Chapter 6 - The Mud Flats of Slip 14
The pipe was a nightmare of enclosed claustrophobia. Evan crawled on his elbows and knees through an icy sludge of harbor silt, dead crabs, and decomposing oil, the ceiling barely inches from his back. Every breath was a fight against nausea, but every time his hands slipped in the muck, the sound of Grace’s fractured voice echoed in his memory: *Your mother sent Peter to kill him...*
For years, Evan had believed he was different from his ancestors. He had prided himself on his philanthropy, his clean venture portfolios, his modern ethics. But as he crawled through the subterranean sewage of Boston Harbor with a loaded gun, he understood the truth: his entire clean, pristine life had been purchased with the dirt beneath his fingernails. His mother had simply kept the sewer covered until today.
Ahead of him, Claire kicked out an iron intake grate.
A rush of cold, salt-laden Atlantic wind hit them in the face, reviving Evan’s burning lungs.
They emerged into the low-tide underbelly of Slip 14. Massive, creosote-soaked wooden pilings rose like towering forest trunks from the black mud, supporting the heavy timber boardwalk of the commercial pier twenty feet above. Overhead, the deep, rhythmic *thrum-thrum-thrum* of a marine diesel engine vibrated through the timber.
"That’s the *Marauder*," Claire whispered, crouching in the shadow of a cross-brace.
She pointed up through the gaps in the decking.
Tied to the weathered cleats of the slip was an ugly, rusted commercial fishing boat, its decks cluttered with lobster traps, heavy rusted winches, and black plastic barrels.
Standing on the deck was Daniel Han.
He was barely conscious. His face was swollen, his lips split, his hands zip-tied tightly behind his back. A tall man wearing a heavy black waterproof jacket stood behind him, holding a short-barreled shotgun pressed against the base of Daniel’s skull.
And standing near the wheelhouse was Grace.
Her ivory silk bridal slip was torn at the shoulder, her dark hair tangled and matted with salt spray. But her eyes were wild with fury, not surrender. In her right hand, held out over the dark water between the boat and the pier, was a small, ruggedized black hard drive.
"Let him go onto the dock!" Grace screamed over the roar of the diesel engine. "Untie his hands and let him walk, or this drive goes straight into the harbor channel! You know how deep the silt is here! If this drops, your divers will never find it!"
A man stepped out of the wheelhouse. He wasn't a deckhand. He was dressed in a tailored wool overcoat that looked absurd against the fish scales and rust of the deck.
It was Peter Cho.
He had bypassed the tunnel, taken the surface elevators, and beaten them to the water. A white gauze bandage was wrapped around his broken right wrist, but his left hand held a sleek, suppressed pistol pointed directly at Grace’s heart.
"You're not going to drop that drive, Grace," Peter said, his voice amplified by the quiet over the water. "Because on that drive is the only evidence that clears your father’s name. If you drop it, he dies a thief and a failure in the public record forever. Hand it to me, step onto the boat, and I promise Daniel gets medical attention."
"You murdered my father!" Grace cried, the tears freezing on her pale cheeks. "You came to our house when I was sixteen! You told him that if he didn't take the blame for the steel welds, Evan’s father would make sure Daniel and I ended up in state custody! You destroyed our lives!"
"And look at you now," Peter said, taking a slow step toward her across the rocking deck. "Two hours away from becoming the wealthiest widow in New England. You almost pulled it off, Grace. If you hadn't tried to save this pathetic little addict, you’d be Mrs. Evan Lee right now, sipping Cristal under the chandeliers."
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"She’s not becoming a widow, Peter," a voice called out from the darkness beneath the pier.
***
