1
FORD
The engine coughs twice before catching, and I count the seconds until she settles into her familiar rhythm. Three. Four. Five. There she goes.
Second Watch rocks gently in her slip as I run through my pre-dawn checklist, same as I have every morning for the past four years. Fuel lines, bilge pump, navigation lights, VHF radio. The ritual keeps me honest. Keeps me sane. Keeps me from thinking about the hundred ways a man can drown in his own past before the sun clears the horizon.
April in Tidehaven means the charter business picks up. Tourists escaping the last cold snaps up north, weekend warriors who think catching a redfish makes them Hemingway. I take their money, point them toward the promising waters, and keep my mouth shut while they talk too loud about their stock portfolios and their second wives.
It's honest work. Quiet work. The kind of work that doesn't ask questions about the years between my last SEAL deployment and this weathered slip at the Tidehaven marina.
"You're up early." Captain Sunday's voice drifts across from his own boat, a shrimp trawler he hasn't taken out in three years but maintains like she might save his life tomorrow. The old man moves slow these days, arthritis claiming what the sea couldn't take, but his eyes miss nothing.
"Charter at seven." I coil a line that doesn't need coiling. "Henderson party. Four guys from Atlanta."
"Saw an unfamiliar boat come in last night." Sunday settles onto his deck chair, coffee steaming in a chipped mug that says WORLD'S OKAYEST SHRIMPER. "Forty-footer, Boston registration. Three men aboard who didn't look like they knew port from starboard."
I stop coiling. "They dock at the marina?"
"Nope. Anchored out past the lighthouse. Still sitting there."
Unfamiliar boats with unfamiliar men aren't unusual in a coastal town during tourist season. But Captain Sunday doesn't mention things that don't warrant mentioning. Forty years working these waters taught him the difference between fishermen and something else.
"Thanks for the heads-up."
He lifts his mug in acknowledgment and returns to watching the marsh birds pick their way through the shallows.
I finish my checklist and head up the dock toward Nettie's for coffee that won't strip paint and a biscuit that might actually kill me someday but not today. The Boathouse sits dark at this hour, Cal and his crew not due in for another two, but I make a mental note to swing by later. Mention Sunday's observation. Salt and Steel Security keeps tabs on strange movements along the coast, and Cal Hayes is the kind of man who files information away until it becomes useful.
My phone buzzes in my back pocket.
I almost ignore it. Almost.
The number on the screen stops me cold in the middle of the dock, three feet from Nettie's screen door and the smell of butter and bacon.
No caller ID. Just a string of digits I memorized twelve years ago and never managed to forget no matter how hard I tried.
I answer on the third ring because waiting longer won't change what's coming.
"Ford Callahan." The voice is older than I remember, rougher, but unmistakable. Enzo Mancini sounds like gravel soaked in whiskey. "You remember who this is."
It's not a question.
"I remember."
"Good. Then you remember what you owe."
My grip tightens on the phone. The morning sun catches the water, turning the harbor gold, and somewhere behind me a pelican screams at a rival over scraps from last night's catch. Normal sounds. Peaceful sounds.
"You calling in your marker."
"I am." A pause. "You're going to protect something for me. Two weeks, maybe less. Keep it hidden. Keep it breathing. Then we're even."
It. That's not how men like Enzo Mancini talk about cargo they care about. Unless...
"What kind of package are we talking about?"
His laugh carries no humor. "My daughter."
