Covert Cargo. Elisabeth Rees

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СКАЧАТЬ dog stubbornly ran in the opposite direction. “That dog is so disobedient,” she said, with a shake of her head. “He’s got a rebellious streak.”

      “Just like me,” Beth said. “But you love us anyway.”

      “I sure do,” Helen said, beginning the walk along the sand to her bungalow. “And so do a lot of other people.”

      Beth nodded, not in agreement but to appease her friend because, in her own mind, she was a laughingstock and always would be.

      Before she left, she turned and made one last check on the Jet Ski sitting in the bay. It was still there, and the man was staring intensely at her, wearing a hood pulled up over his head despite it being a bright and clear day. His presence felt sinister in the calm, sunny morning, and she drew her eyes away. She wanted to leave.

      “Ted,” she called. “Let’s go.”

      Her dog dutifully complied and bounded to her feet, carrying a pebble in his mouth.

      “Drop it, boy,” she said. “You know those stones wear down your teeth.”

      Ted released the pebble onto the sand, and Beth gasped in shock at the image with which she was faced. Helen reached for her hand, and they both stared down at the unusual stone, appearing totally out of place among the dull gray shingle and golden sand.

      “Ted must have picked it up when he was digging in the dunes,” Helen said. “But what on earth is it?”

      “I don’t know,” Beth replied, bending to pick the stone up and turn it over in her hands.

      It was a normal pebble, the gray kind found on any seashore, but this one had been intricately painted with an array of bright colors, illustrating a picture of a female skeletal figure, shrouded in a long golden robe. In one hand, she carried a vivid blue planet: the earth in all its glory. In the other hand, she held a scythe with a menacing, curved blade. Beth gazed at the skull protruding from the hooded cloak, the eye sockets painted so well that the stone truly seemed to have been drilled away to reveal deep, dark shafts. The image was both beautiful and terrifying all at the same time.

      “Maybe somebody dropped it,” Beth said, putting the stone inside her pocket. “Or it got washed up from a boat.”

      Helen raised her eyebrows. “It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. And a little scary to be honest.”

      “It doesn’t scare me,” Beth said, the lie sticking in her throat. “It’s just a rock.” She attached Ted’s leash to his collar. “I’ll take Ted home while you wait at the bottom of the steps. He looks exhausted from all this foraging for stones.” She tried to sound lighthearted, but inwardly the fear wouldn’t budge.

      Arm in arm, the women resumed their return walk along the sand. Beth’s stomach was swirling with anxiety. She wondered if her discovery of the child and the stone were somehow connected. Had she stumbled into something more sinister than she realized? And was the man on the Jet Ski part of it?

      She thought of Dillon Randall, and his assurance that she could call him at any time if she felt troubled. Beth normally shunned the outside world at all costs, but she might have no other choice than to reach out for help.

      * * *

      Dillon spread a large map over his desk, studying the suspected trafficking routes that were marked upon it. The smugglers’ boats had been heading up the western coast from Mexico, laden with adults and children from all over South and Central America—people who believed that decent jobs and homes awaited them in the US, but in reality they were destined to be domestic servants, rarely paid or rewarded for their hard work and left with no money to return home. The traffickers seemed to be using flotillas of small motorboats and rowboats for their journeys—vessels that were too small and dangerous for the purpose. One of these vessels had capsized four weeks previously, leading to the deaths of most of its occupants. That was when Dillon was covertly recruited into the coast guard from his SEAL base in Virginia.

      There was a knock on the door. “Enter,” he called.

      Carl came into the room, closely followed by the station’s chief warrant officer, Larry Chapman. Larry was five years older than Dillon, and Dillon had felt a considerable resentment from his subordinate officer on their first meeting. He sensed that Larry felt cheated out of the top job at the station—a job that the chief warrant officer felt was rightfully his.

      “How are you getting used to being back on the front line?” Larry asked. “It must be difficult to adjust to active duty after spending so many years sitting behind a desk, huh?”

      Dillon slowly rolled the maps up on his desk. His cover story involved placing him in the Office of Strategic Analysis in Washington, DC, thereby hiding his true past as a SEAL with almost twenty years’ combat experience.

      “I’m doing just fine, thanks, Larry,” he replied, sliding the maps back into their protective tube. Larry never missed an opportunity to remind Dillon that he didn’t believe desk work to be real experience. Little did Larry know that Dillon had racked up fifteen active missions, rarely ever seeing the inside of an office.

      “Is there anything to report on the traffickers?” Carl asked. “Did the child say something that might help us?”

      “The kid’s not saying much at all,” Dillon replied. “The authorities think he’s from El Salvador and they’re trying to locate his family.”

      “And I’m guessing there was no sign of the smugglers when you dispatched the search-and-rescue boat,” Carl said.

      Dillon shook his head. “No, no sign at all.”

      Carl let out a long breath. “How do they keep doing that? It’s like they know we’re coming.”

      “They’ll slip up eventually,” Dillon said. “They always do.” He turned to Larry. “I’d like you to analyze the data I put on your desk. Your specialist skills in identifying the type of boats being used could be crucial.”

      “Yes, Captain,” Larry said. “I’m on it.”

      Both men headed out the door just as the phone rang on Dillon’s desk. He answered with his usual greeting: “Captain Randall.”

      The voice on the other end was panicked. “Dillon. Is that you?”

      He knew who it was instantly. “Beth? Are you okay?”

      Her voice was thick with emotion, and she snatched at her words through sobs. “It’s Ted,” she cried. “Somebody hurt Ted.”

      “Ted,” he repeated. “Who’s Ted?”

      “My dog. Somebody tried to get into the cottage while I was out, and Ted must have stood guard.” She broke off to catch her breath. “He’s bleeding badly.”

      Dillon checked his watch. “I can be there in ten minutes. Stay exactly where you are, and wait for me, okay?”

      “Okay.”

      He hung up the phone and raced out into the hall, grabbing the truck keys from the hook in the corridor. Once he was in the vehicle, he activated the sirens to reach the lighthouse in extra-quick time, and he found Beth kneeling on the grass outside her home, cradling СКАЧАТЬ