Chapter 70

• At the water, a skiff rocked. The biker lowered the crate into it; Elena knelt and flipped the buckles with fingers that had opened stranger things. Inside the false top: nothing. In the belly: everything anyone with no flag would kill for. She spread the black cloth flat, dropped the lid, snapped it shut again, and pulled the decoy crate’s inner latch so it would be heavy and empty when lifted. Then she stood and the world narrowed to a point because a voice behind her said, “Don’t turn around.”
• Familiar. Too familiar.
• Alessio.