Sofia shuffled into the kitchen in her pajamas, her hair sticking up on one side. She was nine now and had opinions about everything.

“Are you delivering to the boats today?” she asked, climbing into a chair.

“Some of them. Why?”

“Bring me back a picture of the biggest one. Ava at school says her uncle has a boat with a hot tub on it. I said that’s not real.”

“It’s real,” Mateo said. “Some of them have helicopters on top.”

Sofia’s mouth dropped open. “No way.”

“Way.” He tapped her nose. “I’ll get you a picture.”

He ate fast, grabbed his water bottle, and headed out the door. The sky was already turning pink over the trees. The forecast said ninety-three degrees by afternoon, the hottest day of the summer so far.

He had no idea it was about to become the longest day of his life.

## The Route Nobody Wanted

The Swiftline depot sat at the edge of an industrial park off Route 25. By six-thirty, the loading bays were loud with rolling carts and beeping scanners. Drivers in green polos joked and complained and gulped coffee from paper cups.

Mateo’s supervisor, a heavyset man named Gus Pellegrino, waved him over with a clipboard. Gus was sixty-one, had worked for Swiftline for twenty-two years, and called everybody “kid,” including people older than him.

“Reyes. Got you on the Gull Point harbor loop again.”

Mateo groaned. “Gus, come on. That’s three Saturdays in a row.”

“You’re the only one who doesn’t come back with a complaint.” Gus shrugged. “Those marina people like you. You say ‘ma’am’ and ‘sir.’ You don’t park in the fire lane. Last time I sent Kowalski, a guy called corporate because Kowalski whistled.”

“He whistles at everything.”

“Exactly. So you get the marina.” Gus flipped a page. “Also, heads up. You got a signature-required in there. Adult signature, certified, can’t leave it. Recipient is at the yacht club. Slip forty-two. Name’s Whitlock.”

Something in the way he said it made Mateo look up. “Is that a problem?”

Gus scratched his jaw. “Nah. Probably not. Just a law office envelope. Those are always a little touchy. People don’t like getting mail from lawyers. If they refuse, you scan it as refused, you take your photo, you leave. Don’t argue. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“And Reyes?” Gus lowered his voice. “Make sure your cameras are working. Corporate’s been on everybody about it.”

Every Swiftline van had two small cameras built in. One faced the road through the windshield. The other was mounted high on the back, pointed down at the rear doors and the area behind the van. The company had installed them two years ago after a run of fake injury claims. Drivers grumbled about being watched. But the cameras recorded both video and sound, and they had saved more than one driver from a lie.

Mateo did his walk-around check. Front camera, green light. Rear camera, green light. He tapped the screen on the dashboard and saw the little red dot in the corner that said it was recording.

He didn’t think much of it. It was just routine.

He loaded his packages, sorted them by stop, and set the thick manila envelope with the orange “ADULT SIGNATURE REQUIRED” sticker in the slot by his seat. The return address read: Harlan, Moss & Pryce, Attorneys at Law. The recipient line said: Vanessa Whitlock.

He didn’t know the name. He didn’t know what was inside. And he didn’t know that the woman it belonged to had already decided, long before he arrived, that she was not going to accept it.

Gull Point was the kind of town people saw in magazines. White shingle houses with blue shutters. Hydrangeas the size of basketballs. A Main Street full of coffee shops that sold eight-dollar lattes and boutiques that sold linen shirts nobody actually needed.

In the summer, the population tripled. Big money arrived from the city every Friday afternoon in black SUVs. They filled the beach clubs and the restaurants and, most of all, the Gull Point Yacht Club & Marina.

The marina sat on the edge of the harbor where Mateo’s father used to tie up his old fishing boat. Back then, there had been working docks on the east side. Now those docks were gone. They’d been replaced by long white floating piers and slips for yachts that cost more than every house on Cutter Street put together.

Mateo pulled into the marina lot just after one-thirty. He’d already done forty-one stops. His shirt was soaked through under the arms, and the van’s air conditioning had been making a sad rattling sound since noon.

The parking lot was full of luxury cars. Range Rovers, Teslas, a red Ferrari someone had parked across two spaces. Beyond a chain-link fence, the water sparkled like broken glass. White yachts sat in neat rows, their flags snapping in the hot breeze.

He took a quick photo of the biggest yacht he could see for Sofia. It did not have a helicopter on top. But it did have what looked like a small swimming pool on the back deck. She would lose her mind.

His first marina stop was the dockmaster’s office, a weathered gray shack near the main gate. Inside, an old man in a faded Mets cap sat behind a desk covered in tide charts and fishing magazines.

“Well, look who it is,” the old man said, breaking into a grin. “Rafael’s boy.”

“Hey, Mr. Pruitt.”

Walt Pruitt was seventy-three and had run the docks at Gull Point for nearly forty years. He had known Mateo’s father. When Mateo was a teenager, Walt had given him a summer job hosing down boat decks and coiling ropes for ten dollars an hour, cash. After Rafael died, Walt had never once let Mateo pay for a soda at the marina store.

“You look like you’re melting, son.”

“I am melting.” Mateo set down a box of marine supplies and held out his scanner. “Sign here?”