Chapter 6 - The War Room in the Smuggler's Cove
By midnight, Thomas’s boat shed had transformed into a makeshift command center.
Thomas had pulled an old, military-grade satellite uplink out of a storage container—equipment he had kept from his naval intelligence days. Grant sat at a folding table, his long fingers flying across a grease-stained keyboard, bypassing firewalls and connecting to encrypted servers he had built years ago as emergency fail-safes.
Claire sat beside him, cross-referencing bank routing numbers from a leather notebook she had carried out of the house in her coat pocket.
Despite the bitter wedge between them, they moved together with a terrifying, synchronized efficiency. They were no longer just estranged husband and wife; they were two apex predators protecting their nest.
"Vance’s security team is monitoring the local law enforcement bands," Thomas reported, leaning over a radio receiver in the corner. "The state police have issued a Blue Alert for Grant. They're telling the media he's armed, dangerous, and believed to have fled toward Canada."
"Let them think that," Grant said without looking up from the monitor. "Vance is holding an emergency shareholder meeting at eight o'clock tomorrow morning at the corporate headquarters in downtown Chicago. He needs the board to vote on the asset-liquidation clause before the markets open at nine."
"He thinks you're either dead or hiding in a ditch," Claire noted, pointing to a line of code on the screen. "Look at this transfer. He just moved fifteen million dollars from the Holloway primary reserve to a private security firm called Vanguard Tactical."
"That's the hit team that came to the house," Grant said, his eyes narrowing into cold slits. "He's paying them off."
"No," Claire corrected, her eyes widening as she read the transfer details. "He didn't pay them to disappear, Grant. Look at the destination address. It's a localized retainer."
Thomas stepped forward, his face darkening. "He’s paying them to stay on the ground. He knows you survived the house fire."
"He knows I came for Claire," Grant realized, a chill running down his spine. "He's tracking the cell towers along the interstate."
Suddenly, the red light on Thomas’s external security monitor flickered.
On the black-and-white feed showing the perimeter gate of the boat yard, three black sedans pulled up without headlights. The car doors swung open simultaneously, and six men wearing night-vision gear stepped out onto the muddy road.
"They found us," Thomas grunted, reaching under the workbench and pulling out a heavy, double-barreled shotgun.
Grant stood up, reaching for his gun, but remembered Thomas still had it.
Thomas pulled Grant's pistol from his belt and tossed it across the table. Grant caught it smoothly in mid-air.
"Claire," Grant said, looking her straight in the eyes. "Take the kids into the dry-dock cellar beneath the floorboards. Lock the hatch. Don't open it for anyone except me or Thomas."
Claire looked at the monitor, then looked at Grant. For a brief second, she reached out and touched his hand—a quick, firm squeeze that carried years of shared history, pain, and unspoken resolve.
"Don't die, Grant," she said quietly. "We aren't finished talking yet."
May you like
"I won't," Grant promised.
Claire ran to the back room, pulling Emma and Noah out toward the floor hatch, while Thomas cut the main power to the shed, plunging the room into absolute, pitch-black darkness.
