Page 15 of The SEAL and the Sheriff

Sarah’s stomach performed an uncomfortable loop. “Meaning?”

“Meaning everyone who knows this building stays away from this section.” He stood, dusting his palm against his thigh. “It leaves this waterside access out of sight and mostly unobserved. If someone wanted to bring something in without using the main dock, the rot gives them cover.”

“Huh.” Petey scratched at his chin, leaving a faint grease smear behind. “That’s a hell of a thing to notice about my drainage hazard.”

“He’s federal,” Sarah said, by way of explanation that explained nothing but satisfied Petey completely. He nodded like that accounted for several mysteries at once and wandered off toward Walter, already narrating something about belt tension.

Which left her alone with Hudson and several feet of cold air between them that did absolutely nothing to dilute the problem.

“You think someone’s been using this section.” Questions gave people room to manage their answers, and she didn’t especially want his answer managed right now.

“I think it’s worth finding out.” He looked past her towards the loading gates. Beyond them lay the exterior loading platform and, farther along, the oldest section of walkway extending over open water. “If you wanted to bring something in without putting it through the main dock where your caretaker would notice, this is exactly the access you’d want. Remote. Falling apart already. Nobody questions the falling-apart part.”

“And nobody questions a few extra footprints on rotten boards that already look unstable.”

“Right.”

She crossed her arms against the draft whistling up from beneath the broken boards.

“So. Are you going to tell me what this is all about?”

His gaze stayed on the shattered section of flooring before lifting to hers. There was calculation there. Not whether to lie—that wasn’t the man he was—but how much he was prepared to say.

He scrubbed a hand over the stubble on his chin. “The man I’ve been looking for isn’t Jake Mercer.”

She waited.

“His real name’s Cord Blake.”

The name meant nothing to her.

“He’s living under an alias.” Hudson’s eyes drifted briefly toward the gate. “I’ve got an active federal warrant for him.”

“For what?”

Tendons stood out briefly in his neck. “He’s wanted in connection with an ongoing federal investigation.”

She held his gaze. “That’s not an answer.”

For the first time since she’d known him again, the corner of his mouth twitched into a smile. It was lopsided, an acknowledgment that she’d caught him trying to answer without answering.

“We have reason to believe he’s involved in moving illegal firearms.”

This whole place was freight, boats, seasonal workers. A place where people and cargo came and went without attracting much attention. “You think the cannery’s being used as a transit point.”

“I think it could have been.”

“And Jake Mercer—Cord Blake—worked here.”

“Hmm.”

She looked back at him. “Why Aurora Cove?”

“Because this is where the trail stopped.”

Matter-of-fact. It answered the question. It also somehow didn’t.

There was something about how he’d said Cord’s real name. Barely anything. Just the faintest tightening around his eyes.