Chapter 4 - Someone on the Inside.
The microphone behind the clock changed everything.
Until that moment, Chief Ramos had been careful.
After that moment, she became surgical.
She did not use the radio.
She did not call the bridge from the cabin.
She did not tell the officer standing outside the door what we had found.
Instead, she removed the microphone, sealed it in a bag, and wrote the time on the label herself.
Then she looked at me.
"Pack only what you need for twelve hours."
"We're moving again?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"I'm not telling you until we arrive."
That was the correct answer.
I gathered my phone, charger, a sweater from the emergency clothing bag the ship had provided, and the flat slippers on my feet.
Ramos led me through a service corridor instead of the guest hallway.
We took two staircases down.
Then one up.
Then crossed through a crew passage where no passengers were allowed.
It was deliberate misdirection.
I recognized the logic immediately.
"You're checking whether we're followed," I said.
"Please don't narrate my work."
"Sorry."
"You're not sorry."
"No."
That almost earned a smile.
Almost.
We ended in a small officer's cabin near the medical center.
There was no room number on the outside.
Ramos unlocked it with a physical key.
"This room isn't in the passenger assignment system," she said.
"It belongs to an officer who is currently on leave."
"Who knows I'm here?"
"Me. The captain. And now you."
"What about Bennett?"
"He thinks we moved you to medical observation."
I studied her.
"You don't trust your own officers."
"I trust evidence."
"Good answer."
She closed the door.
"Your mother-in-law's voicemail suggests someone with access to cabin assignments is compromised."
"Could the microphone have been installed before I was assigned there?"
"Possible."
"Likely?"
"No."
She sat in the only chair.
I took the edge of the bed.
"How many people can see emergency cabin reassignments?"
"More than I like. Security supervisors. Certain guest services managers. The duty officer. Systems staff."
"And whoever installed the first camera had physical access to a luxury suite before boarding."
"Yes."
"So someone has operational access and information access."
Ramos nodded.
"Or two people are involved."
I had not considered that.
"Great."
She ignored the sarcasm.
"We're going to work backward."
She opened her tablet, disconnected from the ship network, and switched to an offline note application.
"Who knew your honeymoon itinerary before you boarded?"
"Gregory. Walter. Miriam. My mother. Ava. Our travel advisor. Maybe Gregory's assistant."
"Who booked the suite?"
"Gregory."
"Through whom?"
"A luxury travel company called Halcyon Voyages."
Ramos wrote it down.
"Did you know the exact cabin number?"
"Not until check-in. Gregory handled everything."
"Good."
"Why is that good?"
"Because it narrows how far in advance someone could install the camera."
She pulled up a cached copy of the ship's turnaround schedule.
"The suite was occupied until seven yesterday morning. Housekeeping cleared it at eight-fifteen. New guests boarded after eleven."
"So the camera was installed during a three-hour window."
"Likely."
"By crew?"
"Or contractor. Or someone given temporary access."
I thought about Gregory's confidence when he locked the door.
He had not checked whether the camera was working.
He had already known.
"His phone connected to it automatically."
"Which means someone configured the device and app before departure."
Ramos stood.
"I need to review access logs."
"Do it offline."
She looked at me.
"Again, please stop narrating my work."
"Right."
She moved toward the door.
My phone buzzed.
A message from Ava appeared through the cellular signal still reaching us intermittently at sea.
CALL WHEN SAFE. FOUND MORE.
I showed Ramos.
She hesitated.
"Use the cabin landline."
"Can that be monitored?"
"Everything can be monitored if the wrong person has enough access."
"Comforting."
"Call anyway. Keep it short."
Ava answered immediately.
"You okay?"
"For the moment. What did you find?"
"The document package has an audit trail. Whoever created it used your credentials, but they didn't know our internal naming convention."
"Explain."
"Every board authorization I create gets a project code in the metadata. This one doesn't."
"So?"
"So the files were uploaded through an external API, not created inside our normal system."
I looked at Ramos.
"Can you trace the source?"
"Already did. The connection came through a legal document vendor used by Hartman Legal Holdings."
"That gets us to Walter."
"It gets us near him."
Ava paused.
"There is also a draft email in your account."
"From me?"
"Supposedly."
"To who?"
"The board."
My stomach tightened.
"Read it."
Ava did.
"Dear directors, due to an unexpected medical issue during my honeymoon, I am temporarily stepping back from operational duties. My husband, Gregory Hartman, will serve as my personal representative until I am cleared to return. Please cooperate fully with him and with Hartman Legal Holdings regarding any urgent governance matters."
I stood up.
"When is it scheduled to send?"
"Tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. Eastern."
"Cancel it."
"I already disabled scheduled sending across your account."
"Good."
"Ash, there's more."
Of course there was.
"Someone created a second draft from your personal email to your mother."
My throat tightened.
"What does it say?"
Ava's voice became careful.
"It says you had an emotional episode onboard and that Gregory is helping you get treatment."
I closed my eyes.
They were building a story.
A medical event.
An emotional episode.
A frightened husband.
A former Marine with alleged rage.
A temporary transfer of business authority.
A concerned spouse stepping in to help.
It was not random.
It was architecture.
"Save everything," I said.
"Already done."
"Send copies to outside counsel."
"Already done."
I almost laughed.
"I love you."
"I know."
Then her voice hardened.
"And Ashlynn?"
"Yes?"
"I checked Gregory's company."
"Which one?"
"Hartman Maritime."
"What about it?"
"They have a debt payment due in nine days."
"How much?"
"Thirty-one million dollars."
Ramos stopped writing.
"Can they pay it?" I asked.
"Not from what I can see."
There it was.
Not just control.
Not just family ideology.
Money.
A lot of it.
"They need my company."
"Or your credit. Or your contracts. Or your shares as collateral."
Ava exhaled.
"I don't know which yet."
"Keep looking."
"Carefully."
"Always."
I hung up.
Ramos stared at the wall for a moment.
"Thirty-one million."
"Apparently."
"That is enough motive for people to become creative."
"Walter was already creative."
A knock sounded at the door.
Ramos froze.
Nobody was supposed to know we were there.
The knock came again.
Two short taps.
Then one long tap.
Ramos put a finger to her lips.
She moved beside the door instead of in front of it.
I stepped away from the bed.
No weapon.
No shoes worth running in.
No problem.
Ramos called through the door.
"Who is it?"
A man's voice answered.
"Medical."
Ramos did not move.
"Name?"
"Dr. Patel."
She looked at me.
I shook my head.
I had not requested a doctor.
Ramos answered.
"One moment."
She silently pulled her phone from her pocket and typed a message.
A reply came almost instantly.
Her face changed.
She turned the screen toward me.
DR. PATEL IS IN SURGERY ASSISTING WITH A CREW INJURY. HAS NOT LEFT MEDICAL.
The person outside knocked again.
"Mrs. Hartman?"
My blood went cold.
They knew I was inside.
Ramos's hand moved toward the security alarm on her belt.
Before she touched it, footsteps sounded in the corridor.
Fast.
The person outside moved away.
Ramos opened the door just enough to look.
The corridor was empty.
At the far end, a service door swung slowly closed.
Two security officers arrived seconds later.
They searched the stairwell.
Nothing.
No doctor.
No guest.
No one willing to admit they had been there.
Ramos closed the door and looked at me.
"We're done hiding."
"What does that mean?"
"It means the captain is locking down access records and we are bringing in shore authorities before Nassau."
"Can they reach us?"
"Possibly by helicopter or patrol vessel if the threat level justifies it."
She looked toward the corridor.
"And it means someone on this ship knows exactly where you are."
My phone vibrated again.
This time the message came from Gregory.
That should have been impossible.
His phone was in security custody.
The message contained a photograph.
It showed me sitting inside the officer's cabin less than thirty seconds earlier.
The picture had been taken through the small window in the corridor door.
Underneath it, one sentence appeared.
YOU WERE ALWAYS HARDER TO TRAIN THAN WALTER EXPECTED.
Ramos read the message.
Then she looked at the door.
"That's not Gregory," she said.
I knew she was right.
Someone else had his account.
May you like
Someone else was on the ship.
And whoever it was had just been standing less than twenty feet away.
