The summer sun blazed over Riverside Auto Spa, one of the busiest car wash centers in Phoenix.

Little Havana at midnight was a sensory overload of neon lights, the smell of roasting pork, and the rhythmic pulse of salsa music spilling from open doorways. Elias Vance walked down Calle Ocho, blending into the shadows. He hadn't been to this part of the city in over two decades.

He stopped in front of a rundown cigar lounge called El Habanero. The windows were tinted dark, and a massive man with a scarred face stood by the door.

"Closed, old man," the bouncer grunted.

Elias didn't blink. "Tell Mateo that the Ghost of Biscayne is here to collect on a twenty-year-old favor."

The bouncer frowned, but he reached for the radio on his shoulder. A minute later, the heavy wooden door clicked unlocked.

Elias walked into the thick, smoke-filled back room. Sitting at a high-stakes poker table, counting stacks of hundred-dollar bills, was Mateo "Cuban Joe" Ruiz. Mateo was a kingpin of the Miami underground, a man who controlled the illegal imports and underground gambling rings. He looked up, his eyes widening in genuine shock.

"Madre de Dios," Mateo whispered, tossing his cards onto the table. "Elias Vance. I thought you were dead. Or in a nursing home."

"Neither, Mateo," Elias said, pulling out a chair and sitting down heavily. "But I need money. A lot of it. And I need it fast."

Mateo laughed, pouring a glass of dark rum and sliding it across the table. "The great Elias Vance, the smuggler who never got caught, the man who could outrun the Coast Guard in a bathtub with a V8 engine, is asking for a handout? The world really is ending."

"Not a handout," Elias corrected, his eyes hard. "A job. The biggest one you have."

Mateo’s smile faded. He leaned forward, studying the lines on Elias’s face. "You've been out of the game too long, Eli. You're an old man. Your reflexes are gone. The waters belong to the cartels and the billionaires now."

"I need two point five million dollars in thirty days, Mateo. What do you have?"

Mateo sighed, lighting a thick cigar. "There is only one thing in Miami that pays that kind of cash. The Midnight Run. It's an illegal, high-stakes offshore boat race. No rules. No Coast Guard. The billionaire syndicates run it for sport. The buy-in is a hundred grand, and the winner takes all: three million dollars in untraceable bearer bonds."

Elias’s heart pounded. "When is it?"

"Twenty-eight days," Mateo said. "But you can't enter, Eli. You don't have the buy-in. And even if you did, you don't have a boat that can compete. These guys are running twin-turbine, carbon-fiber monsters that cost five million just to build. Marcus Thorne’s syndicate has won it three years in a row."

Elias froze. "Thorne is racing?"

"Thorne owns the reigning champion boat, The Apex," Mateo confirmed.

A slow, grim smile spread across Elias’s weathered face. It was fate. "Cover my buy-in, Mateo. If I win, I'll pay you back double."