Blood Print

By Bonnie Ramthun

When out-of-work ex-soldier Kyle Templeton agrees to a job interview set up by his fellow ex-soldier Tater Underwood, he's hungry enough to consider a job as a Texas mall cop. The mall turns out to be an abandoned facility converted into cloud computer storage and the manager, beautiful Jackie MacAllistair, has no sooner greeted them when the facility is attacked by deadly creatures of unknown origin. Kyle and his fellow ex-soldier Tater Underwood must use every skill they have to fight for their lives and the lives of the innocents caught in an arena of death, an arena that turns out to be their real job interview. If they survive, they're going to be offered a position that turns out to be more tempting, and more evil, than they can imagine.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bonnie Ramthun
• Release date: Jan 28, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301582518

Bonnie Ramthun

Bonnie Ramthun lives in Erie, Colorado with her husband and children. Her novels for adults include Ground Zero, a thriller published by G.P. Putnam, Earthquake Games, a 2000 Colorado Book of the Year nominee, and The Thirteenth Skull. The White Gates, her middle grade mystery published by Random House in 2008, is a Junior Library Guild Premiere selection and was a finalist for the Missouri Truman Award. She is a former chapter president of Mystery Writers of America, a member of Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, and former war gamer for the Department of Defense. There are two cherished compliments that Bonnie Ramthun has received for her writing. A reader wanted to know if the childhood events that happened to Eileen Reed in Earthquake Games had actually happened to Bonnie as a child. She considers this a high compliment - she made a lonely Wyoming car crash and an abandoned child so real that her reader thought it actually happened. The second compliment was when a reader wrote her a letter and praised The Thirteenth Skull, Bonnie's third Eileen Reed book. The reader loved the novel and hated the villain so much that she thought he should have died more slowly. Bonnie will never forget this compliment either, for it means that she created a character so evil and so hateful that the reader wanted him to die...harder. Bonnie's favorite stories are the ones where ordinary people are placed in world-changing events. The people who live in her stories are fictional, but she tries to make them so real you want to have coffee with them. Or kill them.

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What Others Are Saying About Bonnie Ramthun's Novels

Great characters, great story, great writing...what more could you want? -- Lee Child, #1 internationally bestselling author of the Jack Reacher thrillers.

Bonnie Ramthun is like Sherlock Holmes meets the X-Files. -- Robert New, Entertainment Attorney, Century City, California.

Bonnie Ramthun scores yet again, assuring her reputation as a premier thriller writer. -- Carolyn Hart, Agatha Award winning author of 34 mystery novels.

Blood Print

a Kyle Templeton short story

by Bonnie Ramthun

This story is a work of fiction. Any reference to historical events; to real people, living or dead; or to real locales are intended only to the give the fiction a sense of authenticity. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.

Blood Print

Copyright 2013 by Bonnie Ramthun

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America

Production credits:

Cover Design, Layout and Production by: Adam Noffsinger

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Discover other titles by this author at BonnieRamthun.com

Ground Zero

Earthquake Games

The Thirteenth Skull

The White Gates

Chapter One

Are you kidding me, Tater? Kyle asks. "The great job you found for us is at a mall?"

Mall cops are well respected law enforcement personnel. Tater steers his Ford truck into the vast parking spaces around a drab tan building in front of them. Sheets of glass at the mall entrance glitter in the hot Texas sun, reflecting the blue sky and the first clouds of late morning. Tater turns and eyes Kyle with a baleful glare. Would you rather we took that Decaware contractor job?

Kyle slumps in his seat and runs his hand over his head. Instead of the bristly black hedgehog quills of his usual Marine haircut his hand slips through hair long enough to be soft against his palm. We hate those guys. They're mercenaries.

At least they wanted both of us. Tater stops the Ford in a parking space with a wheeze of the brakes. Something under the hood makes a tired whine, like a dog with a stepped-on tail. Tater frowns at his truck. There was that New York job. But they only wanted your good looking ass.

That job was stupid too. Kyle examines the mall entrance, an imposing expanse of windows flanked by tall, round columns, like a Roman temple mated with a spaceship. Behind the entrance glass a fancy red neon sign hangs high inside and spells out: Food Court. He sighs. It was all about looking after movie stars and drugged out rockers.

Making big bucks dressed in a tuxedo with gorgeous women hanging on your arms, is what you mean. You should've gakked me in an alley and taken the job. Tater opens the door and jumps out. Or told me to go work in the exciting world of janitorial service. You should've taken it.

Kyle gets out and slams the Ford's door shut. He leans over the hood and smiles at his friend. What, and miss a chance to ride a Segway and chase down pimply shoplifters?

Tater makes a mock boxing move, muscles rolling under his suit jacket, his shirt tight against his thick neck. His blonde hair, shaved close, shines in the sun. "And catch them. That