Chapter 35
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Havana, Cuba
The streets of Havana burned all around them. Smoke coiled up from rooftops and trash fires, staining the night air with the stench of melting plastic and scorched concrete. The acrid smell cut through the humidity and clung to everything.
He called to Lizzy over the noise. “Keep moving.”
He stayed close to the rear of their tight formation.
Glass crunched under his boots with every step.
His gaze swept the skyline, jagged now with collapsed rooftops and buildings missing whole chunks of structure.
Sirens wailed two blocks over, pitch rising and falling like wounded animals.
Somewhere close by, a dog barked once and fell silent.
“How much farther?” Lizzy’s fear squeezed her voice box and softened her tone to barely audible.
“Not far,” Drake answered.
The blackout held. No streetlights pierced the darkness. No traffic signals blinked warnings. The flicker of flames dancing in windows and the sharp edge of panic bleeding through every side street threatening to grow into violence like tossing a burning match onto spilled gasoline.
Drake moved fast up ahead. He cut left across a narrow alley that skirted a boarded-up cantina. The metal security grate rattled in the wind.
“This way,” he said, gesturing for them to follow.
Lizzy hurried behind him, arms pumping, breath coming short and ragged. She hadn’t complained once since they had left the abandoned factory.
Flint was impressed. She was tough. Scared, yes. But steady.
“You okay back there?” Drake called.
“Fine,” Lizzy replied. “Just keep going.”
Flint scanned for threats behind them. This time, he noticed unusual movement in the shadows. Two men, maybe three, keeping pace but not closing. They moved too carefully for civilians running from a disaster.
Which meant they were being followed.
Drake came to a sudden halt at the mouth of a cross street.
“Crap,” he muttered under his breath.
When Flint caught up he saw the checkpoint.
Cuban military trucks were angled across the road, forming a wall of steel.
No soldiers were visible on the ground, but the mounted guns were manned.
A spotlight scanned the area, sweeping from building to building like a searchlight from an old prison movie.
They couldn’t advance any closer to the harbor.
“Can we go around?” Lizzy whispered.
“No. Back,” Flint said quietly, gesturing. “Same way we came.”
Drake turned without another word and Lizzy followed. The smell of rotting garbage and motor oil rose from the gutters as they walked along the alley.
They emerged onto a side street slick with rain and leaked fuel.
An argument was raging half a block down. Two men shouted in Spanish on a stoop beside a tiny corner market. Between them, an old, beat-up sedan idled at the curb. The engine coughed and wheezed, but it continued to run.
The driver’s side door hung wide open.
“What do you think?” Drake asked.
“Yeah,” Flint replied. “Take it.”
Drake didn’t hesitate. He slid into the front seat and threw it into gear. The transmission whined.
“Get in,” Flint told Lizzy.
Flint opened the rear door and shoved Lizzy inside, then climbed in behind her and yanked the door shut.
“This is stealing,” Lizzy said. “Stealing isn’t tolerated here. You’ll go to prison.”
“We’re just borrowing the car. We’ll leave it at the harbor, and he can pick it up,” Flint replied. “We won’t be back to face charges.”
Shouts erupted behind them. A bottle shattered against the car’s trunk. Glass exploded in a spray of amber fragments. Drake gunned the engine and pulled away. The tires slipped on broken pavement.
“Hang on,” Drake called out as he pressed the accelerator and fled.
Flint glanced through the rear window. One of the men from the stoop was pointing at the car and yelling. A helmeted rider on a motorcycle pulled out, phone raised to catch the license plate and a glimpse of passengers.
“Drake,” Flint said. “We’ve got a tail.”
“I see him.”
“What do we do?” Lizzy asked.
“We outrun them,” Drake said.
The vehicle sped through the dark streets as fast as possible. The sedan was underpowered, rattling at every turn, but it ran. The smell of hot metal and burning oil seeped through the vents. For now, that was enough.
A second motorcycle appeared in the rearview mirror. Sleeker, faster than the first. Both riders gained on them, weaving through debris scattered across the asphalt.
“They’re getting closer,” Lizzy said.
“Hold steady,” Flint said to Drake.
He rolled down the window. Hot air rushed in, thick with smoke and the smell of fear-sweat from the crowds lining the sidewalks. He leaned out, braced his elbow on the window frame, and sighted down the short barrel of his sidearm.
The lead rider was close now. Ten yards. Five. Flint could see the man’s face beneath the helmet visor.
Flint fired once. The shot echoed off the buildings and debris.
The bike wobbled, veered hard left, and crashed into a pile of rubble. Chunks of concrete and a cloud of dust flew in all directions. The rider tumbled over the handlebars and landed hard. He didn’t move.
The second bike peeled off and vanished into the smoke like a ghost.
“Nice,” Drake muttered. “But they’ll be back.”
They reached the edge of the harbor minutes later. The stench here was different. Salt and diesel fuel mixed with the smell of rotting fish and tar.
“Kill the lights,” Flint said.
“Copy that,” Drake said as he cut the lights and coasted through a shadowed service lane behind a crumbling freight terminal.
The building’s corrugated metal siding was streaked with rust and peppered with bullet holes.
“There,” Drake said, pointing ahead.
A rusted crane loomed to the left. Beyond it, the docks came into view. Angled piers stretched into the dark water like broken fingers.
Derelict shipping containers were stacked in haphazard towers. Dark water stretched beyond the seawall, reflecting the orange glow of fires burning in the city.
“That’s our ride?” Lizzy asked.
“Yep.” Drake killed the engine. They slid out of the sedan and moved quickly across surfaces slick with fuel and condensation.
“Stay quiet from here,” Flint whispered.
They hugged the metal siding of the nearest warehouse, staying in the shadows.
The boat was waiting.
It was ugly, loud, and perfect. A forty-something-foot diesel patrol craft, stripped of insignia, patched with rust, and riding low in the water. It had no name on the hull. No flags. A single bearded man stood on deck, arms crossed, watching them approach.
The boat’s diesel engine was running and rumbled like a predator’s growl. Exhaust fumes mixed with the salt air making it difficult to breathe.
“Is that him?” Lizzy whispered.
Drake gave a signal. The man nodded once.
“That’s him,” Drake confirmed quietly.
“Let’s go,” Flint said.
They moved fast across the open ground toward the dock. Their footsteps echoed on the concrete. Somewhere in the distance, another siren began to wail.
Then Lizzy stopped.
She grabbed Flint’s sleeve. Her voice was low and urgent. “Wait.”
He turned to her.
She pointed across the water to a service platform about thirty yards down the quay. A single yellow bulb flickered overhead, casting sickly light onto the deck. The bulb buzzed like an angry insect.
A man stood beneath it.
Still. Watching.
“That’s Frankie,” she said.
Flint stepped in front of her and raised his weapon. Tantanella didn’t move. He stood like a statue, silhouetted against the weak light.
Then the single yellow bulb flickered out and he was gone.
Vanished into the dark.
“On the boat,” Flint said, giving Lizzy a push. “Now.”
They rushed to board as the diesel engine rumbled louder and began to move away from the dock. No spotlight. No questions.
The boat turned toward the open sea at full throttle. Spray kicked up from the bow, misting them with salt water.
And Havana burned in the pitch dark behind them.
“How long will it take to reach Key West?” Lizzy asked, looking back toward Havana and hunching down into her jacket in the cool night air.
“Too long,” Flint replied, scanning the darkness for pursuers.
He saw no one following, but it was only a matter of time. After sunrise, they’d be too visible for comfort.