Karen Harper - Falling Darkness

Oh, boy, Claire thought. You might know hormones were roiling here. She hoped it could work to their advantage, but what if it didn’t? Matters were already complicated enough considering her own problems with Jace and Nick, not to mention Heck keeping an eye on Nita since she and Bronco were lovey-dovey.

While Carlita, with Nita’s help, put quesadillas on each plate and poured homemade papaya wine, Gina suggested something they hadn’t thought of, something that made Claire hope they could believe and trust her.

“I got to explain something to Berto here—” another smile at Heck “—since he say he is a—what was that?—a computer trekky?”

“A techie,” Nick corrected her.

“Oh, yes. But I think I know a way getting to the internet that is safer than going near the embassy. We have what you call internet cafés, only the lines long and most Cubans believe what they write is watched by—you know—the government,” she added, whispering. “I have a laptop, but it only connects with university areas that been approved and what we call SNet, the Street Net. If you have any money, you should check into a real nice hotel, then rent an hour of worldwide net online, maybe between eight to fifteen dollars, so pretty expensive.”

If this woman thought that was expensive, Claire thought, things were indeed bad here.

Lowering her voice again, Gina went on, “They say others—well, you know, the government—watches that internet for problems, so the hotel, bigger the better, might work best.”

Her voice returned to normal range and she began to gesture again. “See, I was dating a musician, played at the Nacional, best hotel in Havana. Foreign tourists, European, Canadian stay there, not so many Americanos anymore, not for years, since the horrible dictator Batista and his gangsters ruled here, but that might work for you. If there’s any rooms available, if you have some cash. Cash is king here, American dollars, even.”

Nick told her, “We might be able to arrange that. When you head back to Havana tomorrow on the bus, can we all go along, maybe the last bus in the evening?”

“First of all, no streetlights there. Dark for you to be getting around at night. Besides, I have to take a bus at dawn, but I know where I keep you hidden until afternoon. Then you go to the hotel about the time a plane would land and you would arrive. We take another taxi to the airport first, since you got some money.”

This girl was proving herself as bright as she looked, Claire thought, even thinking of little details, but was she after their money or did she really want to help? At least there was just one more night’s sleep here in crowded conditions with the breeze whispering through the old wooden shutters and bad dreams to make her think someone was coming after them.

Claire hated to dwell on dangers, but they’d been through so much. When she first became a Certified Fraud Examiner and Forensic Psychologist, she’d never imagined it would lead to more than interviews of Americans who might have broken the law, even though she’d realized she could be dealing with criminals. And Nick as a criminal defense attorney certainly never planned to be defending his own life.

Later, over a dessert of amazingly little bananas that had been soaked in rum, though Claire made sure Lexi’s was without the liquor, Gina was still talking. “I know where to get some clothes to loan—or is it lend?—you all, except little Meggie, but we will manage. And you won’t have suitcases, but I know where to borrow one or two. Still, once we leave this casa, ’specially when we be in Havana,” she said, looking intently at each of them in turn, “until you get a place to stay, think of it as hiding in the shadows so you not get caught.”

4

After several more rural stops, the bus to Havana became crowded, though they all had seats since Costa Blanca was near the beginning of this line. Nick noted there weren’t many cars on the road until they neared Havana.

“No es facil,” Gina whispered to him and Claire from the seat behind and patted them both on their shoulders as if to buck them up. Lexi was on Claire’s lap, nodding in sleep, and Gina was sitting with Heck. “That’s my motto,” Gina said. “Nothing is easy, even getting around in the city. We’ll get out near where I live.”

Nick had noticed, despite the buzz of voices on the bus, that Heck and Gina had sometimes switched to Spanish, though she’d said she wanted to practice her English. Claire had clued Nick in like he was some idiot about Gina and Heck. At least Heck was smitten, because you couldn’t really tell about her. They needed her to help them, but Nick agreed with his personal forensic psychologist that Gina needed watching. Everyone in Cuba did. No es facil, indeed.

At first the city seemed to him a sprawl of huge, block-like apartment buildings with an occasional blast from the past like an aging Spanish hacienda, some with wash on the line and people watching out the window. Many were smoking. Kids played in the potholed streets, and old men sat on barrels over games of checkers. They passed a series of buildings painted Pepto-Bismol pink. Nick’s stomach was roiling and not from being rattled on this bus. He could use some of that stuff right now, but what couldn’t they use? He’d quietly left one of his smallest bills, fifty dollars, in Carlita’s money jar. He was nervous about flashing big bills—would stores even have change?—to get underwear and a change of clothes for everyone.

Claire poked him in the ribs. At least she had the brains not to say anything. Their Spanish might be sketchy, but they could both translate the words on the huge mural with Fidel Castro’s bearded profile they were passing: Solcialismo o muerta. In other words, Socialism or death. Somehow, that threat was the least of their worries right now.

But when they looked out the other side of the bus, it was pure beauty. They were driving along what Gina called the Malecon, a gorgeous avenue with a seawall and the glittering water just below. People were strolling or just hanging out. He spotted some who must be tourists.

“Caramba! There, there!” Gina said, bending low to look ahead of them. She pointed at a huge, turreted building, blinding white in the sun on an elevated area overlooking the city and the green-and-violet sea beyond. “The Hotel Nacional de Cuba,” she told them, then repeated it to Bronco and Nita, who were sitting behind her. Jace was across the aisle, sitting next to a man who was bringing sunglasses into the city to hawk on the streets. “Later,” she told Nick. “We will go there later, not looking like this, yes?”

“Yes, okay,” Nick threw over his shoulder. He, Jace and Claire had decided that they would go with her tourists-to-the-hotel plan. But first they were going into the heart of the city to the university area.

“Next stop,” she said. “Here, we get out here.” She shouted “Chofe!” to the bus driver over the noise and got up to lead them to the exit. Nick hefted Lexi, and they straggled out into an area where ficus trees lined the avenues and some lovely old buildings cast sharp shadows.

“This way,” Gina said, starting out with Heck at her side. Nick reminded himself he had to tell him not to answer every question Gina asked, despite her charms. They’d been talking about life in the US most of the way here.

His legs were stiff after sitting tense for so long. Gina turned away from the vista ahead with large homes and the huge main university building beyond, leading them toward a run-down-looking place that must have once been beautiful.

Heck turned back to tell them, “Gina says she can take me later to see the small hotel and hacienda my grandfather owned. She said not to get my hopes up that they look like my family said.”