AJ shook her head, lost for words for a moment. Sydney added a little wine to all their glasses. Thoughts raced through AJ’s mind about what she’d just heard and her blood boiled at the thought of thousands of years of reef growth being destroyed over a non-sustainable fuel that was destroying our own atmosphere.
Carlos sipped his wine and put a hand on Sydney’s knee. “I had to do something. As soon as they found how accessible the ribbon that stretches to the islands is they’ve been rushing to get started.” He looked at AJ with pain in his eyes. “We have very little time, the barges and crews to start construction are on their way from the north. On Monday they will begin blasting the reef in preparation for the footings for the rigs and the pipeline. In a week the Jardines de la Reina will be torn apart.”
AJ had to think about what day it was after the long, crazy day. It was 1am on Thursday; he was right, they didn’t have much time.
“So what’s the evidence you have? It’s going to take something pretty conclusive to make any difference; even then I don’t know that bad press would deter them,” AJ wondered.
Carlos managed a smile. “What I have will, I believe. I have two sets of plans. Both sets have official government stamps on them. The first shows how the oil rigs, terminals, pipelines and tankers will not affect the marine sanctuary.” He leaned forward. “The second shows what will actually happen.”
Chapter 10
Mikhail settled into the smelly, cramped bunk of the nicest stateroom on the boat, which differed from the others simply by having one cot instead of bunks. Most men would be wondering about their career choices, stuffed into the belly of a sweaty, fish and diesel infested, rotten trawler, traipsing across foreign seas into a raging storm, chasing an idealistic pain-in-the-arse Cuban kid. But not Mikhail. He didn’t know why these things didn’t bother him but they didn’t. He’d always been this way since he could remember. His father was the same which was probably the main reason, now he thought about it. His father was KGB during the cold war days. That was when this line of work really meant something, those guys were truly front line, risking everything when it wasn’t all computer tracking and databases at your fingertips. It was almost too easy these days. Everyone’s on the Internet, everyone has a mobile phone. It was so simple to find people. Although Carlos hadn’t made it easy.
Mikhail had immediately checked all flight records and unidentified traffic picked up by radar; nothing, as expected. Carlos had clearly flown low, under radar, which meant he’d stayed over water as inland meant mountains to cross and he’d have been picked up at some point. Next clue was range – the seaplane could manage about 500 nautical miles which ruled out looping around Cuba to Florida or south to Venezuela and made Mexico or Honduras a stretch. Especially as anything west or southwest had to go around the storm. That left Jamaica, Haiti or the Dominican Republic, none of which Carlos had any connection to so their only appeal was a place to land which didn’t add up in Mikhail’s mind.
He then checked on the girl. The Cuban government had been keeping an eye on Sydney Bodden since she and Carlos started dating while Carlos attended the University of Miami for a semester two years ago. Carlos had returned, finished his education and been placed in the geological study program with Mikhail without complaint or apparent issues, so the interest in Bodden had remained low priority. As a Caymanian she could come and go to Cuba as a visitor without a problem, which she appeared to do every three months or so. A quick search revealed Sydney had flown into Havana two days ago and taken the bus to Jucaro the next morning.
The Russian was going on a hunch but logical deduction told him the seaplane had headed for Grand Cayman, despite the storm. He wasn’t sure what Carlos’s plans were once he reached Cayman, but he knew they wouldn’t align with his own. Which aligned with Mother Russia’s. He would stop Carlos and return him to Cuba, or not, using whatever means necessary.
Unperturbed by his paltry quarters he laid his head down and slept while he had the chance.
Chapter 11
Sydney lay sound asleep next to him, but Carlos, as exhausted as he was, couldn’t get his eyes to close and his mind to rest. Maybe the adrenaline, he thought. Maybe it was the weight of what his actions had caused. Lying on a sofa bed in a stranger’s apartment felt like a different planet from the life he’d thrown away this night, and for what? Did he really think that he, Carlos Miguel Rojas, could dissuade the combined force of the Cuban and Russian governments from destroying a stretch of reef that most Cubans didn’t even know exists? He felt like a pebble at the foot of a mountain. More than that he’d dragged the girl he loved, her brother and the owner of the sofa bed he rested upon into this mess with him.
He was now a wanted criminal in his homeland. His poor parents, they’d done so much for him. He pictured the police banging on the front door of his mother and father’s house in the middle of the night, telling them their son was a traitor to the Republic, a thief, a conspirator. He feared his father, a respected professor at the University of Havana, would be stripped of his position and dishonoured. Unless he denounced his son. Maybe they’d go easy on him if he disowned me, he pondered, praying his father would. For the sake of his mother and his little sister he prayed his father would know how much his son loved him and have the confidence to disown his only boy and believe their love would not change.
Carlos pictured the proud look on his father’s face the day he graduated from Ciudad Universitaria Jose Antonio Echeverria in Havana. The same look he had when Carlos completed his two years of national service, leaving home as a seventeen-year-old boy and returning a young man with a pilot’s licence and a confident stride. He would do anything to speak to the man he loved deeply, the man he’d respected and looked up to his whole life, the man he was desperately praying would denounce him and yet not be disappointed in him. Carlos couldn’t bear the idea of his father not understanding what he had done, or why he had to do it. He had to have faith his father would know his son would never do anything frivolous or without compelling reason. He’d give anything to hear his voice and explain it all. But his mobile phone was at the bottom of the inlet in Jucaro where he’d thrown it last night, and any contact would only make things harder for his family.
Faith, he had to have faith. Not religious faith, but faith in the bond between father and son, a love that had never been in question. Until now? He felt in his heart, no, deeper than that, with every fibre of his being he knew his father had to believe his son was doing the right thing. Regardless, he’d come too far and brought too many people with him to turn back or give up now.
He closed his eyes and imagined he was back on the reef. The bubbles exhaled from his regulator were the steady, rhythmic soundtrack to the movie playing from his many memories of dives at Jardines de la Reine. Giant sea fans danced back and forth in the gentle surge as a pair of butterfly fish chased each other round a coral head. The crusty antennae of a hidden lobster probed the waters as a silky shark glided effortlessly across the reef, curiously eyeing the divers. Beautiful trumpets of orange sponges protruded towards the sunlight and a tiny blennie poked its head from one of the pores while a juvenile angelfish flittered away to hide amongst swaying fingers of soft coral.
He looked to deeper water and there, stretching as far as he could see through the cut-glass water was a bright orange line. Running along the reef and secured every twenty metres by a skewer in the coral was the marker for the concrete oil pipeline. Each skewer marked the spot for the concrete support to hold the pipeline. Two metres square of gouged-out reef replaced with marine-grade concrete to hold up the pipe to pump the crude oil from the platforms to shore. Further up were larger squares marked off with more orange line. These were ten metres long each side and marked the feet of the oil platforms, four per rig. Large boats flooded the ocean with thrashing sounds of propellers and diesel engines. An industrial hammer drill smashed the coral to pieces, the water dampening the sound to reverberating thuds. Pieces of broken and sha
ttered coral floated about in the water as the ocean clouded over with debris, silt and dead fish.
Carlos shuddered awake and blinked back to consciousness, slowly recognising where he was lying, on a stranger’s sofa bed. Damn it, he thought, dreaming may be worse than thinking.
Chapter 12
The seas had picked up overnight and now the rain joined in to make it a gloomy morning, destined to decline further as they headed towards the storm cell. The forecast showed the front clearing through the region in the next eighteen hours but as they were halfway through their outbound, that wouldn’t help them. Julio had taken a four-hour stint at the helm now Silvio had just relieved him and planned to take them the rest of the way. His four-hour nap went by quickly so Silvio had some strong Cuban roast in a big mug and a couple of thick slices of bread toasted and buttered to start his day. The Russians had been in the dining area off the galley when Silvio had grabbed his breakfast but he was happy to avoid conversing with them; they all made him nervous.
Mikhail hadn’t slept well, but adequately to his mind. Now he sipped coffee and took the opportunity to assess the two men he’d been given. They were both young, special forces-trained operatives that functioned as ‘problem solvers’ for the SVR, the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation formed in 1991 after the demise of the Soviet Union and along with it the KGB. Seemed overkill to him to send two of these guys on what should be a relatively simple retrieval exercise. The plan was to do this quietly and diplomatically, not start World War Three. Apparently someone in Moscow was looking at this a little differently, or perhaps they were just planning for any scenario. Either way Mikhail didn’t need these guys going full commando mode on a tiny island they were yet to confirm Carlos had landed on. He sat at the opposite end of the dining table and kept to himself; the two agents drank coffee and told stories. The more they told stories the more they forgot Mikhail was there and the more Mikhail listened and sized them up.
Mikhail hadn’t planned on being a geologist. Trained as an agent in the GU, the Russian Foreign Military Intelligence Agency, he was keen to serve his country in the field, as close to the action as he could get. His problem was his scores on strategy and management tests; he performed too well and the agency wanted him overseeing projects and coordinating efforts from headquarters. Directing his group in a joint mission with another KGB department in London he made the mistake of ignoring a senior official’s command to abort the mission when one of their men was identified by MI5. Mikhail pulled the operative, stepped in himself and completed the mission.
His next, and possibly his final, assignment was running security around the oil fields in Siberia, penance for crossing his boss’s wishes. Desperate for something to challenge his sharp mind and figuring oil fields were now his existence, Mikhail took a geology course and gained his university degree. His luck turned when someone recognised his oil field experience combined with his management skills made him a good fit for a project they planned in Cuba. Things continued to move quickly from there when the southern oil deposits were identified and interest in getting oil flowing as soon as possible ramped up. Carlos was causing an unwanted glitch in those interests. Perhaps these goons will be useful, he thought to himself. One of them seemed a little sharper than the other, maybe he could be trusted to go ashore without causing an international incident.
Mikhail surprised the men by speaking, “What identification papers did they send you with?”
The man Mikhail had noted spoke up, “There was no time to generate papers for the oil industry, the best we already had was for marine biologists, sir.”
Mikhail looked indifferently from one man to the other, then surprised them again by asking in English, “And what are three marine biologists from Russia doing in Grand Cayman?”
The other man glanced at Anatoly, clearly not understanding the question but Anatoly didn’t hesitate and replied in English, “We could be conducting a study comparing the health of the reefs in Cayman to that in Cuba, sir?”
Mikhail nodded and returned to Russian to address his colleague, Pavlo Yeltsin. “You are to remain on ship at all times and monitor the computer, I’ll let you know if you’ll be needed on shore.” Turning back to Anatoly, he added, “What’s the name you’re using?”
“Anatoly Karin, sir.”
“That’s the name on your papers?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Okay, you’ll be with me, we’ll go onto the island once immigration has cleared us.”
Mikhail took his time topping off his coffee before continuing, “Here’s what will happen, once we arrive we’ll inform the Port Authority by radio that we are here and they will either request we dock and see them or they’ll send a boat out to meet us. I assume you gentlemen are armed?”
They both nodded.
“Cayman has strict gun laws so we’ll need to carefully hide the firearms in case they decide to search the ship. If this goes correctly you won’t need them for this operation. We’ll hide your additional identification papers as well.”
The boat was rolling more and more as the seas worsened the closer they got to the storm and things were starting to slide around. Mikhail let the men scramble to catch cups and plates and continued calmly, “Our first priority is to locate the seaplane if he indeed came to Cayman. If he landed legally we’ll find record of it, if he landed illegally the plane must be on the water somewhere as there’s nowhere to land on the island besides the main airport.”
Pavlo was starting to look a little green but Mikhail paused even longer until each of them was uncomfortable whether they felt ill or not. Finally he finished his brief. “Our objective is to return with Carlos Rojas and all the information he brought with him – recovering the plane itself will be secondary. The girl, Sydney Bodden, we’ll handle as necessary; she’s a Caymanian citizen so her disappearance will cause more problems than an illegal Cuban thief.”
Pavlo timidly raised his hand and Mikhail nodded his consent to speak.
“What’s our timeline, sir?”
Mikhail glanced at his watch to verify the date, the last twelve hours of unexpected action blurring his internal clock. “Today is Thursday, on Monday work is scheduled to begin on the new oil field. We must resolve the situation in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours.”
Anatoly raised his hand more confidently. “Are we taking Rojas alive, sir?”
Mikhail didn’t flinch, “From the island, preferably yes. Reaching Cuba, unlikely.”
Chapter 13
The sound of a coffee maker gurgling gently eased Sydney awake. She blinked a few times and slowly recalled where she was in the dimly lit living room of AJ’s apartment. The sofa bed creaked as she sat up rubbing her eyes. The sound of rain pelting the windows and roof told her the storm had yet to pass.
AJ whispered quietly from the kitchen, “Sorry to wake you but I figured we should get going.”
Sydney carefully stepped out of bed leaving Carlos mumbling but still asleep and walked the few steps to the tiny kitchen that was open to the living area. Her body ached and the scrapes stung, reminding her of yesterday’s ordeal.
“Coffee smells good.”
AJ poured her a cup. “The storm will clear out overnight tonight so the airport will probably reopen in the morning. I’m guessing anyone looking for you would fly in then?”
Sydney nodded, “I think that’s a fair assumption – don’t know how they’d get here before then.”
Carlos’s voice came from the living room, “We must find the plane before then – once they’re here I cannot say what they’ll do but it’ll be harder to move around knowing they’re looking for us.”
He joined the two girls and AJ poured more coffee. “We’re going to need some help finding the plane. My RIB boat only has a simple pinging depth finder, we need a CHIRP Digital Sonar that paints a picture of the sea floor or we’re shooting in the dark. It’s going to be rough as hell on the north side and the water is badly s
tirred up, so visibility above and below won’t be much better than it was last night.”
Sydney smirked. “Well, I can tell you I couldn’t see a thing last night and I’m in no hurry to go anywhere near that plane again. Diving is Thomas’s thing not mine. I’m a normal Caymanian, we prefer to stay on top of the water.”
Carlos rubbed her arm affectionately. “No problem, I’m happy to do the diving part.”
AJ found a half loaf of sliced bread and popped some in her toaster, grabbing marmalade from the fridge. “Breakfast is thin pickings I’m afraid.”
Carlos asked, “I know the sonar you mean, they are wired into the boat with the transducer underneath aren’t they?”
“Correct, so it’s not the sonar we need it’s a boat with the sonar, but luckily I know a man.”
Carlos was unsure. “We must be careful involving anyone else. I already feel awful we dragged you into this and the more people the more chance someone says something or leaves a trail the Russians can pick up.”
The toaster sprang and AJ retrieved the toast, offering it to her guests. “Are you certain they know you flew here? You mentioned last night you stayed under radar – how can they know it was Cayman you flew to? You could have gone anywhere.”
Carlos eagerly took the toast. “Mikhail Gurov is a smart man, I know he and his people watch everyone involved in the project so by now they will have seen Sydney entered Cuba a few days ago. When we first started dating in Miami we didn’t have a reason to hide our relationship so there’s enough evidence we’re connected and since then she’s visited every few months. I didn’t tell anyone at work but he asked me how my girlfriend was when she visited the last time. It was his way of telling me we’re always being watched. He will have narrowed it down to Cayman.”
Gardens of the Queen Page 4
