Bluest of Grey Skies

Chapter Sixteen

Regina checked her watch as she pulled up behind a building not far from the cannery. It was almost one and she had just left from checking in on Ruby who was parked in her cruiser and keeping watch a few blocks away. The agents had outfitted them both with very discreet radios, hidden beneath their clothes and the small speaker, small enough to fit in the ear canal sitting in her right ear and painfully uncomfortable.

The discreet radio wasn't the only thing Chapman had handed off to her before they left her house, she was also equipped with a camera and instructed to photograph any suspicious activity or persons entering or exiting the cannery. Her neck already ached as well as the rest of her body as it painfully reminded her she had gone nearly twenty-four hours without sleep. She shifted in the seat of her cruiser, the camera resting in her lap, and her tired eyes wandering around the dark harbor and the buildings that surrounded her.

Regina had parked the cruiser behind a row of crates, not entirely visible but not entirely hidden either, not even under the cloak of darkness and the street lamp that glowed nearby, the light barely reaching her secluded hiding spot. She saw a pair of headlights make a turn onto the road alongside the harbor and she ducked down, her hands grabbing the camera as the car passed by slowly.

She swallowed thickly when she caught sight of the tail end of the car. It wasn't just any car, it was Robert Gold's car, or at least the one he employed Jones or another man to drive him around town. Regina slipped out of the cruiser and very quietly shut the door, wincing at the sound of the soft click the door made as it shut tightly. She hugged the building in front of her and took a deep breath, trying in vain to still her shaky hands as she lifted the camera and turned the corner.

This was it, this was the very moment the plan began and there was no backing away now. She was equal parts excited and nervous and she watched from her safe distance as Gold emerged from the back seat of the car while another man got out of the driver's side and walked around to the trunk of the car. Regina's fingers hit the button on the camera several times, capturing the scene unfolding in front of her and she winced as she could faintly see Gold speaking yet couldn't quite hear him in the slight distance between them.

She steadied her nerves, finding the confidence and the strength to move from the spot she was rooted in, using the cover of darkness and the many different crates and barrels that lined up along the buildings to keep hidden. She got as close as she could, stopping behind the very crates she'd hidden before the last time she had been at the cannery, Gold's voice, although still faint, became clear.

"Remove him at once," Gold ordered, standing idly by the side of the car with both hands on his cane. "Now, Felix."

"Yes, sir."

The man, barely a man but still a boy now that Regina could see his face as he stepped into the light. She pointed the camera and hit the button, freezing in place in case the small shuttered sound caught either of their attention.

"Come on you," Felix said as he popped open the trunk and reached inside, hauling out the body of another man whose hands were bound behind his back and his face bloodied and swollen. With a small shove, Felix let the injured man fall to the ground into a heap. "What shall we do with him, Mr. Gold, sir?"

"You know what I do to those who betray me and the family business, boy," Gold replied and he reached inside his jacket pocket, pulling out a crooked silver dagger. "Slit his throat."

"Mr. Gold, please," the man on the ground begged and Regina leaned forward, exhaling sharply yet quietly as she watched Gold make a move towards him, the glow of the street light catching the crooked silver blade and made it appear as if it were glowing. "Please, Mr. Gold, I made a mistake. Please...I beg of you, spare my life. My—my daughter, Grace, she needs me, sir."