PROLOGUE
The bitter wind cut through Marcus Whitman's coat as he hurried across the deserted shipyard. Ice crystals formed in his beard with each labored breath, the temperature having plummeted to well below zero after sundown. His footsteps crunched in the fresh snow, the sound amplified in the night stillness of the Duluth port.
He shouldn't have come alone. That much was clear now. But after fifteen years as a customs inspector, Marcus trusted his instincts, and something about those shipping manifests from the Northern Star had been off. Numbers that didn't add up. Cargo weights that were always just slightly above what was expected. Destinations that changed between documentation. Little inconsistencies that would be missed by anyone who hadn't spent their career scrutinizing such details.
Marcus pulled his collar higher against the wind howling off Lake Superior, his fingers stiff with cold as he fumbled with his flashlight. The beam cut through the darkness, illuminating the maze of stacked shipping containers stretching before him like a steel and iron labyrinth. Somewhere in this frozen maze was container 4873-B, the one whose contents didn't match any official record.
A sound behind him—the soft crunch of snow under a boot—made him freeze.
He wasn't alone.
Marcus quickened his pace, weaving between the towering stacks of containers. The flashlight beam bounced wildly as he moved, casting disorienting shadows. Another sound—closer now—had him breaking into a jog, his breath coming in painful gasps as the frigid air seared his lungs.
"Hello?" he called out, immediately regretting it as his voice echoed through the empty port.
No response came, but the footsteps continued, matching his pace with uncanny precision. Marcus had investigated enough irregularities to know when he was being followed, and whoever this was, they weren't part of the security staff making their rounds.
He ducked between two container stacks, hoping to lose his pursuer in the industrial maze. His heart hammered against his ribs as he spotted an open container door, its interior pitch black. Without thinking, Marcus slipped inside, pressing himself against the cold metal wall. It was a rookie mistake, breaking the first rule of port safety: never enter a confined space without backup. But panic had overridden his training.
The footsteps slowed, then stopped somewhere nearby. Several agonizing seconds passed in silence. Had he lost them? Marcus allowed himself a moment of relief, exhaling slowly.
Then came the unmistakable sound of boots on metal—someone climbing into the container.
"I knew you'd notice eventually, Marcus," came a voice he recognized, though he couldn't immediately place it. "You've always been too thorough for your own good."
Marcus raised his flashlight, both as a potential weapon and to see who had cornered him. The beam illuminated a face twisted into a cruel smile, and recognition dawned with a sickening lurch in his stomach.
"You? But why would you—"
The blow came before he could finish, sending him sprawling onto the container floor, his flashlight skittering away into darkness. As Marcus struggled to his knees, he heard the heavy groan of the container door beginning to swing shut.
"No! Wait!" he shouted, lunging forward on unsteady legs.
Too late. The door slammed closed with a deafening clang, plunging the space into absolute darkness. The metallic sound of the latch being secured from outside echoed in the confined space.
Frantic, Marcus felt his way to the door, pounding his fists against the unyielding metal until his hands were numb from the cold and the impact. No one would hear him here, far from the active areas of the port, with the wind howling across the frozen harbor.
As the bitter cold began to seep into his bones, Marcus Whitman slumped against the container wall, the realization settling over him like the snow blanketing the port outside: he had found his evidence, but the price would be his life. And as the temperature continued to drop in his steel coffin, his last thoughts were not of himself but of who might be next to discover what he had found in those falsified manifests.
The secrets of Duluth's port would remain frozen beneath the surface a little longer.
CHAPTER ONE
Agent Isla Rivers of the FBI woke before dawn in her sparse, barely unpacked apartment overlooking Lake Superior. The bitter Duluth cold seeped through poorly insulated windows as she stared at the vast frozen expanse before her. Sleep had been elusive, haunted by recurring nightmares about her final case in Miami.
In her dreams, she always arrived seconds too late. The victim's eyes—accusatory, lifeless—stared up at her from a pool of blood that seemed to grow with each recurrence of the nightmare. It was her profile that had led her team to the wrong suspect while the real killer claimed his final victim. Her mistake. Her failure.
She hadn’t gotten there in time.
Isla pulled her robe tighter around her body, the chill in the apartment matching the coldness that had settled in her chest since the transfer. She still hadn’t figured out how to get the radiator working at the right heat. She made her way to the kitchen, mechanically preparing coffee while eyeing the stack of moving boxes she still hadn't touched after two days in Duluth.
What was the point? This assignment wasn't meant to be permanent. It couldn't be. Duluth, Minnesota, was punishment—a professional purgatory where agents went when they'd screwed up but not quite enough to warrant dismissal.
Steam rose from her coffee mug as Isla carried it to a box labeled "CASE FILES" in her neat, precise handwriting. She hadn't meant to bring them, had been specifically instructed not to by her therapist, but at the last minute, she'd packed them anyway. Some masochistic part of her couldn't let go.
Her fingers trembled slightly as she opened the box and retrieved the Miami file. The folder was worn at the edges from how many times she'd reviewed it, searching for the moment where everything went wrong, the clue she missed, the assumption she shouldn't have made.
As the winter sun slowly rose over the ice-covered lake, casting pale light across her living room, she studied the Miami victim's photo—Alicia Mendez, 28, elementary school teacher. Beautiful. Beloved. Dead because Isla Rivers had misread a killer.
