Liberation Day - A Thorn Byrd Novel

by Dustin Stevens

It was the second time in three days Thorn found himself sprawled out on concrete, sputtering as frigid water sluiced from his body. He remained facedown for several moments, letting the cobwebs recede from his vision before pushing himself up onto his knees and drawing the .44 out in front of him.

  Under the dim light of the moon, gone was any sign of the two trespassers he had dispatched.

  In their place was a solitary figure, his body twisted in a grotesque fashion on the ground.

  “Aw hell,” Thorn muttered, trudging to his feet.

  Keeping the gun in his right hand, Thorn crossed the pier, watching for any sign of movement, before kneeling beside Cyrus’s body. The left arm and right leg were both shattered and contorted at harsh angles. A bullet hole at the base of his skull oozed blood, just inches beneath lifeless eyes staring up at the sky.

  Blowing a breath out through his nose, his body trembling from the air touching his clammy skin, Thorn crossed over to the crane and peered into the cab. As suspected it was deserted, the machine even turned off and the keys left on the seat. He gave a quick pass over the interior for anything that might be left behind, but it was barren.

  With angry resignation, Thorn retreated back and dropped to the ground.

  In front of him stood a man roughly the same age as he, his coal black hair wet and matted to his head. Sopping wet clothes hung lank over a wiry frame, his nose and chin both formed at sharp angles.

  “Is this how you killed my father?” the man asked, his voice thick with contempt.

  Thorn cocked his head and narrowed his eyes at the question, but said nothing. The heft of the gun weighed heavy in his hand, hanging by his side in plain sight.

  “I said, is this how you killed my father?”

  “Yeah, I heard what you said,” Thorn responded, his own voice hard. “I just don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

  The man circled to his left as he spoke, his body trembling with fury. “The other container. Is this how it went? You got them into the country just to drown them like mongrel dogs?”

  Thorn matched the circling motion in turn, his own anger beginning to build. “If that was the case, why did I just save your ass?”

  The man’s eyes blazed at the statement, defiance on his face. “You? Saved my ass?”

  Thorn smirked, though there was no joy in the gesture. “What? You think it was a mermaid that shot the lock off the door? Or did you just power it open yourself?”

  The man opened his mouth to speak but paused, unsure how to respond. Seizing the moment, Thorn motioned toward Cyrus lying between them, gesturing with his chin. “And then I came back up here and killed my partner, too?”

  Again the young man remained silent, acrimony splayed across his features as he stared from Thorn to Cyrus and back again.

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Thorn said, nodding for emphasis, droplets of water falling from the top of his head. He shifted away from the man, raising his voice so it carried into the night. “You can come out now, too. And bring Cyrus’s gun with you.”

  Confusion passed over the man’s face as he stared at Thorn before the sound of heels clicking against the ground drew his attention away. As it did so, the look of revilement faded from his features, realization, shock, and finally chagrin finding their way in.

  “Your sister, I presume, based on the resemblance,” Thorn said, watching as Vanessa emerged from behind a nearby container, walking straight for the man across from him, gun in hand.

  Ignoring the statement, the man kept his attention on Vanessa as she grew closer, his jaw falling slack. “What the hell are you doing here, Isabel?”

  The single sentence confirmed everything Thorn had thought for the last hour. The entire story of stumbling her way onto the docks was fabricated, including even her name. Remaining in place, he watched as she crossed to the man and wrapped one arm around his neck.

  “Isabel, huh?” Thorn said. “I knew you were full of shit.”

  “Worked on you two,” she retorted, the saccharine tone from earlier gone.

  “No, you took advantage of my partner’s embarrassment,” Thorn replied. “But you didn’t have to kill him.”

  Isabel flicked her gaze from Thorn to the body on the ground between them. “I didn’t kill him. I hid until they were gone, then grabbed the gun before you came stumbling back up here like a damned water buffalo.”

  Thorn cast her a wary glance, pausing to let her cool down, knowing that anything he said now would only be met by another smart retort.

  “So then why are you here?”

  His original assessment was correct, as she opened her mouth and raised a finger toward the sky, about to unleash a verbal barrage. Just as fast she stopped, taking pause at his straight-ahead question.

  “Yeah, why are you here?” the man beside her asked, his attention shifted her direction. “And dressed like a damn streetwalker?”

  A look of pure venom passed over her face as she glared at her brother. “You know why I’m here. It’s the same reason you came up a week ago, the same reason Mama will be here this weekend if she doesn’t hear from me.”

  “You shouldn’t have come,” the man snapped. “I can take care of myself.”

  “So could Papi.”

  Sensing that the situation was fast devolving, Thorn cleared his throat. His skin was now dry to the touch, the ocean breeze having pulled the moisture away, though he could feel his core temperature continuing to drop in his wet pants and boots.

  “Not to break up the family moment here, but...” he said, leaving the statement open ended.

  The pair across from him remained in a faceoff for several long moments before shifting toward him, the male taking the lead.

  “My name is Antonio Garcia, this is my sister Isabel,” he said, motioning between them. “Since you work here, I’m sure you know what goes on after dark. Our presence shouldn’t be too much of a surprise.”

  Folding his arms across his chest, the gun still held in his right hand, Thorn looked each of them over.

  Given everything that had just taken place, it wasn’t hard to ascertain what Antonio was alluding to. Still, he would rather hear the words then have to go on any conjecture.

  “I’ve worked here a total of four hours,” Thorn said. “Let’s pretend I don’t know anything.”

  Across from him Isabel snorted, but said nothing.

  “So you don’t know that you’re standing on one of the pre-eminent ports in all of America for smuggling Cubans into the country?” Nio asked, his eyes narrowed.

  “Cubans?” Thorn asked. “As in, illegal immigrants?”

  “No, cigars, you idiot,” Isabel blurted.

  Thorn leveled a hardened glare on her, but remained silent.

  The truth was, even now looking at the two of them, their features unmistakably Hispanic, he never would have guessed that he was standing at the endpoint for a pipeline from Havana. Everything he had ever heard was that Cubans tended to flood in through Florida, assimilating into society there without so much as a passing glance.

  “A steady line of ocean traffic runs from Galveston to Boston,” Nio said, lifting his soaked shirt overhead and dropping it to the ground with a heavy slap of saturated material against concrete. “With the embargo on Cuba, the easiest form of entry is to have a ship swing a little wide along the way.”

  There was much Thorn wanted to ask, holes that needed filled in, but he let it pass. There would be time for that later.

  “So the two of you just came off the island?” he asked.

  Isabel smirked. “You would think that, wouldn’t you?”

  For a moment Thorn thought of telling her to find a corner somewhere to stand on, but held his tongue. Right now they were divulging information, something he sorely needed. It was best to keep them talking, no matter how many times she spouted off at him.

  “No,” Antonio said, taking a half step forward, extending a hand toward his sister. “That’s a fair question.” />
  He turned his head toward Thorn. “And the answer is no. With the exception of myself for the past few days, neither of us has ever been on the island.”

  Thorn remained rooted in place, waiting for him to continue.

  “Several weeks ago our father went to visit. At some point between departing and arriving here, he disappeared.”

  Again Thorn got the impression there were parts of the story that were being left out, but he let it pass. Instead, he turned over his shoulder and examined the few handfuls of people scattered along the pier, some trudging in the opposite direction, others huddled together nearby.

  In total, there appeared to be no more than a dozen.

  “How many boarded?” Thorn asked, nodding toward the people drifting away from them.

  “I don’t know,” Nio replied. “Better part of a hundred anyway.”

  Thorn again scanned over the thin crowd dispersing in front of them, shaking his head at the numbers still trapped on the harbor floor. “What happens to them now?”

  Nio shook his head. “The same thing that happens to every illegal immigrant that survives the trip. They’ll find family or friends if they have them, find work if they don’t.”

  “Damn,” Thorn muttered.

  “Still a hell of a lot better than the island,” Isabel said, earning a nod of agreement from her brother.

  Thorn shifted his attention from the refugees to Nio and Isabel. “And what happens to you?”

  Nio lowered his head to the side and looked at Thorn with a sideways stare. He remained that way for a moment before saying, “Eventually, we’ll find our way back to Miami.”

  The insinuation was none-too-subtle. “Eventually?”

  “You know we can’t leave without knowing,” Nio said, raising his head back up to look straight at Thorn.

  “I can respect that,” Thorn said, “so long as you respect that isn’t my problem.”

  Across from him Isabel took a half-step forward, again raising her finger, ready to berate him. Once more she was cut off by her brother, him stepping forward, putting a hand on her wrist.

  “Meaning?” he asked.

  “Meaning this is my job,” Thorn said. He motioned to Cyrus growing cold between them. “And any second now I have to phone this in. Within a half hour this place is about to be crawling with pissed off Irishmen.”

  The top of Nio’s head rose in a slow nod of acceptance. “We’re Cuban. We’re good at disappearing when we need to.”

  Again the implication was clear, if completely unstated. “I get the feeling I’ll be seeing you both again soon.”

  “And I get the feeling you’re not just a security guard,” Nio replied, meeting the gaze.

  The three stood for another moment, watching as the last of those that survived the container disappeared into the night. Once they were gone, Thorn looked down again at his fallen partner before following the trail of water left drying along the pier.

  A few steps down he turned, walking backwards. He hooked a thumb at his chest and said, “Thorn Byrd.”

  “Seriously?” Isabel asked, no small hint of surprise in her voice. “Did your parents hate you or something?

  “Nio,” the man called, cutting things off before Thorn could reply. “Short for Antonio Garcia. And you can call her Iggy.”

  “No, he can’t!” Isabel snapped, the sound of a hand hitting flesh sounding out.

  “Iggy it is,” Thorn muttered, shifting to face front, his mind already working on the next steps before him.

  Chapter Nineteen