I fall to my knees, the dress I bought to seduce Fidel covered in dirt. My fingers brush the wooden box my father used to keep in his study. I recognize it instantly. He hid money there sometimes, too, and after Alejandro was disowned, I used to steal cash from the box to give to my brother. My father always replaced the money, and even though we didn’t speak of it, he had to have known.

I pull the box from the ground, lifting the lid and flipping through the contents.

My father is not one for sentimentality, and at the moment, I am grateful for it. The box is filled with jewelry, money, things that were once our family legacy, valuable items we couldn’t take with us when we were forced to leave Havana.

It’s enough to convince someone to risk their life to take me back to Florida.

There’s a brief instant when I hesitate, the thought of using our family heirlooms to save me a painful one.

And yet, the truth is, at the moment, I can’t think of a better use of them, and I’m fairly certain my father would agree. What we once held as so valuable no longer seems to matter anymore.

I gather the box in my hands.

The rustling sound is back, the palm trees, I imagine.

The moonlight shifts.

A man steps in front of me, a gun pointed at my chest.

chapter thirty-four

The box slides from my hands, hitting the metal shovel with a clunk as I stare down the barrel of the gun, and face the man holding it.

We haven’t seen each other in over two years, but it only takes a moment for me to place him.

We’ve both come a long way since those meetings in Hialeah.

“Javier, isn’t it?”

He grunts in acknowledgment.

“Did you come here for me?” I ask.

“I’ve been in Cuba for some time now. And then I heard you had shown up.”

“Who told you that?”

“Does it matter, really? The CIA thinks they’re so good at keeping secrets. Their arrogance prevents them from realizing that others are good at learning them.”

“Fidel won’t let you get away with this,” I say with more confidence than I feel. “He wants me to carry a message back to the Americans.”

Javier shrugs. “He won’t know what happened to you. It’s not like there will be a body to find.”

“What will you do with me?”

“Shoot you. Throw your body in the ocean.”

“Why?”

“Ramon was my cousin.”

So that was the connection between Claudia and the Hialeah group. It would have been helpful for Dwyer to give me a little warning, though at this point the secrets have become expected.

“He was a murderer.”

“Claudia had it coming. She was a traitor to her people.”

“I suppose it’s all a matter of perspective.”

“She worked for the CIA. Like you. She was a traitor, like you.”

I laugh. “And you’re what, exactly? A hero to the Cuban people? That group you were involved with was a joke. A bunch of kids playing at revolution who knew nothing.”

“Like your Lee Harvey Oswald?”

A chill slides down my spine.

“It’s so easy to inspire these Americans when they’re desperate to belong to something bigger than themselves. So easy to recruit them to the cause when you fill their heads with notions of glory in battle. I imagine it’s not that different than the approach the CIA took when they recruited you. What was it, ‘a chance to save Cuba’? The CIA has no problem involving themselves in Cuba’s affairs, sending agents to meddle in our national sovereignty, attempting to destabilize our government. Why shouldn’t we do the same to them?”

My eyes narrow. “Were you the one who blew my cover?”

“Ramon contacted his handler with questions about you the night before he disappeared. He saw you at some party, talking to a Soviet colonel. My aunt asked me to look into what happened to him. I recognized your name from our meetings in Hialeah.

“Ramon was my aunt’s only son,” he adds. “I made her a promise that I would see his killer dead. Given what I’ve heard about you, I would think you would understand that.”

“So this isn’t just about Cuba. It’s personal for you, too.”

He cocks the gun in response.

I reach for the shovel, swinging it in the air, high above his head.

It’s unlikely I will escape death twice, but I have to try.

I bring the shovel down, but before it can connect with his head— A shot fills the night air.

The shovel drops to the ground, and I brace, but where I expect to feel pain, there is nothing.

No blood.

Javier crumples to the ground in front of me.

Eduardo stands behind him, a pistol in hand.

* * *

? ? ?

“Did you kill him?” I ask, a tremor in my voice.

“I hope so.”

Eduardo checks the body.

My legs tremble.

He nods. “He’s dead.”

“What happened? Where were you? I looked for you when I left the hotel.”

“We got hassled by some officers. By the time they let us go, you were already gone. I guessed you might come here.”

“He was going to kill me.”

“You had it in hand.”

“Not this time.”

“What happened with Fidel?” Eduardo asks, his voice grim.

“He knew. Before we came, he knew. My cover was blown. He met with me because he wanted me to pass a message on to the CIA. It’s over. It’s all over. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” Eduardo’s gaze sweeps over the backyard. “Someone will have heard the shot. We need to get out of here. Now. We’ve missed the boat that was scheduled to get us out, but—”

“I have our boat passage here,” I say, picking up the wooden box from the ground. My fingers slip against the edge.

They’re covered in the splatter from Javier’s blood.

I shudder. “Let’s go home.”

chapter thirty-five

Eduardo finds a man at the docks who is more than happy to run us back to South Florida for the remainder of my family’s fortune. It’s an absurd amount of money, but I don’t have another option.

Who knows what happened with the rest of our valuables, if my father entrusted them to family friends, or other family members, of if those items simply disappeared, swept away by the revolution that took everything else? Does it really even matter anymore? You can’t put a price on everything we’ve lost.

I wait while Eduardo and the sea captain negotiate the details of our passage, doing my best to clean myself off with the rag the boatman provided me, my gaze on the city, on the Malecón, the five miles of seawall between the city and the sea.

I grew up along this seawall, dangling my legs over the edge, feeling the ocean spray on my skin.

Will I ever see it again?

I turn as Eduardo comes to stand beside me, his gaze cast out to sea as well.

“He says there are only a few minutes left before it will be too dangerous to leave.”

“I’m ready. Let’s go.”

Eduardo snags my wrist. “Beatriz—” He swallows. “I’m not coming.”

“What do you mean, you’re not coming?”

He doesn’t say anything else.

He doesn’t have to.

I can read it all over his face and in his eyes, and where I always thought looking at Eduardo was like looking in a mirror, now a stranger stares back at me.

“When?”

“After Playa Girón,” he answers.

“Why?”

“Because I was sick of losing. Sick of being used by the CIA. Of the Americans making promises they don’t keep. Because I wanted to go home.”

“Fidel took everything from you and your family.”

He has the grace to look embarrassed. “It turns out he’s willing to make some amends on that front.”

“In exchange for you selling secrets, double-crossing the CIA.”

Everyone has their price. Eduardo’s was always his pride.

“And me?” I ask. “Did you sell me out to Fidel?”

“He wanted to know about any assassination attempts on his life.”

“It must have been valuable information to him. Did I win you back your estates?”

I want to slap him. I want to scream.

I’m too numb for any of it.

“He said he wouldn’t hurt you. I would never let anyone hurt you. When Kennedy died, Fidel was desperate to make sure the Americans knew he wasn’t responsible for it. He said he just wanted to talk to you. So you could carry the message back to the CIA. Dwyer trusts you.”

“He trusted you, too.”

“He used me,” Eduardo retorts.

“We all used one another. And if I’d been successful? If I’d killed Fidel? What would you have done then?”

He gives me a sad smile. “I wasn’t opposed to that happening, either. You always have to hedge your bets.”

“So what? You’re a communist now? You think Fidel is a great man? I don’t understand how you could change your opinion so drastically, so quickly.”

“Quickly?” He laughs, the sound devoid of humor. “I’m tired, Beatriz. We left almost five years ago. What’s changed? Maybe we were wrong all along. Some of Fidel’s ideas aren’t that far off what we dreamed of years ago.”

“You can’t believe that.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. You’re in bed with the CIA now. Who would have imagined that five years ago? We all do what’s necessary to survive.”

“He killed my brother. Your best friend.”

“He says he didn’t.”

“He told me the same thing. Do you believe him? How can you trust him?”

“Of course I don’t trust him. I don’t think I believe in anything anymore.”

I give a bitter laugh. “That makes two of us then. After all, I always did see myself in you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not.”