Free The Warrior Code by Ty Patterson

the girls. We can arrange a time and a place for the transfer; then you can go your way and we go ours.’
    ‘Not going to happen.’
    The voice lost its mocking tone, became hard. ‘Friend. You don’t know who you’re dealing with. You have no idea who you’re up against. You don’t want me hunting you, bud. That’ll end only one way. Life will be simpler for you if you do what I said and walk away.’
    Zeb leaned forward. ‘You’re a small-time hood with delusions of being someone bigger. You probably are the leader of those fake federal agents. You and your men are actually not as good as you think you are. Probably you’ve started realizing that. For one, your men should have finished me off at the RV before I entered it. Your second mistake was making this call.’
    There was a stunned silence in the room, a silence echoed by the voice.
    ‘You–’ the voice began.
    Zeb cut him off. ‘Shut up. You’re done talking. That thing you said about hunting me? Get off the phone. Start hunting me.’
    He cut the phone and pushed it to a shocked Kelly.
    ‘I know what you’re going to say. That you could have tracked that call. You couldn’t. That was an Internet call, one of those voice over IP calls. That guy on the phone – I meant what I said. He’s a glorified hood, but that doesn’t mean he’s stupid.’
    Kelly swallowed his words. ‘How did you know the call would come?’
    ‘I didn’t. I was going to call the wait off if it hadn’t happened in a couple of hours.’
    ‘But you were expecting the call, weren’t you?’ Beth protested. ‘And how did you know it would come now? Not earlier?’
    ‘Yeah. That phone was left on the body for a reason, for it to be picked up. And about the timing of the call – I removed the battery on the phone as soon as I grabbed it. I inserted the battery just before meeting Kelly. I’m sure there will be several missed calls in the call history.’
    Meghan tapped buttons on the phone with a pen and nodded when she saw the call log. ‘All from an unknown number. These must be from before you removed the battery.’
    Zeb looked at Kelly. ‘I think the only prints you’ll find on that phone are Perez’s. He’s dead, so those prints will lead us nowhere. Call history and message history might have something, but I’m not betting on it.’
    Kelly headed to the door and yelled at someone. A fresh-faced cop came, slightly out of breath. When Kelly yelled, things happened and people moved. He took the phone from Kelly, bagged it and, after a lot of nodding, disappeared.
    Kelly turned back, his hands on his hips. ‘Why did they call you, though? Beats me.’
    Zeb watched the twins, saw the light spark in Beth’s eyes and then in Meghan’s.  Smart. Scarily smart. They’re able to connect dots and think steps ahead. Broker will like these two.
    ‘They don’t know who Zeb is and they want to find out?’ Beth said tentatively and added more confidently when she saw Zeb’s reaction. ‘That and also if a threat can scare him, then grabbing us will be easier.’
    ‘You’ve got it. I’m an unknown quantity that they want to get a handle on.’
    He turned to Kelly. ‘Perez? How senior was he in the gang?’
    Kelly had shared the gang’s structure, history and activities with them earlier. He disappeared and came back with head and profile shots of the gang members. ‘Growing fast, ruthless, started off as meth peddlers but now muscling in on other activities, mostly prostitution, drugs and extortion.’ He grunted. ‘Compared to other organized gangs in the country, these guys would be small time, operating within the state limits.
    ‘Perez was number two. The guy Zeb killed at the park was the number three. The gang boss is a piece of shit called Tom Cargill, who goes by the name Snake. Snake because he’s got their tattoos all over him. He’s done time once for drug dealing, and slipped back to a life of crime as soon as he got out. He’s wanted here