Authors: Robert W. Walker
Cuba Blue (37 page)
“Both at once?” asked Arias, smiling.
“I get the first dance, Papa!” said Angelica, snatching Arias away from Reyna, who gracefully acquiesced with only a glimmer of distaste that quickly faded.
Gutierrez frowned at this and thought,
Witch always has to be first. How has Reyna kept from killing her all these years?
Alejandro added, “Alfonso and I will join you shortly, after a smoke. After all, we’re nearly brothers now, and we hardly know one another.”
Arias looked pleased at the suggestion and with a daughter on each arm, he strolled off.
As Alejandro guided Alfonso toward the balcony, he produced a cigar for Gutierrez, saying, “It’s true, we have not had the opportunity to get to know one another, Alfonso.”
“My work keeps me pinned to that desk in Havana.”
“My work, too, has kept me unusually busy lately.” Alejandro leaned over the balustrade and pointed to the lights of Santiago. “It looks like a fairy city with the lights and colors of Carnival, doesn’t it, ‘brother’?”
“I like that you can call me brother, Alejandro. I’ve liked you since Reyna brought you into the family, but I also have it on good authority that you may have secret motives.”
“Me? Secrets? Who tells such lies?”
“I need no one to tell me that if Reyna bears children, you’re gold in the old man’s eyes.”
Alejandro smiled wide. “Ahhh…so you have me then. Not many are as astute as you, Alfonso. It’s why I needed to talk to you in the first place, a warning my friend.”
“Indeed…you know why I’ve been summoned here like a dog on a leash to be insulted by my wife and her father?”
“It’s nothing to do with Arias. He’s not summoned you here. Be smart. It’s entirely Cavuto’s idea, dragging you here. Arias, Angelica, why they were as surprised to see you as you obviously were to see them.”
“That Ruiz. I suspected something was not right.”
“If you’re not careful, Alfonso, he’ll dangle you over a fire to be toasted…like a marshmallow on a stick.”
“What do you know of Cavuto’s plans here in Santiago?” Alfonso warmed to the direction this was taking him.
“I know only that he’s made dangerous mistakes that’ve upset and annoyed Arias.”
“Are you saying that there is a way for me to get on Humberto’s good side after all?”
“Precisely, and the key is Ruiz.”
“Tell me what you want.”
“Stay close to Ruiz, and report all of his movements back to me. Together, we will tell Arias what a lying scoundrel Cavuto really is.”
“And how does that benefit me?”
“Arias rewards those who watch his back, and I’ll make certain your part in this is clear to him.”
“I do despise Cavuto.”
“Speak of the devil, look.” Alejandro pointed with his cigar as Cavuto’s figure emerged from the crowd and came toward them.
“Ahhh…Alfonso, Alejandro! Here you are!” Cavuto extended another drink to Alfonso. “Time to join the party inside, my friends. Your wife is dancing with another man.” Even Ruiz’s laugh sounded disingenuous now.
Alfonso next heard the wave of clapping and cheering, knowing his wife and Arias had regaled the crowd, finishing their dance with a flourish. As always, Angelica—
the exhibitionist
—must show off her
look-but-don’t-touch
body to gain the approval she’d never gotten from her father. But for now, Alfonso knew he must continue playing the dutiful husband, and to remain close while concentrating on Cavuto and his game. The idea of finally pleasing the old man was irresistible.
Alfonso allowed himself to be led by Cavuto toward the banquet hall, Alejandro following, just behind them, a shadow overhearing Ruiz say, “You know, Alfonso, we’ve never really had an opportunity to truly get to know one another. Let me freshen your drink.”
So why do I feel like a lamb being led to the slaughter, and which of these men—Ruiz, Valdes, or Arias is my butcher?
Same time at a bar near the hotel Casa Grande
“So why are Cavuto Ruiz and Alfonso Gutierrez here in Santiago if they’re not shadowing us from Havana?” Luis Estrada asked Alejandro Valdes.
“For the same reason I’m here.”
“Which is?”
“Ordered to come to the Forteleza de la Montana.”
“Why?” pressed Luis.
“We’re to be congratulated…and given our just rewards.”
“You sound your usual skeptical self.”
“Suspicion is a way of life when handling vipers. We’ve all been kept in the dark about who gets a thumbs up, who gets it down.”
“And I’ve heard the Forteleza can mean way, way down.”
“Two fathoms below the lowest rung of Hell.”
“I can’t imagine the tightrope you walk…weaving among Arias, the SP, Cavuto, and us.”
“More complicated since Cavuto’s men killed those doctors. Cavuto’s pissed because Arias sent me to clean up the mess…again. Since you netted ’em last week, Humberto’s paranoia is at an all-time high and rightly so. Cavuto’s an ass. He still thinks he blew up the Sanabela. I haven’t told him otherwise.”
“Then so far as Humberto knows, Cavuto blew us to Africa along with my boat?”
“Correct. When I told him it was not Latoya but an American security guard aboard, the look of pure malice on his face when he ordered me to hunt down Cavuto and stop him at any cost was stunning.”
“But you obviously failed. Cavuto’s here, and the American is dead of his wounds, sustained at the marina, along with Quiana Aguilera,” lied Luis.
“Yeah, which places me in trouble with Humberto. Once again, I’m somehow responsible for Ruiz’s fuckups.”
“The price you pay for being the heir apparent.”
“On the other hand, when they find out you’re not dead…”
“And they discover the Sanabela’s in the harbor…”
Luis stopped to sip his drink, then added, “Every freedom-loving Cuban would celebrate the end of Cavuto Ruiz. How much danger are you really in, Ali?”
“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve felt certain Arias had found me out, how often I felt on my way to a black SP cell to rot. This time…the worst.”
“If you need an out, we can always hide you in the hills.”
“And do what, Luis? Do I look like a basket-weaving coffee bean collector?”
Luis smiled. “You could do worse, my friend. You could be a fisherman in Cuban waters.
“Not the sort of life that Reyna’s accustomed to.”
“If she loves you-”
Luis stopped at Alejandro upraised hand.
“Don’t’ go there, Luis.”
“If there’s love, I tell you, nothing else matters.”
“If you dance along a high-wire like I do, everything matters. I can’t look away now, not until I have it all in my grasp, including Reyna.”
“Still, if she loves you, where you live, or how you live won’t matter. If it’s become too dangerous, tell me now, so I can make arrangements. Rita’s people can get you both safely out of Cuba.”
Later same night at Rita’s home
Around the simple meal at Rita’s, the investigators mulled over what they’d learned since arriving in Santiago. Luis remained adamant, saying, “I can’t reveal sources, but believe me, Humberto Arias is not only guilty of the crimes in Havana but has come to Santiago to privately celebrate your deaths as well. The bastard,” finished Luis when a slightly built, hawk-featured young man with nervous mannerisms entered. He gave a quick and furtive glance toward Qui and JZ before Rita hustled him into a back room and closed the door, where she engaged him in a conversation marked by hushed tones.
Qui saw that the man wore the traditional garb of a service person with a lapel nameplate. From the ruffled white shirt, black bowtie, and the faint scent of alcohol haloing the visitor, Qui made an unconscious assumption—bartender from one of the many watering holes in Santiago.
Luis, as though to draw attention from Rita’s late night visitor, said, “Pasqual, I hear that your brother, Alejandro, is in town. Up at the
Forteleza
.”
“I’d like to see him, but not there. I’d never get past front desk security.”
“He could send for you, if he were any kind of brother.”
“No…he knows I’d never set foot in that place, not even for him. You lie with dogs, you wake with fleas.”
As they began clearing the table, Qui tried to imagine Father Pasqual scratching at flea bites under his robes. “You wash, I’ll dry,” she bargained with JZ. “Work for our dinner.”
They’d gotten into a friendly water fight when Rita’s door opened, and the young stranger slinked out into the hot humid Santiago night to disappear within a passing group of Carnival revelers.
“What was that all about, Rita?” asked Pasqual. “Wasn’t that Tio? Why didn’t he say hello?”
“Shhh…no names.” She indicated Qui and JZ. “But your brother…like Luis said is here in the city.”
“Yes, so Luis said, but as I’ve told him, I won’t go behind the
Forteleza
walls to see Alejandro.”
“Tio came straight from the fort, but he has it on good authority that your brother, and his intended, are staying in the city—at the Casa Grande.”
“How do you know all this, and what
intended
?”
“This is good news!” exclaimed Luis. “Now you can see your brother, after all! And you may want to introduce him to JZ and Qui. Take them along, absolutely.”
“Luis is right, Gabriel,” agreed Rita as she crossed the room and shooed JZ and Qui from finishing the dishes, taking charge of her kitchen. “Alejandro hates Arias more than all of us combined.”
“Hates him enough to ruin others’ lives as well as his own,” muttered Pasqual, looking disquieted. “Including, no doubt, this fiancée you speak of. No one’ pain is as great as his…or so he thinks.”
“Tio tells me the fiancée is in fact Arias’s daughter.”
“A marriage of convenience, if ever—” began Luis who cut himself short when Rita shot him a look and shook her head as if to warn him off.
“His convenience…I’m sure,” replied Pasqual. “Do you think he will talk to Detective Aguilera?”
“It’s time they met,” said Rita, Luis nodding his assent.
“And is it Alejandro you’ve been protecting as your source?” Pasqual asked Luis.
“Sworn to secrecy,” he said putting a finger to his lips, a twinkle in his eyes.
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
Qui noticed the look of determination pass over Father Pasqual’s features, and that in one palm he twiddled a pair of the metal soldiers from his youth.
At the same time, JZ saw a corresponding look of frustration on Luis’s face. The two men, Luis and Gabriel, continued with their games of secrecy, but the veneer of cloak and dagger had grown thin and irksome, when Gabriel brought his fist down on the table and announced, “That’s it! Tomorrow morning! I’ll go see him, talk to him. It’s no coincidence that he’s in the city at the same time as Arias. He knows something.”
“Remember…your brother’s not responsible for the deaths of those people in Havana, Gabriel,” said Luis. “I know this in my bones.”