The Asset (19 page)

“On Belle.”

“Oh my God. Fine, I swear it on my dead sister, you creep.”

“Good. Havana, here we come.”

HAVANA

Day 30

K
ennedy made arrangements for he
and Love to travel to Cuba via the Bahamas, and they were in Havana three days later. Without the help of the CIA, he wasn't able to get any more intel on Rico. But he knew most pilots had their favorite bars. Like cops and firefighters, they enjoyed talking shop over a few hundred beers. Kennedy spoke to a pilot friend in Miami who said that on layovers he had frequented a dive bar called ­Shangri-la, a half mile from Ciudad Libertad Airport. Love did her part too and found Rico on Instagram. He had posted selfies at Shangri-la, mostly on Fridays when he went there with friends to watch soccer. When Friday night rolled around, Kennedy posted up at a table in the back of the bar and waited. When Rico rolled in with his boys, Kennedy texted Love and she made her entrance.

She sat at the bar and ordered a drink while half the patrons ogled her unrepentantly. A few of them actually tried to hit on her and she shot them down in flames. In the midst of all this, she flashed Rico one look. It was quick and subtle, but it was all the invitation he needed.

“My name is Rico,” he said in accented English, “and I'm going to buy you a drink.”

“Knock yourself out,” she said as he sat on the stool next to hers.

After a few shots and some gently provocative conversation, Rico was nice and oiled up. And like most colorfully narcissistic egomaniacs, he
loved to talk about his favorite subject: himself. He went on about his time in the air force, then his move into private aviation, where he used to fly pop stars in and out of Ibiza. Since moving to Cuba, he'd been flying rich Europeans and South Americans around the world. He even bragged about having carried the occasional Bolivian marching powder payload up to the Bahamas or Key West. Love had him drooling in the palm of her hand.

“Oh my God,” she exclaimed, doing her best naïve American girl impression. “What an amazing job. Do you love it?”

“It's okay . . .”

His face darkened, and he gulped down the rest of his drink. Love almost burst out laughing at the dramatic overtones. Rico was like the hunky star of a Mexican soap opera, gearing up for his big scenes. Love could tell he wanted to get something off his chest, but like most drama queens, he needed her to draw it out of him. The problem was, the bar was getting more crowded with loud soccer fans and Rico became preoccupied with the looks the other men were giving Love. She played that note like a prodigy.

“You want to get out of here?” she asked.

He nodded and left a wad of cash on the bar. They walked outside for a smoke, and when Rico got an even better look at Love under the streetlamp, the fire in his belly became an inferno.

“Where do you want to go?” she asked.

“My apartment is nearby,” he said.

Love wasn't about to take one for the team. She lit another cigarette and tried to get him to open up.

“Tell me more about your job. You seemed upset in the bar.”

“It's just . . . I shouldn't talk about it.”

“Aw, and I thought we were making a connection.”

He looked at her with stars in his eyes and touched her cheek tenderly.

“Tell me what's wrong. Maybe I can help,” she cooed.

“I work for a fucking Nazi asshole,” he said.

“Tell me about him. What's his name?”

Rico ranted about the “fucking Nazi asshole” he had to fly all over the world. Based on the small number of times Rico had seen him, he provided a physical description that sounded very much like what Kennedy had told her about Lentz. But Rico had never learned his name.

“Motherfucker killed my friend,” he said, his eyes welling.

“Oh my God. What happened?”

“She was one of his regular girls,” he said shamefully. “He goes through them like shop rags. It wasn't her thing. I know everybody says that, but she really needed the money and the
putas
know how to suck a young girl in, you know? She'd only been turned out a couple of weeks when his people picked her up. She was young and fresh, so he kept bringing her back. She made more money than she'd seen her whole life, more than even her father or grandfather ever made, so she didn't want to quit. She thought she could do it for just a while, and then buy her way to New York or Miami. But then he started asking for some really weird shit that she didn't want to do.”

“What kind of weird shit?”

“She wouldn't even tell
me
. It was that bad. She just kept saying he was the devil, that no man would ever want things like that from a woman. So one night she told him to go fuck
himself
. She called me the next morning, so proud. I was proud of her too. We went out and celebrated. But after that night I didn't hear from her again. Then they found her. She was . . . I can't even say it . . .”

Rico fought back the tears. Love hugged him tightly, and he wept for several minutes. When they made it back to his apartment, Love skillfully extricated herself, telling Rico she had feelings for him and didn't want to destroy what they had by moving too quickly. So she promised to have dinner with him the next night.

“Oh, you're
good
,” Kennedy told her as they debriefed later at their hotel.

“It's weird, right? I never thought in a million years I could be a
spy
.”

“You're a performer, Love. And a damn good one. Plus, you're helping this guy out. This is probably the only way for him to get out of a very bad situation.”

“Are you going to tell your CIA contacts about me?” she asked excitedly.

“I'm going to do better than that. I'm going to tell them to get their asses down here to watch your repeat performance tomorrow night.”

Day 31

Y
ou're one ballsy son of
a bitch. I'll give you that.”

The next morning, Juarez was smiling at Kennedy and Love across an outdoor café table overlooking the bay. The place was small, filthy, and loud—a local hangout for commercial fishermen and dock laborers. Juarez had chosen it because it was far from any of the city's tourist spots. Kennedy figured he might have also picked it because if he didn't like what they had to say, he could easily kill them and stuff their bodies in waste oil tanks or pay someone to haul them out for chum.

“Not as ballsy as Love,” Kennedy said.

Juarez looked at Love and sized her up.

“You got that right,” he said.

“What do you think?” Kennedy asked. “About tonight?”

“I think we need to prep,” Juarez said. “Where did he ask you to go?”

“His place,” she replied. “Shocker.”

“Romantic intentions aside,” Juarez began, “that's perfect. Means we don't have to do any of this in public.”

“So what do I tell him?”

“Depends. How much does he know about Lentz?” Juarez asked.

“Not a lot. When I asked his boss's name, he didn't know it. I guess he mostly deals with a handler and rarely sees Lentz.”

“Here's what we're gonna do. You're going to show up at Rico's place
and blow his mind. He doesn't know shit about his boss? Good. Then, you tell him his boss is the head of a drug cartel family . . . and you're DEA. That'll put the fear of God in him that he needs to get out and needs your help to do it. We make you DEA so if Lentz catches wind, he'll sic his dogs on them first and we'll have time to regroup.”

Kennedy could see Love was working it all over in her head.

“So, I'm asking him to be a snitch,” she said. “What's in it for him?”

Juarez handed her a box of chocolates.

“Seriously?” She laughed.

“There's twenty thousand US in there. Enough to whet his appetite. Tell him there are five more stacks where that came from if he finishes the job.”

“Which is?” Kennedy asked.

“Planting bugs. I want him to wire Lentz to the gills—house, cars, and private jet especially. We'll use the tech you've been installing in airports so Lentz's sweepers can't pick them up. The money will show Rico we're for real. If he bites, we'll set up a meeting tomorrow and I can prep him.”

“What if he doesn't bite?” Kennedy said.

“Then Love will have to kill him and get the hell out of there.”

“What?” Love yelped.

Juarez laughed. “I'm messing with you. He's not going to say no. Twenty large goes a very long way in Cuba.”

“He's a man. If I do my job right, I can probably get him to pay you.”

“No doubt,” Juarez said.

“What if he isn't as cooperative as we would like? Or maybe even hostile?”

“Got that covered,” Juarez said.

He handed Love a jewelry box. There was a silver skull ring inside with black gemstones for eyes.

“There's a bug and a GPS transmitter in there. If you feel at any time you're in danger, tap the ring three times on a hard surface and it will send out a distress signal.”

Love looked at the ring anxiously.

“Don't worry, I'll be close by with Kennedy and I'll be able to get to you in five minutes.”

“You all right?” Kennedy asked her.

“Yeah,” she said, twisting the ring onto her finger with an air of indifference.

“We'll all recon later tonight,” Juarez said. “Now you should head back to the hotel and wait there,” he told Love. “Stay off the street today.”

Love saluted him and took off. Kennedy got up to follow her.

“Have a seat,” Juarez said. “We should have a chat.”

Kennedy sat back down.

“You realize how dangerous this is, right?” Juarez asked.

“Do you want me to stop her?”

“That's not what I'm saying. I just want to make sure you're clear on what we've just asked her to do.”

“Yes. And so is she. You should have seen her last night. She can handle this guy.”

“I hope so. For all of our sakes.”

Love's dinner with Rico worked out better than expected. He had been in an especially bad mood when she came over. He told her that Lentz had killed another friend of his, a limo driver, for picking up the boss a half hour late. The man was in his sixties and Lentz's men had supposedly dragged him to death behind the limo. It was a horrific story, but Love couldn't help but think it would be good for their cause.

“Soon that will be me,” Rico said gravely.

“It doesn't have to be,” she said, playing off his emotions. “But we need your help to put an end to this guy. And it sounds like you might need ours.”

Love told him she was DEA and delivered her snitch sales pitch. Not only was Rico eating out of her hand, but he also didn't even seem interested in pursuing her romantically anymore. He looked like a dog that had been on the business end of his master's belt for far too long. Love promised him all the things she knew he was desperate for—revenge, freedom, and a return to dignity. The money she offered sweetened the pot, but in the end, she could tell he was tired of being afraid all the time and feeling powerless to help the good people Lentz was happy to destroy. He wanted in.

Over the next two days, Juarez met with Rico and trained him on how to use the same new surveillance tech he had given Kennedy to bug airports—virtually undetectable using any known sweep tech. As a pilot, Rico was extremely gear savvy, so he learned quickly and was a natural at
finding new ways to plant the devices. A week after Kennedy, Juarez, and Love left Havana, Rico had managed to bug two of Lentz's private jets and some of the cars he brought to the airport.

Not only could they record conversations, but they could also capture encrypted wireless data transmissions from mobile devices and any device communicating with his servers via his proprietary instant messaging app. The pièce de résistance was the GPS function that made it possible for Langley to track Lentz's movements around the globe.