Chapter Fourteen
A day and a half after the aborted pirate "attack", while the Mariposa was (finally) docked in Hong Kong, First Officer Taveras walked swiftly into the galley after lunch and beckoned to Javier. "The Captain wants to see you."
A bit taken aback, Javier asked if there was a problem, but Taveras simply shrugged noncommittally, so Javier nodded to Jiho to continue the cleaning as he pulled off his apron and tossed it aside, then followed the officer out into the hall. Instead of climbing up to the bridge, however, Taveras led him off the ship, across the wide dockside, and into the massive, cluttered warehouse beyond, explaining that the captain was overseeing operations there.
As they came to an open area in the center of the piles of crates, boxes, and assorted piles of cargo, Javier saw that Frontera was talking with yet another man, a stranger in a sharp but comfortable-looking dark business suit half-sitting on a crate, listening intently. They turned to the newcomers, and Frontera thanked Taveras, dismissing him, then said cryptically to the stranger in Spanish, "This is the man, Señor."
Now Javier was getting concerned. He didn't like being singled out to strangers, especially when he had no idea what was going on. Frontera turned back to him and, guessing his thoughts from his wary expression, gave a tight smile. "I have not given you to the police, as you requested, nor mentioned you in any reports," he began reassuringly, before adding with emphasis, "but I will tell the truth to the owner of the company when he asks." After dropping that little stunner, he made quick introductions, using Javier's assumed name. "Diego Perez, Chief Cook; Paulo Rodriguez, owner and CEO of Rodriguez Shipping." With perfect timing, a whistled signal came floating across the warehouse floor, and Frontera waved an acknowledgment before turning to the owner with an apology. "I must get back to work, Señor."
Rodriguez stood swiftly and took a step forward to shake Frontera's hand. "Of course, and I won't keep you. But I'm glad you are still with us, Isaac, old friend." Slapping the Captain's upper arm with his other hand, Rodriguez gave him a warm smile before letting him go.
Javier was still eyeing his ultimate boss warily. Rodriguez had an open, friendly face with bright brown eyes, laugh lines, and a ready smile, coupled with an air of both confidence and competence. A couple of inches shorter than Javier, he had the kind of trim body that an executive only maintains with dedicated, regular visits to a gym. A businessman's short hairstyle and clean-shaven face completed the image begun by his suit and polished shoes of a hard-working industry leader who loved to laugh. Javier took in all this in a single sweep, and found, surprisingly, that he wanted to like the man, to trust him – but lifelong habits die very hard.
As Frontera walked away, Rodriguez turned his gaze on Javier, knowing he was being evaluated, and taking a moment to return it, before he offered a handshake. "I am indebted to you, Señor Perez, for the safety of my ship, its cargo – and its Captain, who is far more important to me than all the rest. Thank you."
Unsure, for once, of what to say, Javier merely shrugged self-deprecatingly as he returned the man's handshake. "Did you fly over from Ecuador because of the pirates?" he asked, grabbing the question almost at random.
"Of course!" Rodriguez seemed surprised. "When one of my ships has a serious incident, I go there to make sure everything is worked out. And an act of piracy, even if foiled, even if... what did you call it?"
Javier was confused for a moment, then remembered his comment, which Frontera had evidently passed along. "Keystone Kops?" he said with a grin, and the boss laughed.
"Well, definitely amateurish, that's for certain. But still needing investigation." Rodriguez motioned towards the crates he'd been sitting on a minute earlier. "Come and sit down, in my spacious corner office," he added with a mock-grand air. "So, Diego," he continued as they each took a perch facing the other. "I would like for you to tell me the story of how you came to be on my ship. Isaac told me what he knew, of course, but I would like to hear it directly from you." As Javier shifted uncertainly, Rodriguez held up a placating hand. "I'm not going to fire you. Isaac tells me you are an excellent ship's cook – and those are hard to come by. No..." He paused. "I am asking you to trust me. I value honesty," he ended simply, and then waited to see what the response would be.
Javier was struggling. He wanted to trust the company owner, and had felt pulled towards him since catching the first glimpse. The man was magnetic. But still... this was asking a lot.
Rodriguez was still waiting, a faint pleasant smile still on his lips – and it looked genuine. Well, pendejo, Javier said to himself, you wanted to start a new life, totally legit. You are going to have to trust people, and give them reason to actually trust you. This man seems like a good one to start with. So he told him the truth – not about his former profession, but why and how he had come to be on the docks, to sell Miguel Perez a bit of coke. "Neither of us had any idea how much we looked alike. It was... mind-blowing." He didn't share what he had learned of Miguel since, not then. He described how they had apparently – from the news reports he'd gleaned later – been caught in unrelated crossfire, Miguel dying under the docks, while he himself had crawled unwittingly onto the Mariposa and become an unknowing stowaway. He made certain to express his gratitude to Captain Frontera for not tossing him overboard, and then giving him the chance to join the crew.
At the end of the recitation, they sat in silence for a moment while Rodriguez absorbed the news. "The disappointing thing to me is that Miguel was apparently using cocaine. I had no idea. I'm not a... rabid anti-drug crusader. I realize people have been getting high since the dawn of time, and will till the end of it. I am rabidly anti-drug-trafficking, and have from the beginning done everything in my power to keep that business off of my ships and out of my company. If one of my employees is using anything, I try to help them, but I don't punish them unless it affects their job performance." It was quite a speech, but seemed to be a well-rehearsed one. Javier wondered briefly how often he gave it.
Rodriguez went on, considering. "But what strikes me as odd is how readily you did join the crew. Why was that? Why didn't you leave in Singapore, and return to the States?"
Javier stared away for a moment, thinking how to answer. Then he replied honestly, "I was at a crossroads. I want... I need to start a new life. I had gotten into some... pretty bad situations." Let Rodriguez presume he meant dealing drugs; it was better than the absolute truth at this point. "I'd been a private chef before, and would like to get back into it. This seemed to be... a good step along that path. A good start, while I look for something better." Realizing he was dissing the job he fully intended to keep, he put up his own placating hand. "That doesn't mean I'm not giving the Mariposa one hundred percent, or that I'm going to suddenly disappear. I intend to put in a full tour of duty, and give a decent amount of notice before disembarking."
"What of family? Did you leave someone behind?"
Javier couldn't tell if Frontera had told Rodriguez about Letty, and his frustrated attempts to find or contact her. His thumb had automatically sought the bottom of his wedding ring and was rubbing it. He held up that hand to show the ring. "I was married, yes. But I can't find her," he explained simply. He waved off whatever the other man started to say. "I know many ways, including many on the dark web. She's... apparently gone into hiding." Shaking his head, he looked away again, but not before Rodriguez saw the pain etched deeply into his eyes. He let it go.
"I am sorry," was his only – soft – reply.
They sat in not uncomfortable silence for a moment, then Rodriguez abruptly leaned forward, preparing to stand, saying, "Well, I should let you get back – " but at that moment, a bullet zinged through the space where his head had been a split second before, hitting a crate a few feet beyond and sending splinters flying in every direction with a tiny explosion. The report of a gun came from the far side of the open warehouse a beat later.
Rodriguez jerked around instantly, staring across the warehouse – but Javier plowed into him and pushed him to the floor just as more bullets came ripping through the air. Javier pulled his boss behind the crates on the floor and sat against them for a second, gasping for breath against the sudden fierce pain in his side – the old bullet wound usually didn't bother him unless he did something idiotic like that – and trying to see which way to go to escape. His face twisted in tired, disgusted fury. "I am tired of people shooting at me," he snarled to Rodriguez.
The tidy exec's eyes were huge in a pastry-pale face. "It's never happened to me before, but I agree with you," he replied breathlessly.
Javier snorted a laugh, then grabbed Rodriguez's shoulder. "This way," he hissed sharply, and pulled him along in a crawl until they got beyond the first taller stack of crates. Then they surged to their feet together and ran, dodging, as fast as they could through the maze of goods towards the far end of the warehouse. The occasional shot or hoarse shout from behind told them they were being rapidly followed.
"I was warned about kidnapping attempts all over the world," Rodriguez panted to nobody in particular, "but I never expected to actually be in one!"
"DAMMIT!" Javier swore, trying to keep it quiet – they had found a dead end, no exit to the building. There was a warren of small, interconnected offices here, crammed with dusty, unused furniture and office debris. He pulled Rodriguez behind him into one room and put him behind some filing cabinets, out of view of the only doorway, while Javier made his skinny frame as small as he could in a tiny niche next to the entry, holding his breath to listen. He could hear at least two, maybe as many as four, men spread out and systematically searching for them. Their only chance was to jump one of them, get a weapon, and shoot their way out.
One man passed the doorway, glancing in, but he saw nothing, and continued on. Javier caught Rodriguez's eyes and motioned shhh with one finger, then mimed groaning, holding his belly as if wounded. Rodriguez caught on immediately, and let out a soft, low moan. Javier grinned at him and nodded as he heard the man stop and turn back.
The gunman was no novice – he held the pistol straight-armed before him gripped in both hands, proper police style, pointing it rapidly around the room as he moved cautiously through the door. Unfortunately for him, Javier's niche hid him nicely from view until the gun was past his head. He lunged at it, grabbing the pistol and the man's hands with both of his and trying to rip it away.
The two of them wrestled madly for the pistol, and Rodriguez, watching wide-eyed from his hiding place, flinched hard as he heard the gun fire and somebody give a grunting scream. He couldn't tell who had been hit, as they slammed up against a desk and bounced off. Then another shot sounded, the pair seemed to freeze for a second, and one man slid bonelessly to the floor. Rodriguez was unutterably relieved to see his companion still standing, lungs heaving.
But he was also listing to one side. Javier was the one who had taken the first bullet. The pistol must have been pointing down at that moment, because the bullet had gone into his upper thigh. Blood was already soaking through his pants leg.
Pulling himself together, Javier ignored the wound as best he could, checking out the handgun. It was an ordinary pistol with a ten-round magazine inserted, six bullets still inside. Kneeling as best he could at the dead gunman's side, he patted his pockets and came up with a spare magazine, and nothing else. He stopped, staring at the body, registering several oddities, including the lack of wallet or anything else in the pockets. Something was wrong.
"This isn't a kidnapping," he realized. "It's a hit." He looked up at Rodriguez. "Who wants you dead?"
"Who wants me dead? Who wants you dead?" countered his boss, his meaning plain. Why assume he was the intended victim?
"Hmm," Javier admitted the point wordlessly, then filed it away. They still had to get out of there. He struggled back to his feet, reloading the partial magazine in the gun and slipping the full spare into a front pocket for easy grabbing. "Stay behind me, Rodriguez," he ordered the other man.
"Wait," Rodriguez hissed. Javier looked at him sharply, puzzled, but his boss was already pulling out a large handkerchief and, half-squatting, tied it firmly around Javier's wounded thigh. Javier tried, not entirely successfully, not to grunt in pain. Then Rodriguez stood straight again and nodded at Javier. "Call me Paulo," he said, as friendly and reasonable as if they were standing on a sunny sidewalk in Paris.
One side of Javier's mouth quirked in a smile. "Javier," he replied simply. One of Paulo's eyebrows shot up as he registered the different name. Then he smiled briefly back, nodded firmly, and moved behind Javier's back, taking a light hold of his shirt. Javier took up the gunman's former stance, holding the pistol cocked and ready before him in his usual careful two-handed grip as they slowly, cautiously, moved out of the office.
They made it several yards away before a pair of shots whizzing by their heads signaled the next gunman. Javier whipped around faster than Paulo could follow and fired off two quick shots of his own. His found their mark, and the assailant fell. Javier glanced down at him as they moved cautiously past, stopped for a second and frowned. Something was vaguely familiar about him – but he couldn't take the time to place him. Shrugging, he moved on, Paulo still clutching his shirt.
On into the main area of the warehouse. Shots suddenly came at them from both sides, and Javier yelled at Paulo to get down as he swung from left to right, firing two lightning-quick shots in each direction. He got the first man, but missed the second. Paulo pulled him down behind the crate, Javier grunting again as his new wound screamed in protest, then he swapped out magazines and proceeded to pop up and trade shots with – apparently – the last remaining member of the assault team. Paulo hissed "Police coming!" in his ear, and then he heard the sirens rapidly approaching outside. Somebody must have heard the shooting and called the cops.
A bullet scored the top of the crate, inches above his head, and it infuriated Javier all over again. He popped up one last time and finally nailed the guy, just as heavily armed officers burst in a side door, yelling in Chinese.
Javier threw the gun out before him and struggled to his feet, raising his hands above his head. "Hands up!" he hissed to Paulo. "They'll likely shoot anybody the least bit threatening!" Paulo scrambled to comply as suddenly several assault-style police rifles were pointing at them.
But all at once, Javier's leg decided it had taken enough punishment and his knee buckled, collapsing him to the floor. Paulo grabbed at his companion, keeping his torso and head from banging on the hard concrete. Luckily, none of the cops thought they were attacking, and held their fire. They could hear many more policemen pouring through the several doors and fanning out to find anyone they could.
"Paulo!" Javier hissed, reaching up with a hand to grab the man's collar. "Don't give me to the police!" he pleaded, as he had with Frontera. He had no idea what might happen, on this other side of the world from the scenes of all his former crimes, but he couldn't take the chance. "Please!" he added, obvious desperation coloring the word.
He had no time to explain, but somehow Paulo divined enough. "You just saved my life," he pointed out, and made a lightning-fast executive decision. "You're my bodyguard," he replied significantly. "You flew here with me. Got it?"
"Got it," Javier breathed as he nodded. "Thank you." Then, from adrenaline overload or loss of blood, he slid into unconsciousness, vaguely aware of Paulo shouting for an ambulance above his head as he slipped away into the warm darkness.