Hot Schemes

by Sherryl Woods

  Having had a close encounter with the dogs herself, Molly understood their concern. “Did they have a lot of visitors? Had you ever seen the guy who shot at the place today before?”

  “I suppose it’s possible he’s been around. The guy seemed to have friends here at all hours. We thought maybe he was into drugs or something. I mean, that’s what I told my husband the very first week they lived there, what with all the coming and going. In fact, when I first heard all the gunfire, I thought maybe it was the start of one of those cocaine lab explosions I’ve seen on the news.”

  “And you’d never reported your suspicions to the police?”

  “Hey, around here we try to mind our own business. It’s safer that way. Besides, none of us ever really saw anything. It wasn’t like he was collecting money in the street.”

  Molly nodded. “I see what you mean. Just think how you’d feel if you turned someone in and the only thing he was guilty of was keeping late hours. So,” she added nonchalantly, “what kind of car was this guy driving today?”

  The woman shrugged. “Are you kidding me? I can’t tell a Jeep from a Jaguar. Made my husband put a bright yellow sunflower on our antenna so I could find our car in the parking lot at the mall.”

  “I think it might have been a Chevy,” a young Hispanic woman offered hesitantly. “My brother has a car that looks exactly like it, only his is that pretty bright blue color and this one was white.”

  A white Chevrolet, Molly thought triumphantly. Exactly like the one Herman Gómez-Ortega had been driving when they followed him from Pedro’s restaurant.

  She shook her head sorrowfully. “Jeez, it’s getting so no place is safe anymore, isn’t it? I think I’ll go talk to the cops and see if they think this was some random thing or a hit.”

  One of the younger mothers shivered and held her baby a little tighter. “You think it could have been random, like somebody who might come back to the neighborhood?”

  Molly immediately felt guilty. “No. I mean it almost has to be someone who was after the people who lived in that house, don’t you think?”

  “I wonder if that was why they moved out?” another of the women speculated. “Because they knew someone was after them?”

  “All I can say is it’s lucky for them they did,” Molly’s primary source observed. “This time of day, the kids were usually inside taking a nap in the front bedroom and the woman was watching some soap opera on TV right by that window that got blasted out.”

  This time Molly shuddered right along with them. She glanced toward Michael and wondered if he’d found out about the car. She doubted it. All the witnesses were women and all of them were over here. Obviously the police were too busy inside to worry about chatting with the neighbors yet. She decided it was time to take her piece of information and go.

  “I’ll let you know if I find out anything from the police,” she said, and walked back across the street.

  When she finally got Michael’s attention, he joined her beside her car. “I think it’s time to run a Department of Motor Vehicles check on Herman,” she suggested.

  He grinned. “Oh, you do, do you? Who died and left you in charge of a police investigation?”

  She frowned at the sarcasm. “It just occurred to me that you might want to see where he lives and what kind of car he drives.”

  “I know what kind of car he drives. I was following him, remember?”

  “Oh, I’d be willing to bet that the car he was in today was not his,” she said, advancing a theory that had struck her as she crossed the street.

  His gaze narrowed. “Why the hell would you say that?”

  “Would you drive your own car if you intended to try to murder someone in broad daylight?”

  He regarded her in stunned amazement. “What the hell did those women tell you?”

  “Not much,” she said modestly. “They did describe the car of the assailant as being a white Chevrolet. Isn’t that the kind of car we were tailing?”

  Michael’s approving expression lasted for half a heartbeat, before he looked more puzzled than ever. “But why would Gómez-Ortega want to kill Paredes? I thought they were coconspirators.”

  “Guess not,” Molly said smugly.

  “Unless he knew that Paredes had moved out, knew it was safe to blast away, and just wanted to create a diversion from whatever is really going on,” Michael said thoughtfully.

  Molly sighed. “Damn, you’ve done it again.”

  “Done what?”

  “Turned all devious on me, just when I had things figured out all logically.”

  “It’s not my deviousness you need to worry about, amiga. We’re trying to think like the bad guys.”

  “That’s what worries me,” she said. “You do it so well. It’s bound to rub off.”

  Michael called police headquarters and had Felipe run the DMV check on Gómez-Ortega. When Felipe called back as they were driving away from the scene, he confirmed Molly’s guess. Gómez-Ortega didn’t own a white Chevy or anything that might have been mistaken for one. He had, however, leased one from a small rental car agency on South Dixie Highway, an independent company that was less likely to ask questions or keep records. Unfortunately for Herman, the trail was still hot when Felipe called.

  “Are we going to question him?” Molly asked hopefully.

  “Nope. Felipe’s offered to have a chat with him. You and I are going to get all dressed up and meet José López.”

  “But we’re not meeting him until nine o’clock,” Molly protested.

  “With the distractions I have in mind, amiga, it will take you that long to get ready.”

  • • •

  The salsa beat was seductive. Celia Cruz might be an aging songstress, but she knew exactly how to capture her audience with the passion and soul of her music. People around Molly, Michael, and José López were on their feet, swaying to the provocative rhythm. Molly would have been totally caught up in it herself if it hadn’t been for Michael sitting there impatiently tapping a silver spoon on the table. She knew it was impatience, because he wasn’t even close to the music’s beat.

  Señor Lopez, in contrast, couldn’t have been happier. In fact, he hadn’t looked this pleased when he’d won the dominoes game the day before. His expression was dreamy, as if Celia Cruz’s music had reached his soul and transported him back to late-night Havana.

  When the set finally ended, the old man dragged his attention from the stage down front in the crowded supper club to Michael. “Your mother was even better,” he said. “She sang like a lark. Everyone who heard fell a little in love with her.”

  Michael appeared startled. “I don’t recall ever hearing her sing.”

  “Perhaps not. After she fell in love and your father left her, I think the romance went out of her soul.”

  Molly sensed Michael tensing beside her. She caught a fleeting glimpse of guilt, as if Rosa Huerta’s loss of romance were his responsibility. How often, she wondered, had he blamed himself just for being born?

  “It is Miguel I want to talk about,” Michael said stiffly. “Tell me what you recall of my uncle.”

  “Miguel García was a dreamer. When Fidel began to talk of a better future for the masses, Miguel was one of the first we knew to embrace his words. He had seen firsthand the struggles of so many of our people to rise above poverty. He dreamed that a classless society was possible.”

  “What happened to change his mind?”

  “Like so many of us, he quickly grew disenchanted when he saw the military force that would be used to make change. It grew worse when he saw that Fidel sought power almost as greedily as he sought change, and worse yet when he saw land and businesses seized indiscriminately. Then, when he saw brothers fighting against brothers, much as they did in this country’s Civil War, he rebelled. As he had been among the first to join Fidel’s cause, he was also among the first to seek his overthrow. It was only by the grace of Almighty God that he escaped with his life. He brought that passionate ha
tred for Fidel to this country. He holds himself partly accountable for all that went wrong in Cuba. All these years he has seethed with the need to make things right.”

  Michael seemed to be struggling to understand such powerful emotions. “He would do anything, then?”

  “Anything,” the old man agreed.

  “Including taking part in a foolhardy invasion even less likely to be successful than the Bay of Pigs?”

  “Ideals are not something you give up in the face of hardship. The odds would not have deterred him, not if there were even the slimmest margin of hope.”

  “Has Paredes staged such an attack?” Michael asked, though he looked no more hopeful of a straightforward response now than before.

  “This is not for me to say. You have asked him this, yes? What did he say?”

  “He denied knowledge of it.” Michael pinned the old man with a piercing gaze. “But he would deny it, even if it were true, wouldn’t he? He would deny it because he knows it is a violation of the Neutrality Act to stage a paramilitary attack on Cuba from American soil.”

  As she listened, Molly had a sudden terrifying thought. “Señor, how would Paredes and the others feel about one of their people working for the newspaper they regard with such hatred?”

  For the first time since they’d sat down at the table, José López looked as uneasy as he had on the first day they’d questioned him. Michael clearly recognized that uneasiness.

  “Well, Señor?” he prodded.

  “There are some who might view it as traitorous. But,” he added quickly, “they are extremists, and there are few of them.”

  “It only takes one,” Michael said quietly. He leveled another look at López. “I want names of those who might have considered my uncle such a traitor. Would Paredes himself have felt that way?”

  Señor López looked pale, even in the restaurant’s dim light. “I have heard him say such things, yes.”

  “But he would not personally have acted on his opinion, would he?” Molly asked.

  The old man shook his head. “No, but there are always those who will do anything to please a leader such as Paredes. These men are anxious for violence. They see spies and traitors everywhere.”

  Michael covered the old man’s hand. “Names, Señor. For the sake of your good friend, I want you to give me names.”

  López seemed to struggle with his conscience. “I cannot,” he said sorrowfully. “I am making my own inquiries, but I cannot help you with yours.”

  Michael regarded him shrewdly. “Perhaps your own name should be on that list,” he suggested.

  A tear spilled down José Lopez’s cheek. “Miguel was my friend,” he said softly. “Again and again I told him he was embracing the enemy with that damnable job of his, but he would not hear it. He said putting food on his family’s table did not constitute a betrayal of the cause.”

  He lifted his watery gaze to meet Michael’s. “But I did not harm him,” he said emphatically. “I could no more have harmed Miguel than taken a gun to my own head. No, my friend, if you think I am capable of that, you are a fool and you are wasting precious time.”

  “It is not I who waste it, but you,” Michael said accusingly.

  “I am doing what I can.” He reached for his crutches then and hobbled away from the table, his shoulders stiff with pride and anger.

  Molly exchanged a glance with Michael. “Do you think he was telling the truth?”

  “About not being involved in my uncle’s disappearance? Probably. About not knowing who was involved? No. I believe he knows or suspects.”

  “Why wouldn’t he tell you, then?”

  “And betray the goddamned cause?” Michael said angrily. “Can’t you see that he would go to his death first?”

  “It is a code of honor among them,” Molly reminded him.

  “And under other circumstances, perhaps I could admire it. With my uncle’s life at stake, amiga, I cannot afford to.”

  CHAPTER

  SIXTEEN

  When they got back to Michael’s townhouse, Molly was the one who spotted the blinking light on his answering machine. Five messages.

  “Michael, it’s Jorge Martinez,” began the first disembodied voice. “I just wanted to let you know we didn’t pick up anyone in the Straits today, just a couple of empty rafts, the makeshift kind, not anything Miguel would have been on. Sorry, amigo. I will go up again myself tomorrow. Call if you’ve had any word.”

  “Damn,” Michael muttered. “I should have been out there when they came in.”

  “For what? The bad news? You’re doing your part to break the case, while they do theirs. They understand that.”

  “I suppose,” he said as the second message began.

  “O’Hara, it’s Felipe. Call me at headquarters when you get in. I’ve had a chat with Herman. He claims to have no idea where you got the information that he had anything to do with the attack on Paredes’s home. He swears he left your uncle’s restaurant, stopped to make a call, then cut through Coral Gables to take the car back to the rental agency on Dixie Highway. I can’t prove otherwise, because there’s no exact time listed for his check-in. Ken said he’d go down and do a search of the car for some trace of gunpowder or shell casings if you want him to. Let me know how you want me to follow up. Should I turn this over to the investigating officers on the Paredes incident?”

  Michael sank into a chair and held his head. “Damn, we’re drawing blanks everywhere.”

  The next message began. “Michael, this is Pedro. Call Pilar’s when you get in. I am worried about her. She has gone to her bed and won’t speak to anyone.”

  “Terrific,” he muttered, hitting the off button on the machine before it could play the remaining messages. “That’s just great. Now Pilar is going to have a breakdown.”

  Molly stood behind him and massaged his shoulders. “Bed is probably the best place for her. She hasn’t rested since this all began.”

  “She’s not resting, dammit. She’s sinking into a depression.”

  “Then we’ll just have to come up with good news to snap her out of it.”

  Michael reached up and put a hand over hers. “I appreciate your optimism, amiga, but I think it is misguided.”

  Molly turned the answering machine back on. “There are two more messages. Either one of them could be the break we need.”

  The first, however, was a call from Bianca. Molly bristled when she heard the name. Bianca was the woman with whom Michael had been living when Molly had first met him.

  “I am so worried about you,” she said in a low, seductive voice that set Molly’s teeth on edge. It didn’t seem to matter that she was here and the other woman was not.

  “Please call me and tell me what I can do to help,” the message continued. “I spoke with your mother today and she said you are exhausted. Por favor, mi amor, let me do something.”

  Molly stopped the tape, her gaze pinned on Michael’s face. It betrayed no emotion at the sound of his old lover’s voice. “Do you want to call her?”

  He seemed startled by the question. “For what? It is over between us.”

  “This is a crisis. Obviously she would like to help.”

  “And my calling would send her the wrong message. It is best to leave things as they are.” He touched Molly’s cheek. “Do not looked so worried, amiga, you have nothing to fear from Bianca.”

  “I wasn’t worried.”

  His lips curved slightly. “If you say so.”

  Because it was not a statement she cared to examine any more closely, Molly punched the button to listen to the last message. It was from Walt Hazelton for her.

  “I’ll be at the paper until midnight or one. Call me.” There was a sense of urgency in his voice.

  “See, I told you that a break was just around the corner,” she said triumphantly. “I’ll bet he’s learned something.”

  “Or he’s trying to pick your brain.”

  “For what?”

  “To discov
er what we’ve learned today.”

  “Then he’ll be disappointed, won’t he?”

  When she got the correspondent on the line, he said, “I just wanted to be sure you’d heard about what happened out at Paredes’s place this afternoon.”

  Offer of information or sneaky ploy? She supposed the reporter’s statement might indicate there was some truth to Michael’s cynical suggestion. Molly was willing to play along for the moment. “I was out there right after it happened.”

  “Then you know he’d moved out,” he said.

  “Yes. Any idea where he is?”

  “I’ve been making calls all afternoon. He’s disappeared without a trace. My sources have clammed up completely. My sense is that something big is about to break.”

  “Like what? An attempted overthrow of Castro?”

  “Could be that or could be another Mariel situation, when the floodgates open. Washington’s been working on an emergency plan to cope with another influx of exiles from Cuba or Haiti for months now. If O’Hara picks up anything on Paredes’s whereabouts, will you let me know?”

  “I’ll do my best,” Molly said, resigned to the fact that Hazelton knew no more than she did at this point. She was ready to hang up when it occurred to her that the correspondent could save her a lot of time digging into Herman Gomez-Ortega’s background. She mentioned his name.

  “Why do you ask?”

  At a warning look from Michael, she hedged her answer. “Turns out he and Miguel were friends. He didn’t particularly strike me as the friendly type.”

  “He’s a mean son of a bitch, actually. He and Paredes are like two peas in a pod, though Herman has more of a reputation for violence. He’s been head of military operations for the Paredes organization, though he would deny that. There was talk for a while that he was also the mastermind behind some bombing incidents targeting Cuban diplomats. People in Washington keep a very close eye on him. To hear him tell it, though, he is nothing more than a simple businessman, trying to live out his remaining years in peace.”