Chapter 3 - FLIGHT FROM HARBORVIEW
The rain outside the hospital was coming down in thick, blinding sheets, transforming the neon signs of the Portland medical district into smeared streaks of red and blue paint. I hurried Noah through the side exit of the pediatric wing, my hand firmly gripping his uninjured right arm. He was swallowed up in an oversized hospital sweatshirt the triage nurse had kindly given us, his sneakers squeaking against the wet concrete pavement.
My old Honda Civic sat under a flickering streetlight near the edge of the lot. As I unlocked the passenger door, I kept looking over my shoulder, half-expecting Vance or a black commercial van to materialize out of the midnight fog. Every shadow looked like a threat; every passing engine sounded like a trap.
"Get in, buddy," I murmured, helping him slide into the worn fabric seat before rushing around to the driver's side.
The engine turned over with a rough, sputtering cough before settling into a familiar hum. I jammed the car into reverse, backed out of the space, and tore out of the parking lot without turning on the headlights until we hit the main avenue. My hands were shaking so violently against the steering wheel that I could barely keep the car centered in the lane.
"Where are we going?" Noah asked from the darkness of the passenger seat. He was staring out the window, his small face illuminated by the passing green glow of traffic lights. "Are we going to your house?"
"No," I said instantly. "If that man in the suit saw the lining of your jacket, he already knows my address. We can't go anywhere near my apartment. He's probably waiting there right now."
"I'm sorry," Noah whispered, his voice cracking as he pulled his knees up to his chest. "I didn't mean to bring the bad men to you. Mom said you were safe. She said you were the only safe place left."
The raw guilt in his voice hit me like a physical blow. I reached across the center console, resting my hand on his shoulder. "Hey. Look at me, Noah."
He turned his head slowly.
"This is not your fault," I said, making sure my voice was steady and absolute. "You did exactly what your mom told you to do, and you were incredibly brave to survive that crash. I am not mad at you. Do you understand me? We are going to figure this out together."
He nodded once, a single tear escaping his eye and tracking through the dust on his cheek.
I drove deep into the industrial district near the Willamette River, a landscape of rusted shipping containers, darkened warehouses, and gravel lots where no one asked questions after midnight. I needed time to think, a place to park where the car wouldn't be easily spotted from the main thoroughfare. I pulled into an abandoned loading dock beneath a crumbling overpass, killing the engine and the dashboard lights. The interior of the car instantly became dark and silent, save for the rhythmic drumming of the storm against the metal roof.
"Noah," I said, turning in my seat to face him. "We need to talk about what happened before you got into that courier car. What did your mom give you? Why were those men at your house?"
Noah reached into the pocket of the oversized hospital sweatshirt. His fingers fumbled for a moment before he pulled out a small, heavy object wrapped in a piece of faded flannel cloth. He handed it to me.
I unwrapped the cloth. Inside lay an old-fashioned, brass wind-up pocket watch. The glass face was scratched, and the metal was tarnished with age, but when I held it up to my ear, I could hear the faint, erratic ticking of the gears inside.
"It doesn't tell the right time," Noah explained softly. "Mom told me never to change the hands. She said the time on the face is a secret code that unlocks her computer at the office. She told me if she didn't meet me at the Portland bus station by midnight, I had to give this to you."
I looked closely at the watch face under the dim light of my phone screen. The hour hand was frozen between the four and the five. The minute hand pointed directly at the seven. It read 4:35.
"Where did your mom work, Noah?"
"A big place near the river in Vancouver," he said. "It had a sign with a blue triangle. She called it Apex Logistics. She was the person who looked at all the money numbers."
My stomach dropped. Apex Logistics wasn't a standard shipping firm. They were one of the largest private maritime transport contractors in the Pacific Northwest, recently hit by a massive federal investigation regarding illegal smuggling and customs fraud. If Megan was their chief financial controller, she wasn't just running from a bad crowd—she was running from a multinational criminal enterprise that had deeply embedded roots in the local authorities.
Suddenly, a pair of bright high-beams cut through the darkness of the overpass, illuminating the interior of my car in a harsh, blinding white glare.
May you like
A heavy vehicle pulled up directly behind us, blocking the exit from the loading dock. A figure stepped out of the driver's side, holding a heavy flashlight that beamed straight into my rearview mirror.
It was a black commercial van.
