Maria continued to glare at him. No laughter from Maria.
“When the blockade went up, and Castro wanted to hide some things away for a rainy day, our fishing boat was the perfect choice,” Salzar said. “I was a trusted aide, and the boat wouldn’t raise suspicions. Unfortunately, Maria’s grandfather and I had a difference of opinion. He thought we should follow orders. And I thought we should take the gold and the SovarK2 and never look back. Marcos was the silent partner, the partner Enrique knew nothing about, really the mastermind of the plan. Even then, Marcos had a taste for power, eh Marcos?”
There wasn’t a lot of light in Marcos’s eyes. They were focused on me and they weren’t smiling. And it occurred to me that Marcos was probably crazier than Salzar.
“Enrique and I were arguing on the little fishing boat and not paying close attention to navigating and somehow we hit a reef,” Salzar said. “The boat began taking on water, so I shot Maria’s grandfather in the head and left him for dead. Then I set out in the dinghy we carried and watched for the boat to go down. I knew exactly where we were. Salvage would be easy. But the boat didn’t go down. Maria’s grandfather didn’t die fast enough. He managed to get the boat moving away from the reef, leaving me behind. I don’t know how he did that with a head wound. A hard head, I guess.
“Can you imagine? There I was in the dinghy and I had to watch the boat cruise off away from me.”
“You must have felt pretty stupid,” I said.
Salzar’s eyes narrowed, and I thought he might hit me, but he reined himself in and continued. “We searched for that boat for years without finding it. Who would have thought it could have gotten so far away? When he left me he was moving toward Havana. Those were the waters where I concentrated my search.”
“You disgust me,” Maria said. And she spit at him again. This time scoring a direct hit on his perfectly polished shoe.
Salzar flicked his arm out and caught Maria on the chin with his fist. Her head snapped to the side, and a small trickle of blood appeared at the corner of her mouth.
Maria was concentrating so hard on hating Salzar, I wasn’t sure she felt him hit her.
“Where were we?” he said, settling back in his seat, forcing his cold, thin-lipped smile on me. “Oh yes, the gold and the SovarK2. Isn’t it interesting that it’s been returned to me after all this time? True, I don’t have the SovarK2 in my possession, but that’s just a technicality.” He leaned close to me. “Where is it?”
“Uh…I don’t know,” I said.
Salzar rapped on the tinted glass window and Pukey opened the door.
“Miss Barnaby and Miss Raffles are going to the garage now,” Salzar said to Pukey.
I cut my eyes to Maria, and she gave an almost imperceptible shake to her head. Going to the garage wasn’t a desirable thing to do.
My hands were cuffed behind my back, and Maria and I were transferred to the Town Car. There was a guy driving. And there was Pukey. Pukey looked like he had a different opinion of the garage. Pukey was looking forward to it.
Once we got on the Trail there wasn’t a lot to see at night. A lot of dark. Occasionally rectangles of light from a house. A few headlights from cars en route to Miami or points south. Maria didn’t say anything. She’d lost the angry energy and was slumped in her seat, smaller than I’d remembered her.
Hard to keep track of time when you can’t see a watch, but I was guessing we drove for somewhere between thirty to forty minutes before slowing and turning onto a dirt road. After maybe a quarter of a mile we reached our destination. I was pulled out of the limo, and I stood for a moment looking around. I was in a large hard-packed dirt field, and beyond the dirt was tall grass and swamp. A large cinder block building with a corrugated metal roof hunkered in the middle of the dirt field. The Flex helicopter was parked behind the building. A large military-type helicopter was parked beside the Flex chopper. A couple cars were parked in the front of the building, not far from where I stood. A single light burned over a door at one end. A bunch of bugs were beating themselves senseless against the light. Not a good omen, I thought. Four portable latrines sat off to one side. Another bad omen.
The building was large enough to hold maybe eight eighteen-wheelers. Only one was parked at the rear of the building. The floor was poured concrete, stained with oil drips, transmission fluid spills, and the rest of the crud that accumulates when cars and trucks are involved. Plus, I thought there were some stains I’d rather not identify.
There were no windows. A large fan droned on the far wall, providing ventilation. Lighting was overhead fluorescent. The air was damp and tasted metallic. The door was solid metal. Heavy-duty fire door. Two garage doors were built into the far end. Again, heavy duty. This wasn’t a mechanic’s garage. This was a storage garage, reinforced to serve as a bunker.
A wood crate sat on a forklift. The gold was ready to go. A motley assortment of chairs had been gathered around a rectangular scarred wood table. A single can of Coke had been left on the table. A small television tethered to a wall outlet had been placed on a folding chair. A makeshift kitchen with a rusted refrigerator, coffeemaker, and hot plate occupied an area behind the table.
We’d been told by Dave that there were four men in the garage keeping watch over Maria. This evening there were twenty. The men were working, cleaning out the garage, moving crates of guns, massive amounts of consumer goods that probably had been hijacked, and several metal file cabinets into the eighteen-wheeler. Dave told us that Salzar had a small army of dedicated men, and that almost all were illegal immigrants, handpicked by Marcos Torres, brought over one at a time on Flex. This was obviously some of that army.
I didn’t see any rooms partitioned off. No bathroom. No office. A wood bench had been placed more or less in the middle of the floor. It was long and narrow and it had heavy metal rings screwed into the seat.
Maria and I were handcuffed to the bench.
“What are we supposed to do with them?” one of the men asked.
“Nothing,” Puke Face said. “Salzar wants them left alone until he gets here.”
After several hours my ass was asleep and my back ached. Thank God I didn’t have to use the latrine because I’d already been told that wasn’t one of my options. I had both wrists shackled, which meant I couldn’t lie down. I now understood the sunken eyes and dark circles on Maria. She was exhausted. Probably the sunken eyes had other sources as well, but I didn’t want to dwell on that. I was making a large effort not to freak.
No one came near Maria or me. Not complaining about that. Only occasionally Puke Face. He’d look down at us, drool a little, and move on. Hours passed. Once in a while the door would open for someone to use the latrine, and I’d look out to see if the sky was showing signs of light. I dozed off very briefly, head between my legs. When I awoke the men were still working, but the garage was close to empty of goods.
Another horn sounded outside the garage bay. The bay was opened and the stretch rolled in, followed by an SUV. Beyond the open garage door, the sky was still dark, but I thought it had to be almost daybreak. I looked over at Maria.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “This is all my fault.”