Page 19 of Undertow

Still nothing from Cara.

He grabbed his jacket.

The official justification was the patrol route. The actual justification was that he’d lose his mind if he sat at that desk for one more minute listening to the clock make its point. He drove the harbor loop, which took twelve minutes and produced nothing of law enforcement interest, and was heading back toward Main Street when he spotted Voss’s car—a silver Audi, because of course—parked near the waterfront.

Gabe pulled into the lot two rows back and cut the engine.

No official reason to be here. No probable cause, no warrant, no active investigation he could point to on paper. Just instinct and a slow Friday and years of fieldwork that had taught him to trust the itch at the back of his neck when something didn’t sit right. The Bureau had drilled the patience into him—the ability to sit in a vehicle for hours and watch a door and think about nothing.

He sat. He waited. He was good at that. Hunting fellow cops for the Bureau, he had to be. He’d been good at it in Philadelphia, sitting outside a row house in Kensington for fourteen hours while a suspect decided whether or not to come home. He’d been good at it in that parking garage in Baltimore, three days before his last big case broke open. Patience wasn’t a virtue for Gabe. It was a professional skill, and right now it was the only one he was allowed to use.

Voss appeared near the harbor railing. Checking his phone. Shifting his weight, adjusting his collar, glancing at the parking lot entrance—the restless energy of a man waiting for someone he didn’t want to see. He hadn’t shown this at the bakery or the diner. Whatever was coming, Voss knew it wasn’t friendly.

A black limo pulled into the lot. Tinted windows, recent model, the kind of vehicle that cost more than Gabe’s annual salary and was designed to communicate exactly that. It parked twenty yards from Voss. The driver stayed behind the wheel, engine running.

The rear door opened.

Older man. Silver-haired, mid-sixties, expensive overcoat that had never been near a rack. He moved with the authority of someone accustomed to controlling rooms before he entered them—unhurried, deliberate, each step landing with the weight of a man who hadn’t opened his own door in years. Gabe didn’t recognize him. But he recognized the type. Money. Power. The composure that came from decades of people stepping aside.

The two men faced each other near the railing. Gabe couldn’t hear words from this distance, but he’d spent his career reading body language. Voss started defensive—arms crossed, weight on his back foot, chin up. The older man was controlled at first. Gestures clipped. Posture rigid. The body language of two people with history, and none of it good.

Then something Voss said broke through.

The older man’s composure didn’t crack—it detonated. He lunged forward, both hands closing around Voss’s throat, and Derek Voss went backward into the harbor railing with a sound Gabe could hear from fifty yards away.

Gabe was already out of his car. Badge in his hand.

8

The command voice came from somewhere deep in Gabe’s chest—the one the Bureau had installed and Philadelphia had sharpened. “Haven Cove Police. Let him go. Now.”

The older man’s hands stayed where they were for one full second—long enough to be a choice—and then released. Voss stumbled sideways along the railing, coughing, one hand at his throat. The older man straightened his coat. Adjusted his cuffs. Looked at Gabe with the measured calm of someone who considered the interruption an inconvenience, not an arrest.

The limo’s driver-side door flew open.

The driver was big. Not Wade-big—trained-big. He was out and moving toward Gabe with the instinct of a man whose job description started with protect and ended with whatever it takes. Dark suit. Earpiece. Hands that knew exactly what they were doing.

Gabe badged him without breaking stride. “Stay back.”

The driver didn’t stop. His eyes moved from the badge to his employer to Gabe, calculating, running the math on what happened next.

Then the older man’s voice—sharp, clipped. “Stand down, Chuck.”

Chuck stopped. Didn’t like it. His jaw worked and his weight stayed forward, every muscle arguing with the order his mouth was following. But he stopped. Planted himself and watched Gabe with the fixed attention of someone memorizing details for later.

Voss was still against the railing, breathing hard, red marks already forming on his throat. He straightened, reaching for outrage. “You saw that. He assaulted me. I want to press⁠—“

“Derek.” The older man didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t look at him. “Leave.”

Voss’s mouth worked. He looked at Gabe, expecting backup—. Gabe kept his expression neutral. This wasn’t about Voss right now.

“I could file charges,” Voss said. To Gabe. To anyone who’d listen.

“You could,” Gabe said. “Station’s on Main. Open until five.”

Voss read the room. Whatever calculation he was running, the answer came back insufficient. He tugged his coat straight, shot the older man a look that was equal parts fear and resentment, and walked back toward his Audi.

That left Gabe, the older man, and Chuck. The harbor. The rain. The wind off the water carrying the smell of salt and diesel and January.