Pack Protocol: A Near Future Thriller

Book 2: Jack Voss

by Jonathan Yanez

Genres: Conspiracy Thrillers; Pulp Thrillers

Synopsis

When the going gets tough,
The tough get lethal.

Jack Voss has fully embraced his new life. It's something that fate has had waiting for him ever since the beginning of his XFC career. Now he's set his eyes on doing some real good with the skill set he'd honed over the years.

But there's a whole new toolbox of abilities to be mastered. While training with his mentor Cross Mancado in the Montanian wilderness, Jack will receive a call drawing him back into a past life. A former training partner has been found dead.

As Jack pulls on the thread of his friend's death a new threat arises that includes an underground fighting circuit, a crime lord hell-bent on power and an introduction to a clandestine organization known only as The Order.

If you love conspiracies, assassins, and mercenaries with your action-packed thrillers then this one's for you.

 

Release date: May 21, 2024

Publisher: Archimedes Books

Print pages: 400

Sample

1

Hunting a man is unlike anything I’ve ever done. He
disappeared into the wild Montana wilderness and
like the unrelenting beast of focus I was, I followed.
It had been just over three months since I had
started training with the semi retired assassin I
knew as Cross Mancado. In that time, my eyes had
been opened to things like creating and dismantling
explosives, firearms ranging from sniper rifles to
handguns, and jump school.
Oh, you heard that right. Cross put me through
the ringer, and the more I understood, the more I
realized how little I knew. This new world of cloaks
and daggers was one in which I was just scratching
the surface. I had spent months studying, but I
understood it would take years. Maybe not even
years, a lifetime. Much like martial arts, I was a

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J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
student in a game where there were no masters. Any
self-proclaimed master was just fooling themselves.
The same savage force that lived inside of me and
had made me a world-class champion in the XFC
was alive and well, loving the challenge as Cross
pushed me harder every day. He was the kind of
teacher who gave little praise and believed in repeti‐
tion and training. I was the kind of student who
didn’t need a pat on the back. I needed to know how
to get better.
Right now, I found myself trekking through the
wild Montana wilderness tracking Cross through
the thick trees and hard-packed ground that made
up the land around his estate.
I’d learned when tracking that everything told a
story. A bent branch here, a wayward depression in
the ground there. My senses were on overdrive as I
hunted him down. We were two miles out from the
house; he had doubled back twice already trying to
throw me off the chase.
A small river running through his property
afforded him another opportunity to travel in the
water, exiting somewhere up or down stream. I lost
his trail and then found it again, hours ticking by
until my stomach told me lunch was quickly
approaching.

Likewise, my back was telling me that the fifty-
pound pack Cross made me wear was a lot heavier

2

PAC K P ROTO CO L
than I anticipated. Carrying it for an hour or two, no
big deal; after that, the hours started to add up. Right
now, the straps were digging through my shoulders
and my lower back was screaming at me, telling me
this kind of thing was reserved for men in their early
twenties, not their late thirties.
Still, I followed, quiet, calm, patient. At any
moment, Cross could jump out on me, lying in
ambush and ready to take me out with a well-placed
shot. I knew he wouldn’t do any permanent damage,
but I wouldn’t put it past him to send a stun bolt my
way or even a rock to my chest or belly.
The trail I followed led around a small hill thick
with trees. I stopped to listen to the wildlife, the
birds and the small mammals running free. I thought
about what I would do, where I might lie in wait.
Cracking limbs overhead sent my mind in
overdrive.
The tracks had gone cold because he was here, I
shouted in my mind. He’s here.
No time to think, no time to plan or strategize.
Branches snapping overhead, form descending on
me, I reacted.
Rolling out of the way from the falling assassin, I
reached for my knife. The vibro-bladed kukri was a
weapon I had learned to love. It was the perfect
weight and size for anything from cutting through
cord to slicing through skin.
3

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
Coming out of my roll, blade in hand, I finally
got eyes on my target. Cross had gone all out. I
hadn’t seen him because he blended into the land‐
scape seamlessly. Twigs, branches, leaves stuck to his
already camouflaged suit with distinct care. This was
no halfway job. Cross had done his due diligence,
placing the items on his outfit with intention and
skill born of a lifetime at this kind of work.
Cross flashed toward me, a Ka-bar raised in his
hand. In a second, the blade was at my throat.
“You’re dead, Champ,” Cross told me, pressing
the knife to my jugular close enough for me to feel
the cold weapon touch my skin but not hard enough
to draw blood.
“We both are,” I told him, not daring to tilt my
head down but moving my eyes to his belly. I held
my kukri there, ready to slash across his midsection.
Just applying enough pressure for him to feel it
without cutting through any of his clothes.
“Not bad,” Cross said, removing his knife from
my throat. “But not great. You and your target both
being dead is no victory at all. It’s the other guy,
always the other guy, never you. A draw is a loss.”
“Agreed,” I told him, also sheathing my blade. “I’ll
do better. I won’t let it happen again.”
“I know you won’t,” was all the praise Cross was
prepared to give. He retrieved his pack from behind
a thick tree and dropped it at my feet. “Come on,

4

PAC K P ROTO CO L
carry this back. Let’s go get some lunch. All this
hiding and waiting for you has me hungry.”
I carried his pack backward across my chest,
forcing my mind to believe a lie. This is light weight.
This is nothing. You could carry this all day and all night
and all day the next day.
I fell in step with the assassin as we moved back
to his house. Our walk together was comfortable,
speaking when we had something to say, an easy
silence resting over us when we didn’t.
We arrived back at Cross’ cabin somewhere
between lunch and dinner. I could eat an elk right
about now. As soon as we opened the door to the
single-story home, Bubs rushed out. The white wolf
dog looked at me sideways, pissed at being left out of
the day’s activity.
“If looks could kill, you’d be murdered right
about now.” Cross chuckled, ruffling Bubs’ soft ears
as he passed.
I unshouldered both packs, stretching my aching
back. “I’m sorry, boy. You would have sniffed him
out a mile away and that defeats the entire point of
this exercise.”
Bubs huffed something that I was pretty sure was
a curse in his dialect before coming over and giving
me a good sniff down. I patted the side of his belly.
He licked my hand, telling me all was forgiven.
As Cross cooked up a pair of steaks and Bubs

5

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
trotted off to go mark his territory, AKA pee on
various portions of the property, I found myself with
a few minutes to wash up.
Cross’ house was simple but nice. There were
three rooms and two bathrooms. Cross had his bath‐
room attached to his room. My bathroom was
across the hall from my bedroom. I entered my
bedroom now, a small cube of a space with a
window on the far wall. There was enough space for
a bed, dresser, nightstand and closet. That was about
it. On the nightstand were a pile of books on
dressing wounds, applying tourniquets, how to
follow someone and in turn how to tell if you were
being followed in any situation.
On the nightstand also sat my phone, a
rectangular piece of glass that carried a notification
of an incoming voicemail. Jaxon Alexander Voss
didn’t exist for the time being. Now I was working
under the alias of Russel Park. All my accounts,
emails, and messages were linked to this false
identity.
Vash, my new Zennial tech savvy friend, had
helped me with that. She had made it so I could still
monitor emails, texts and calls coming in to my old
accounts. Any new communication, however, would
have to be done under my alternate identity and
alias.
The voicemail was from Henry “Henrietta” Jones.

6

PAC K P ROTO CO L
She was a friend from my XFC days, someone I had
had no communication with in years. The feeling
that something had gone very wrong prickled the
hairs on the back of my neck as I put her message on
speaker and listened in.
“Jack, it’s me. I know it’s been a long time,” Henry
said with a pause as if she were searching not for the
words but for the strength to say them. “Listen, I’m
not good with these kinds of things, so I’m just going
to tell you. Skip was murdered. They found his body
a few days ago in a ditch. Rose is more than busted
up over it. His funeral is in Dallas in a few days. She
wanted to reach out to you herself, but you can
imagine she has a lot going on right now, so I told
her I’d call you.”
There was another long pause, this time so long, I
had to wonder if she had already hung up and my
phone had just failed to notify me.
“Jack, please come,” Henry said, not choked up
like she was going to cry, but softer this time, as if
she were forcing the words out one by one. “I know
you’re more of a lone wolf now, but there was a time
you preferred to run in our pack. Please come, if not
for Skip then for Rose. It would mean a lot.”
A beep on the phone told me the voicemail had
ended. I didn’t know how to feel. Henry, Rose, Skip;
they were all friends. I still considered them as such
despite going years without talking to them. I

7

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
harbored no ill will toward them and still remem‐
bered our time together with fondness. She was
right; since my days in the XFC, I had receded into
myself.
I went to fewer and fewer functions until the
invites stopped coming. I understood, I was living a
different life back then training at Ken’s gym. Henry
also knew how to pull on my heart strings. She knew
loyalty was something important to me. Of course I
would come if my friends needed me.
Coupled with this was what might have
happened to Skip and Rose. Rose was a mixed
martial artist who made her bread and butter in
sports nutrition. Skip was a world-class condi‐
tioning coach. I could still remember times with him
drenched in sweat as he motivated me to push
harder than I ever had before.
Skip was a likeable guy. I couldn’t imagine who
would want him dead. But Henry had said murder. I
stood in my room staring at my phone, torn about
what to do. Yes, I would go, but what would I say
when I was there? Should I call Henry back? Text
her? Should I call Rose and ask what exactly had
happened?
Cross saved me, calling out from the kitchen that
a late lunch was ready. I moved robotically to the
table where a steak and cold sweet potatoes left over
from the night before waited. A thick slab of butter

8

PAC K P ROTO CO L
on the steak would normally be enough to send my
mouth watering. Not today.
“You good?” Cross asked.
“No.”
“Your mother?”
“No.”
“Want to talk about it?”
“Not really.”
“Good. Me either. Let’s eat.”
I knew Cross was trying to ease the severity of
the moment. It didn’t help. We ate in silence, the
perfection of the medium rare steak lost on me as
my mind swirled memories like a washing machine
would clothes.
I drained my glass of water in front of me. When
the meal was over, Cross looked over and leaned
back in his chair. “Jack, I don’t need to know. What I
do need you to know is that whatever this is, you’re
part of a dangerous world now. You need to watch
your back.”
“It’s not me that needs to be worried,” I said,
thinking back to who might have done this to Skip.
“Not me.”
I ended up telling Cross everything that night. He
soaked it all in, in silence. We were at the kitchen
table yet again after an afternoon of reloading
ammunition cartridges in the garage. My empty
plate of chicken, rice, and vegetables was in front of

9

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
me, looking like a landscape of carnage after an epic
defeat.
“So, you’re going to go, then?” Cross asked.
“I think so,” I answered, drumming my fingers on
the table.
“You should,” Cross confirmed with so much
authority in his voice, it was like a biblical proclama‐
tion. “Go.”
“You sound so sure,” I told him.
“I am,” Cross answered. “If these people were
truly your friends, then you should go. You don’t get
many real friends through life. If they need you, you
ought to be there.”
I nodded along with his words, understanding
then that I was always going to go all along.
“A word of warning,” Cross cautioned. “The skill
set you’re developing, the world you’re a part of
now, it would behoove you to remain in the shad‐
ows. Any confrontation with the law, any confronta‐
tion at all could lead to questions you can’t answer.”
“I understand,” I told him as he rose from the
table, taking our plates.
“All right, watch your back out there. The world
can be a dangerous place.”
That night, as I packed to leave the next morning,
I sent Henry a text. “I’ll be there tomorrow.
Address?”
Henry responded with the address a few minutes

10

PAC K P ROTO CO L
later, telling me she’d pick me up, and asked for my
arrival information. I answered. She closed the short
conversation with the emoji of a wolf, the logo of the
gym I fought out of. The logo we all bled and
sweated under during my training camps. That
night, I couldn’t sleep, which was strange for me.
Usually, I was out harder than a rock, snoring like a
hibernating grizzly.
Tonight, I lay in bed, eyes closed, willing myself
to sleep. When sleep did come, so did the memories.

11

2

JACK VOSS TRAINING CAMP
“Come on, champ, come on, champ, dig, dig, dig,”
Skip shouted as I pushed the sled weighing over two
hundred pounds in front of me. “You’ve got more to
give. You’ve got more to give. Go. One word in your
mind, that’s all you should be focused on right now,
one word, ‘go’.”
Lungs burning as bad as my legs, I pressed on.
Arms extended in front of me, gripping the poles to
the sled with a white-knuckled strength, I pressed
on. The sled was a simple contraption, metal frame
with four metal poles extending up. In the center
was a section to stack plates of iron weighing up to
forty-five pounds each. There were four of them on
the sled at the moment.
“You’re not throwing up, you’re not passing out,”

12

PAC K P ROTO CO L
Skip told me, walking beside me as I pushed the sled
up the incline. “Your body will do what your mind
tells it to do. Your mind is the master, your body the
servant. Go, come on, Jack, push.”
One foot and then the next, sweat dripping off
my shirtless body, leaving a trail behind me as I
pressed on. I lost myself in the rhythm of each step,
the life and death of each footfall and then the next.
“Good!” Skip yelled out when we finally reached
the end of the one-hundred-yard lot. “Take a minute
and then we’re going back.”
Lungs screaming, legs like noodles, I walked
around the sled, hands on my head, trying to catch
my breath. We were conditioning up in the Cali‐
fornia mountains in a secluded location we had
rented for my training camp. Skip was my cardio‐
vascular conditioner, his wife Rose on meal plan‐
ning. She showed up now wearing a backwards hat,
carrying water bottles for both of us.
“Here, drink,” she said, throwing a water bottle to
me and then one to her husband. “You boys need to
hydrate.”
I didn’t have the breath to thank her. I grabbed
the water bottle from the air and took a swig. It was
water with a hint of lime in it.
“Hey, this is good,” Skip said, going over to his
wife and planting a kiss on her lips. “What flavor?”
“Just water balanced with electrolytes, vitamin B,

13

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
a hint of sugar and salt.” Rose listed off the ingredi‐
ents like a chef. “Sun’s going down; you two almost
done?”
“Almost,” Skip said, jogging over to the end of
our makeshift field. “I’m going to get Jack to push
the sled back and then do a burnout of battle ropes
and box jumps at the end. Give me a minute, Jack.
I’m going to set things up.”
“Take your time,” I told him, waving him off and
meaning every word of it.
Rose waited until Skip was out of earshot before
turning to me. “You know he adores you, right?
Mention it and he’ll deny it all, but all I hear is how
you have a heart of a champion, how he’s never
trained anyone like you before, how you’re going to
go all the way. He believes in you, Jack. He knows
you’ll win.”
“It’s my first title fight,” I told her with a sigh. “No
pressure, though, right?”
“No pressure,” she agreed with a chuckle. “I just
want you to know that we believe in you, and Skip
loves you like a brother.”
“I won’t let you or him down,” I told her. “Too
many people have sacrificed too much. I’ll win.”
“I know you will,” Rose said, looking up at the
clear California sky. “This place is beautiful. How
did you find it?”
I glanced around at the trees surrounding us,

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PAC K P ROTO CO L
smelled the clean air and had to agree with her. “I
didn’t. Scott knew the place. He and Ken would
come out here back in the day.”
“Is Ken coming out too?” Rose asked.
“He has the gym to take care of back in town, but
he’ll be here on the weekends,” I answered. “Hey,
what’s for dinner?”
“Are you serious right now?”
“What?”
“You ate like a horse at lunch.”
“I’m a growing boy.”
“Right,” Rose said, raising an accusing brow. “A
growing boy that needs to watch his fat and calorie
intake. Don’t think I didn’t notice an extra muffin
missing this morning.”
“Aren’t those protein muffins?” I asked.
“Sure, and they still contain things you need to
limit yourself on,” Rose answered.
“Are you trying to fat shame me?” I inquired.
“Because it feels like you’re trying to fat shame me.”
“I would if I thought it would work,” Rose
answered as Skip trotted back to join us. “But let’s be
honest, you have no shame.”
“Who? This guy?” Skip asked, throwing a thumb
in my direction. “None. You have a better chance of
taking a nun to Burning Man than getting Jack to
feel any shame.”
We all broke into an easy laugh at that one.

15

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
“Well, I’m off,” Rose said, slapping her husband
on the butt. “Dinner’s not going to make itself. Oh,
Jack, Henry was looking for you. Something about
you owing her some video clips and interview
spots.”
I groaned internally. Henrietta Jones was no
stranger to the fight world. A mixed martial artist in
her own right, she had pivoted her focus to main‐
taining the social media presence and PR life of
professional fighters like myself. She monitored
everything from interviews to sponsorships and
travel. I was lucky to have her as my manager, but in
the same breath, it was always a drain creating
content.
Like a bearer of bad news, Rose was gone, and
Skip and I were left staring at one another.
“Well, this sled isn’t going to push itself,” Skip
told me with a frown. “Come on, we’re going to
build you lungs of steel. You’ll be able to go five,
five-minute rounds without a break if you have to.

You don’t gas out, you don’t get tired; for twenty-
five minutes, you go all out and then you can get

tired.”
I nodded, repositioning myself on the sled,
preparing to drive it back to where the battle ropes
and box jumps waited for me, looming in the
distance like gallows. I gripped the steel poles on my

16

PAC K P ROTO CO L
side of the sled and squatted, readying myself to
drive forward.
“Who are we going to send when things get
tough?” Skip asked, reminding me of our team
mantra, the one Scott had created so long ago. “Who
shall we send when it’s time to grind toward destiny
and everyone else is too tired to go?”
“Send me,” I grunted, channeling all the anger
and rage inside of me into something good and
using it as fuel to push me forward. I dug in, let the
sled feel my pain, and the weight surrendered.
I knew a fighter who fought with their emotions
was a liability, but if I could tap into those emotions
to propel me forward and then remain levelheaded,
that was a dangerous combination.
One foot after the other, I pushed until
momentum was working on my side and the finish
line was close.
Skip ran beside me, taking it upon himself to add
to my burden when he could tell I had gotten the
hang of it. The dirty little son of a Baptist preacher
jumped on top of the sled.
I registered the added weight, deciding to press
harder while I still had the momentum of the sled
moving forward instead of coming to a standstill
and asking him what in all that was holy he thought
he was doing.

17

J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
Digging deeper, the sled scraped forward over
patches of grass and dirt.
“I do it because I love you,” Skip said, still
encouraging me. “Come on, you’re almost there.
Twenty yards now, come on, last round in a fight,
seconds left. Who’s going to get tired first? Who has
a deeper well to pull from? Come on, Jack, come on!”
If I had enough oxygen in my lungs to bellow, I
would have. Sweat stung my eyes under the sun as I
submitted to this accepted form of torture known as
conditioning.
As soon as the sled came to a stop at the battle
ropes and box jumps, Skip had me begin. The black
battle ropes were so thick, I couldn’t get my hands
around them. I used the strength of my grip to hold
them as I assumed a squatting position then
whipped the ropes up and down. The far end twenty
feet in front of me was anchored to the ground with
a steel spike.
Skip had me alternate between one-arm exer‐
cises and then two at a time as I slammed the rope
down then lifted it up repeatedly for a length of five
full minutes.
One thing I had realized early on about working
out is that exercises for a period of time versus a set
number of reps was way more excruciating. For
example, tell me to do a hundred reps of the battle
rope and it would be easy. I could speed through

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PAC K P ROTO CO L
them, counting in my head until I had reached the
appropriate number, and stop.
Right now, there was nothing but suffering for
five minutes, no matter how fast or slow I went.
What was more, Skip held the stopwatch. No finish
line in sight, just suffering, just me against me,
willing myself to continue.
After what felt like an eternity and I couldn’t feel
my arms, Skip called a stop.
“All right, good,” he said with an approving nod.
“That was a great six minutes. Box jumps next.
Let’s go.”
“Six?” I gasped. “I thought we were going for
five?”
“Did I say five?” Skip asked, feigning confusion.
“My bad. Okay, five minutes of box jumps.”
I looked at him sideways.
“I do it because I care,” Skip told me, patting the
top of the box I was to jump on and off of for the
next leg of this torture session. “Now come on,
enough stalling, this box isn’t going to jump itself.”

19

3

The next morning, after a goodbye to Bubs and a
drive to the airport from Cross, I was off. There was
no need to fly Cobra Air, the private airline for
assassins and mercenaries in the underworld. I
wasn’t carrying anything I wasn’t supposed to and
my new alias thanks to Vash was whole.
The trip from Montana to Texas was blissfully
uneventful. I caught up on some sleep and even
finished a few more chapters on my last book,
Tourniquets for Dummies. The title of the book earned
me a sideways glance from the elderly woman sitting
next to me, but she went back to her knitting and
didn’t look twice.
Dallas International Airport, or DFW, was a
cluster at the moment, but I was used to it with all
the travel I had done in my previous life. Henry was

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PAC K P ROTO CO L
going to pick me up. I didn’t check any baggage, just
had my backpack and carry-on. I met her outside the
terminal amongst a swarm of people exiting the
airport. A new game I played with myself kicked in
as I walked through the airport asking myself if
something were to go down right now, where were
my closest exits? What was option two and then
three and four?
I saw people differently as I walked beside,
around, and with them. While normal people might
be thinking about what they needed next on their
grocery list or what time little Billy had to be at
practice, my mind ran with questions like, “If
someone were to attack you right now, how would
you react against a bladed weapon versus a
firearm?”
I have issues. Trust me, I know.
While I had changed over the years, Henry had
not. She was there waiting for me just outside the
terminal, leaning against her Cyber Truck, a great
silver beast with a designer lifted tire job, redone
exhaust and added lights.
While most people might have been blown away
with her ride, I was more surprised to see her. She
hadn’t aged a day. Red hair worn down, a muscular
body under a designer jacket, jeans and boots. It was
like she had been frozen in time and the Henry I
recalled from all those years ago had been preserved.

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J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
“Jack,” she said, pushing off her ride and offering
a smile. “Long time.”
“Too long,” I answered, realizing I was as much to
blame for that as she was. “I’m bad at keeping in
touch.”
“We both are,” Henry said, jerking her head down
the line of waiting vehicles. “Come on, I don’t want
to get a ticket from one of those ROs.”
I followed her gaze to where a robotic officer, or
RO, was asking a driver to move their vehicle. The
RO was about six feet tall, shaped like a human with
a flat face and two blue eyes. It was only lightly
armored and carried no weapon.
It was the government’s first step into integrating
robots with law enforcement. Each RO had a human
handler who worked side by side with it like a part‐
ner. Past the RO, I watched as a uniformed officer
oversaw the robot.
“The future is a strange place,” I muttered to
myself, throwing my suitcase in the back of the
Cyber Truck. Unlike Cross’ very clean and meticu‐
lous approach to vehicle care, Henry was an animal.
As I got closer to the car, I could see a thin layer
of dirt over the whole thing as well as splashes of
mud on the undercarriage. Inside, the vehicle wasn’t
much better. Empty water bottles crunched under
my boots as I took a seat and torn wrappers told me
a story of protein bar intake.
22

PAC K P ROTO CO L
“Business good?” Henry asked as she pulled away
from the sidewalk and entered the stream of traffic
headed for the airport exit. “Ken is coming to the
funeral as well. When I asked him for you, he said
you were taking some time off.”
I had spoken to Ken since the events at North
Sentinel Island, letting him know I was safe but that
I needed to step away from the gym. He had under‐
stood and didn’t ask questions, only told me that he
was there for me if I needed anything.
“Yeah, I had some family issues I needed to take
care of, but I’m good,” I told her, trying to get the
topic of conversation off me as fast as possible.
“How about you? You look like you’re doing well. A
new Cyber Truck all tricked out. Business is good?”
“You know how it is, it’s a small world in the
fight community.” Henry shrugged. “Once you
retired, I opened up my own business representing
fighters, and soon after that, we had an entire roster
of clients. People I hire manage the day to day and I
get to be more of the strategy behind everything.”
“Look at you,” I said, genuinely proud of my
friend.
“Don’t sound so surprised, jeez,” Henry said
good-naturedly.
“What? I’m trying to give you a compliment. Your
cleanliness, on the other hand.”
“Oh, here we go again.”
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J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
“What?”
“Just because we don’t all throw out our trash
every day doesn’t mean it’s wrong,” Henry said,
ribbing me for good measure. “I seem to remember a
certain sandwich that went missing for weeks and
no one could find that smell.”
“That was one time,” I said, inhaling as if I were
genuinely shocked. “And you said you forgave me
for that.”
“Forgave, yes,” Henry answered. “Forgot, no. By
the time I found it under the seat, it was covered in a
quilt of mold.”
“Gross way to describe it,” I said as we both broke
out chuckling over memories shared what seemed
like a lifetime ago.
After the laughter died down, we both sat in the
quiet for a moment. I knew I had to ask. We were
headed to Rose’s place. I needed to know what I was
getting myself into. “Over the phone, you said Skip
was murdered?”
“Official report was that he died by suicide,”
Henry said, not taking her eyes off the road. “We
both know that’s a lie.”
I knew she was right as soon as she said it. There
was no way Skip would have done that to himself. He
loved life, he loved his wife and his job. There was
more to this than what first met the eye. I was sure of it.

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“His—his body was found in a ditch next to his
car. A bullet through his head,” Henry said, slowly
and painfully. She didn’t shed a tear, but I knew it
wasn’t an easy conversation for her to have. I could
only imagine what Rose was going through. “Police
are over it. Everything points to a suicide. He even
left a note. It’s all gift wrapped and perfect.”
I listened, my mind already running through
some of the new skills I had acquired in my months
of training. It would have been better if I was years
into my new line of work instead of months, but I’d
have to work with what I had.
“Are you staying at Rose’s?” I asked.
“I am, so are you and so is Mike,” Henry
answered. “She doesn’t want to be alone. She won’t
say it, but she doesn’t.”
“I didn’t know Mike was in town,” I answered,
thinking to the jujitsu black belt who had also been
part of many of our training camps. “How’s he
doing?”
“You’d know for yourself if you kept in better
contact with everyone,” Henry said abruptly.
I shut up. I knew I deserved it. She was right.
What was it about my own day-to-day life after the
XFC that had sent me into a reclusive lifestyle? I
wasn’t selfish. I’d reach out if I had something to say.
I wasn’t lonely. I saw people at the gym every day.

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J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
Then, why had it not been a priority for me to stay
in contact with everyone?
“I’m sorry, that’s not fair,” Henry answered.
“Life’s not fair,” I told her, shaking my head.
“You’re not wrong. I could stay in better contact.
Said yes to some of those invites early on. I said no
long enough the invites stopped coming and I get it.
That’s on me, not you guys.”
We drove the rest of the way in silence, out of the
sprawling metropolis that had been Dallas and out
into the country away from all the high-rise dura
steel buildings and neon lights.
The sun was beginning its inevitable descent into
the west. On either side of the highway was open
land. It made me wonder what it was about cities.
People living on top of people. I think most wanted
it that way. Fewer were willing to go off alone,
claiming land that rolled out as far as the eye
could see.
I was somewhere in the middle. The gym I had
worked at was in the city while Cross’ place was
secluded from the rest of the world. I saw value in
both ways of living.
We arrived at Rose’s home two hours into our
ride. She lived on the outskirts of her town in a
suburban area. It was nice, not gaudy, not white
picket fence and swing in the front yard but nice.
Rose and Skip had done well for themselves. A

26

PAC K P ROTO CO L
Harley with monkey bagger bars was parked out
front. That same scarred wolf logo rested on the fuel
tank.
Mike had been driving the same ride for years.
Even when the future moved to automatically driven
crotch rockets, this guy had weathered the storm of
change, hanging on to the past with an unwavering
grip.
Henry parked in the driveway and we walked
through the overgrown grass out front to the
entrance. She knocked once, and a moment later, the
door was opened by none other than Michael Keevil.
Mike was close to six foot, with a balding head and
eager smile. Even now at our darkest hour, he
welcomed me like the old friend he was.
“Kill you to send a text every once in a while?” he
asked, dismissing any sense that he was actually
pissed with a warm embrace.
I wasn’t expecting the hug. It was short and
fierce, like one a younger brother would give. I
barely managed to return the embrace before he
broke away.
“You look good,” Mike said, eyeing me sideways.
His gaze landed on my stomach. “Add a few extra
pounds now that you don’t have to weigh in?”
“No such thing,” I lied. “I’m still ten pounds away
from making that weigh-in.”
“Ten pounds, huh?” a woman’s voice came from

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J O NAT HA N YA N E Z
deeper within the house. “Come on, you’re at least
fifteen pounds off.”
I peered behind Mike and nearly lost it. Rose was
there, red-eyed and exhausted. I’d never seen her
like that before. She and Skip were two peas in a
pod. Energy flowed off the two like the stink of a
skunk. It was clear to everyone they were in love and
so happy with each other.
Mike moved to the side, allowing Henry and me
entrance. The house was warm, lived in, but clean,
with original wood flooring covered over with a
flattened rug. Gray walls with a white ceiling, a
piano in the family room, worn leather chair in the
corner.
It was then I realized I didn’t know what I was
supposed to say. What do you tell the woman who
just lost the love of her life? “I’m sorry” just didn’t
seem like enough.
“Rose,” I told her, swallowing hard. “I—I—loved
Skip like a brother.”
“I know you did,” Rose said, coming to me and
wrapping her arms around me. It wasn’t the quick
embrace like I had with Mike. This one was fervent,
like she needed me there and she was so grateful I
had come. “He didn’t kill himself. He didn’t, Jack. He
didn’t kill himself. The police keep telling me he did,
but he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have done that, Jack.”
I wrapped her in both arms, looking up at Mike

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PAC K P ROTO CO L
and Henry, who stood as still as statues, sadness
filling their eyes with each passing proclamation of
Skip’s innocence.
“I believe you,” I told her. “We’ll find out what
happened to him. I promise.” ...