Cutter

The storm had been stalking them since dawn.

By noon, it caught up.

Mace stood on the bow of Calypso Jane, one hand on the rail, feeling the hull rise and fall like a living thing under his boots. The sea wasn’t blue anymore—it was the color of old metal, churning and mean.

“Should’ve stayed in port,” the engineer shouted from the wheelhouse.

“Too late now,” Mace said, though he barely heard his own voice over the slap of waves.

The cargo below deck wasn’t supposed to be out here. Not in daylight, not in this weather. Three locked crates marked “survey equipment,” but Mace had handled enough steel to know what a crate of rifles felt like when the boat listed hard to starboard.

He turned, saw the coastline vanish into mist. Just gray. Just motion.

Inside the wheelhouse, Nina kept the throttle steady. She wore her rain jacket open, hair plastered to her neck. Cool, quiet type. Didn’t scare easy.

“You said the buyer’s man would meet us three miles offshore,” she said.

“Yeah,” Mace said.

“And if we don’t see him?”

“Then we keep the guns and double the price.”

A wave slammed the hull—white spray over the bow like shattered glass. The boat shuddered but kept climbing. Nina didn’t flinch. She just looked at him with that slow, even stare.

“You think he’s still coming?” she said.

Mace wiped the salt from his face. “He’ll come. People always show when they owe.”

Another blast of wind hit them broadside. The compass on the dash swung madly, needles trembling.

“You trust that thing?” Nina said.

“Never did.”

Out of the haze, a dark shape formed—a smaller boat, running without lights.

“There,” Mace said.

Nina throttled down. The two boats rolled in the gray water, drifting closer. A figure stepped onto the deck of the other boat—slicker, hood up, one hand raised.

Mace grabbed the rope and leaned over the rail, watching. The man shouted something, voice torn apart by wind. Mace cupped a hand to his ear.

“Payment first!” the man yelled.

Mace laughed—short, dry. “He’s new.”

Nina didn’t move. Her hand rested on the flare gun by the throttle. “You think he brought company?”

“Maybe. Or maybe we did.”

Behind them, a low thump from below deck. One of the crates shifting.

Then another sound—metal splitting, slow and deliberate.

Nina looked at him.

“Mace.”

He went for the hatch, ripped it open. The smell hit first—diesel and gun oil. One crate cracked open, lid half-hinged. A hand came out of it.

Not a gun. A man.

He was small, eyes wild, wrists zip-tied.

“They’re already here,” he said.

The next wave hit harder, knocking Mace into the ladder. He got up, blood on his lip. Nina was shouting something, pointing toward the other boat—but it was already turning, fading into the fog.

“Where the hell’s he going?” Mace said.

“To watch,” Nina said. “See who lives.”

The engine coughed once, then twice, then quit.

Silence except for the sea, hammering away.

Mace went to the console, tried the ignition. Nothing.

The radio was dead too.

Nina looked at him—cold now, calculating.

“You said you checked the fuel.”

“I did.”

“Then what?”

He turned toward the hold. “We’re leaking. Or they cut the line.”

The man from the crate started laughing, hoarse and cracked.

“You were never supposed to make it this far,” he said.

Outside, the waves built higher, gray into white. The bow climbed, dropped, climbed again. The storm roared so loud it swallowed everything else.

Mace looked out through the rain—nothing but motion, and the shape of their own wake disappearing behind them.

He gripped the rail, steadying himself. “All right,” he said. “We finish this.”

Nina gave him a look—half trust, half dare—and hit the flare.

The red light burst across the gray, painting the sea blood-bright for a second, long enough to show what was waiting out there.

Three boats. Engines quiet. Watching.

And Calypso Jane charging straight at them.