The Powers That Be. Cliff Ryder

struggling to free Cuba from the Communist dictatorship. It was the one goal he still clung to—even though he couldn’t be sure, given his semi-lucid state from hour to hour, that he hadn’t already done so.

      The interrogators had certainly tried hard to break him. They had taken him from his stifling cell to an air-conditioned room and left him there for hours before questioning him, when he could barely answer through chattering teeth. The beatings and malnutrition were bad, but it was during the third month that they had come closest to breaking him.

      Just when he was coming to terms with the cruel conditions, the guards had come to his cell and told him he was being released. They had allowed him to wash up and shave, given him a decent meal, then escorted him to the main doors of the prison. And there, with freedom just a few yards away, the commander of the prison had walked up and told him that it was a mistake, that he was going back to his cell. It had taken three guards to wrestle him back into his cell that day. He had been beaten for resisting them, and that night he had been beaten again by fellow prisoners, who suspected he had made some kind of deal with the government to betray them.

      Since that day, Francisco had resisted his captors as much as possible, but he had steadily weakened. He was on the edge of telling them whatever he could to get out of his punishment cell, receive some medical treatment, even just get a bare concrete bed to sleep on. His only solace was that if they ever broke him, he wouldn’t be able to tell them much. His mostly bare-shelved bodega had been a drop point for messages among cells of the resistance, but he had never known who any of the contacts really were besides the man who had recruited him long ago. Francisco wasn’t a government informer, but obviously someone in one of those cells he had serviced was.

      Guard Three opened the interrogation-room door and entered, followed by Francisco, who stumbled in, assisted by a shove from Guard Four. The room looked like every other room he had been questioned in. A rattling air conditioner blew cold air across his fevered skin, and there were the standard two chairs and a small table in the center of the room. What was different, however, was the man sitting in the chair on the other side of the table.

      He was a high-ranking member of the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces, at least a major, according to his epaulets. He was taller than the usual Cuban soldier. Even seated he loomed over the table. His features were unusual, too. He didn’t have the usual dark caramel coloring of the majority of the people. His skin tone was a few shades lighter, almost café au lait. Francisco thought he was mulatto, perhaps part African, but that his nose wasn’t broad, but narrow and long, almost patrician. And his eyes—which had locked onto the prisoner with the usual single-minded zeal—were a common light blue, not the expected dark brown.

      The two guards came to attention and saluted. The man sitting in the chair tossed off a crisp but casual salute to them.

      “Abandónenos.”

      The order to leave made the guards look at each other in confusion. “Mayor?” one asked, confirming Francisco’s suspicion about the man’s rank.

      The major waved his hand at the door. “Leave us,” he ordered again.

      “But, sir, all interrogations are to be supervised in the event of an attack by the prisoner,” a guard said.

      The major leaned back in his chair. “As you can see, this man is no threat to me. I wish to question him in private. Now.” The genial expression hardened in the blink of an eye. “Or must I report this insubordination to your superiors?”

      “No, sir!” The two men saluted again, and left, closing the door behind them.

      Francisco shivered in the cold, unable to take his eyes off this man who held his life in a black-gloved hand.

      “Please, sit. You must be weak after everything you have endured.” The major pushed his chair back and stood, making Francisco cower, tensing in expectation of the first blow.

      “No, no. Come, sit, please.” The tall man took an overcoat from the back of his chair and slowly walked toward Francisco, holding it out like a matador approaching a nervous bull. He eased it around the wasted man’s shoulders, then led him to the second chair and gently pressed him down.

      “Thank—thank you.” Francisco pulled the lapels of the coat around him and huddled into the cloth.

      The major did not return to the other side of the table, but walked around to stand behind Francisco. “No, it is I who should be thanking you, Francisco Garcia Romero. You have survived agony that would have broken a hundred lesser men, yet you have not bought yourself any comfort by providing even a scrap of information about the counter-revolutionaries that plague our great nation. However, all men have their limits, my friend, and I am afraid that my superiors have reached theirs.”

      The odd choice of words made Francisco start to turn to look up at the major, but as he did, he saw a shadow rise above him, and the last thing he felt was an impact at the base of his neck, then merciful blackness.

      The hammer blow to Francisco’s neck fractured his second and third vertebrae, causing a piece of bone to punch inward, severing the spinal cord. The shock to his nervous system killed him before the pain impulse reached its final destination.

      The major relaxed his interlaced hands and examined the prisoner, satisfied that he had broken his neck and killed him as painlessly and quickly as possible. Turning his back to the door, he quickly made the sign of the cross over the body and bent low to the man’s ear.

      “The people thank you for your dedicated service. You will be remembered when our nation is truly free.”

      He walked to the door and knocked on it, looking over his shoulder at the body slumped on the table. “Vaya con Dios, amigo.”

      1

      Kate Cochran somersaulted through the air, maintaining enough control to tuck into her fall and roll with it instead of slamming to the mat on her back. Rising, she immediately assumed a defensive posture, feet shoulder width apart, legs slightly bent, arms close to her sides, fists clenched at her waist with knuckles up, ready to either punch or block.

      A burst of laughter came from behind her. Kate turned, keeping her fists ready, to confront the man who had just sent her sailing across the room.

      “My, my, don’t you look tough.” The man was a full head taller than her, and all lean, wiry muscle. His ink-black hair was cropped just short of high and tight, making it impossible to grab in a fight—as she had already discovered. He regarded her with amused, dark brown eyes that missed no detail of their surroundings.

      “Kate, I’m not training you to fight in a dojo. What I’m teaching you—well, trying anyway—is how to survive on the street. Pure down-and-dirty fighting, where no one is going to wait for you to assume the position. By the time you’re ready, your attacker will have already incapacitated or killed you.”

      “That’s what I have you for, remember?” She slowly stepped toward him, keeping her center of gravity balanced, waiting for him to pounce again.

      “Well, let’s assume for this exercise that I’m already fighting two—no, make that three other guys, and you’re on your own.” His white teeth flashed in a razor-thin grin, and Kate knew who would win in a three-on-one fight with the man standing in front of her—Jacob Marrs, her bodyguard and instructor. “Now, relax that horse stance of yours, and for god’s sake, stand like you’re walking down the street, not some extra in a kung fu movie.”

      Kate straightened up and dropped her arms to her sides, unclenching her fists. She walked toward Jake, maintaining eye contact the whole way, ignoring the spectacular view her floor-to-ceiling town house windows afforded of the Manhattan skyline to the west. Sweat dripped in to her gold-green eyes.

      She walked to within a foot of him, but nothing happened. Turning on her heel, Kate strode back across the room, ready for a chokehold from behind, or a grab at her platinum-blond hair or any one of a dozen other possible attacks. Still nothing. Peeking at him out of the corner of her vision, Jake still stood there in loose pants and his sleeveless gi, hands on