By the time she held the passport out, she was surrounded. She had drawn all four of them. Was this Paul’s plan? she wondered. Let her create the diversion while he worked his way through the window?
She handed over the passport.
She stood quietly and watched as the Cuban officers studied her passport. She waited. Her dress stuck to her ribs.
From beyond the four men, came one strong arm. The commander’s. His name tag said MAJOR MEJIAS. He took the passport. He stared at it, looking down, looking up, looking down again, and then looking back up.
“Yours?” he asked.
“Who else would it belong to?” she asked.
“Good question,” he answered. “Let’s find out.
He stepped away for a moment, still holding her document and pulled a cell phone from his pocket. One of the cops with a shotgun went to the door and stood. One cop remained with her as the others continued to wander through the room. Alex wondered whether Paul was gone by now. She threw a glance in his direction via a wall mirror. Their table was empty. The drink glasses remained.
She looked back at the man who stood next to her. He was looking at his commander and had removed a set of handcuffs from his belt. She wondered if she should just run. She glanced at the door. The officer with the shotgun was staring at her. No chance.
Major Mejias was on the phone. He looked serious and seemed to dwell on something in her passport, some detail. Then he had a sneaky smile. He laughed to whoever was on the other end. He looked at Alex, then looked away, then back to her. He rang off, came back to her, and still in Spanish asked, “So. You are Anna Tavares?”
A beat. “I am Anna Tavares.”
“And that is your actual birthday?”
“Of course.”
He closed her passport and stared into her eyes, as if he were trying to burrow into her to find a hidden truth.
“What work do you do back home in Mexico?” he asked.
“I work for a newspaper.”
“Which one?”
She had rehearsed the lie.
“You’re a writer?” he asked.
“I work in the financial department.”
He held her passport. “If I phoned there, your paper, they would know you, Anna Tavares?” he asked.
“Of course they would,” she lied boldly. “Once you got past the switchboard. You know what Mexico is like.”
His eyes narrowed. “I know quite a bit about the world beyond Cuba,” he said.
“What are you suggesting, Major?”
“Then what’s the problem? Have I done something wrong?” She was ready to bolt to the door, as hopeless an act as that might be.
“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Mejias said. “You have the same birthday as my daughter. Same day, same year.
“You called your daughter just to tell her you had a woman in front of you the same age as she?” Alex asked.
“I did.”
Alex knew better than to say anything else, though much ran across her mind.
“You are very pretty,” Major Mejias said. “Same as my daughter. I like to talk to pretty women. Maybe you would like to stay and have a drink with me. We can talk about the world. How would that be?”
“Am I free to go?” she asked indignantly.
“Why wouldn’t you be?”
“Your men are blocking the door.”
“They won’t be as soon as I tell them not to,” he said.
“And when might that be?”
“I don’t know,” he said. After a pause, he asked, “Does the name Roland Violette mean anything to you? What if I told you Roland Violette was dead?”
She felt a surge within her. She kept a lid on it. She had been in these situations before and knew the tactic. He was looking for any reaction, any weakness. She shrugged. “I’d say send my condolences to his family,” she answered boldly. “But I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Mejias stared deeply into her eyes, then broke a grudging smile. “See that the Violette name
He handed back her passport and signaled to his officer at the door. The officer stepped aside.
She was out the door in a flash. As soon as she was around the corner, she weaved in and out of shops and pedestrian traffic till she was convinced she was alone.
FORTY-EIGHT
Five minutes later, sweating and breathing hard, Alex was walking down a quiet side street. She spotted Paul, arms folded, leaning against the fifteen-year-old Toyota version of a Jeep. The vehicle was a clunky old beast with a canvas top and open sides.
“Good to see you,” he said.
“Are you always so blase?” she snapped.
“Not always, no.”
“You had an easier time than I did,” she said.
“But your passport worked,” he said, “or you wouldn’t be here.”
“They stopped me. They examined my passport and quizzed me about Violette,” she said sharply. “I was able to BS my way past them, but not by much. And if Violette is in play, that means Cuban intelligence knows what’s going on. That means they have at least a vague idea of who they’re looking for. You might be clean but I’m not.”
He blew out a long breath. “I hear you. Anyone follow you?”
“I don’t think so.” She settled slightly. “I did my best to lose anyone following.”
“We need to get moving,” he said.
He held out a hand to help her up into the Toyota. She accepted it. There were no seat belts, and the car had a strange smell, as if fish had been stored there at one point and forgotten. As she settled into the shotgun seat, Guarneri came around the vehicle and climbed into the driver’s seat.
“How was the squeeze through the window?” she asked.
“Fine if you don’t mind a few nicks and scrapes.” He showed where his arm had been scratched and his shirt torn. “And if you don’t mind a couple of Cubans laughing at you as you go up over the sink and out the window,” he said. “But it’s better than a bullet, so I’m not complaining.”
“Do me a favor,” she said. “Just get us out of here.”
“That’s what I’d planned.” He turned the key and the Toyota clanked to life. “Okay, look,” he said, “before we get moving, let me bring you up to speed, and you bring me up to speed. I have an uncle on the island. Uncle Johnny – Giovanni. You know about him if you’ve read the FBI file.”
“He’s the one who went in the other direction,” she said. “Right?”
“If you mean pro-Castro, Marxist, and worked for the government, yes,” he said. “He was a young Commie, and now he’s an old Commie. And his health is failing. He and my dad were estranged for years. That’s where I was.”
