Jim Oliver had his team on standby. They waited only on the warrant. He placed the call to set them in motion. It would take four hours to get out to the Lake Placid cabin. In the meantime, since Thursday morning, agents had been dispatched to the hiking trails around the cabin. Their job had changed from surveillance to security. Their objective now was to make sure Garth Montgomery did not leave the cabin.

Thirty minutes later, Jim Oliver and his team were en route. A caravan of SUVs tore out of Manhattan and headed to the mountains of Lake Placid. His phone rang again.

“Oliver.”

“Sir,” the agent said. “We have a visual on the cabin and confirmation of a single occupant inside.”

“Hold tight,” Oliver said. “We’re on the way. No one leaves that cabin, understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

CHAPTER 66 - New Orleans, LA Sunday, July 11, 2021

CHAPTER 66

New Orleans, LA Sunday, July 11, 2021

THEY WAITED NERVOUSLY IN THE LINE OF PASSENGERS PREPARING TO board The Emerald Lady. He had bent and unbent the top of the boarding pass protruding from his passport so many times that the corner was a withered mess. Meghan reached over and gently pulled his hand away to stop his fidgeting. There were only a few things his level of anxiety could relay: He was nervous about climbing onto a cruise ship for fear of it sinking. Or he was apprehensive about tropical storm Bartholomew, which was swirling in the eastern Caribbean, and which meteorologists were predicting would twist its way into the Gulf of Mexico. It was too early in the season for hurricane concerns, but the storm promised a deluge of rain and rough waters. Either supposition was better than the truth—that he was uneasy because he was fleeing the country under an alias, and if caught was facing years in prison.

He stemmed the fidgeting just in time to come face to face with the pretty, young deckhand dressed in a crisp white uniform that sported gold stripes on the shoulders as if she carried some level of military rank. She smiled warmly at them, expecting the same in return. After all, every passenger she encountered this morning was about to embark on an epic vacation cruising the open waters of the Caribbean and visiting its fabulous islands, which included Grand Cayman, Jamaica, Cozumel, Belize, and Roatán in Central America. What was there not to be happy and excited about? He and Meghan smiled back at her.

“Passport and boarding pass, please,” the woman said.

Meghan took the lead, handing over her information. Her papers were real, and there was no worry as she confidently waited while the deckhand scanned the document. The woman smiled a moment later and handed the passport back to Meghan.

“Ms. Cobb, welcome aboard The Emerald Lady.”

“Thank you,” Meghan said.