a swig of water. The man was well-equipped with a backpack and had several liters of water in cans strapped across his body. The backpack contained several pieces of clothing to tackle the heat and the cold. The temperature in the summer could go as high as the mid-eighties and could fall to the low forties.
The man was brown-haired, lean and tall, and moved with an easy gait that suggested a lot of experience walking outdoors.
The man, Zeb Carter, did have that kind of experience. He had walked in some of the most inhospitable deserts in the world and across the most rugged terrain. He wasn’t going to any particular place this time, nor was he on any mission.
The High Desert wasn’t a region he had previously visited, and he was rectifying that during this trip. He was alone, his vehicle parked in a motel in Burn
s, which was on the edge of the desert.
He had been in the desert for three days, camping in the open, and it was on the third day, he spotted the bald eagle. It was circling in the sky, swooping lower, and disappeared out of sight, a mile away.
Zeb had nothing better to do and set out in the direction of the eagle. It rose several minutes later and through his binoculars, he spotted a piece of flesh in its beak.
Probably a wild animal, dead. He checked his location and his phone. His GPS was working, his cell phone had no signal. The eagle was flying away in the sky and became a distant speck.
Zeb navigated past a rocky outcrop and came to the bird’s position and stood still at the sight that beheld him.
A body, a human, male from what remained of it, lying face up.
He looked around swiftly, assessing any threat, the action second nature to him. Nope, no threat. He was the only living person for miles around.
He approached the body cautiously, watching where he placed his feet. There were no tracks for him to carelessly erase.
He got closer to the body and crouched next to it. The face had been savaged by wildlife, as was the upper torso. Heat and the dry weather had decomposed the skin and white bone showed in several places.
Male, white, bare-chested, was what Zeb could make out from the remains. The bare-chested part intrigued him. No sane person was foolhardy enough to wander in the desert without clothing.
The lack of tracks intrigued him even more. There wasn’t much wind and loose soil and sand wouldn’t have covered tracks. He moved in widening concentric circles, but he still didn’t come across any vehicle tread marks.
He came back to the body and photographed it from various angles. He spoke in his phone and narrated his discovery of it. He went closer to it to get a better angle when a remaining patch of skin on a forearm caught his attention.
There was a tattoo on that patch of skin, a design he knew very well. Several of his friends wore that ink. He pulled out his sat phone and powered it up, knowing that his holiday had just ended.
The tattoo was that of a dagger crossed by three lightning bolts, on a darker, arrowhead background. Zeb had seen that ink on several of his friends once they had left the Army.
It was that of the Special Forces.
Chapter 2
Zeb sat on his haunches and studied the body for several long minutes as he considered his actions. Yeah, he would call the sheriff, maybe even the state troopers. But did he want to get involved? In his mind he heard the twins groaning and rolling their eyes, and that decided it for him.
The sheriff could handle it.
He searched for the local sheriff’s number and called in the body. ‘Yes, ma’am,’ he told the dispatcher, ‘I’ll be waiting at the scene.’
Zeb looked around for shade and finding none, drew a battered Stetson from his bag and jammed it over his head. He brought out a map of the region and rested his back against a conveniently located rock. The rock was warm and pretty soon, it would turn hot, but for now, it would do.
Zeb’s sat phone had maps, he was carrying a laptop and a tablet computer, those had maps and more applications, but he still preferred the touch and feel of paper. He unfolded the map and folded it back again to focus on the High Desert and the surrounding towns.
He had set out early in the morning from Burns and had walked for five hours, before he had come across the body. He was in open country, somewhere to the west of Summer Lake and to the east of Diamond. He could see nothing but undulating land and shrubs and vegetation that didn’t reach any great height. Nothing moved; even the eagle had disappeared.
He reckoned the sheriff would take three or four hours to arrive; the sheriff would have vehicles, but topography and natural caution would slow down the law enforcement officers.
Zeb took another swig, lowered the hat over his face and went into a dreamless state between sleep and alert.
Zebadiah Carter, Zeb to his friends, was the lead agent in a covert U.S. agency that was known, simply, as The Agency. Barely a handful of people knew of its existence and the missions it undertook were known to even fewer. The Agency went after threats to national security; stolen nuclear weapons, taking down terrorists, erasing international criminal gangs – its remit was loose and it operated across international borders.
The Agency’s setup was unique which made it very different from other covert agencies and that structure played a major role in its success. The Agency had a near-zero admin footprint; Zeb and his seven fellow operatives were based in New York and worked in a private security consulting firm. The firm advised corporations and large businesses on premise and executive security. The firm was genuine and had real clients all across the country, and its work provided cover to the operatives as they went about Agency business.
All but two of the eight operatives had served in the U.S. armed forces; Zeb, Bwana, Bear, and Roger were ex-Special Forces, while Broker had been an intelligence analyst in the Pentagon. Chloe had been with the 82nd Airborne and was the oldest of the three female operatives.
Beth and Meghan Petersen, twins, took care of the intel side of The Agency and also oversaw its logistics and equipment. The sisters, in their late twenties, were the youngest in the crew and came from an illustrious law enforcement family. They brought youth, energy, and humor and had become integral to the unit.
The Agency was headed by Clare, who rarely gave out her second name. Those who knew her, didn’t need it. Those who didn’t, had no need. Clare had overhauled the covert unit when she had taken over as its first female director and, along with Zeb, had devised its current organization.
The structure enabled The Agency to move much faster than other deep-black agencies, and provided total deniability that Clare’s boss, the President, needed.
The rumbling of engines roused Zeb and when he peered beneath his hat’s brim, he saw two police vehicles making their way slowly over the uneven terrain. The lead vehicle, a SUV bearing the crest of Harney County, flashed its lights at Zeb, acknowledging his presence. A short, stocky, man jumped out of it and stood for several seconds with his hands on his hips, surveying the scene. He was joined by a second police officer, who crossed his arms and seemed to take his cues from the short man.
‘Garav,’ the short man introduced himself when he approached Zeb. ‘Sheriff Jeremy Garav,’ he added needlessly since his title was displayed on a nameplate on his chest. ‘That’s my Deputy, Packman,’ he gestured to the second man who nodded at Zeb.
Garav was in his late fifties with a full head of steel-grey hair. His tanned and deeply lined face had a somber expression as he knelt over the body and inspected it from up close. A look at Packman stirred the deputy into action; Packman unslung a camera from his shoulder and started taking pictures of the scene from various angles.
‘What’s the story, sir?’ Garav addressed Zeb, his brown eyes moving over Zeb’s body and resting momentarily on his rucksack. He looked behind Zeb and frowned, ‘Where’s your vehicle?’
The sheriff looked at him dumbfounded for moments when Zeb told him about the eagle and coming across the body.
‘You walked?’
‘Yes, Sheriff.’
‘For five hours?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘In this heat? Why? What’s there to see here? It’s nothing but flat land and some vegetation.’
‘I like walking, sir. I was exploring this part of the country.’
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed as he mulled over Zeb’s words and from his body language, Zeb knew Garav wasn’t buying his story.
‘You know this man?’ the sheriff asked him with an inscrutable expression.
‘No, sir. I am new to this county. His face isn’t recognizable, in case you haven’t noticed,’ Zeb added dryly and mentally berated himself when a dull flush spread across Garav’s face. No need to antagonize him.
‘I can see that,’ the sheriff snapped and turned to his deputy. ‘Packman, search the body,
see if there’s anything in his pockets. Call in to Debbie. Get her to send the van.’
‘He was without a shirt?’ this was addressed to Zeb without looking at him.
‘Yes, sir. The body is as I found it.’
‘You didn’t touch it?’
‘No, sir.’
‘What do you do, Mr. Carter? Most people would touch the body and trample all over the scene.’
‘I run a security consulting firm in New York, sir. I was in the Army. I’ve seen some bodies before.’
‘Where did you say your vehicle was?’
‘At a motel in Burns, sir.’ Zeb repeated evenly, knowing the sheriff had heard him the first time round.
‘Sheriff,’ he called out softly when Packman turned away from them and spoke in his phone.
‘I am not your problem,’ he met Garav’s eyes. ‘You’ll find my car at that motel. They’ll have reservation records. This body looks like it’s been out here about two days. Two days ago, I was nowhere near Harney County.’
‘You can tell the body’s been here that long?’
‘I was in the Special Forces, sir. Like I said, I’ve seen some dead bodies.’
Garav glanced back at the body, his eyes lingering on the ink on the dead man’s hand and there was a question in them when they returned to Zeb.
‘Yes, sir,’ Zeb confirmed. ‘That’s a Special Forces tat.’
Garav and Packman spent a couple of hours searching the scene and when they returned, the sheriff jerked a thumb at his vehicle. ‘Let’s go,’ he told Carter. ‘I’ll drop you off at the motel. There’s nothing keeping you here, is there?’