Cliff Ryder - The Powers That Be

Edging around the perimeter, he scanned the floor and walls, looking for a loose board, a broken section of wall, anything that would give a clue as to where the package was hidden. Other than a crumbling, weakened wall above the staircase, he saw nothing out of the ordinary. He searched to the lip of the hole on one side, then went back and examined the other side, as well, to no avail.

It has to be here somewhere he thought nervously.

Damason walked back to the doorway and looked around the room again. Nothing looked any different this time around, the collapsed bed, the poster— the poster —surely that would have rotted away long ago. He walked over and examined it closely. The paper looked old, but wasn’t stained or wrinkled as it should have been if it had really been hanging there for months. He pulled it down to find a head-sized hole behind it. Banging on the sagging wall to make sure no rats were lurking, he carefully reached inside.

His questing fingers pushed past spiderwebs and flaking plaster to touch a narrow, cloth-wrapped package. After some maneuvering, he extracted the long, heavy parcel from the hole, and knew he was holding some kind of firearm.

A shout from the street brought Damason’s head up, and a burst of answering laughter confirmed his suspicion.

Creeping to the window, he peeked out to see three young men approaching his car, the only one parked on this street.

He cursed his luck under his breath. The message had been very specific, warning him that he shouldn’t be seen by anyone when he went to retrieve the package. He waited in the shadows, hoping they were just walking by, but the three circled the vehicle, peering into the windows and testing the hubcaps, prying one off with a twist and more laughter.

Damason didn’t think they’d steal the car—that was a major crime, and would send them to prison for years if they were caught—but he didn’t want to sit around and wait for them to become bored, either. He hefted the package in his hands, immediately dismissing the thought of using it as a deterrent. Glancing around the room again, he saw a long crack on the wall facing the street, running parallel to what remained of the roof. It gave him an idea.

Grabbing one of the bed frame’s iron bars, Damason worked it free and made his way over to the wall. He braced it against the crack and pushed with all his might. At first nothing happened, but then the entire section groaned, split and toppled to the street with a crash that echoed off the surrounding buildings.

Damason ducked behind the wall until the noise of the destruction had died away, then peeked over the wreckage.

Instead of chasing the three youths off, the collapsed wall seemed to have piqued their interest in the building. They were walking toward the entrance. Scowling, he watched them skulk around the doorway. Their laughter and boasts carried up to him as each dared the others to go farther inside. Another inspiration came to him, and Damason grabbed a pebble and tossed it through the back doorway, the rock rattling down the stairway. The trio fell silent, then all of them crept through the room. Lying next to the hole in the floor, Damason poked his head through, trying to see where they were.

The three young men were clustered around the doorway.

Damason got up and tossed another rock at the door. The three whispered among themselves, then one began climb-ing the creaking steps, with the other two watching.

He crept back to the rotting wall that formed part of the stairway and listened to the slow footsteps as the boy approached. When he judged the intruder was close enough, Damason put his shoulder to the wall and pushed again.

The weakened wall crumbled and gave way, collapsing on top of the boy, who screamed briefly as dozens of pounds of mortar and dust rained down on him. The other two scrambled to assist him, shouting his name and digging through the rubble. Damason checked to make sure they were completely occupied, then slid through the hole with the package in his hands, landing in front of the doorway.

He raced to his car, placed the package in the backseat and drove away.

Damason wound through the narrow streets of Havana until he found a deserted alley. He got out, put the package into the trunk and, after another circuit of the city to ensure that he wasn’t being followed, he headed south, getting on the highway that would eventually take him past the military base at Managua. He didn’t give much thought to the three youths he had left behind. If their curiosity hadn’t gotten the better of them, their friend would have been fine. It was a minor sacrifice compared to what he had gained.

Risking pushing the Lada beyond its limits, Damason pressed the gas pedal down harder. He had to be back in the city for a rare speech that Raul Castro was giving in the plaza later that afternoon, but first he wanted to see what he had recovered, and to do that, he needed total privacy.

A dozen miles outside the city, he found one of the in-numerable side paths that led into the jungle. They were little more than trails that had once led to fields or an old sugar mill, now long overgrown. He pulled onto it, wincing as the Lada bottomed out in the ruts. He prayed not to get stuck, for it would impossible to explain why he had come out all this way. The little car seemed to sense his need, however, for it rose to the occasion and didn’t bog down once.

When he was sure he wouldn’t be seen by anyone, Damason pulled over and got out. Walking to the trunk, he opened it, removed the package, then closed it and placed the bundle on top. He carefully unwrapped the cloth to reveal a slender, long-barreled rifle with an unusual, skeleton-ized stock featuring a built-in pistol grip. A long scope was mounted on top. Included with the rifle were two magazines full of 7.62 mm ammunition.

Damason lifted the Russian-made Dragunov SVD sniper rifle, feeling its weight, its balance, relishing the texture of the wood and stamped steel. It felt right in his hands.

It felt like a weapon that could kill a dictator.

Jonas sipped an excellent Australian Zinfandel and dabbed his mouth with his napkin, then placed it over the remains of his delicious blackened-snapper lunch. “There is something about everything in America, although I enjoy my homeland, everything here somehow just tastes better.” His accent had thick-ened, the guttural Germanic tones coming through on each word.

He was dressed in a new, tropical-weight, beige linen suit with a white, raw silk shirt underneath. A pair of Christian Dior sunglasses covered his eyes, lending a cool gray tone to everything he looked at. His dining companion—a Room 59 operative on temporary loan from a long-term assignment in the Florida Keys—was dressed in a strapless, light blue, hibiscus-print sundress and a straw hat.

“Glad you think so. Has our target arrived yet?” Karen Mulber was tall, blond and tanned—the perfect accessory for a foreign businessman on vacation. She also had a mind like a titanium trap, which made her the perfect partner to watch his back during this meeting. While Jonas was making contact, she would be locating Castilo’s car to plant a minuscule tracking device on it.

They sat on the topmost tier of the five-level restaurant, which had been built to allow all of its guests an unobstructed view of the track below. The bright Florida sun bathed the arena in golden light, making it a perfect racing day. While pretending to discuss the day’s races, they casually scanned the rest of the restaurant.

Jonas finished his wine. “Not yet, but the matinee begins in twenty minutes, so unless he’s stuck in traffic, I expect him to walk in any moment now.” The Room 59 hackers had accessed Castilo’s computer calendar. Every Wednesday afternoon was blocked off for the greyhound races.