Chapter 9 - Resonance Disaster
The spray was freezing as Wren scrambled over the low bulwark of the tug’s bow onto the swaying timber fender.
Her leg screamed. The scar tissue in her quad pulled like wire, but she didn't look down. She dropped to her hands and knees, crawling along the wet, slime-coated timber until her fingers found the cold rim of the four-inch PVC inspection conduit.
Above her, gunfire broke out—sharp, flat reports from nine-millimeter pistols echoing off the underside of the concrete deck. Wood splinters flew from the timber two feet from her shoulder.
She popped the latches on the waterproof case, pulled the heavy tungsten probe, and shoved it down the pipe.
The cable hummed as it spooled out: ten feet, fifteen feet, twenty feet.
*Clack.*
The probe seated in the bottom of the footing.
Wren tapped the membrane keyboard on her wrist display. *INITIATE ACOUSTIC PULSE.*
A series of rapid, high-pitched chirps vibrated through the steel cable. On the screen, a red wave line spiked, flattened, then began to draw a ragged, chaotic cross-section.
“Come on,” she whispered, her rain-soaked hair plastered across her eyes. “Give me the density.”
The screen blinked: *COMPRESSIVE STRENGTH: 3,420 PSI.*
Below minimum. Far below. It was garbage. It was practically porous limestone.
*UPLOADING TO NTSB GATEWAY... 40%... 70%...*
A heavy boot slammed down onto the timber three inches from her fingers.
Wren looked up through the rain. Julian Delacroix stood above her on the narrow maintenance stringer. His high-visibility slicker was torn, his hard hat was gone, and his silver hair was plastered to his forehead like wet straw. In his right hand was a small, nickel-plated revolver.
“You little rat,” Julian snarled over the roar of the river. “You ruined thirty years of work for four hundred thousand dollars of your sister’s worthless paper.”
“The numbers don't lie, Julian,” she shouted back, her fingers remaining flat on the keypad, shielding the upload bar with her palm. “It’s already in the cloud. Washington has the core data. You’re done.”
Julian’s face twisted into an ugly, murderous mask. He raised the revolver, leveling the barrel straight between her eyes. “Then you won't be around to read the NTSB report, will you?”
He tightened his finger.
A shadow detached itself from the dark below the fender.
Cormac Vale did not shout. He did not issue a warning. He came over the bulwark like an iron gantry swinging on a broken cable. His left hand caught Julian’s gun hand, twisting the wrist outward with a sickening, wet crack that sounded clearly above the wind. The revolver fell into the black water below without a splash.
Julian screamed, dropping to his knees.
Cormac’s right hand caught the older man by the throat, hoisting him four inches off the timber stringer until his legs dangled over the churning prop wash of the tugboat.
“I told you, Julian,” Cormac said, his face inches from Delacroix’s terror-stricken eyes. “I don't let broken men run my river.”
“Vale!” Julian choked out, his fingers clawing uselessly at Cormac’s iron wrists. “Vale... please... we can settle... the accounts...”
“The accounts are settled,” Cormac said.
He did not throw him into the river. He slammed him down onto the timber deck at Wren’s feet, pinning him with one heavy knee across his chest until Teague appeared with zip-ties and an iron collar.
Wren looked at her screen.
*UPLOAD COMPLETE. RECEIPT CONFIRMED: NTSB CASE #884-21.*
She let out a long, ragged exhale that turned into a cloud of white vapor in the damp night air. Her strength gave out completely, and she slumped back against the wet timber piling, her head resting against the rough, creosote-soaked wood.
Cormac turned to her. He was soaked through, his coat ruined, a deep graze along his left cheek where a ricochet had cut the skin, but his gray eyes were clear and steady.
He reached down, took her hand, and pulled her to her feet.
“Can you walk?” he asked.
“No,” she said honestly, her leg trembling violently under her weight.
May you like
Cormac lifted her into his arms, exactly as he had done two weeks ago in his office on Magazine Street. But this time, she was not bleeding out. This time, she wrapped her arms around his neck and held on.
***
