Chapters (78)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Acknowledgments
- Discover More
- About the Author
- Also by Owen Laukkanen
If any man in Deception Cove wanted to go ahead and kill someone or rob somebody’s store, now was the day to do it. Harwood had brought his whole team. He’d armed Whitmer and Cole Sweeney with Remington model 700P rifles, deployed them to the stern of the boat, and told them to shoot anything that moved on the shore. Joy had brought the M4 with the grenade launcher, and Harwood had an M4 as well. In the little galley up by the bow, they’d stashed the rest of Joy’s weapons—a couple of shotguns and some pistols—plenty of ammunition. By the numbers, the job sounded simple. Three cops and one scary Nigerian motherfucker with big guns and unlimited ammunition should have no trouble taking over the island. But by Harwood’s way of thinking, the math just didn’t add up.
Whitmer nudged him. “Kirby.”
“I heard you, Dale,” Harwood said.
“We don’t move now, we don’t move at all, boss. We need to get in there.”
Harwood scratched the top of his head. “Get in there, you mean?” he said. “Up into that pass?”
He could feel Whitmer staring at him. “Where else?”
“Take a look up in there, Dale,” Harwood said. “Tell me what you see.”
Whitmer didn’t answer right away. Then he spat. “I see the tide’s turning, is what I see,” he said. “Now listen, Kirby, if you’re too chickenshit to—”
“To what?” Harwood looked at him, hard. “That’s a US Marine waiting for us in there, Dale, and as best we can surmise, she’s heavily armed. When we get up in that pass, there’s no turning around, and if she’s half as smart as we know she is, she’s already figuring she can trap us in there, pick off each and every one of us from up on one of those ridges.” He cocked his head. “Are you seeing that, Dale? Because that’s the first thing I fucking see, and if I’m thinking about it, you can be damn sure the goddamn marine is thinking it too.”
Whitmer went silent. He looked away, spat again. Joy picked up the thread. “You said that pass was the only way onto the island, Deputy.”
“Maybe it is.” Harwood searched the rocky walls of the pass one more time. Couldn’t see movement, but he knew—just knew—Jess Winslow was out there, somewhere, waiting on them. “But we’re not going in there.”
Joy made to reply. Harwood shifted the engines into reverse, drowned him out with one thousand horsepower.
“I’ll find another way,” he hollered over the roar. “That bitch hasn’t seen the last of us yet.”
* * *