59

ALLIE CROUCHED BETWEEN TWO OIL DRUMS, LOOKING THROUGH A PAIR of expensive night vision binoculars she had picked up at a sporting goods store at the mall after work. She was in a dark corner of Deep Seven’s lot at the Port of Oakland, hiding in what seemed to be a junk storage area between the water and the wall of a warehouse.

She saw five white housing trailers lined up on a parking lot next to a small administrative building and what looked like a garage or machine shop. A ship—the Grasp II she had remembered from the tax memo—lay tethered to the dock, rising and falling slightly with the waves. A large tractor-trailer waited on the shore next to the ship. A high fence surrounded the whole compound like a steel hedge.

She’d been there for over an hour, and the initial adrenaline rush of sneaking into the dock had worn off. Petroleum fumes from the barrels gave her a headache. She was cold. Her legs and back were stiff, and the grime all around her had already stained her new jeans and the sleeve of her jacket.

So far nothing interesting had happened. The ship had arrived and tied up at the big concrete dock. They set up a gangway. A bunch of Asian guys came off, some carrying boxes or bags on hand trucks. Maybe they were carrying nuclear bomb parts or smuggled diamonds, but she kind of doubted it.

Other people went on the ship. Some other Asians wearing body armor and carrying assault rifles milled around, talking to each other and looking bored. Big deal. She saw that in the parking lot every morning at Deep Seven.

She put down the binoculars and rubbed her eyes. At least she hadn’t called Connor or Julian to tell them about her new lead. That would have been painful. No one knew she made this little recon trip, and no one would unless and until she found something.

She sighed. It would be a lot easier to find something if she had some idea what she was looking for.

Oh, well. Back to work the next morning. Maybe she’d find something good before her assignment ended. She looked at her blackened knees. Maybe those stains would even come out. Miracles were possible.

She took one last look at the ship, and a movement in the shadows at its back—stern?—caught her eye. She lifted the binoculars to her eyes and the world turned from night to green-tinged twilight.

Two figures were climbing down to the water. They paused for a minute and then dropped into the dirty water of the harbor, making hardly a ripple.

They didn’t swim directly for shore, but moved in a wide crescent that kept them in the shadows and out of view from the dock. She leaned forward, forgetting her dirty knees and aching back. “Now we’re talking.”

The swimmers made slow progress, disappearing under water and then popping their heads up for a few seconds ten yards away for a breath and a quick look around before disappearing again. They turned toward shore, following a line of pilings that gave them some cover. With a start, Allie realized that they would reach the cement seawall just a few yards from her.

Excitement and fear twisted her insides. Should she run? Stay put and see what happened? Go to meet them?

Inertia won out. She moved back further into the shadows and watched as they came closer and closer. They seemed to be having some trouble—They came to the surface more often, staying up longer. Then they stopped going down at all. They swam with slow, uneven strokes. One of them lagged behind, and the other went back and began half-towing him.

Allie looked around, but didn’t see anything resembling a life preserver. So there really wasn’t anything she could do to help, was there?

The swimmers continued to make gradual progress. Eventually they disappeared from view beneath the edge of the wall. Long minutes ticked by. Allie looked at the glowing face of her watch and wondered how long the men had been out of sight.

Finally, she decided to go over to the wall and look down. But as she started to rise, she heard grunting and a hand appeared over the top of the wall. She crouched back between the barrels and watched as a man pulled himself over and collapsed to the ground.

He lurched to his feet and called down in a rough, shaking whisper. “Hold on, Ed!”

He staggered toward the random piles of junk as if looking for something. His hands shivered badly as he fumbled among the trash. After half a minute, he found a heavy chain with a hook on one end and started dragging it over to the seawall. But the chain suddenly went taut, jerking the man to a halt. He yanked on it without result, then stumbled back and began shoving a large piece of scrap metal that was apparently pinning the chain down.

Allie couldn’t bear it any longer. Against her better judgment, she pushed herself to her feet and ran over.

The man was intent on his task and didn’t see her until she set her shoulder beside his. He looked up, surprise on his dripping face. He grunted his thanks and pushed harder.

The metal groaned and scraped forward, releasing the chain. The man grabbed it and ran back to the low wall, Allie a step behind him.

She looked down and saw dark waves rolling up against slimy green cement ten feet below. Rusty D-shaped loops of rebar stuck out from the wall, forming a rough ladder. A semiconscious man hung from the bottom, his right arm wedged through a rung to keep him from slipping under.

The man beside Allie let the hook down. It thumped against the wall with a dull clank. The man at the bottom lifted his head and reached for the chain with his left hand, but he couldn’t seem to catch it. His other arm slipped out of the rung and he flailed wildly for a few seconds before grabbing the rung again. He clung to it with both hands.

“I’ll go down.” Allie’s voice surprised her, but she found herself stepping over the top of the seawall and gripping the top rung. It was rough and very cold in her hand. Then she was climbing down, and a few seconds later she had almost reached the bottom.

A shockingly cold wave rose out of the dark and slapped her. Her foot slipped off a slimy rung, and she barely avoided falling. Wet and shivering, she cowered against the hard wall, wondering what she was doing. She should be in her apartment right now, or at Tang Dynasty or Starbucks with Trudi, or planning her next move at Deep Seven. Somewhere—anywhere—other than hanging from a cold and unforgiving cement slab over inky waters, trying to save some man she’d never met.

She looked down. The man was looking at her. He shook uncontrollably. His face was pale and slack, his eyes half-glazed.

Another wave rolled toward her and she tensed as it splashed against the wall, soaking her a second time. The man below her hardly seemed to notice.

She climbed down the final few rungs and grabbed the chain that hung beside her. She tried to hand it to the man, but he shook his head. “B-belt.”

“What? Oh, the hook.”

He nodded.

Allie stepped down into the frigid water and felt the man’s waist. There it was. It felt thick—hopefully thick enough to support him. She attached the hook and gave the chain a jerk.

The man at the top of the wall pulled and the chain went taut. With Allie pushing the second man’s dripping and copious backside, he rose out of the water, pawing weakly at the ladder as he went up.

His legs disappeared over the top, and Allie heaved herself over right behind him. He had curled into a shivering ball, but he nodded to her with a quick jerk of his head. “Th -thanks.”

Allie nodded back. She was wet and freezing, but a sunny glow spread through her. She knew she didn’t look her best, but she wished Connor could see her now.

The man she had just saved grunted something.

“What was that?”

“Phone,” he repeated, his voice slurred and shaking. “You gotta phone?”

Fortunately, it was in her purse, which was still back by the oil barrels. She retrieved it and returned a few seconds later. “I’ll call you an ambulance.”

She started to dial 911, but he shook his head. “No! Cops first. There’s n-nukes on that ship. Buncha North Korean commandos too.”