Chapter 14 - Cold Waters
The wind picked up off the river by nightfall, howling through the metal eaves of the workshop. We worked by the amber glow of the desk lamps in the loft, combing through digital archives and cross-referencing Harborstone Capital’s tax filings with the corporate records my father had hidden away.
The deeper we dug, the filthier the picture became. Arthur Vance hadn't just financed Richard’s recent bail; Richard had been laundering Vance’s offshore kickbacks through our marital assets for five years before I ever caught him on that boat. The diamond necklace Richard had bought Vanessa? Purchased through a front company tied directly to illegal harbor dredging contracts in Baltimore.
"Emily, listen to this," Julian called out from the window overlooking the docks.
The tone of his voice made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I walked over to the glass.
Down below, at the end of the dark wooden pier, thick black smoke was billowing from the engine bay of *The Solace*.
"No!" Julian lunged for the stairs.
"Julian, wait! It might be a trap!" I screamed, racing down after him.
The night air was freezing, the smell of burning diesel fuel and fiberglass acrid and suffocating. Julian sprinted along the slippery planks, grabbing a heavy chemical extinguisher from the dock station. The stern of the boat was already licking with orange flames, illuminating the dark, choppy water of the slip.
"Stay back, Emily!" Julian roared, pulling the pin on the extinguisher and blasting a plume of white powder into the engine hatch.
The fire hissed and coughed, thick plumes of suffocating smoke blinding us. I grabbed a second extinguisher, spraying the surrounding dock wood to prevent the flames from spreading to the neighboring yachts. My lungs burned; my hands were slick with cold river mist.
Suddenly, a dark silhouette detached itself from behind the marina fuel tanks fifty yards away.
A figure in a dark hooded jacket began running toward the perimeter fence. Through the smoke and flickering firelight, the figure turned for a fraction of a second to look back.
It wasn't an anonymous thug. It was Richard.
His face was contorted with a feral, twisted rage that I had never seen during our marriage. Seeing me look back at him, he didn't run faster. He stopped at the edge of the chain-link fence, lifted his hand, and made the shape of a gun with his fingers, pointing it directly at my chest, before slipping into the shadows of the alleyway.
"Julian, he's here! Richard was here!" I coughed, stumbling toward the edge of the boat.
Julian smothered the last flame with a final blast of powder. The boat’s stern was charred black, the rigging melted, the air thick with the stench of destruction. Julian stood there, drenched in sweat and soot, chest heaving.
He didn't check the engine. He didn't look at the ruin of his beloved sloop. He threw the empty cylinder onto the deck, leaped over the charred railing, and caught me in his arms, pulling me tightly against him until I could feel the violent, frantic pounding of his heart against my ribs.
"Are you hurt?" he demanded, his voice raw, hands checking my face, my shoulders. "Did he touch you?"
"I'm fine... I'm fine," I sobbed into his shoulder. "He ruined your boat, Julian. He tried to kill you."
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"Boats can be rebuilt," Julian said, his voice dropping into a deadly, ice-cold register I had never heard from him before. "He made a mistake coming here himself. He left footprints, Emily. And he forgot that the marina installed high-definition thermal security cameras last Tuesday."
***
