And then Jose had a hand on her arm and was turning her toward him, roughly, urgently, as if something had gone wrong.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Volkes took a sip from his martini, just the smallest sip, just to have the taste of cold vodka on his tongue. Not far from him, the great Roberto Anzar continued to wear out the balcony’s floor with his pacing, and filled the air with mutterings about his daughter, his godchild, all his fear and negativity pouring out. When the phone rang again, Volkes had it instantly to his ear. The voice this time was rushed, almost panicky, and behind it he could hear sirens and shouting, and then moving air as if his source were running for his life along a city sidewalk. He listened to the words, made his man repeat them, and then heard the line go dead, and felt, in the center of himself, a caving in, as if the weight of age—held at a distance by his will—was now suddenly pressing down on his internal organs. He hit a button on the phone and three seconds later said, “Tell the pilot it is not the port. I say again, Not the port! Tell him to make a landing as close to the plaza as he can get. Tell them to get our girl out of there—I don’t care who they have to kill. Get everyone you can over there, instantly. Get her out. Now!”
Before he’d even closed the connection he could feel Anzar beside him, practically breathing on his face. He made himself turn and look into the brown eyes, alight with a terrible fury now. He felt himself shaking inside, just the most subtle of tremors, as if an old oak beam that bore the weight of a building was beginning to fail. “There is the chance,” he said, as calmly as he could manage, “just a chance, Roberto, that the cream either did not work, or worked only partially. Castro has been taken by ambulance to the hospital. The word I have is that he is gravely ill, and that Olochon is dead.”
“Gravely ill?” Anzar hissed. “Not dead?”
“No, not dead. Not yet dead.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ROLAND MERULLO lives with his wife and daughters in Massachusetts. This is his eleventh book. You can read more about him at RolandMerullo.com.
OTHER BOOKS BY ROLAND MERULLO
American Savior (2008)
Breakfast with Buddha (2007)
Golfing with God (2005)
A Little Love Story (2005)
In Revere, In Those Days (2002)
Revere Beach Elegy (2000)
Passion for Golf (2000)
Revere Beach Boulevard (1998)
A Russian Requiem (1993)
Leaving Losapas (1991)
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2008 by Roland Merullo
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Shaye Areheart Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
Shaye Areheart Books with colophon is a registered trademark of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Merullo, Roland.
Fidel’s last days / by Roland Merullo.—1st ed.
1. Americans—Cuba—Fiction. 2. Castro, Fidel, 1926—Fiction.
3. Havana (Cuba)—Fiction. 4. Miami (Fla.)—Fiction. 5. United States—
Relations—Cuba—Fiction. 6. Political fiction. I. Title.
PS3563.E748F53 2008
813’.54—dc22 2008021278
eISBN: 978-0-307-45175-0
v3.0
Fidel's Last Days Page 22