Page 139 of Slack Tide Kill

"Lots of stuff here. Plenty on Meeks. I'm not seeing anything fresh on Spate, though." She looked up. "We already detailed him pretty well last time."

"That's what I figured." Liam's knuckles whitened on the wheel. "So we try to crack something fresh."

Sally narrowed her eyes. "We follow PACE, Liam."

He snorted. "He's a human trafficker, Sally. Back in the FBI, did you handle scum like that according to PACE?"

She said nothing, because he was right, she hadn't.

They continued on through New Romney, Greatstone and St. Mary's Bay. Soon they reached the broad swathe of Gerald Spate's holiday camp, its mobile homes and caravans slotted evenly into the earth like rusted components in a ramshackle circuit board.

The site looked grim in the beating rain, water running off the road and down into the park like a shallow river, making the gravel track sludgy under their tires. The squad car slid and Liam corrected.

"Shit," he muttered, bringing them to the side and killing the engine. "The whole field's flooding."

Sally looked out over Gerald Spate's glamorous holiday haven. A thin skin of water shimmered atop the artificial grass. A few holidaymakers were already vacating their properties, throwing belongings into the trunks of crammed cars. Every step they took splashed and sent ripples spreading wider.

"It's a floodplain," she said, barely audible over the beating of rain on the car's roof. "Locked in by the sea wall."

"Didn't put that on his posters, did he?" Liam asked, and pushed his door open. "Come on, before the whole place gets washed away."

Sally stepped out and was deluged. Her boots sank into the grass, water almost to her ankles already, while cold rain trickled down her neck. Liam set off over the watery plain at a loping jog and she followed. Families continued packing frantically on either side, bundling their belongings and their children up like refugees.

"This is worse than I thought," she shouted ahead.

They passed the café, its doors locked and windows already shuttered, up to the sole elevated corner of the park where Spate's 'mansion' waited.

His tarpaulin porch was barely holding its own against the whipping sea wind, his door shut, but to Sally's surprise he was actually standing right there beside his hot tub, wearing only a pair of scraggly boxer shorts and looking out to sea.

They ran under cover of the tarp awning, relieved to be out of the rain if not the wind. The generator thrummed beside the mobile home, barely audible over the storm as it strained to heat the hot tub. Sally opened her mouth to speak, then she saw the view Spate was looking at, just over the sea wall.

The ocean was a vast gray cauldron of racing whitecaps, boiling under the rain and foaming in the gale-force winds. She became aware of a strange, rumbling drumbeat carrying beneath the onslaught of the rain and the wind, passing through her body like a giant's pulse.

"That's the sea on the wall," Spate said without turning. "Boom. Boom. Boom. It's hypnotic. I always do this. Get in the tub and watch. Listen. Dare it to come for me."

He turned to face them. His belly was flabby and sagged over his waistband, his face was almost yellowish and waxy, like a two-day-old corpse. He didn't seem at all surprised to see them.

"It hasn't yet, though. Maybe this time." The tarpaulin whipped and yanked overhead. "Officers, to what do I owe this pleasure?"

Sally fought her urge to dunk the man's head in his own hot tub. A corrupt little king in a drowning kingdom. But she'd promised to let Liam lead.

"We're here to talk about Reg Rook, Mr. Spate," Liam said.

Spate's lips widened, revealing brown teeth. "Still dead, last I checked."

"Thirty years ago he was an active smuggler. We've had this confirmed. He was involved with Nancy Cagen, now dead. Her nephew was Tom Richter, also dead. Richter saw something and he died with shells in his eyes. Cagen heard something from Richter 30 years ago, something about Rook smuggling something worse than people, and now she's dead with her ears cut off. You tell me that's not the hand of the Rooks at work, Gerald. There's got to be a fifth. Someone keeping the killing going, now all four of them are in custody."

Spate stared at Liam. Seconds passed. The wind lashed the porch tarp and ejected a waterfall, splashing down around Sally's ankles. She didn't budge.

"Thought about that speech a lot, did you?" Spate asked.

Sally's hand twitched, the urge to punch his fat gut only growing stronger. "What was Rook smuggling, Gerald?" she asked.

"I already told you, I wasn't in with that side of him. I don't know."

"And we don't believe you," Liam said, stepping closer to the hot tub. He tapped the edge and it rang hollow. "This is some risk you're taking, Gerald. Sitting in water heated by a generator while there's a storm blowing. You ever heard of arcing?"

Spate's eyes narrowed. "Some kind of threat, son? From you?"