Godsend (The Circle War Book 1) Read online

  CONTENTS

  Other Books

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Quote

  August

  Title

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Author's Note

  Other books in the Circle War series:

  The Last Winter

  Ascension

  Godsend

  Matt King

  Copyright © 2017 Matt King

  Published by Heroic Age Books

  Raleigh, NC

  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 author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art by Jörn Zimmermann (joern-zimmermann.com)

  www.kingwrites.com

  For Ryan and Audrey

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  There are roughly a bajillion people I need to thank for bringing this novel together. I’ll start with my writing family: Barbara Davis, Doug Simpson, Lisa Rosen, Michelle Hicks, Sheryl Cornett, Sharon Kurtzman, and Mitch Richmond of the Raleigh Novel Group, who helped me tremendously throughout. They’re all accomplished writers, and I can’t thank them enough for helping me get Godsend ready for the masses.

  Speaking of masses, I had a truckload of people sign up for beta reading duties, and they all did their part to help me hone the story. A special acknowledgement goes to Jim McCann (www.jmjazzproject.com) for his tireless work in combing through the pages, looking for plot holes and character discrepancies. You rule, mang. Other beta readers who are owed an adult beverage of their choice: Colleen, Jerrod, Clay, Seth, Nat, Jon, Kevin, Kristi, Susie, Greg, Jack, Allen, Amanda, Melissa, Marc, Phillip, Tara Lynne, Eve, Rafael, Jason, Shawn, Michelle, Josh, Leigh, and Brantley.

  Finally, I want to thank you, the superhero decision-maker, who made the choice of buying my book. Independent authors face a number of challenges when bringing their book to market, none more daunting than getting noticed by readers. If you liked Godsend and want to help ensure that more of August’s stories come your way, my advice is to spread the word, and most importantly, leave a review on your book-buying site of choice. We live and die by such things, and I would send you many internet kisses if you took a few minutes to jot down your thoughts about the book when you’re done. It helps more than you know.

  And now, let the Circle War begin…

  "We only have to look at ourselves

  to see how intelligent life might develop

  into something we wouldn't want to meet."

  - Stephen Hawking

  AUGUST

  “Alpha, this is Phoenix. Are you in position?”

  “I’m in a position,” August answered.

  He swore under his breath as he tried again to dislodge the swords on his back from the overhead network of pipes. The hum of the subway tracks below prickled his nerves. He freed the swords with a hard tug, nearly costing him his balance.

  Coburn’s rocky voice broke through the comm link embedded in his ear. “Cut the chatter, Mr. Dillon, and call out your position.”

  August pointed his flashlight down the length of the pipes. A rat scurried into the shadows. “Still trying to find a comfy spot.”

  The southern end of the Brooklyn G line was mercifully quiet. Even at three o’clock on a Sunday morning, he had expected more foot traffic. With any luck, it would stay empty.

  He settled along a run of pipes above the center bench, away from the fluorescent light. He checked the display on his comm device, a paper-thin touchscreen sewn into the forearm of his suit. The black screen read Incoming Target Dossier in monochrome green letters.

  A familiar knot formed in his stomach. Who would it be this time? Some government contractor who’d been too loose with state secrets? A paraplegic nun? He could count on two fingers the number of times he’d actually felt good about doing a domestic kill job. Most turned out to be some random foreign national the FBI decided to label as a threat, one they didn’t feel like dirtying their hands with.

  Enter the mercs of Phoenix Paramilitary.

  While the picture uploaded, he scanned the platform below. Something streaked by his vision on the left side, a blue and white blur that disappeared behind a pillar.

  “Base, am I alone down here?” he whispered.

  “No sign of movement,” Coburn answered. “Eastern entrance still blocked.”

  He kept his eyes trained on the pillar. I’m seeing things. There’d be a shadow if someone was there.

  “August?”

  Coburn again. For whatever reason, the old man was more vocal than usual. It was a rare event for him to make the trip on a slash-n-dash; even more rare to have him take over communications.

  “Still here. Must’ve been a rat.”

  “Dossier delivered,” Coburn replied.

  August closed his eyes behind his black goggles and took a deep breath. He brought up his comm device and checked the screen. “Shit,” he muttered. “She’s just a kid.”

  “She is your target,” Coburn answered. “Complete the job and get back to the rendezvous point through the eastern exit. Do you hear me?”

  August deleted the image. He felt a layer of sweat forming beneath his mask, even though the height of New York’s summer heat was still half a day away. “I want to know who the client is,” he said.

  “Negative.”

  “I’m not killing a teenager because somebody in the FBI doesn’t like her after-school activities.”

  “August—”

  “I won’t do it.”

  “You won’t?” Coburn asked calmly. He let the channel stay open as he stretched out the silence. “I don’t need to remind you of the penalty for insubordination, do I, Mr. Dillon?”

  He didn’t. The pen
alty for insubordination was ten minutes spent as the Horsemen’s personal punching bag. The quadruplets were Coburn’s pet squad of assassins—the pride of Phoenix and his personal tools for punishment. While August was sent in on single-kill jobs, the Horsemen specialized in taking down multiple targets. It didn’t matter if there were four or four hundred. No one was a match for the brothers.

  “Contact,” Coburn announced.

  August hung his head. When he looked to his left, he saw a mousy teenager sneak down the tiled subway steps carrying a small duffle bag in one hand. She wore a Jets t-shirt and a red Giants hat pulled down over sunglasses too big for her face. She couldn’t have been more conspicuous if she were floating.

  The girl settled onto the bench beneath him. She clung to her bag and looked nervously at both sides of the platform. Her hands shook as she checked the time on her phone.

  “Confirm visual on the target,” Coburn ordered.

  August’s finger hesitated over the communicator’s screen. He tapped it once to confirm.

  “Move in.”

  There was a moment, as he hooked his belay line around the pipe, that he entertained the idea of running away again. I can do it, he said to himself. I know the way they work. I can get away.

  Then he thought of Coburn. The old man would never rest until August was found. He would turn down every contract Phoenix ever got until the man he considered his adopted heir was back home with the Phoenix family, and punished as any unruly family member should be.

  Beneath him, the girl pretended to be busy on her phone.

  Just get it over with.

  He moved silently off the pipes, twisting in the air until his legs dangled over the concrete. He lowered himself on the wire. When his feet touched the floor, he unhooked the line from his belt and slowly unsheathed one of his swords. The blade slid silently out of the leather. His fingers wrapped around the grip as he moved the sword in place behind her head.

  He tried twice to force his hands to move. His reflection stared back at him in the polished metal.

  God damn it. You’re an idiot, Dillon.

  With a flash of his blade, he whipped the edge of his sword under her throat and pulled her up to standing.

  “Oh, God. Oh God, no,” she whimpered.

  “Shut up,” he hissed.

  Coburn’s voice snapped on the line. “August, what are you doing?”

  He dragged the girl off the left side of the platform into the shadows of the subway tunnel, keeping his blade pressed into the loose skin where her chin melted into her throat.

  “What did you do?” he asked her.

  “August!” Coburn yelled.

  August ripped the comm device out of his ear and threw it onto the tracks below. It shattered, sending up sparks from the electric rails.

  “I’m going to ask you one more time,” he said. “What did you do?”

  “I…I didn’t do anything,” she croaked.

  “Look, you and I don’t have a lot of time here. They don’t send me in to kill random commuters at three in the morning. What did you do?”

  The girl choked back tears. After a few gulps of air, she caught her breath enough to speak. “I’m a deserter.”

  “Army?”

  “No.”

  “Where then?”

  “From Phoenix. Phoenix Paramilitary.”

  It took him a few seconds to process what she said. When he did, he nearly dropped his sword. “Where were you stationed?”

  “Main base. North Carolina. I was in Dispatch.”

  No wonder he didn’t recognize her. Dispatch was only partially under Coburn’s control and kept to themselves in a building away from the main base. They were the office that took contract requests from clients. He was beginning to understand Coburn’s interest.

  “Running makes you look guilty. You could’ve just quit and walked away.”

  “I tried.”

  “What do you mean you tried?”

  “I couldn’t work there anymore,” she said. “I hated it. The things I had to hear and be a part of—I couldn’t keep going. I told them I wanted out and they said they could transfer me. When I said I didn’t want that, they sent me to that Coburn man. He said no one with the knowledge I had could leave Phoenix. Not ever.”

  He released some of the pressure from his sword. She craned her head to look at him.

  “You don’t have to do this, mister. Please. I just want to go. I won’t say anything.”

  Coburn’s men would be on them soon. August sheathed his sword. This isn’t going to be ten minutes with the Horsemen for insubordination. It’s gonna be ten weeks. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  She coughed as he led her back onto the platform. “Where are we going?”

  “Just follow me and don’t make a sound.”

  He took off his mask and goggles and threw them into a trashcan. Behind him, the girl shuffled across the cement floor. He guided her up the eastern steps. When they got close to the entrance, he put his finger to his lips and motioned for her to get behind him.

  A Phoenix guard hovered over an open manhole in front of the subway entrance. Four sawhorses blocked anyone from getting through.

  “Hey, Bob,” August said.

  The guard looked up. “Bob? I’m not B—”

  August whipped out a sword and slashed it across the back of the man’s knee. He shoved him into the open manhole before dragging the cover on top to muffle the screams.

  “This way,” he said as the girl looked on, wide-eyed. “We gotta move.”

  They ran across Church Avenue toward a stand of sleeping brownstones. He guided her into an alley between buildings. Before he followed her through, he looked back to see if they were being followed. His eyes flashed across a blue-flowered skirt on the opposite corner. The shade of blue was exactly the same as the one he’d seen on the platform.

  A string of cars cut across his line of sight. When they passed, the corner was empty.

  He shook it off and followed the girl into the shadows.

  “Where are you taking me?” she asked.

  “Two blocks south. You’re getting in a taxi.”

  “To where?”

  “Where were you headed before?”

  “Port Authority bus terminal. I thought I could go to Canada.”

  He came to an intersection in the alley and looked both ways before rushing her through.

  “You can’t take public transportation,” he said. “They’ll find you. Are you using credit cards or bank cards? Anything they can trace?”

  Her eyes shifted away from his stare.

  “Don’t,” he said. “When you get in the cab, tell him to take you to Diamond Car Rental on 101st. Do you have any cash?”

  She nodded.

  “A guy named Kenny runs the place. Tell him you want to make a donation to his daughter’s college fund and he’ll keep your real name off the books. Drive as fast as you can and don’t stop until you’re over the border. Do you understand?”

  “Yeah,” she answered. She looked down the alley. Her eyes widened when a taxi pulled up to the curb at the other end. “There’s one!”

  She took off through the maze of trashcans. Her Giants hat fell, landing in a puddle.

  “Cash!” he called after her. “Don’t forget!”

  She ran from the alley and onto the sidewalk. When she turned around to face him, a sound like thunder ripping across the sky echoed down the alley as the side of her head exploded in a spray of blood and bone. A woman’s shriek from the apartment building above filled in the silent scream on the girl’s face. She fell to her knees with her eyes still wide, staring at August. Her body slumped to the ground.

  Coburn stepped into view. He gave her body a cursory glance before stowing his gun in the pocket of his full-length tan leather jacket. A cigarette burned beneath his white mustache.

  The cab screeched its tires as it pulled back into traffic. Coburn walked down the alley toward August. His cigarette
died in a hiss as he flicked it into a puddle.

  “Jesus Christ, is this what we do now?” August asked. “Kill people who want to walk?”

  Coburn wrapped his fist around the front of August’s uniform and pushed him against a wall. He locked eyes with August, breathing in quick bursts through his nose. “What we do is what I say we do. Not what August Dillon thinks is best.”

  “She was just a kid.”

  “Was she?” Coburn asked. “That young woman had access to private data, Mr. Dillon. Valuable data that could be used to compromise our clients’ interests, as well as our own.”

  “So she deserved to die?”

  “I don’t ask you to dole out what people deserve. I ask you to kill people who are a threat. She was a soldier and a traitor.”

  “Bullshit. This wasn’t some goddamned Marine who got bought off by the Chinese. All she wanted was to leave.”

  Coburn stifled a wet cough. His blue eyes looked sunken in a face August recognized was more gaunt than usual. Drawn cheeks created wide shadows across his jaw. “Do you know why you were assigned this mission?” he asked once he caught his breath.

  August stayed quiet.

  “I wanted you to understand what it took to run this operation,” he said. “Our company is entrusted with information that could topple empires. The protection of that information means the survival of our way of life. This wasn’t about killing an innocent, it was about protecting our legacy. My legacy. I have worked too hard to see this company fall into the hands of someone who doesn’t have the strength to lead it.”

  “I never said I wanted to,” August answered. “I’m not your kid. I’m not waiting around for the day you kick the bucket so I can take over the family business. I don’t want this.” He looked toward the girl’s body. “I don’t want any of it.”

  Coburn raised the corner of his mouth in a smile. He shook his head. “This was always my fear with you. So much potential. I thought you might eventually find a way to realize it, but maybe I was wrong. Maybe you never will.”