27. Luke #2
"No way," I say firmly, not even trying to be quiet. "What if they come back? Or what if someone is on that boat? We didn't see Dorsey among them. He could be there waiting. I can’t let you get hurt, Hannah. Nick would kill me."
She huffs and stomps her foot, and I instantly know I'm being overruled, but it won't stop me from resisting her.
"Look, I'm not a child. They could just as easily come to your office and find me here too. I'm going with you, so shut up and open the door." She reaches past me and I grab her wrist, holding her back.
"I don't like this." Why does it feel like I'm being given a second chance by the universe to protect someone who wants to be foolish? And why won't she listen?
"I don't care if you like this, Luke. I'm going."
I know if I could see her face I'd see she's glaring at me. I don't think it's a good idea, but I don't have time to fight her. If those men get their van and get back and we're still out there, we'll be taking a long, cold swim.
"Fine," I grumble, opening the door.
We hustle across the pier as quietly as we can, keeping our heads down.
Hannah is right behind me, so close I can feel her fingers brushing against my back every few steps like she's making sure I haven't disappeared on her.
The gangway to The Cut Bait is still down, which tells me those guys left in a hurry and didn't bother pulling it up behind them.
That's sloppy, and right now, sloppy works in our favor.
When I step onto the gangway, it rocks under my weight.
Hannah grabs a fistful of my shirt and I freeze, listening.
All I hear is the water slapping the hull and something electrical humming somewhere below deck, no voices or footsteps, nothing that sounds like a person.
If Dorsey's on this boat, he's doing a hell of a job playing dead, but I don't think he's here.
A man like Dorsey doesn't haul his own freight. He pays people to do that for him.
"Stay right behind me," I whisper over my shoulder, and she tugs my shirt so I know she heard me.
The deck is covered in crates. I recognize most of them from staring at ones like them through my office window for the past month.
It's the same heavy hardware on the lids but some of them are already cracked open, the lids pried back and leaning against the deck railing, and whatever was packed inside has been partially pulled out.
I crouch down next to the closest open crate and pull my phone out, turning the screen brightness all the way down then turning it so the faint light acts as a flashlight to shine down into the crate. What I see sends a ripple of shock through me and my jaw drops.
There are rifles packed into custom foam cutouts, at least six of them on the top level and who knows how many more under it. I pick one up and study it. The serial numbers have been filed down to nothing and the barrels are wrapped in oiled cloth.
"Oh, my God," Hannah breathes from right behind me, and I hear her phone camera click. She's leaning over my shoulder, snapping photos as fast as her phone will let her. This is the exact proof we need to give the police and Colonel Harlan, and I didn't even think to take pictures.
"Get the labels on the outside of the crate too," I tell her, keeping my voice barely above a whisper. "The shipping tags and the customs seals and anything else you can read."
She moves around to the side and starts photographing the exterior while I shift over to the next crate.
This one is open too, and inside it I find more handguns packed tightly in foam and boxes of ammunition stacked along the bottom.
I photograph everything I can see and make sure the images are clear enough to make out the markings on the weapons and the stamps on the wood.
Then I hear Hannah suck in a sharp breath from the other side of the deck.
"Luke," she hisses, and I cross over to where she's standing and look down into a crate that makes my stomach drop all over again.
There are compact grenade launchers in there, four of them, strapped into foam inserts. This isn't good.
"Jesus Christ," I mutter, and I take at least six photos of that crate before I pocket my phone and grab Hannah by the arm.
"We have enough," I tell her. "We need to get off this boat right now."
She doesn't argue with me for once. She probably understands what we've just stumbled upon.
I check the pier in both directions before I wave her up. She steps off the gangway and I put my hand on the small of her back. We move as quickly as we can back toward my office.
We're about twenty yards out from my office door when a set of headlights sweeps across the parking lot at the far end of the marina.
I pull Hannah down behind a stack of lobster traps and we press ourselves against them, barely breathing.
I watch the white cargo van roll through the lot and park near the stairs.
"Shit," she hisses, and I feel her trembling. Rightly so—if these guys spot us, our bodies will be floating in the Coquille River in the morning.
Then I pull her up and we cover the last stretch to my office at a sprint before the men have even exited their van. I get the door open and she ducks in ahead of me. We stand there in the pitch dark with our backs against the door, breathing so hard, I'm sure everyone on the pier can hear us.
When Hannah holds up her phone, the screen is packed with photos. Rifles, handguns, ammunition, grenade launchers, shipping labels, customs seals. Every image is clear and every one of them is timestamped.
"That is definitely not festival supplies," she says, and I can tell she's pissed.
"No it's not," I say, holding up my own phone. My screen looks like hers. We have dozens of photos between us, more than enough to put Calvin Dorsey and every man on that boat away for a very long time. "This is the proof we need."
Hannah leans over and kisses my cheek. "We did it," she whispers.
"We did… Now we just have to wait until they leave to get out of here. Where is that licorice?"
When those men take their crates and leave, I'm calling Colonel Harlen immediately.
He's got to get his men into place. We have less than one week left to make our move, and I want it to bring Dorsey down in such a humiliating way, he never closes his eyes without seeing my face glaring at him again.