The Catch: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

inconsistenciesin the way the bags of rice had been loaded, and it took over two days of incursions into the belly of the freighter before she found the first storage crate buried two bags deep, directly beneath the center of the number one cargo hatch.
    A touch of splintered wood had led her to more until she’d uncovered a portion of what had to be a larger cache, a mixture of small arms, Russian-made assault rifles, and antitank and antiaircraft weapons. There were possibly additional stockpiles, perhaps even larger munitions, buried deeper or that she’d overlooked in the other holds, but discovering this was enough for her questions and suspicions to find answers: If these weapons were legal and intended for discharge in Mombasa, they wouldn’t have been hidden, which meant they would have to be offloaded before reaching Kenya, and the only place to do that was Somalia.
    Munroe reburied the cache and made for the ladder, moving hand over hand, anger at Leo rising higher with each rung toward the deck. He hadn’t been hired to protect the ship, which was old and carrying worthless cargo; not even hired to protect the crew. Instead of diverting hundreds of nautical miles out of the way to avoid the hazard area, at some point they would be traveling directly into it. He’d been brought on to stand guard over the arms delivery itself.
    She reached the top of the ladder, disgust rising at the audacity, not the gunrunning—given her history she could hardly be a hypocrite in that regard. Leo had played God with her life, had deliberately taken choice away from her by withholding information: an act made all the more vile because as far as he knew she was young and inexperienced, and if things went to hell, he’d knowingly written her a death sentence.
    Munroe moved through the opening and crouched onto the deck, resealed the hatch, skirted between the coamings, and waited in the shadows, watching for Victor to pass on patrol. Strategy and tactical possibility laid themselves out on a chessboard inside her head, cold calculation muting the fury.
    It was one thing for her to play the fool and willingly allowsomeone to use her, another entirely to be played and used as if she were a fool.
    Certainly Victor, too, knew what lay beneath her feet, and his betrayal in the face of his act of concern stung worse than if this entire venture had only been Leo’s doing. And Amber Marie? What of her?
    Munroe drew in a deep breath and let the anger seep out, pulled rationality into its place. Detachment would serve her far better.
    She felt Victor’s approach before she saw him, instinct long honed during the years of hunting and being hunted in the dark. Waited for him to pass and then rose to approach from his blind spot, moving soundlessly, steps drowned by the wind.
    Victor startled when he felt her, said, “Christ!” and spun to face her. “Are you crazy?” he said, and then trying to cover the surprise gave her his bearded grin and said, “What new secrets do you bring tonight?”
    She kept beside him, stride matching his. “I think it’s you who’ve been keeping secrets.”
    “My secrets?” he said, and his voice betrayed a genuine earnestness that she’d truly hoped wouldn’t be there.
    “Where is this ship headed?” she asked.
    “That’s no secret. Mombasa—we all know this.”
    “Before Mombasa.”
    He stopped walking, turned to study her, and in the moonlight his expression twisted and his eyebrows lifted as if he’d begun to understand.
    “I’ve been exploring down in the hold,” she said. “Found a few interesting things. So where do we stop to deliver them?”
    Victor started walking again. “You didn’t know?” he said.
    “Didn’t know what exactly?”
    He didn’t reply.
    “Obviously, Leo knows,” she said. “And you know, and I assume that David knows. What about Emmanuel? Marcus? Am I the only one that Leo neglected to tell?”
    “He briefed me alone,” Victor said. “Told me he