enjoyed another night with this amazing creature. Yes, four days and—he frowned.
“Is something wrong?” she asked.
Through the mattress, he felt her climb back onto the bed. Her warm hands rubbed his chest. She always told him how she loved his smooth skin. It wasn’t hairy like a gorilla.
“I’m going to be busy four days from now,” Peng told her.
“Oh,” she pouted, taking away her hands.
Peng yawned. It was getting hard to stay awake. “I’m going to be very busy moving Blue Swan. Another shipment arrives, from Japan this time.”
“Couldn’t you get away for just a little while?” she asked. “I really want to see you again, Colonel.”
Peng smiled faintly. The girl was amazing in bed but otherwise unimaginative. She never seemed to understand he had tasks to perform.
“No, my dear,” he mumbled, beginning to fade away. “I have to oversee everything.” She probably couldn’t understand that. “Blue Swan is critical,” he explained. “It is the can opener that will pry apart American defenses. It would be my death to slip away to see you, delightful as that would be. I…”
Colonel Peng’s head tilted until his right cheek sank against the pillow. He drifted to sleep. Thus he never saw Donna Cruz stare at him in amazement.
The next night, Daniel Cruz stared bleary-eyed at his teenaged daughter. She paraded through their tiny living room in a red dress. She was stunning, his daughter. It amazed Daniel that he had ever produced such a pretty girl with such long, raven hair.
“Where did you find the money to buy that?” he asked.
She frowned.
It hurt Daniel’s heart to see that. He should have told her how beautiful she looked. It’s what he would have told his wife. She had died three years ago. Everything had gone sour afterward: his wife dying and his daughter learning to whore herself out to the Chinese. He knew where she’d “earned” the money to buy a red dress like that.
Daniel picked up a glass, swirling the brown-colored whiskey at the bottom. He sipped, letting the alcohol slide down his throat. A moment later, the pleasant burn and the numbing in his mind began. This was good whiskey, better than he’d had in a long time.
“You’re pretty,” he muttered.
Donna swirled on her toes. She had such slender legs, perfectly muscled from all the bicycling she did. Wherever she rode, Daniel knew his daughter turned heads.
“Do you sleep with them?” he asked bitterly.
Anger flashed in her eyes. She strode to the nightstand and grabbed the whiskey bottle by the neck. “I brought you this! Drink it and drown your sorrows. But do not ask me what I do as if you’re a shocked priest. You work for them, Papa! I work for them! So do not judge me.”
Daniel wanted to surge up and slap her across the face. He had bad knees, hobbling like an old man wherever he went. Bicycling to the office every day only made his knees worse. They popped and crackled horribly when he pedaled. He held out his glass to her, deciding silence would be his whip.
She poured, slammed the bottle onto the nightstand and strode across the living room. Before leaving, she whirled around. “You should thank me and you should thank Colonel Peng for his generous gifts.”
Daniel sipped whiskey, looking away. He would ignore her. She knew better; thus, he would let her own conscience whip her.
“The colonel is an important man!” she declared.
Daniel snorted. They were always important.
“He’s in charge of Blue Swan,” Donna said.
“Birds?” asked Daniel, letting his voice drip with mockery.
“No! Blue Swan is the can opener that will pry apart the American defenses.”
Daniel’s head swung around. With the whiskey in him, it felt like a long journey. He stared at Donna, standing there so fiery, with her fists on her hips.
“What did you say?” he asked.
“They’re from Japan,” she declared. “He’s moving them. He is very important, Papa, and he loves me.”
Daniel blinked heavy eyelids. He knew this Colonel Peng. His office in the city had dealings with Chinese supply, in charge of traffic control. Daniel worked in the Mexican government, what had become the puppet regime for the foreigners. Once he had believed in the SNP. Now his wife was dead and his daughter slept with the enemy. She had become little more than a whore. Even though he loved her dearly, he recognized the truth. Because he made too little money and drank too much, he couldn’t give her what she needed and had to take what she gave.
“Drink your whiskey,” she said, interpreting his silence the wrong way.
“Donna,” he whispered.
She ran from the living room. Seconds later, the front door slammed as she fled the apartment.
Daniel stared at the glass with the brown-colored whiskey. It was Japanese, too, the alcohol. What his daughter had just told him…if it was true…
He grabbed the bottle from the nightstand and as carefully as possible, he poured the whiskey in his glass back where it belonged. A few drops spilled onto the carpet, but that couldn’t be helped. He corked the bottle, set it on the nightstand and went to the fridge. He drew two bottled waters, opening the first and beginning to guzzle. Tomorrow, he needed to be as sober as possible.
Afterward and in a daze, he went to bed. Sleep proved difficult. Five times, he woke up, shuffled to the bathroom and dribbled into the toilet. He hated being old.
In the morning he ate a tasteless burrito, shaved his face with a shaking hand and chose his cleanest uniform.
He pedaled through the city, listening to his knees crackle and pop. He had to ride slowly; otherwise, the pain became too intense. Thousands pedaled with him, hordes on two wheels. At a thirty-story glass tower, Daniel parked his bike in an outer rack, locking it with a chain.
He took an elevator to the twelfth floor. There he worked diligently in his office, only later finding an excuse to head to the fourteenth floor and speak there with Pedro, who was in charge of scheduled routes in the countryside. Pedro was an old friend from elementary school, so many decades ago.
In a storeroom with a single bulb in the ceiling they played checkers. The ivory pieces had an unusual heft to them and were always cool to the touch. The design etched onto the backs showed the ancient Castilian crown from the old country. The ivory pieces came from Daniel’s grandfather, inherited at his death. Pedro and Daniel usually played around this time.
After moving a piece, Daniel looked up and told Pedro, “I had forgotten, my friend, that you introduced me to my wife.”
“That was long ago,” Pedro said as he eyed the board.
“Hmm. It is our anniversary today.” That was a lie, but Pedro would never know. “Since my wife is gone, I wanted to celebrate with someone. Would you share this with me?” Daniel asked. He produced the whiskey bottle, which was three-fifths full.
Pedro looked up and his eyes widened. He grinned. He had a silver-colored crown among his yellowed teeth. Pedro was an alcoholic, although he’d never admitted that to anyone, certainly not to himself. “Just a quick sip, si?” Pedro asked.
“Yes, a quick one,” Daniel agreed.
A half hour later, the bottle was empty, Pedro having consumed most of it.
“Oh,” Daniel said, as he shelved the game in its hiding spot. “I just remembered. Senor Franco is planning a surprise inspection today.”
“You lie!” Pedro said.
“I’m only wish it were so.”
“He’ll smell the whiskey on me.”
“I’m sorry, my friend,” Daniel said. “If Franco is coming, I must leave for an early lunch.”
“Yes, yes, an excellent idea,” Pedro said.
