Chapter 15 Quinn
FIFTEEN
Quinn
Krewe Hierarchies: Most krewes operate under a defined chain of command, led by a captain and supported by lieutenants and committee chairs who oversee logistics, membership, and event planning.
This internal structure preserves order and authority, ensuring that tradition and decision-making remain tightly controlled.
The badge reader chirps. Green light. I push through the security door and let it seal behind me.
Monday mornings always feel like this. The weekend evaporates the moment I cross the threshold. Whatever warmth existed out there, the run with Keller, the movie, the kiss on my porch, it stays on the other side of reinforced glass.
In here, everything is protocol.
I drop my bag at my desk and boot up the workstation. The encrypted login takes three separate credentials. Password, badge tap, fingerprint. The system hums to life, the glow spreading across the muted gray walls.
The audit dashboard loads, and I pull up the variance summary I flagged yesterday.
Three projected container arrivals. One cluster of amendments. All entered within minutes of each other. I am not chasing ghosts. I am following data.
That's what I tell myself as I open the formal request portal and draft the follow-up. I keep the language neutral.
Routine variance clarification. Q4 routing amendment review. Requesting projected routing logs for inbound containers scheduled October tenth through thirteenth, Terminal 4.
Submit.
The confirmation pings almost immediately. I lean back in my chair while the system processes the request. It usually takes longer than this. Either the queue is light, or someone has streamlined something behind the scenes.
The deeper logs populate. On their face, they are clean.
Manual routing amendments authorized by a mid-level operations manager, David Parsale, entered the morning after Robert Stone was murdered.
I pull his file. Twelve years with Stone Intermodal.
Strong reviews. No disciplinary issues. The kind of employee who keeps his head down and keeps the machine moving.
The justification language is identical on all three entries.
Temporary routing consolidation due to executive-level security disruption.
I read the phrase twice.
Executive-level security disruption.
Robert Stone was killed on October 12th. The company would have tightened protocols overnight. Federal investigators descending, legal counsel swarming, insurers assessing exposure. Movement would continue, but nothing would be business as usual.
Pre-designating certain inbound shipments for bonded warehouse holding during instability is defensible. It limits liability. It buys time.
On paper, it makes sense.
I open the timestamp metadata.
10:42 a.m. 10:47 a.m. 10:56 a.m.
Fourteen minutes. Three projected arrivals. Same credential. Identical language copied into each field.
I pull the manifest details.
All three vessels were still in transit when the amendments were entered. Two had estimated arrivals of October 30th. The third was not due until November seventeenth.
None of these containers were anywhere near New Orleans on October thirteenth. They were still weeks out.
Someone changed their intended routing the morning after the CEO was murdered.
That is not overflow management. That is anticipation.
Maybe Parsale was executing instructions handed down quickly in the aftermath. That would explain the efficiency. It would not explain why these three shipments were singled out from the hundreds scheduled through mid-November.
I widen the manifest view.
Two of the October arrivals are listed as high-end Swiss watches and paper products. Both cleared without incident upon arrival. No seizures. No anomalies.
The third shipment is declared as industrial electronics.
There is a linked flag.
I follow it.
The federal seizure database takes its time loading. The interface is older, layered with authentication prompts that slow everything down. I wait through the progress bar and then scan the record when it finally opens.
Arrival date: November 17.
Declared contents: industrial electronics.
Intercepted during coordinated federal inspection upon docking.
Actual contents: pharmaceutical-grade fentanyl precursors.
Estimated street value in the mid-seven figures.
I sit back slowly.
Six months ago, this was national news. Ridge Stone standing beside federal agents, announcing cooperation. Zero tolerance. The Stones do not move poison through this city.
At the time, it read as decisive leadership in a crisis. Possibly even a cover-up of something, if you're jaded like me.
But now, looking at the backend, maybe Stone Intermodal has nothing to hide. But someone who works with them does.
November seventeenth, that shipment docked and was intercepted during a coordinated federal inspection.
The drugs never reached the streets. That part matters. And that only happened because of Ridge Stone. He stopped them. He didn't find a way to get them in.
If the override had originated from the top, if this had been a coordinated effort to move narcotics quietly through the port, there would have been no press conference, no federal cooperation, no public declaration of zero tolerance.
Ridge did not bury it. He exposed it. He shut it down. Which means the routing amendment didn't come from him.
I return to the authorization chain and stare at the credential attached to all three entries.
David Parsale.
Mid-level operations manager. That does not make him guilty.
It does mean someone at the operational level moved quickly in the morning after a murder, pre-designating shipments from a client who later turned out to be pushing fentanyl through the port.
It could have been panic. It could have been someone overcorrecting for liability during chaos. It could have been someone working with the shipper of origin, exploiting instability and leaning on whoever he could reach.
What it does not show is coordinated executive concealment.
And that is what I am here to find.
If Robert Stone was murdered over business, if there was something inside Stone Intermodal worth killing for, it would leave residue. Financial anomalies. Executive overrides. Suppressed reporting. Obstruction.
Instead, when the shipment arrived, Ridge Stone alerted Customs and Border Patrol. He did not reroute it quietly. He did not bury it. He handed it over and stood beside federal agents while they announced the seizure.
That is not how a company behaves when it is protecting a narcotics pipeline.
I lean back in my chair and let the pieces settle into something less catastrophic than they first appeared.
I'm not here to dismantle a family because of one clustered override. I'm here to determine whether there is a credible basis to escalate this into a formal inquiry.
Right now, I don't have that.
I have an operational anomaly. I have a mid-level credential attached to three pre-arrival reroutes. I have one shipment that later proved illicit, and two that did not.
That suggests fracture. Not a conspiracy.
Keller runs private tables. He operates in a different sphere entirely. If there were executive-level corruption tied to Robert’s death, it would be visible higher in the chain than this.
There is no indication of that here.
The distinction matters.
Because if this is an internal vulnerability rather than institutional rot, then the assignment remains what it was meant to be: a quiet audit.
And Keller… Keller has never been the subject of my review.
Maybe I don't have to treat him like collateral damage, and shut anything down before we even allow ourselves to explore whatever this is between us. It's like I've been anticipating something before it is even there.
And maybe there's nothing there, anyway.
My phone buzzes. Leah's name lights up the screen.
Coffee? I'm dying in this sales meeting and need an excuse to escape. Save me.
I glance at the clock. Almost eleven. I have been staring at shipping records for three hours.
Perfect timing. Would love to. Rosies?
Beat you there.
I grab my jacket and badge.
The coffee shop sits three blocks from the federal building. Close enough for convenience, far enough that I rarely see colleagues. Leah found it two years ago, and we have been meeting here ever since.
The espresso machine hisses behind the counter as I slide into the booth by the window. Mid-morning light cuts through the glass, warming the worn wooden table. The place smells like roasted beans and cinnamon.
Leah arrives four minutes later, her black hair swept up in a messy bun, gold earrings catching the light. She drops into the seat across from me and exhales.
"Ha. I beat you. How about that?"
"I swear to God, five people stopped me on my way out. I can't even sneak out for a fucking coffee without being attached. I'm going to start screaming."
"That bad?"
"Worse." She flags down the server and orders a vanilla latte. "You look weird."
"Thanks."
"Not bad, weird. Distracted, weird." She tilts her head, studying me. "And that's not your spreadsheet face. I know your spreadsheet face. This is something else."
Of course she notices.
I wrap my hands around my mug. The ceramic is warm against my palms. "I went to a movie this weekend."
"With glasses guy?"
"His name is Keller."
"With Keller." She draws out the syllables, grinning. "What movie?"
"The Housemaid."
I hold my breath because I know she's going to give me a hard time for going without her.
"You're cheating on me?! I thought we were supposed to go see that together."
"You bailed on me three times. It's going to be out of theatres soon. Plus, I'll go again with you. It was so good."
"More importantly, did y'all hold hands and kiss?"
"No." I take a sip of my coffee. "But he did seem to get into it. And he indulged all of my post-movie analyzing."
Leah's eyebrows rise. "He asked for your analysis?"
"I wouldn't say he asked, but he listened. And at least seemed interested. And he still kissed me."