Page 16 of Jonah’s Lure

What he couldn’t see yet was who the architect was.

He started the engine and pulled out of the lot. He had one stop to make—the harbor board office to look through the meeting minutes from the past fourteen months. Every name of those who were in attendance. Somewhere in that list was the first time Ray Cobb walked into a room in Weyport. And sometime near that entry, if he was reading it correctly, was something or someone who had pointed Cobb toward Jonah Holt in the first place.

He drove with the wipers on, the rain steady against the glass, the harbor on his left, and thought about a man who planned carefully and patiently and well.

Thought about what kind of man that was.

And he drove on.

Chapter Ten

The harbor board kept its meeting minutes in a binder archive going back eleven years, housed in a filing cabinet in the harbormaster’s office at the north end of the waterfront. The harbormaster, a compact man named Dale Fickett who ran his operation with the economy of someone who had long ago learned that words and space were both limited resources, pulled the relevant binders without being asked and left Angus at the table in the back room with a cup of coffee that was better than it had any right to be.

Marsh had been clear. The Holt investigation belonged to Miguel until the anomaly was resolved. Angus had told himself on the drive over that meeting minutes were public records, that any citizen could walk in and request them, and that this was not the same as running an active line of inquiry on a case he’d been asked to step back from.

He knew that was true. He also knew it was the kind of truth that didn’t hold up well in a room with an oversight board.

He went ahead anyway.

Fourteen months of meeting minutes. He worked through them in order, oldest first.

The format was consistent across all of them: date, attendees, agenda items, motions, votes, and any guests listed separately at the bottom of the first page. Members signed on the left, guests on the right. The guest list was usually short. Harbor board meetings drew the occasional developer, the odd supplier, and sometimes a representative from the Maine DMR. People with a specific interest in a particular agenda item who came once and didn’t return.

He found the name in the minutes from thirteen months ago.

R. Cobb. Guest. Marine mechanical services, south waterfront.

One entry. A single meeting, thirteen months ago, listed him as a guest observer with no specific agenda item beside his name. The minutes confirmed that Cobb was in the room.

No follow-up appearance in the following months.

Angus photographed the page. Then he reviewed the preceding months looking for any earlier appearances. Nothing. Cobb arrived in Weyport sixteen months ago. He waited three months before showing up at a harbor board meeting. He attended once, made contact with Jonah, and never signed the guest list again.

One appearance. Long enough to find the door he was looking for. Short enough to leave almost no trace.

He closed the binder and sat for a moment with his coffee. Rain moved against the back room window in steady waves, the harbor beyond restless and choppy. A lobster boat came in low and heavy, running before the wind, the crew in slickers moving about the deck.

He thought about the patience required for it. Three months of watching before the harbor board meeting. One appearance to make contact. Then came months of careful cultivation. Most people, when presented with an opportunity, move on it. This was someone who had a timeline and adhered to it regardless.

He drove home in the rain.

* * *

Murphy arrived at six thirty. No groceries, no pretense of a casual visit. She came in out of the rain, took off her coat, and sat at the kitchen table with the directness of someone who had decided during the drive what she was going to say and how.

Angus put the kettle on. He didn’t ask how she was. He waited.

She looked at the table for a moment. Then she looked at him.

“I need to say something, and I need you to hear it the way I mean it, not the way it might sound.”

He sat down across from her. “Go ahead.”

“People are talking, Angus.” She said it without softening it, which was the right way to say it. “Not everyone. Not loudly. But I’m hearing things—at the office, at the pharmacy, at the diner. The kind of things that start quietly and don’t stay that way.” She met his gaze. “I know you didn’t do anything wrong. I know that. But I want you to know what’s out there because I think you need to hear it from someone who isn’t going to dress it up.”

He nodded. “I appreciate that.”

She held his gaze a moment longer, checking something, and whatever she was checking apparently satisfied her because she moved on.