Rogues: A King & Slater Thriller by Matt Rogers

Author:Matt Rogers [Rogers, Matt]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-07-25T22:00:00+00:00

45

Years passed that way.

Ronan’s life became a seesaw of shaky mental health. Of course, he’d never admit that, because he was a soldier, and soldiers could simply tough their way through anything that afflicted them.

They had to, or they wouldn’t call themselves soldiers.

Depression could be beaten into submission, like Brad suggested. Iron, steroids, good food. And there was every likelihood that would’ve actually helped. Maybe routine would’ve been good for him, pulled him out of the hole he kept falling back into, just the way Brad said.

As far as Ronan was concerned, Brad was a superhero. Still off fighting battles, still with his shit together. The big man never stopped calling, texting. Ronan always made sure to pick up the phone. He considered that an achievement in itself. In between the calls that proved to Brad he was still alive, still kicking, he drank and he lay in bed and occasionally he collected his small government checks — unofficial, of course — for taking care of the things in Afghanistan that America couldn’t put on the record.

He checked in sporadically with Dominic and Zach and Troy. Otis less so, because the psycho didn’t need reassurance. Ronan didn’t realise what he was doing in the moment, but upon reflection he understood he was keeping the susceptible ones on the leash. They were just as fucked up as he was, and no matter how bad he spiralled he could still manipulate them, convince them he was their only port of call in the entire world, the only one who still cared about them.

He figured he was doing it so they could one day do robberies.

He’d had the idea ever since he got back, in the early 2010s. Back then the squad spent all their time together, even after they were dissolved, unemployed. They plotted and schemed and cursed the government that had abandoned them. They came up with the vilest insults they could think of for a general population they considered weak, overfed, sedentary. Like, We were overseas fighting for these people? So they envisioned putting their skills to use, keeping themselves sharp by coordinating kidnappings and robbing men with gross sums of money they hadn’t justly earned. They never went through with it, though.

Then they started to figure out they had in fact been overseas fighting for faceless suits, not the civilian population they hated, and they started drinking so they didn’t have to think about that.

They drifted.

Ronan spent the latter half of the 2010s in this fugue state. One morning in 2019, head pounding and extremities freezing from the poor circulation that accompanies chronic alcoholism, he took a phone call from Arnold.

He’d always kept in touch with the kid, who sure wasn’t a kid anymore.

Ronan mumbled, ‘Hey, man.’

‘What’s the deal?’ Arnold said, his voice high-pitched and fast-paced, always neurotic. ‘You just going to slowly give up on me after Afghanistan? It’s been two months since you last picked up, bro.’

‘After Afghanistan? We got back nearly ten years ago.’

‘Yeah. Right. Yeah. I appreciate it.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.