“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 fiancee you speak of. No one’ pain is as great as his…or so he thinks.”
“Tio tells me the fiancee 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.”
“Can you be sure? Can any of us be sure? Alejandro is reckless, his heart filled with a venom you cannot conceive of.”
“All true,” said Rita, “but his sins pale beside Arias’s, and I know in my heart that Alejandro’d never murder innocent people. He can’t have had a hand in this Havana business.”
Father Pasqual stood and made his way to the door. Before leaving, he said with clenched teeth, “I’ll hear it from his own lips before I believe it.”
36
The following morning
Alejandro stared from a top-floor window of the Casa Grande, sad that he’d had to part with Reyna, having just put her in a cab for the flight back to Havana.
“We’ve no choice; it’s your father’s orders,” he’d explained. “Same goes for your sister.”
Reyna protested and pleaded and cried, but she eventually she calmed down and left. Should Alejandro’s plans go awry, it was good that Reyna would be safe back in Havana.
Alejandro lit a cigarette, the smoke curling about him where he stood above the street, taking note of the passing life below, paying heed to nothing in particular and trying to remain calm instead of succumbing to his worries about Arias’s plan for him. Most certainly, Arias would be headhunting by day’s end after allowing him and Ruiz to sweat out yet another night. Part of Alejandro’s mind mulled over the chess pieces in play on the now crowded board, when suddenly, he saw a woman climb from a vehicle outside the hotel entrance, a woman with a striking resemblance to Qui Aguilera. When a tall man emerged and stood beside her, he recognized him as well. “Damn, they survived after all.”
After the shock washed over him, Alejandro realized their car was the same grimy little Russian Lada he’d given his brother Pasqual years ago. To cap it all, his brother, Pasqual now exited the vehicle. Alejandro felt a mix of anger at himself for having believed Luis, that Cavuto had actually killed the tenacious Qui Aguilera and the American, Zayas.
