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. Follow me on Facebook! https://www.facebook.com/mattrogersbooks 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 just 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
