The slug took Dante in the right shoulder, the impact spinning him completely around and smashing him against the rough cedar wall of the boathouse before he collapsed into the heap of rotting netting.

The roar of the twelve-gauge was deafening inside the enclosed wooden shed. Acrid blue smoke rolled through the rafters, smelling of sulfur and burnt plastic.

Dante lay on his back, his breath coming in wet, ragged gasps, his hand clutching his shattered collarbone. Blood, dark and thick as motor oil in the dim bulb light, was already soaking through his charcoal wool coat.

Emma didn't scream. She had buried her face in the moldy orange canvas of the life vests, her small shoulders shaking violently, her hands clamped tight over her ears.

I lowered the shotgun, stepped across the blood-slicked planks, and kicked the flare gun through the open door into the black water of the river.

"The keys to the town car," I said down to him.

Dante looked up at me through hooded eyes, his lips pulling back over teeth stained red with internal bleeding. He coughed—a wet, bubbling sound—and reached his left hand into his overcoat with agonizing slowness.

He didn't pull out keys.

He pulled out a small black remote control with a single red toggle switch, the indicator light glowing a steady, malevolent crimson.

"You... you always were... impatient," Dante wheezed, blood flecking his chin with every syllable. "You think Carlo was the only one... talking to the U.S. Attorney?"

I leveled the barrel at his forehead. "Give me the keys, Dante."

"There are no keys," Dante whispered, his face graying as his blood pressure plummeted. "The car... is on a three-minute timer from the moment... the boathouse door opened. Sofia isn't in the trunk, Alejandro."

A cold spike of adrenaline punched through my gut. "Where is she?"

Dante’s eyes drifted toward the dark expanse of the Hudson River outside the broken window, where the low, mournful foghorn of a container ship sounded through the mist.

"She’s on the launch," he rasped, his voice fading to a dry rattle as his fingers tightened around the remote. "Nico took her out twenty minutes ago. He thinks... he thinks he’s meeting a pilot boat at the mouth of the bay. But the launch doesn't have enough fuel to clear the shoals."

He smiled—a grotesque, bloody grin—and his thumb hovered over the red toggle.

"You have two minutes, boss," Dante whispered. "The boat is drifting toward the shipping lane. Or you can take the girl and run before Mateo’s people get to the pier."

Behind me, Emma lifted her head from the life vests. Her eyes were wide, wet with tears, staring not at the blood on the floor, but at the pocket of my coat where the white rabbit ears were sticking out.

"Mister," she whispered, her voice tiny against the wind howling through the broken boards. "My bunny has a phone inside it. It’s making a noise."

From deep inside the torn lining of Emma's backpack, muffled by the polyester batting, a high-pitched digital chime began to pulse—a ringtone that didn't belong to any phone I had ever owned.

Dante's eyes widened in sudden, genuine horror.

"That isn't my line," Dante choked out, his hand shaking as he stared at the backpack. "Alejandro... don't answer that."

The chime grew louder, rhythmic and relentless in the smoky air of the boathouse, as the headlights of three black SUVs swept across the outer gravel road of Pier 42, boxing us in from the dark.