Covert Cargo. Elisabeth Rees

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      Arm in arm, the women resumed their return walk along the sand. Beth’s stomach was swirling with anxiety. She wondered if her discovery of the child and the stone were somehow connected. Had she stumbled into something more sinister than she realized? And was the man on the Jet Ski part of it?

      She thought of Dillon Randall, and his assurance that she could call him at any time if she felt troubled. Beth normally shunned the outside world at all costs, but she might have no other choice than to reach out for help.

      * * *

      Dillon spread a large map over his desk, studying the suspected trafficking routes that were marked upon it. The smugglers’ boats had been heading up the western coast from Mexico, laden with adults and children from all over South and Central America—people who believed that decent jobs and homes awaited them in the US, but in reality they were destined to be domestic servants, rarely paid or rewarded for their hard work and left with no money to return home. The traffickers seemed to be using flotillas of small motorboats and rowboats for their journeys—vessels that were too small and dangerous for the purpose. One of these vessels had capsized four weeks previously, leading to the deaths of most of its occupants. That was when Dillon was covertly recruited into the coast guard from his SEAL base in Virginia.

      There was a knock on the door. “Enter,” he called.

      Carl came into the room, closely followed by the station’s chief warrant officer, Larry Chapman. Larry was five years older than Dillon, and Dillon had felt a considerable resentment from his subordinate officer on their first meeting. He sensed that Larry felt cheated out of the top job at the station—a job that the chief warrant officer felt was rightfully his.

      “How are you getting used to being back on the front line?” Larry asked. “It must be difficult to adjust to active duty after spending so many years sitting behind a desk, huh?”

      Dillon slowly rolled the maps up on his desk. His cover story involved placing him in the Office of Strategic Analysis in Washington, DC, thereby hiding his true past as a SEAL with almost twenty years’ combat experience.

      “I’m doing just fine, thanks, Larry,” he replied, sliding the maps back into their protective tube. Larry never missed an opportunity to remind Dillon that he didn’t believe desk work to be real experience. Little did Larry know that Dillon had racked up fifteen active missions, rarely ever seeing the inside of an office.

      “Is there anything to report on the traffickers?” Carl asked. “Did the child say something that might help us?”

      “The kid’s not saying much at all,” Dillon replied. “The authorities think he’s from El Salvador and they’re trying to locate his family.”

      “And I’m guessing there was no sign of the smugglers when you dispatched the search-and-rescue boat,” Carl said.

      Dillon shook his head. “No, no sign at all.”

      Carl let out a long breath. “How do they keep doing that? It’s like they know we’re coming.”

      “They’ll slip up eventually,” Dillon said. “They always do.” He turned to Larry. “I’d like you to analyze the data I put on your desk. Your specialist skills in identifying the type of boats being used could be crucial.”

      “Yes, Captain,” Larry said. “I’m on it.”

      Both men headed out the door just as the phone rang on Dillon’s desk. He answered with his usual greeting: “Captain Randall.”

      The voice on the other end was panicked. “Dillon. Is that you?”

      He knew who it was instantly. “Beth? Are you okay?”

      Her voice was thick with emotion, and she snatched at her words through sobs. “It’s Ted,” she cried. “Somebody hurt Ted.”

      “Ted,” he repeated. “Who’s Ted?”

      “My dog. Somebody tried to get into the cottage while I was out, and Ted must have stood guard.” She broke off to catch her breath. “He’s bleeding badly.”

      Dillon checked his watch. “I can be there in ten minutes. Stay exactly where you are, and wait for me, okay?”

      “Okay.”

      He hung up the phone and raced out into the hall, grabbing the truck keys from the hook in the corridor. Once he was in the vehicle, he activated the sirens to reach the lighthouse in extra-quick time, and he found Beth kneeling on the grass outside her home, cradling her limp dog in her arms. The animal was breathing but bleeding from a wound to its rib cage. He looked to have been stabbed, and his shaggy fur glistened with a dark, sticky patch.

      Dillon didn’t say a word of greeting. He simply bent down, lifted Ted from Beth’s lap and carried him to the truck. “Come on,” he said. “I’ll get him to the vet in no time.”

      He saw Beth rise and follow, rubbing her bloodstained hands on her light blue jeans. “There was a man watching me from a Jet Ski in the bay earlier,” she said, her voice noticeably shaking. “I think he tried to get in while I was at my friend’s house. There are pieces of a torn shirt on the floor in my living room, so Ted might have injured the guy before being hurt himself.”

      “How did the attacker get in?”

      “I never lock up when Ted’s at home,” she replied. “It’s usually so safe.”

      “Go lock up now,” Dillon said. “Let’s not take any more chances.”

      He laid Ted across the backseat of the truck and stroked the dog’s small pointed ears. “Good dog,” he whispered.

      He watched Beth turn the key in her front door with shaking hands before she ran to the passenger side and slid into the seat. Her skin was deathly pale and her full lips had been drained of their deep pink color.

      “Thank you,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry for calling, but I panicked and you were the only person I could think of.” She looked into the backseat where the dog lay. “Ted means so much to me.”

      He shut the passenger door and went around to the driver’s seat. “Don’t ever apologize for calling me,” he said. “The most important thing is that you’re safe.”

      He switched on the siren and raced back along the coastal road, heading for the veterinarian’s office in the town. The fact that Beth’s house had been broken into so soon after she saved the young boy was no coincidence. He suspected that the cartel was responsible, and he needed to find out why this woman was of interest to them. Had she been targeted for elimination because she had seen the face of one of their men the previous evening?

      He glanced over at her. She had turned her body to the left, to reach an arm around and stroke the dog’s head. A tear slipped down her cheek. This young woman was in danger. He didn’t know how or why, but he knew it wasn’t good to be on the radar of a Mexican cartel. She would need protecting.

      This situation just got a whole lot more complicated than he would have liked.

       TWO

      Beth felt helpless. She had been sitting in the waiting room of the vet’s office for two hours. She looked around the room, with its bright strip light shining on the metal chairs and coffee table, piled high with various pet animal magazines. Before buying the lighthouse and changing professions, she had been a real estate agent and had shown the young vet, a red-haired man named Henry Stanton, around the building several years ago. He had purchased the property, set up his practice and the rest was history. And now that same man was trying to save the life of her beloved dog.

      Dillon sat opposite, flicking through a back issue of Dog News. He had insisted on staying with her, despite her protests. She was grateful for his help, but she didn’t want to spend time alone with him. She felt awkward in a man’s company. She’d