by Ben English
“At the NBA charity game? Yes. No. Okay, sort of. For the charity and the cameras, yeah—but they had to play wearing golf pants and bowling shoes. And Penn’s got a great outside game. At the pickup game the night before, during rehearsal, they destroyed us.”
He’s such a square, Alonzo thought.
But then he caught a glimmer of paradise at the edge of his senses. A Havana oasis. He tried to call their attention to it, to steer the group verbally in the right direction, offer up a “Land, ho!” sort of thing, but no luck. Speaking was a big deal. It necessitated the re-tasking of critical brain cells which were currently assigned to moving his feet in the proper direction, which of course resulted in him stumbling directly into the Major. Into Allison. Wearing a dress that was very un-majorly—Allison, that is. Not him.
“Coffee!” he blurted.
The café remained open primarily to attend to the needs of a nearby park, where a party was just starting to spin up. Judging by the music, they planned on building up enough energy to meet the sunrise, still some seven hours distant. Habaneros love to dance, Alonzo thought, watching the bodies whirl. Guitar and steel drums echoed across the red brick cobblestones.
Despite the elevated security, everyone they met seemed in search of a celebration.
“I’m buying,” Mercedes announced. “What do you want?”
Allison ordered at the counter, and when it was Alonzo’s turn he found he’d regained a bit of enthusiasm for life when faced with the prospect of a massive jolt of caffeine. He had one demand:
“Take three or four of those teensy little cups and pour it into one big glass. Better yet, a stein. Yes. Give me a stein of your finest ink, good man.”
“How about you?” Mercedes asked Jack.
He shook his head. “Not much of a coffee drinker.” His eyes followed the dancers moving in the plaza, the pulse of the revel.
“You know, me either,” she said. “What are we going to do while these two wait for their drinks?”
Jack looked back at her and they both smiled.
Alonzo checked the progress behind the counter, and when he turned around, dammed if Jack and the woman weren’t in the middle of the street, swallowed up in the mass of dancers.
“Both of them, mad,” said Allison. “And I’ve never met an American who didn’t drink coffee at the drop of a hat.”
He loved her for her accent. Everything she said sounded perfectly reasonable and brilliant. My goodness, he wanted to reply. You’re right! I never would have thought of that.
Instead he replied, “Jack? Plus coffee? That’d be the end of us.”
The band switched to an old Nick Rivers song, Straighten Out the Rug, and the crowd began to jitterbug. Halfway through the next song, Mercedes dropped her arms and leaned in close to Jack.
Thanks to the coffee Alonzo was now thinking clearly enough to wonder if he and Allison shouldn’t pull a fast fade and leave the other two alone for the rest of the evening, but before he could form an escape plan Jack boiled out of the crowd, aiming straight for the café.
“Tell them what you just told me,” he said.
Mercedes nodded. “Lopez waited before he started shooting down into the ballroom. I didn’t think about it at the time, obviously—but why wait? He could have taken a clean shot at the President before the helicopter showed up, and he could barely hold back until the helicopter got there.”
Tactically she was wrong, of course. “He had to wait,” Alonzo said. “His main assault team was in the helo. Maybe his team on the ballroom floor, the ones in disguise, weren’t in place yet.”
The major had another idea. “The helicopter was his means of evacuation.”
Jack shook his head. “He was supported by a team of snipers from at least two shooting positions. They cleared his path through the perimeter guard on the roof; they could have done it again.”
“That’s what made me think of it,” Mercedes said.
Alonzo didn’t like where this was going. “You obviously have an idea,” he said to his friend, but Mercedes responded.
“When the men in the helicopter started firing into the ballroom, they could have killed dozens before Jack pulled the steel shutters closed. And the . . . assault team in disguise, they could have hurt a lot more people. Instead they caused a panic.”
“A stampede,” Jack said.
Allison understood. “You’re saying we were all goaded down a particular path? For what reason?”
For once, Alonzo was ahead of her. He tossed his phone to Jack, and borrowed Allison’s right out of her purse. “Call Nicole. Wake her up,” he said. “I’ll get somebody to task us a couple of forensic experts. The conference center is probably still full of cops.”
He’d forgotten about the coffee.
Jack dialed.
Burner
She funbled in the dark toward the source of the ringing.
“Hello?”
“Nicole, Jack. Were you sleeping?”
“It seemed like a good idea.” She wasn’t fully awake, but didn’t need to tell Jack that. He’d hear it in her voice.
“I need you to get everyone back over to the conference center, as quick as you can. We’re headed there now. Have Pete get hold of some video equipment—he’ll know where to find two cameras—and let Steve know we’re going to need all the notes from Irene’s presentation.”
“Where are you?”
“Chinatown. I got cut tonight, Lopez had a knife. Nothing remarkable. Need to pick up some herbs to take care of it. I’ll get you something to help with your black eye, too.”
“You should be asleep, Jack.”
“I know. This can’t wait.”
“Aren’t you flying to L.A. in a few hours?”
“Yeah, I have to film body scans. Basic motion capture work. I’ll be back tomorrow night.”
Nicole yawned. “By then we should have some luck tracing the cell phones the mercenaries were using tonight.”
“I thought they were burners.” Someone with Jack asked a question, and he replied. “A burner is any cheap cellphone, the kind you buy in a convenience store. An anonymous cell you use for a day or two, maybe a week if you can get your hands on another SIM card, then you throw it away.”
Now Alonzo’s voice in the background. “They’re hard as hell to trace.”
Jack answered. “Unless you have a buddy in the phone company. Or the NSA.”
“Steve’s still awake,” Nicole said, looking at her computer. “When the power came back on, he started hunting through food shipment records. When I left him he’d hacked into Raines’ estate provisioning system.” She squinted at the screen. “He got all excited about a shipment of guanciale that left Rome a few days ago, bound for the Caribbean. Any idea what that is?”
Jack was moving quickly. “A kind of bacon Raines cooks with. Has it sent wherever he goes.”
This was getting strange. “Jack, I mean it. We spend an hour at the conference center, tops. Then you get some sleep before your plane flies out.”
He made a noncommittal sound, and ended the call. Nicole let her phone drop onto her pillow as she forced herself in the opposite direction.
Maybe if she stole Jack’s cell phone battery. What was he doing calling up the team at this hour? Sounded like the Adams woman was still with him. No surprise. By their mutual body language back at the crow’s nest, it was obvious the last thing either one of them wanted to do in a bed was sleep. And yet here he was, pulling the team together again.
Jack could be such a square.
Her body protested movement. What did they say, to eat is to sleep? She balanced on the very edge of her bed, trying to decide between a late dinner and an early breakfast.
Send
--Sent 25 minutes ago--
Irene! Text me back when you get this. Still in Cuba, am fine in case you watched the news.
We saw the news. Glad you’re ok. Tried calling earlier. No service on your end.
--Sent 24 minute
s ago--
Ran into Jack Flynn.
With a forklift?
--Sent 23 minutes ago--
Funny! He’s laughing - read your message.
Need backup? Can take the next flight.
--Sent 21 minutes ago--
No. Am coming to LA this AM with a tag-a-long. Need you to be nice to Jack. You won’t believe what he’s up to.
Comes to Jack, you’d be surprised what I’d believe.
--Sent 18 minutes ago--
Can’t wait to tell you about his team. He needs a forensics expert, BTW.
--Sent 10 minutes ago--
You there?
Merse, make sure Jack gives you the full story.
--Sent 6 minutes ago--
You trust me, right?
I trust your instincts more. What’s he like as a grownup?
--Sent 2 minutes ago--
Lonely but never bored.
That makes sense. Text me when you know ETA of your flight. See you at the airport.
--Sent 1 minute ago--
Pink and vertical, Irene.
Pink and vertical, Mercedes.
When the Wheel Comes Round Again
Jack’s team certainly was an enthusiastic bunch. Mercedes watched them tackle the forensic breakdown of the service corridor with gusto. By the time she, Jack, Alonzo, and Allison arrived, the entire lower service corridor was laid out like an archaeologist’s dig, the site mapped out with a string grid, the wall already partly dismantled. One of the Marines on Jack’s team had just started to sift the debris through one-millimeter wire mesh, and the other Marine—she remembered they were brothers—was setting up a flotation tank to recover every hair, particle, and stray bit of foreign anything. It looked like brutal work, but the team was obviously glad to be at it.
Everyone else was clustered around a neat, square hole in the wall, taking turns to peer in. Metal gleamed beyond.
“Break’s over, boss is here,” said Steve. He was working with a photographer—a local—who was documenting every step of the wall’s dismantle. Another man she didn’t recognize was lifting pieces of a machine out of the wall, laying each component on the floor, carefully, on acid-free paper. She saw the extra equipment, how they would label each piece before packing it away in a plastic evidence locker.
It reminded her of the crime scenes she photographed for her cousin, though Jack and his group weren’t nearly as efficient.
“You need a real crime scene specialist,” she told Jack.
“Working on it,” he said. He used a handheld x-ray device, playing its beam slowly up and down the corridor towards the doorway. “Know anybody?”
She started to answer, but one of the women—Nicole—opened a roadcase and began assembling a digital video camera. A Sony, and there were two others just like it.
The bruise around Nicole’s eye had turned a shiny purple. She was having a tough time with the equipment.
Here was something familiar. Something she could help with. While Jack and the others examined the walls, floor, and ceiling, Mercedes fit the lenses and casings of the remaining two cameras together, snapped the battery pack in place, then helped Nicole finish prepping the first.
The cameras were set to record and broadcast in real-time—apparently they had two technical experts back in the States at the ready to view the wall breakdown over the internet. Jack used a computer to tie the feeds together, along with images from the x-ray device.
Nicole handed Mercedes a headset and one of the video cameras, and introduced her to the specialist on the other end, a man named Switzer. From what she gathered, he was the engineer who designed sections of the machine laid out on the floor. Following Switzer’s direction, Mercedes filmed a series of angles and close-ups of each circuit board and mechanical panel. Everything was very small—elegant and tiny. She wasn’t familiar with such things, but the machine was far beyond simple miniaturization.
When Mercedes finally looked up from the viewfinder, Jack was speaking with several humorless men in unimaginative, black business suits, describing their efforts and what they’d discovered so far.
“– initially believe it to be an aerosolized delivery system.” One of the men started to speak, Jack cut him off with a raised hand. “No signs of a biological weapon, no residue of any kind. The CDC is sending someone over to verify, of course.”
“Mister Hardy,” said the man, addressing Jack. “With respect, can you verify these claims? Until the Cuban government clears us to operate, none of our teams are authorized to investigate. How is it that you are here?”
“Excellent concerns, and we’re confident that we can answer all of your questions in short order. First things first, however. Please allow me to introduce Special Agent Ian Whitaker, who has been recommended by President Espinosa to coordinate the interagency efforts of the American government with their Cuban counterparts.” He smiled politely. “We are, as you mentioned, guests in their country.”
Ian, looking as though he needed coffee in the worst possible way, removed his latex gloves and endured a round of handshakes. “Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve recorded the entire preliminary discovery session for you. If you’d be so kind as to direct your attention to this monitor. Two associates of ours, Dr. Roger Switzer and professor Mitchell Fenn, of the Intercampus Institute for the Research of Particle Acceleration in California, have directed our investigation remotely, and both men are prepared to answer your technical questions.”
One of the suited Americans cleared his throat, but Ian continued. “Both doctors are still online and ready to answer your questions. Please, the monitor.”
Had she heard right? Mitch Fenn? Mercedes was puzzled. How many Mitch Fenns could there be?
She added that to the set of questions she’d ask Mr. Flynn.
Jack helped her disentangle from the headset and camera setup, and both of them stepped behind a screen of Jack’s people, who were suddenly very busy moving equipment around between them and the crowd of Americans.
Both of them stood near the door.
“This is the part where we make a clean getaway,” Jack whispered, and they did. As they passed through the doorway, Mercedes touched the frame with her finger. She wondered about the machine underneath the thin skin of paint and plaster. Wondered what it did.
They made it to the airport without incident. Alonzo dropped them off near the main terminal and they took the pedestrian tram into the duty free shopping area. The terminal for private aircraft was at the opposite end of the airport.
“Need to buy a spoon,” Jack explained. “For my god-daughter in L.A.”
Mercedes figured the plane would wait for them. “God-daughter. Somebody make you an honorary Catholic?”
“The Pope humors me.”
The tram was completely automated, and ran on an electrified rail system. Each stop on its route through the terminal was announced by a soft, pinging alarm. Not unpleasant, but enough to interrupt conversation.
They had yet to settle down for a completely serious discussion. She still hadn’t asked him anything important, and while his questions for her were even more trivial, Mercedes noticed his attention to her answers was absolute. She decided their pace was probably acceptable. He’d promised to tell her everything, and she’d let him take his time. She owed Jack at least a chance to be graceful.
The others on Jack’s team let precious little slip, but Alonzo and the British woman were friendly enough. She gathered the British woman was the newest member of the group, but still saw herself as an outsider. It showed in her physical distance from the others—from everyone but Alonzo.
“What time is it, Jack?”
“Almost three in the morning, I’d guess. You tired?”
Not in the least. Wasn’t that strange?
Jack didn’t wear a watch, but looked at the sky and the horizons from time to time. There were no stars; clouds piled high and deep in the corners of the sky blocked all but the barest hints of light.
<
br /> One bright light—Mars or Venus—rode the western horizon low enough to peek under the clouds. It would be the last twinkling point to surrender the night.
“They say there’s a storm out there,” said Jack. “Tropical storm. Might even be a hurricane by noon. Nobody knows what it’s going to do.”
Figured. Lopez’s attack didn’t keep the athletes from their Games, but even Espinosa wouldn’t argue with a signal one tropical storm.
They were the only ones on the tram. They sat facing each other, the tips of their shoes barely touching. Mercedes waited until Jack looked at her.
“I’m still amazed you dragged Alonzo into all this.”
He kept studying the clouds. “Best thing for him. If not for our missions, he’d have way too much time on his hands. He always fancied himself an inventor. No, really. Since we were kids, he’s had this constant stream of obnoxious ideas. Selling ice cream with popular breakfast cereal mixed into it. Or his one about designing a toaster that burns divine faces into the bread.”
“A toaster of Turin?”
Jack looked aghast. “Please don’t let him hear you say that.”
Mercedes remembered another question. “What about the local law enforcement? Don’t you ever get in trouble with the local cops when you do their job for them?”
He kneaded the flesh at the sides of his hands. “You’d think so, right? But really, cops are pragmatic. Usually they want to deal with problems with as little fuss as possible. If a problem is fixed with quick hands and fast justice, odds are they’ll turn a blind eye and walk away. Same all over the world.” He must have seen her expression, because he added, “If you’ve never seen it for yourself, I can’t convince you it’s true. You have to live a certain kind of life. I’ve only ever met one straight cop who wouldn’t leave us alone.”
