Hawke

“We were both saddened to hear of your mother’s passing,” the Cuban guy said, picking something out of his teeth with a gold toothpick.

“Yeah? How’d you know about that?” Gomez said. “Rodrigo tell you?”

“You’re smart, you never say that name again, seсor. You’re not smart … well …”

Gomez just nodded, looking from one to the other, making sure they knew that he got the picture.

“Rodrigo?” he said, gri

“You just said it again, asshole,” Wideload said. “Twice.”

“Hey, I was just—”

“How about you shut the fuck up while we finish looking at your papers, okay?”

It was just after he got back to the base after the little episode at the Mao-Mao Club that he’d gotten the phone call from these two guys. Before he left Havana, he’d gone back to the hospital and said his goodbyes to his mother. She was still wailing in pain when he’d walked out the door. He’d immediately split for Gitmo.

His mother died an hour after he left the hospital, Rita told him when he walked in the door.

Headed home to Gitmo he’d been sad and pissed about his hand, which stung like crazy, but what he really was, goddammit, was scared shitless about coming up with a hundred large. On the other hand, what could they do? Way he had it figured, if he never left the base, how could they get to him? Fact was, it didn’t take long.

They’d called his house at the base. Late the same night he got home from Havana. He’d been sitting in the kitchen drinking Budweiser tallboys. Crying some, thinking about his mom. The kids were asleep and his wife was upstairs watching some stupid movie. Two Cuban guys on the phone. They wanted to know did he have the money and when he’d be coming to Miami next to visit his Aunt Nina.

Some truly unbelievable shit, man.

They’d known her name, where she lived, everything. They said they’d heard a lot of good things about him and they wanted to hook up with him somewhere. Soon. Before his deadline ran out.

He told them right up front he didn’t have the money. Didn’t see any way of getting it in a week. Could he, maybe, get an extension? He had friends in Miami. He’d done a little dealing before he joined the Navy. Maybe he could work something out with some of his old pals. Seeing Rodrigo’s colorless eyes as he said it. Getting that really sick feeling in his stomach.

Like he really had a chance to score a hundred large in three days. Make that three lifetimes.

Then, a miracle. The more they talked the more he began to understand that they weren’t going to whack him for a chickenshit hundred G’s, after all! No, they had some kind of weird-assed business proposition for him! A deal that would not only erase the unfortunate debt he had gotten into in Havana, but a deal that would make him rich!

They said they wanted to meet up in Miami. They were sure he would find they had a proposition that would interest him greatly.

“Yeah, how greatly?” he’d asked the guy on the phone. He’d heard of these phone scams before. These guys sounded legit, but he wasn’t stupid.

“Is one million dollars greatly enough?” the guy said.

“One million dollars?” he said, almost choking on the figure. “Yeah, I’d say that was greatly.”

So he agreed to meet them and wangled the family emergency leave. Took his family to Miami. He’d listen to what they had to say. Hopefully, it wasn’t some con to get him off the base so they could waste him. He was a pretty good judge of character, though, and these guys sounded okay to him.

So, here he was, Joh

Who wants to be a millionaire? Petty Officer Third Class Rafael Gomez, that’s who.

He was starting to think that the chance meeting with Ling-Ling was the begi

Gomez noticed they still hadn’t bothered to properly introduce themselves. Because they knew his real name, it bothered him a little. Probably the way these kinds of things went down, though. Less he knew the better, he figured, when and if the fit hit the shan. But, still—

“So let me skip the chase and cut directly to the outcome,” Gomez said, liking the way that had come out. “What exactly does a guy have to do around here to make a million bucks? What’s the plan, guys? And, since we’re going to maybe be in business together, let’s cut the crap. You guys have any, like, real names?”

“I am Julio,” Tallboy said. “Like we told you, amigo.”

“I am Iglesias,” Wideload said.

Gomez looked at them for a second, shaking his head. What were you going to do?

“Right, Julio and Iglesias. Okay, fine, and I’m Elvis and Presley. Split personality, get it? So, if it ain’t too much trouble, how about bringing me up to speed on what, exactly, is the big plan? You guys were kinda vague on the phone, know what I mean? Julio?”

“Necesario, seсor. Is very simple plan, Seсor Elvis,” Julio said with a smile. He had a gold tooth right up front that was catching the morning sun bouncing off. the windows big time. Made it hard to concentrate on what the guy was saying. The tooth and the fact that there might be a million bucks in that suitcase.

“Simple is good,” Gomez said, feeling his heart pumping. He’d started shaking again, only from the inside out now. He was going to have to, what, whack somebody? Would he do that for a million smacks? Maybe.

He’d killed a guy once. Accident. Fed him to the gators late one night in the big ditch along Alligator Alley. Way the hell out the Tamiami Trail in the deep ’glades. Nobody ever knew nothing.

No biggie, he thought, remembering.

“Man, it’s hot in here. Anybody for a brewski?” They both shook their heads. “No? Man, I could go for one. Breakfast of champions, man, the King of Beers.”

Thing about these guys, no sense of humor whatsoever.

“All you have to do, Seсor Presley, is take this fine piece of luggage home to Guantanamo with you tomorrow.” The guy picked up the suitcase and placed it on the table.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“You guys aren’t going to believe this,” Gomez said, “but that suitcase looks exactly like my suitcase. Exactly.”

“Maybe that’s because it is your suitcase, seсor,” Julio said.

“What? No way, man. My suitcase is under my bed at my aunt’s place.”

“Really? When was the last time you checked?”

Gomez looked at all the old stickers and shit on the Samsonite. Old United bag tags from when he was flying back and forth from Cecil Field, N.A.S. JAX all the time. Sonofabitch. It was his suitcase.

“What’s inside my suitcase, you don’t mind me asking?”

“It’s difficult to describe, seсor,” Iglesias said. “You’ve heard of a Roach Motel?”

“Yeah. The bugs check in but they don’t check out.”

“Well, inside that suitcase is a kind of reverse Roach Motel,” Julio said.

“Sн , he’s right,” Iglesias chimed in. “In this motel, the bugs they are already checked in, but they can’t wait to check out. Check out and kick some gringo ass.”

“But here’s the good part, seсor,” Julio added. “The bugs? Decoys. The real killer is some kind of bitchin’ new nerve toxin, man. It’s a deadly combo, one-two punch, I’m serious.”

“The hell you guys talking about?” Gomez said. He was getting shaky again. He could really use a cold one right now. But, and it was a big but, all right, he knew he had to keep his cool if he was ever going to see one million smackers up close and personal.