The brakes squealed, followed by a horrific grind from the transmission as the driver shifted into PARK. Jack jumped out of the backseat and ran the final three blocks. The light outside the school was still on—flickering, but on. Jack took a moment to catch his breath and then tried the door. It opened. Jack went inside. The front desk was unattended, but Jack remembered his way down the narrow hallway. The familiar sounds of boxing—footwork on canvas, gloves meeting, competitors sucking air—drew him into the gym. Then he stopped, taken aback. Theo was moving around the ring, squaring off against Josefina’s trainer. Jack walked to the ropes and stood beside Josefina.
“Make your friend stop,” she told Jack. She checked the clock on the wall, and when the second hand swept twelve, she rang the bell. The fighters broke. Sicario went to the far corner, and Josefina brought him a stool. Theo went to the opposite corner. Jack joined him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” asked Jack.
Theo took a mouthful of water and spit in the bucket. “Rafael’s dead. You know it. I know it. Sicario’s our man. I’m gonna knock his ass out and rip those gloves off. We gonna see that same tattoo.”
“He’s a professional, you moron.”
“Was a professional. He’s old.”
“Not that old. His hands are lethal.” Jack shot a quick glance across the ring. Josefina was pleading with her trainer. “Josefina’s over there right now, begging him not to kill you.”
“She’s beggin’ cuz he should’ve hung up his gloves long before he did. All those punches left his skull like an eggshell. I’m gonna knock him out.”
Jack cast another look to the opposite corner. Josefina gave up the pleading. She walked over to the bell and rang it. Round two. The fighters came out. Jack stayed right outside Theo’s corner. Josefina came around the ring and stood beside him.
“Say something, would you? Sicario is not what he used to be. He’s not quick, he’s not strong. He’s damaged.”
Josefina’s words hit Jack in a way that she couldn’t have intended. They didn’t describe at all the man who had overpowered him at Vivien’s house.
Jack leaned into the rope and addressed himself to the fighters. “Don’t see much point to this, men,” he said in a voice loud enough to carry throughout the gym.
The boxers continued to move, sizing each other up, looking for an opening, but no punches had landed. Josefina’s assessment seemed fair: Sicario was slow.
Jack tried again, speaking to Sicario. “Bianca has a right to know if her husband is alive.”
Sicario tried a left hook, but it missed.
“He’s dead,” Josefina said, her voice loud enough only for Jack to hear.
Jack glanced in her direction, but her eyes were cast to the floor, refusing to meet his. Jack put the next question to Sicario, again in a loud voice.
“She has a right to know if he was involved in the explosion.”
Theo ducked away from Sicario’s wild right. Sicario regained his balance and shouted, “Guilty.”
“Sicario!” Josefina shouted.
“He said he was going to do it.”
“Sicario, no!”
Jack suddenly felt like the referee in another fight, one between Josefina and her trainer. “I want the truth,” said Jack.
Sicario seemed energized, suddenly finding his long-lost rhythm as a fighter. He was clearly the aggressor, and he landed his first combination. Theo staggered backward but righted himself.
“You want to know the truth? I’ll tell you the truth.”
Theo wisely backed away, out of Sicario’s reach.
“You don’t know the truth!” said Josefina.
“I know what you told me. That’s the truth.”
“Sicario, stop!” shouted Josefina.
Sicario was breathing heavily. It was becoming an effort to talk, but he pushed through it. “Time for this shit to end, Josefina. Tell him. Tell him what Rafael told you.”
Josefina grabbed the rope, ready to hop into the ring. “You don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Tell him what Rafael said the last time you saw him.”
Jack took a hard look at Josefina. She still had a hold of the rope, but her hands were shaking.
“Rafael told her everything,” said Sicario.
“Stop!”
“He told her he was gonna do it.”
Jack’s eyes darted back and forth from the ring to the rope, from Sicario to Josefina.
Sicario suddenly found another gear as a fighter. He was on the attack, no longer measuring his opponent for the strategic combination. It was an adrenaline-driven surge that bore no resemblance to the former champion’s patient and smooth style. This was pure anger, a recklessness that surely would have gotten him killed in a match with a skilled opponent. But Theo was a street fighter.
“Theo, get out of there!” Jack shouted.
Theo was back against the ropes. Sicario was right on him, hammering at his midsection.
“Just go down, Theo!”
The blows kept coming, but Sicario was tiring. The adrenaline rush could carry him only so far. It was like watching a car run out of gas, and the damage of too many blows and too many concussions in a career that had lasted way too long was evident. Sicario finally took a step back, putting a little space between himself and his human punching bag. It was enough space for Theo to unleash his bulging right arm with all the force he could muster. The punch caught Sicario between the eyes. His costly half-step away from his opponent became a backward stagger. Sicario was no longer a car out of gas. The stone had downed Goliath.
Sicario was on the canvas, out cold.
“Sicario!” Josefina shouted as she ran into the ring. She knelt at his side, put his head in her lap, and then screamed at Theo: “Why did you have to do this?”
“Jack told me to take him down.”
“I told you to go down,” said Jack.
Jack brought a cool, wet towel from the corner. Josefina applied it her trainer’s forehead. He was breathing heavily but still unconscious.
“Take his gloves off,” said Theo.
“Leave us alone,” said Josefina.
Theo didn’t back off. “I want to see the tattoo.”
“He doesn’t have a tattoo,” said Josefina.
“I want to see.”
Sicario was coming around and mumbled something to her in Spanish. Josefina glared at Theo as she untied Sicario’s right glove. She pulled it off, then held up Sicario’s hand for Theo to see. There was no tattoo. She untied the left, tossed the glove aside, and showed Theo his hand. No tattoo.
“You happy?” she asked.
Theo said nothing. Jack answered for them both. “No,” he said. “Confused.”
“He did it!” shouted Josefina. “Okay? Rafael did it. End of confusion.”
“What?”
“Don’t you get it, Jack? Rafael was so close to Key West, closer to the United States than to Cuba. He could practically see Bianca from the top of the derrick. Every other Cuban could leave Cuba under the new travel rules. But not Rafael. Not someone with a college degree and a wife who defected and who might never come back. He was ready to swim there.”
“But, blowing up a rig?”
“They didn’t tell him it would blow up. They used him. All Rafael wanted was some kind of emergency. Something that would get him and all the other workers evacuated to the closest dry land. Haven’t you ever heard of wet foot/dry foot?”
Of course Jack had. It was the U.S. immigration policy that had produced those tragic images on television of Cuban refugees swimming toward shore until they could swim no more. It wasn’t enough simply to reach U.S. waters. They had to get all the way to dry land to get asylum. Or else they were sent back to Cuba.
A noise cut through the gym, the unmistakable sound of the entrance door opening. It pulled a much-needed draft through an open window at the opposite end of the gym, cooling the ring for a moment, but the air went still again as t
he door closed with a thud. All eyes—even Sicario’s—turned toward the dimly lit hallway. Footsteps echoed off the walls, and finally a man emerged from the shadows.
“Who are you?” Josefina asked in Spanish.
Noori didn’t answer. He kept walking toward the ring.
Theo went toward him, stopping at the ropes. “She asked who you are.”
Noori stopped outside the ring. “I’m looking for Rafael.”
Sicario pushed himself up from the canvas. Josefina helped him to his feet, but he was still wobbly.
“Rafael is dead,” said Sicario.
Jack was about to speak, but Noori pulled a gun from inside his jacket, which silenced everyone.
“So are you, liar,” said Noori.
The gun was quickly aimed in Sicario’s direction, the pop of a nine-millimeter round echoed through the gym, and Sicario dropped to the canvas for the last time. Josefina screamed and lunged at the shooter. Another deafening crack of gunfire cut through the gym, and Josefina fell forward and landed beside her trainer.
Jack went to her as Theo threw himself at Noori, but before Theo could make contact, Jack spotted something in the open window, and just as he realized what it was—an arm, a fist, a gun—he heard the pop of a revolver. Noori’s head snapped back, and a hot spray of crimson showered the floor around him. It wasn’t clear who had fired the shot from outside, but it was no amateur. Noori was dead before he hit the floor.
Jack rolled Josefina onto her back. Blood soaked through her shirt at the rib cage, just below the heart.
“Theo, get an ambulance!”
“How?”
“Run to a neighbor’s house. Go!”
A trickle of blood ran from Josefina’s mouth.
“You’re going to be okay,” said Jack.
“No, I’m not,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.
“Just hang in there. An ambulance is coming.”
She grimaced from the pain and grabbed Jack’s hand. “Believe what I told you about Rafael,” she said. “He thought if he played along, the rig would shut down. He just wanted to be with his wife. They needed someone on board the rig to mess with the alarm system. They used him.”
“Who are they?” asked Jack.
Maybe she didn’t hear him. Maybe she didn’t know the answer. Or maybe she just had something more important to say.
“Funny thing is, I always did love Rafael,” she said. “But there’s something I want you to tell Bianca, because it’s true: her Rafael never loved another woman.” She smiled a little, fading. “He really was ready to swim to Key West. This wasn’t his fault. It’s just another love story.”
Jack watched the life drain from those dark, mysterious eyes, and then her body went limp in his arms.
“Josefina?”
“Ambulance is coming!” Theo shouted as he rushed back into the gym. Brunelli was with him, and it was clear to Jack who had fired the shot from the dark side of the open window.
“I followed him here,” Brunelli said, pointing with a nod toward Noori. “I was calling for backup when I heard the shots.”
“Ten seconds sooner would have been nice.”
Brunelli knelt down and checked Josefina’s pulse. “She’s gone,” he said.
Jack didn’t want to believe it.
“We have to leave her,” said Brunelli.
“What?”
“An ambulance is on the way. And if I heard the first and second gunshots when I was outside this building, someone in the neighborhood probably heard them, too. They surely heard mine. The Cuban police will be here any minute. We have to go.”
“We can’t just leave,” said Jack.
“They’re all dead, Jack. We can’t help them. We have to go. Now!”
Jack lowered Josefina’s head gently to the floor. Brunelli jumped up into the ring, went to Sicario, and placed the pistol that he’d used to kill Noori in the boxer’s open hand.
“This was a tragic love triangle,” said Brunelli, staging it, his gaze sweeping over all three bodies. “That’s our story.”
Jack kept Josefina’s last words to himself. “More than you know,” he said.
“Let’s go!” said Brunelli.
“I’m not leaving,” said Jack.
“Don’t be stupid.”
“I won’t pretend that this is some love triangle gone wrong. I won’t dishonor her like that. The truth is going to be told.”
“Fine,” said Brunelli. “Tell your client, tell the press, tell the world. But do it from Miami, and do it tomorrow—after Operation Black Horizon closes.”
“Operation what?”
“Jack, we need to get you the fuck out of this country before you spend the rest of your life in a Cuban jail.”
“What about Theo? He comes with me. He’s not going back to the Bahamas.”
“Understood. Your wife has the Bahamas covered. Right now. As we speak.”
“Andie’s in the Bahamas?”
“You’ll see. Let our operation play out, and let’s get out of here.”
Jack checked with Theo—just a moment of eye contact—and they were in agreement.
“All right,” said Jack. “We’ll go.”
Brunelli raced across the gym and down the hall, pushing the door open at a dead run. Jack could almost feel the hole in his heart as he and Theo followed the agent into the Cuban night.
Chapter 69
Andie reached the marina in Nassau at nine p.m. She was focused on her mission, getting in role, but it was impossible not to take in the beauty of Albany Marina, so many yachts and so much luxury off South Bay. A half-moon hung above the palm trees. Running lights glowed on vessels across the harbor. A hundred-foot sailboat motored into a slip, its five-spreader mast so enormous that it needed a blinking red light to warn low-flying airplanes.
Backing up Andie were two international agents, legates from the U.S. embassy. It was a coordinated effort between the FBI and the Royal Bahamian Police Force. Andie and the legates were technically observers, lacking the authority to make an arrest on foreign soil. But the RBPF’s execution of a Bahamian arrest warrant in connection with the murder of Leonard Jeffries was fully in keeping with the objectives of Operation Black Horizon. As of Monday morning, the RBPF had ruled out Theo Knight in the Jeffries murder. But they had completely lost track of their new suspect. A tip from Andie had steered them straight. Brunelli’s team in Havana had tracked her to Nassau, where Andie picked up the trail. Vivien had led her straight to Albany Marina on South Bay, straight to the man who had murdered Jeffries—to the man who was Vivien’s accomplice in a much bigger crime.
The FBI’s efforts had earned Andie the favor of making one undercover contact with the suspects before the Bahamians moved in for their arrest. The RBPF moved into position in silence. Andie took a seat on the bench on the dock. Beside her was Long Wu, Noori’s boss from N.Y.C. Gadets. His cooperation in this final phase of Operation Black Horizon would earn him immunity from prosecution on counterfeiting charges that could have landed him in prison for the rest of his life.
“Got a visual on the suspects,” said Andie, her voice picked up by her wire. The FBI legates were out of sight, listening.
A dozen yachts rested side by side in long slips, each with the bow facing out, the stern backed up to the dock. From their seat on the wooden bench, Andie and Long Wu were looking directly at the stern of Lucky Seven Seas. Rick’s delivery of the seventy-foot Johnson from Key West to Nassau had been a one-way proposition, and his contract to deliver the even larger Lucky Seven Seas to Havana would get him out of the Bahamas in style, and closer to the big payoff. The FBI could add the boat delivery, a violation of the U.S. trade embargo, to Rick’s long list of crimes. According to Andie’s intelligence, Rick had been making the trip for years. It was how he and Vivien had hooked up and fallen into bed in the first place.
Andie waited for Rick and Vivien to draw even with her on the dock, then rose. “We need to talk, Rick,” she said.
He and Vivien stopped before stepping onto the yacht. “Who are you?” asked Rick.
Long Wu stepped forward and delivered his only line. “This Noori’s girlfriend,” he said in broken English.
Andie took over. “Vivien, I’m sure you remember Dawut Noori’s boss. You met on one of Long Wu’s business trips to Havana.”
“Yes, of course I remember,” said Vivien.
Rick and Vivien exchanged glances. There was some obvious apprehensiveness on their part, but Andie sensed that she had gotten past the first credibility hurdle.
“Dawut is dead,” said Andie.
She checked their reactions in the moonlight. There was none.
“I’m very sorry to hear that,” said Vivien.
“We don’t doubt your sincerity,” said Andie. “I’ve seen the articles you wrote for the Cuba Times about Dawut and the other Uighurs detained at Guantánamo.”
“It was a gross violation of international law,” said Vivien.
“You were one of the few journalists to point that out. And you are one of the few people who could understand Dawut’s desire to get even with the country that held him in solitary confinement for seven years without a shred of evidence.”
“I don’t know anything about getting even,” said Vivien.
“Really? From the tone of your articles in the Cuba Times, I would say you hate the United States more than Dawut did.”
“Writing for the Cuba Times is not a crime.”
“That’s true.”
“But Dawut had good reason to be angry,” said Vivien. “I agree with that.”
Andie nodded. “I tried to convince Dawut to put it all behind him. Now that he’s dead, I know that I failed. That anger kept burning. He wanted big-time revenge. If the U.S. was going to detain him with no evidence that he was a terrorist, then, by God, he was going to be a terrorist. A major terrorist, one deserving of solitary confinement at Gitmo. I thought he was all talk when he said his plan was to blow up the Scarborough 8. Turns out, all he needed was one cooperative worker on the rig to pull off the plan.”
Rick and Vivien stood mute.
Andie continued. “You found his man, Vivien. You found Rafael Lopez.”
Black Horizon (Jack Swyteck Novel) Page 32
