had their backs against the wall.
Claire and Lexi slept in the second small room off this main one in the Hermez daughter’s single bed. Nita was in a sort of sagging cot in that same crowded room. Clarita had fussed over Lexi, washing her hair and combing it out. Then Claire and Nita had washed their hair in rainwater from a barrel out back. All that by lantern light, though they said the village had electricity between blackouts. No wonder Nando had considered two rafts to sell on the black market a gift from God.
Jace just hoped when the urban daughter, Regina, called Gina, showed up for a weekend visit tomorrow she wouldn’t be a flaming commie or want to turn them in. How much were people brainwashed on this island, especially in Havana? In a wood-framed photo, Gina stood before a mural of Fidel and Che Guevara with the words Viva La Revolucion!
Jace had noticed that Heck spent a lot of time staring at the picture as if he knew her. She was easy to look at. Glossy long dark hair and flashing brown eyes. Lithe, young, sexy in trendy clothes that would have done her well on Miami Beach. Her tight T-shirt read in English I’m gaga for Lady Gaga!!! She looked like she came from another planet compared to this fisherman’s house where she’d grown up. He’d seen no photo of the lost son Alfredito or of the family together.
The wind had picked up outside, and Jace saw Nick stand and look out the front window through the open wooden shutters. It was pitch-black outside. Keeping quiet, Jace got up and stepped over the sleeping Bronco, who would be taking the early-morning watch after him and Heck.
Jace whispered to Nick, “I’m awake. I’ll start now.”
Nick nodded and fist-bumped Jace’s shoulder. He moved to take his spot on the floor. Jace thought that they could almost be friends, especially since Nick, WITSEC alias his brother Jack, wasn’t sleeping with Claire tonight.
When Nick lay down with a deep sigh, Jace did some stretching to get his blood moving and his muscles awake. How did things keep spiraling down, getting worse? It was as if they were under some curse.
With his back to the wall, he sat on the floor and became one with the night shadows.
* * *
On Saturday—Claire thought she was losing track of time and her sanity—Nando went fishing since he’d lost his catch when he’d brought them home the day before. Carlita walked to the village to meet the 11:00 a.m. bus their daughter was supposed to be on. See, Claire told herself, time did not stand still, even here where it seemed it should.
“Let’s have a powwow before Carlita gets back with their daughter,” Nick said to their group, and except for Nita, who stayed inside with Lexi, they all went out on the patio. The village of Costa Blanca circled around the fishing dock about half a mile to the east, and they could see some of it from here.
“This girl Gina is obviously way different from her parents,” Nick began. Considering how intent and edgy everyone looked, he felt like he was making a plea in a courtroom. “Who knows what they indoctrinate students with at the university? Nando told Heck that Gina is studying to be a doctor, so she’s probably bright and as modern as it gets around here, maybe a dedicated Communist. No doubt ambitious, though Nando said doctors earn minimal wages.”
Claire put in, “But wanting to go through all it takes to be a doctor for little money makes me think she could also want to help people. She sounds altruistic or at least a people person.”
“Good point, forensic psychologist,” Nick said with a nod and a smile. “I’m remembering why I hired you to figure people out for me, even ones who are gone from this earth. I need—and value—all of your opinions, because we’re still flying blind here.”
“Flying’s my gig,” Jace said. “Like you guys said, we’ve got to get to the internet somehow, so we can send out an SOS for help. And fast, before someone figures out we don’t belong and calls in the—whatever they call them here. Man, I’m starting to feel we’re on an alien planet, like in that old TV show Star Trek.”
“Just hope it doesn’t turn into Star Wars,” Nick said.
* * *
Claire thought it seemed not only a breath of fresh air but a whirlwind that came through the front door with quiet Carlita. Gina Hermez was gesturing with both hands and talking rapid-fire Spanish, until she suddenly switched to English.
“Who says nothing happens outside Havana?” the pretty girl exploded as her big dark eyes jumped from one of them to the other. She propped her hands on her shapely hips before flinging gestures again. “Well, that’s just another government lie, because you are really, really here!”
She wore cutoff jeans and a pink crewneck sweater that might have come from Abercrombie & Fitch. Her glossy raven hair hit below her shoulder blades, and her clear plastic backpack was crammed with books. She spoke strangely accented English, Claire thought—most forensic psychologists were good at placing accents—with a Slavic or Russian tang to her voice, not the usual Hispanic lilt.
“It’s kismet our papa found you,” Gina went on before anyone else could speak. “And where we lost Alfredito. Please, let us sit at the table and talk. And, oh, a bonita little girl...”
Everyone talked at once then, cross-counter introductions, greetings. Nick made some explanation of their plight, using the cover story they had been flying to a vacation when their plane went down, and that the man who owned it was going to be very angry if he caught up with them, so they needed to call a lawyer friend of Nick’s in the States.
“You are a lawyer?” Gina asked. “You know what Shakespeare said—‘First, let’s kill all the lawyers.’ Now, you know, we Cubans are well educated, yes? Free education, free health care here, so not all bad, but the joke now is if we could only find breakfast, lunch and dinner, yes, Mama?”
Carlita, who seemed to have next to no English, said nothing but beamed and nodded. It was obvious she adored her daughter but probably didn’t understand her much lately, whether she spoke English or Spanish. What a contrast in the two women, Claire thought, hoping she and Lexi never got that different. The new Cuba versus the old, that was for sure. And, however Gina had got the money, Claire had seen Carlita quickly put some paper bills in a jar. Claire decided she’d tell Nick. When they left here, he could leave some American money for them as well.
“Of course, I can help you find assistance in Havana,” Gina promised, without taking a breath, “but since you are illegal Norte Americanos, sometimes called Yanquis here, and since you not come by legal means, we have to be careful. Oh, it’s my dream to go to your country. Doctors are special there, have more money and respect, yes?”
The one thing Gina said, Claire noted, that didn’t jibe with her good English vocabulary and slight Slavic lilt was that she said jes instead of yes, just the way Heck did.
“That’s true about doctors in the US,” Nick said. “As for Havana, we have friends who can come for us if we can just get them word, then settle things at home about the lost airplane later. We don’t want to draw attention to ourselves in any way.”
“Well, they cannot come here to get you, ’specially in Havana, or Raul’s security arrest you,” Gina explained. “Once you contact your friends, you need a rural meeting spot, probably for a boat, not a plane, maybe around where Papa dropped you off. Cuba security can find illegal planes in our airspace.”
“Good advice, because, of course, we don’t want to take the chance of being detained or being publicized or even
