Covert Cargo. Elisabeth Rees

from a boat. Carl flashed a smile. “They got the best seafood in town.”

      Dillon nodded in response. He didn’t much feel like talking. He wanted to reach the lighthouse quickly and assess the situation. Could this child be one of the many people who were being trafficked along the Californian coastline from South America? People who were sold a dream of a better life only to find themselves working illegally for a pittance, kept hidden under the radar, denied access to education or health care services. The smuggling cartel always seemed to be one step ahead of the coast guard, almost as if they had insider knowledge. When it became apparent that somebody at the station might be providing the traffickers with safe passage, Dillon was drafted in to take charge of the operation. With a staff of just ten, he couldn’t afford to trust anybody, not even Carl.

      “You don’t say much, do you, Captain?” Carl said, leaving the lights of the town behind them and heading along the curved coastal road, which came to a dead end at the lighthouse.

      The tower was now clearly visible, perched atop a cliff that hung over the bay—a cliff that looked to have been gradually eroded away by the relentless crashing waves.

      “I don’t need to say much,” Dillon replied, glancing in Carl’s direction, “when you’re here to do all the talking.”

      Carl laughed. “I’ve been told I talk a lot,” he said. “But I’m trying to rein it in.”

      Dillon focused on watching the lighthouse. Its distinctive red and white stripes had the appearance of a candy cane, while the stone cottage was pure white. It had stood overlooking the town for well over a hundred years and would probably stand for another hundred more. But it was a remote and unforgiving place to live, and Dillon began to wonder about the woman who inhabited the old place. What would cause someone to embrace such a solitary life?

      Carl seemed to read his mind. “Miss Forrester is a reclusive lady,” he said, pulling into a graveled lot next to the cottage where a small Volkswagen was parked. “She got jilted at the altar a few years back. She never got over it.”

      Dillon pulled out his gun. “As long as she and the child are safe, that’s all that matters.”

      The red and blue flashes from the roof of the truck bounced all the way up the tower and reflected off the Fresnel lenses in the lantern room. Dillon exited the truck and looked up at the tower. The wind immediately yanked down the hood on his waterproof coat, and the rain soaked into his thick, curly hair, snaking down his scalp and into his collar.

      “There’s a woman in the lantern room,” he said to Carl, seeing the silhouette of a female highlighted against the dark sky. “Stay behind me and keep close.”

      Carl took out his gun and together they approached the front door of the keeper’s cottage. There was a driftwood sign above the door with Return to Grace carved upon it, smooth and weather-worn from years of exposure to the elements. As Dillon turned the handle, he felt a shiver of trepidation. It had been many years since he was on an active mission, and the last assignment he had accomplished left a bittersweet taste in his mouth. Along with his SEAL comrades, Dillon had successfully eliminated a terrorist group in Afghanistan four years previously, but he had failed to protect a group of teachers desperately seeking a way of escape from their besieged town.

      Local insurgents had been targeting schools that dared to provide an education to young girls, and the SEALs had come across a building that had been destroyed by militants. Those teachers who survived the attack were living on borrowed time, having heard that more militants from the feared group were preparing to come back and finish the job. Dillon had promised to return and help them escape to Pakistan as soon as the SEAL mission was complete. But that was before he met Aziza.

      On his return journey to the town, he met a young woman who was fleeing a death sentence handed down by a sharia court. Finding Aziza wandering on a desert plain forced him to make a choice—protect her or protect the teachers. He made the only choice he could. It took him three days to deliver Aziza to a women’s refuge in Kabul, and by the time he made it back to the town, the teachers had vanished. He never knew what happened to them. That one distraction had probably cost them their lives. While he saved Aziza’s life, he sacrificed theirs. This mission was his chance to make amends. This time, he could save everyone.

      The door of the cottage opened straight into the living room, and a large black dog stood in front of them barking furiously. Dillon was unfazed. He held one hand down to the dog’s nose and let him sniff, talking softly all the while. The animal responded well, licking Dillon’s hand and calming down quickly.

      Dillon and Carl entered the cottage back to back, turning in circles to scan the room. There was a good fire blazing in the hearth, casting a glow around the sparsely furnished area. The chairs, cabinets and table all looked to be handmade, crafted from different pieces of wood. A large Oriental rug lay over the stone tile floor. The rustic effect was simple and homey. Next to the fire, an old rowboat lay in two broken sections, taking up a large part of the room with its size.

      “Let’s get up to the tower,” Dillon said. “Keep alert.”

      The spiral stairs to the tower were dark, and Dillon could hear the crashing waves outside. The dog followed them, keeping close to heel, giving Dillon reassurance that the animal would alert them if the reported intruder was still inside. The small windows let in a little moonlight but not enough for good visibility, so Dillon activated his flashlight and shone it all around, looking for the man. The stairwell was empty, and when they reached the top, he rapped on the door and called out.

      “Ma’am, this is Dillon Randall from the coast guard.”

      He heard the bolts slowly slide across, and the heavy door opened with an enormous creak to reveal two faces staring at him. One face belonged to a small boy, barefoot, wearing shorts and a T-shirt. The other belonged to a young woman, in a large yellow raincoat. Her brown hair was wet and shone like silk under his flashlight. He lowered the beam of light and studied the pair. The boy clung to the woman, and she squatted down to speak gently to him while her large black dog rubbed himself against her.

      “It’s okay,” she whispered into the child’s ear. “These are the good guys.” When the boy looked at her in confusion, she spoke in faltering Spanish: “Hombres buenos.”

      Dillon watched the way she softly smoothed the youngster’s hair and patted his shoulder before looking up at him and Carl with wide eyes. Even in the darkness, he could see her high cheekbones and clear, scrubbed skin. He had not been expecting her to be breathtaking in her beauty and he was momentarily silenced.

      “There was a man here,” she said, standing up. “But I guess he ran when he saw the lights on your truck.”

      “Are you and the child all right, ma’am?” Dillon asked.

      She smiled. “We are now.”

      Dillon reached for the child’s hand to give him reassurance. If this boy had been trafficked along the Californian coast, it was Dillon’s responsibility to find and free the many others who had not managed to escape.

      “Let’s go make sense of what just happened,” he said. “There’s a lot of work to do.”

      * * *

      Beth stood on the shoreline and inhaled deeply. She loved the smell of the morning air after a storm, new and clean, leaving a sublime taste of fresh oysters in her mouth. The storm had washed up all kinds of jetsam along the beach, mixed with the foam that came in with the tide. The foam caught on the wind and small patches of it swirled in the air, sending Ted into playful mode. He jumped up to snatch at it with his teeth, before bounding off with his favorite playmate, a Jack Russell terrier by the name of Tootsie.

      Beth’s friend Helen Smith walked on the beach alongside her, keeping to the hard sand where Helen could use her walking cane with one hand and lean on Beth with the other. With her eighty-five years of age, Helen’s mobility was failing and she didn’t have the stamina that she used to. Beth called at Helen’s beachside house at 10:00 a.m. each day, which was just a short walk from her lighthouse on the coastal road. Then they would exercise