But once started, the process could not easily be undone.
•
FROM THE GET-GO, the prosecution was fraught with difficulties. There was no budget for a full-scale military action. The arrests would have to be handled by the FBI, using the utmost discretion and respect for the affected islanders. A small number of National Guard troops had been allocated to provide support, but they had been told they were unlikely to see any action and that they were essentially going on a tropical vacation.
Wendy had met up with the FBI team when the navy vessel docked at the cruise ship pier earlier that morning. As the justice department liaison, she had been on-site ever since, monitoring events.
So far, her reports had not brought good news.
Snippets of their phone conversations, the last one ended moments before, replayed in the attorney general’s head.
“It looks like two senators managed to escape from the Legislature Building, Bobo and Sanchez.”
The AG had stroked his chin, pondering. “Well, that’s not so bad. They were low on our list of priorities anyway.”
The next call had caused him to fluster.
“A couple of local DJs are stirring things up with their on-air commentary. I’m afraid they’re calling this a federal invasion.”
“I thought we had clearance to shut down all local broadcasts while the feds were moving in. Why are they still on the air? KRAT? What kind of a radio station goes by the call letters of a rodent?”
The third report generated stomach-churning consternation.
“Hightower arrested the wrong governor!? How did that happen? Doesn’t he know what the man looks like?”
The last call, he had received with exhausted resignation.
“A flight from Miami just landed? How did they get clearance to take off from Florida? Should you send them back? No, that’ll get too complicated. Let the people off the plane, but tell them the city’s been shut down. Make them register their whereabouts. We’ve got bigger problems to deal with.”
The mental recap caused the AG to dig divots into the side of his head.
He directed his next comment to the framed photo of the retriever.
“The Brits would never have called it Operation Coconut.”
Groaning, he pulled open a desk drawer and broke the seal on a fresh bottle of pink tablets.
Cyril E. King Airport
St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands
~ 23 ~
A Bumpy Landing
OF THE 146 passengers on board the Miami flight as it landed on the bumpy runway at the St. Thomas airport, no one was happier to see the approaching ground than the woman in seat 26E.
The author leaned forward at the welcome screech of brakes, relieved beyond words as she felt the forceful drag of the upturned wing flaps.
The two-and-a-half-hour flight from Miami had stretched on interminably. At one point, she had unbuckled, squeezed around the Mojito Man, staggered up the aisle, and shut herself inside the bathroom, just to have a few minutes respite from his ongoing chatter.
Earphones were no use. There was no setting loud enough to drown out his persistent commentary, which vacillated among three main topics: the graphic details of his painful illness, the gruesome means he might use to hasten his impending death, and—by far the most disturbing—his attempts to lure the writer into a romantic rendezvous.
“Why don’t you join me for dinner tonight on St. Thomas? I’ll take you somewhere nice.”
The woman fixed a blank expression on her face, hoping he would think she hadn’t heard the question—to no avail.
“I’ll pay,” he insisted, undeterred. “I’ve got plenty of money and just a few weeks left to live.” He paused for a mojito-scented burp. “No point in holding back now. I can’t take it with me.”
He waited through only a short silence before trying another tack.
“I’ve booked a room at Blackbeard’s Castle. It’s a nice place up on a hill. Great views. You could stay with me for a while. Come on, what do you say?”
She pulled the earphones from her head.
“I’m headed to St. John,” she replied tersely. It wasn’t the first time she had tried to convey this information. The geographical distance and intervening span of water between the two islands appeared not to faze him.
“How about dinner, eh? I’ll take you to the nicest restaurant on St. Thomas. I’ve got wads of cash to spend, and not much time to do it in.”
He paused, a faraway look in his sunken gray eyes, but after constant repetition, the accompanying phrase had lost all dramatic effect.
“Within a few weeks, I’ll be dead.”
•
“UH, WELL, BYE-BYE, then,” the author said to her seatmate as she hurried down the rollaway steps that had been pushed next to the plane’s side door.
She sprinted across the tarmac to the terminal, her backpack swinging from her shoulders, her suitcase bumping wildly across the asphalt.
A frail voice called after her.
“Come see me at Blackbeard’s!”
Her muttered reply was directed at the pavement.
“Not on your life, buddy.”
•
A QUICK DEPARTURE for the St. John ferry, however, was not to be.
Uniformed policemen blocked the terminal entrance. One of them held up a stern hand, halting the author at the doorway.
“St. Thomas is on lockdown. You need to stop here and register.”
“Excuse me. What?”
“The US government has temporarily taken control of the island.”
“What?” she asked again, this time in stunned disbelief.
“Which hotel are you staying at?” he asked, clearly wishing to avoid another “what.” “We can only allow you to go directly to your hotel, nothing more.”
“But I’m staying on St. John,” she said, a lump growing in her stomach.
“No ferries are leaving today, miss. Talk to the woman organizing the taxis. She can get you a room in Charlotte Amalie.”
Woefully, the author walked outside to the taxi stand.
“Where are you headed?” the matron asked, tapping a pencil against her clipboard.
“Anywhere but Blackbeard’s Castle,” she replied with a groan.
•
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, the author watched in despair as the Mojito Man joined her in the line of people waiting for a local taxi. The drivers wouldn’t leave the airport until they had accumulated five or six passengers who were heading into the city.
The midmorning sun beat down like a hammer, as relentless as her sickly suitor.
The Bishop breezed past the taxi line, following a private driver to a waiting car. The author stared numbly at the swishing brown cassock, trying to ignore her traveling companion’s jubilant greeting.
“Hey there, partner. You look like you could use a drink!”
The Governor’s Mansion
Overlooking Charlotte Amalie
~ 24 ~
The First Lady
THE FIRST LADY of the US Virgin Islands sat on a bench in the gardens outside the Governor’s Mansion, sipping a glass of iced tea as she watched the last commercial flight from Miami land at the St. Thomas airport. The short runway on the south shore was just visible from the mansion’s elevated perch above Charlotte Amalie.
Formally known as Villa Catherineberg, the chalk-white mansion occupied the summit of one of the city’s flanking hills. Anchored in place by red retainer walls, the property sat behind a tasteful line of security fencing. Stately columns and a wide portico that looked out over the harbor completed the typically tranquil scene.
A ring of tropical greenery isolated the mansion from the high-density housing that crowded the rest of Charlotte Amalie. Accessed by a curving asphalt road that swept around the
hill, the estate presented the image of an elegant retreat.
Today, however, the property was under siege.
•
THE FIRST LADY set her glass down on a decorative iron table next to her chair and took inventory of the personnel now occupying the residence.
An armed guard stood watch less than ten feet away. He was a member of the regular entourage that protected the first family, so at least his was a trusted face—as evidenced by the relaxed attitudes of her two Chihuahuas. The dogs, both wearing jeweled collars, played in the grass near her feet.
Additional guards from the territory’s regiment manned the front gates and strolled the grounds, but there was little pretense that they were monitoring the hillside for potential intruders. Their attention was focused inward, on the black-clad invaders who had swarmed the premises.
The FBI agents had arrived about an hour earlier, rolling up to the front gates in a convoy of black SUVs. After a tense standoff with the gate attendants, they had grudgingly been admitted—to the fierce barks and threatening growls of the Chihuahuas.
The First Lady had been excluded from the long list of federal indictments, and she had offered no response when the agents informed her of her husband’s arrest. Nor had she expressed surprise when the agents later announced he had eluded capture. As to the questions they put to her about where he might be hiding, she simply replied, “I don’t know.”
•
THE FIRST LADY had been placed under surveillance in case the Governor attempted to contact her. She was, in effect, a prisoner in her own home—a home she was likely to lose in the coming days, if not hours, whether or not the FBI managed to track down her husband.
The couple owned a private estate on the island’s west end, a lavish but much more homey abode.
By contrast, the official mansion had the feel of a museum. Priceless artwork adorned the walls, and plush carpets covered the marble floors. Its primary function was to serve as a venue for hosting foreign dignitaries and for other government-related entertainment.
She and her husband had sprinkled only a few personal touches around the place: a couple of knickknacks, a handful of family photos, and a backgammon set her husband had recently purchased.
For the life of her, she couldn’t understand his sudden fascination with the game. She’d always seen it as an excuse for old men to sit around and gossip. She’d said as much after he’d spent an afternoon staring at his new board and the various checker pieces.
“This is a game of strategy,” he’d replied. “An exercise of the mind.”
If it was exercise he was after, she thought wryly, he would have been far better served by a jog down the hill and back.
•
IT WAS HER strategizing husband who had suggested they reside full-time in the Governor’s Mansion over the past several months. He reasoned the move might prevent a full-scale invasion of their private quarters. So far, his plan had worked. Only a few federal agents had been sent to secure their estate.
The morning’s coup had been anticipated for weeks. It was an eventuality for which the First Lady was well prepared. She was an emotionally solid woman, beautiful but sturdy, and not easily unsettled.
Picking up her iced tea for another cooling sip, she turned her gaze south toward St. Croix, the long flat island of her birth located about forty miles away. Obscured by the sky’s thickening haze, the landmass wasn’t visible that day, even from her hilltop overlook. That made no difference; she was tethered to her homeland by a force stronger than sight.
The First Lady was fiercely proud of her Crucian heritage. True to her roots, she had an independent spirit, and her relationship with the Governor was rarely tranquil. Despite their fiery exchanges, she was deeply devoted to her husband.
Their enemies would have to do far worse than this to break them, she resolved as she stared across the cupped hillsides at another prominent landmark of only slightly lower elevation than the mansion.
Black-clad agents scurried across the one-way street in front of Government House. One of the foreigners strolled onto the balcony outside her husband’s office.
Her fingers wrapped around the glass, the only sign of tension in her otherwise composed figure.
She was willing to do anything to protect the Governor’s legacy.
If she had to marshal her home resources, so be it.
The Caribbean Sea
Midway Between St. Croix and St. Thomas
~ 25 ~
A Bullet for Every Occasion
THE CARIBBEAN SEA stretched across the horizon, a sapphire fan dotted with brown hues of submerged coral and rafts of floating seaweed. A heavy blue sky pressed against the water, the upper atmosphere streaked with plodding elephant clouds.
A midsized powerboat cut across the open sea, churning a foamy wake as it sped north toward St. Thomas.
The boat was functional and fast, the typical white-painted vessel common throughout the region. No bright decals or signature stripe marks decorated its hull; the generic design was easy to maintain and intentionally indistinguishable—unlike the man who stood at its helm.
Nova gripped the boat’s front railing, his arms flexed like oiled pistons. Barefoot and brazen, he let the salty spray mist his skin.
He was joined by his ever-present team of brutes, Crucian toughs who followed his lead without question or complaint. It had only taken a couple of hours to round them up. They had quickly signed on for the trip to the Rock—and for anything else he commanded them to do once they arrived at their sister island.
A fearsome aura surrounded Casanova. The tales of his strength and cunning far exceeded his actual capabilities, but this was of no concern to the man at the center of the myth. He believed his own propaganda, a trait that made him all the more dangerous even as he flirted ever closer with disaster.
The boat hit a wave, leapt out of the water, and bounced down with a splash. Nova licked his lips, tasting the salt.
He envisioned himself a modern-day pirate, a mercenary for hire with allegiance to no one but himself. His natural advantages of physique and appearance entitled him to inflict misery upon others.
A deviant smile spread across his face.
He had left the nervous taxi driver behind at the Christiansted pier. The man from Nevis had been released from his unpaid chauffer duties—if only temporarily.
“I’ll send word when I’m headed back,” Nova had admonished darkly. “You’ll meet me here at the boardwalk.” He paused for a wink, a gesture that caused Nevis to shrink behind the taxi van’s steering wheel. “That is, unless I happen to run into the Coconut Boys while I’m taking care of my other business on the Rock.”
Still smiling, Nova reached inside his pants pocket and pulled out a handful of bullets. He rolled the smooth metal in his fingers, savoring the feel of the familiar round rods.
His parting comment had been more than just a cruel tease. He’d heard a rumor that the Coconut Boys had fled to St. Thomas. They certainly weren’t hiding out on Santa Cruz—if they were, someone would have given him their location by now.
He selected two bullets and slid the rest back into his pocket. Holding up the metal casings, he tilted the points so that they glinted in the morning sun.
The Governor was the main focus of this trip, but if he could kill two birds with one stone, all the better.
“I’m sure she wouldn’t mind a little multitasking,” he murmured, thinking of the woman who had hired his services.
“This one’s for Mic,” he said, tapping his thumb against the far right rod.
Squinting at the shadow of St. Thomas in the distance, he shifted his thumb to caress the other casing.
“And this one’s for Currie.”
Coki Beach
St. Thomas
~ 26 ~
The Coconut Boys
; IT WAS A lazy morning at Coki Beach. News of the turmoil in Charlotte Amalie had yet to reach St. Thomas’s sleepy north shore. As the sun inched toward its midday zenith, the angled rays cast frond-shaped shadows across the sand where two scruffy West Indians sat enjoying the breeze.
“Currie-mon, can you get us a drink?”
Grimacing at the “mon” affectation, a stubby man—the shorter of the pair—popped up from his seat and walked over to a grove of coconut trees.
Currie selected a tree, grabbed a rusty machete, and hoisted himself up the curved trunk, expertly gripping the grooved bark with his bare feet. The palm’s spindly frame bent and swayed as he reached the top. Wrapping his legs around the trunk, he dropped the rest of his body so that he could access the coconuts bunched beneath the crown of fronds.
The machete’s ragged blade swung through the air, knocking loose a pair of green nuts that fell, one after the other, with a loud thunk onto the sand.
Currie slid halfway down the tree and then dropped the rest of the way, landing safely on the ground. Picking up the closest piece of fruit, he lopped off the top and took a sip of the watery juice inside. He swirled the liquid in his mouth, as if evaluating the flavor. With a satisfied nod, he passed the coconut to his long-legged friend.
“Here you go, Mic.”
“Thanks, Currie-mon.”
Currie rolled his eyes.
“No problem,” he replied and then added under his breath, “mon.”
•
RUNAWAYS MIC AND Currie had settled into their new life at Coki Beach, a popular tourist spot on the island’s northeast shore. The Crucian pair had been living on St. Thomas for the past couple of months—ever since their dramatic departure from St. Croix.
Coki was a pleasurable place to camp out, with several leafy trees to sleep under when it rained, and an abundance of coconuts, which provided basic sustenance. Deep sand led to crystal-clear water with excellent snorkeling. Directly offshore, the blocking length of Thatch Cay protected the cove from the Atlantic’s bigger waves.
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