Patriot by M.A. Rothman (summer reading list TXT) 📗

He tried to ignore everything around him and focus on what they’d learned from Khan. Drugged up and loose-lipped, the sheikh had revealed that Hakimi was bringing in the nuke by container ship, and though Khan didn’t know the exact schedule, he was confident it was going to be within the next day or so.

But that didn’t make sense. It took forever for ships to move freight across the ocean. There was no way a ship could have gone from the East China Sea to the East Coast of the US in so short a time. It would probably take a month. The package must have been flown—and then shipped across the Atlantic. Why?

Brice was running through the cargo manifests for all the inbound freighters, looking for any clue as to which might be the ship they were looking for, but it was a crapshoot. Hundreds of ships came and went through the New England ports every day. It was like looking for a specific needle in a stack of needles.

Connor’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and checked the caller ID. Brice. For a brief instant he considered answering it, then he felt his stomach turn and held it out for Annie. “Here.”

Annie took it and answered. “Yeah, Brice? Yeah. Slip number what? What was that container number again?” She pulled a pen from inside her jacket and jotted down several numbers on her palm. “Okay, thanks!” She hung up, leaned forward, and tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “Red Hook Terminal, Slip Fourteen.”

“Roger that,” the pilot answered, giving her an exaggerated nod.

The engines whined as he throttled up and the chopper’s nose dipped.

Connor gritted his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut.

“You really are missing a wonderful view,” Annie said.

Connor gave her the finger.

She laughed. “Brice says this ship is registered out of Naples, Italy, left around the same time as Hakimi disappeared, and guess what they’re transporting?”

The chopper banked again, and Connor groaned.

“Olive oil,” Annie said.

“Just get us on the ground,” Connor replied through gritted teeth.

He kept his eyes shut until the helicopter touched down and the whine of the engines were quieting. Then he disconnected his harness, pulled open the door, and practically jumped from the aircraft.

The pilot had set down in the middle of an empty loading zone. Stacks of containers surrounded them, some piled several stories high.

As Annie climbed down, Connor turned to her with his arms out to the sides. “Where to?”

“The Port Authority guys are going to meet us here.”

As if on cue, two white-and-black sedans pulled around the end of one of the container rows and stopped a few feet away. A slightly overweight man in a short-sleeve button-up shirt and tie stepped out of the lead car, looking confused and more than a little frustrated.

“You guys with Homeland?” he shouted over the sound of the chopper’s down-revving engines. He approached, hunched over and holding his tie to his chest.

“That’s right,” Annie shouted back. “We need to get to Slip Fourteen.”

The chopper’s engines wound down to a minimal hum, and the downbeats from the rotors almost completely died away. “I’m going to need to see some identification,” the man said.

“Sure,” Annie replied, digging in her jacket pocket.

“This is all extremely irregular.”

The man crossed his arms. He had a pistol holstered on his hip. It was a cheap plastic Fobus holster, the same one the FBI had banned several years back for causing a number of accidental discharges. A golden badge clipped to his belt in front of the holster identified him as a security supervisor, and the ID clipped to his shirt pocket said his name was Josh Price.

“What is it exactly that you’re looking for?” he asked. “The agent on the phone wasn’t too forthcoming.”

“That’s classified,” Annie said, holding up her fairly real-looking Homeland Security credentials.

Connor made a mental note to ask the folks at the Outfit what type of credentials he should be carrying.

Price leaned forward and squinted at the ID. After a moment he straightened again and nodded to Connor. “And yours?”

“He’s the new guy,” Annie said. “Doesn’t have his green card yet, you know what I mean. He’s with me.”

The man hesitated.

“Slip Fourteen,” Annie repeated. She looked at her turned-up palm, reading the numbers she’d written there. “We’re looking for container F74-G82A. Can you help us out?”

Price nodded slowly, then motioned to the two cars behind him. “Boat’s already docked and unloading, but we can get you there.”

“You need to stop all the cargo from leaving the area,” Connor said, following Price to the cars.

“You’re kidding me, right?” Price said over his shoulder. “Do you have any idea how much money goes through these docks every hour? I call for a shutdown and that’s my ass. I ain’t doing that for no one, not even Homeland Security.”

Connor put a hand on the man’s shoulder, stopping him before he climbed back into the lead car. “If you don’t stop it, you could be responsible for the deaths of thousands, if not millions.”

Price stood there for a moment, studying Connor’s face as if trying to determine whether Connor was feeding him a line or not. “You’re talking about the bombs in Manhattan. This has something to do with that?”

Connor nodded. “We have reason to believe that a much bigger bomb is coming through your port right now, and if we don’t stop it, the potential body count is…” He trailed off, not even wanting to entertain the number.

The color drained from Price’s face. “My cousin’s in the hospital from the JP Morgan bombing. He might not make it.” He pulled in a deep breath and sighed. “I guess we don’t have any time to waste.”

Connor and Annie climbed into the back seat, behind Price, and the cars took off through the maze of containers.

“This place is massive,” Annie said.

Price turned, putting an arm over the back of his seat. “The Port Authority bought the piers back in the