That’s why he was now on his way over to the Swiss embassy. Kick some serious butt. Open a big can of whupass on somebody. The head nurse said they had an American desk there. A desk? She said she meant there were some American officials there, even though it was the Swiss embassy.
Make sense? No, but what the hell. Nothing in Cuba made sense anymore. Anyway, he was going to go over there to find one of those little bureaucratic dipshits and rip his goddamn head off.
Murder. That was the ultimate pain management.
That was the plan. First, kick some ass. Next, go get some ass. He bought a tourist map and some condoms from a street vendor. He paid one dollar American (nobody took pesos, only greenbacks) and located the embassy on the map. Only eight blocks. He’d hotfoot it over there and pound a few more heads.
Problem was, he found out when he finally got there, the damn embassy was closed. He banged on the door for ten minutes before he realized it was Sunday. Weren’t embassies supposed to be open seven days a week? Like 7-Eleven? What if he had an emergency? Which, by the way, he did. He needed some medicine. He was an American citizen. Hell, he was military. U.S. friggin’ Navy.
Not that the Navy could give a rat’s ass, either. He’d spent the last three nights in the Guantánamo brig for breaking into the base dispensary at three in the morning. He’d copped some morphine and Dilaudid and was just easing out the jimmied back door when the MPs nailed him. The fact that he was stealing medicine for his dying mother didn’t even register.
Tell it to somebody who gives a shit, the MP who busted him had said.
He was sitting on the embassy steps drinking one of his little airplane Stolis and trying to figure out his next move when the weird chick appeared. Blond hair, cut short. Green eyes and big red lips and tits out to here. Christmas in July. Tank top and some kind of black spandex thing that stopped way above her knees. Yellow high heels. That clinched it.
He’d definitely died and gone to prostitute paradise.
The girl stopped and looked at him, lounging there on the steps of the Swiss embassy, Mr. Casual. Weird, but she looked familiar. She had these slanty Chinese eyes, but she didn’t look all that Chinese. Her skin was the color of one of those three-dollar mocha lattes at Starbucks.
Couldn’t tell if she was a working girl or not, more he looked at her. She had this gold collar thing around her neck that looked real. Had a little gold ring hanging down at the front. Hooker jewelry? Hell, they were all working girls, weren’t they? One way or another when you got right down to it, everybody and everything was for sale around here.
Amazingly enough, she climbed up the steps and banged on the door. He let her rap it a few times, then said, “It’s closed. Sunday.”
“What?” she said in English. All attitude this chick.
“You want a mink coat?”
She flipped him the finger and said something that didn’t sound too encouraging.
“How about we start with a big pitcher of sangria over at the Floridita?”
She stopped again, thought about it, turned around. She was checking him out. He yawned and stretched his legs out, cool as a Popsicle.
“Americano, huh?”
“Home of the brave, baby.”
“Yeah, right, Ernesto Junior here wants to buy me sangria at El Floridita, Papa’s favorite saloon. You’re just another Hemingway sucker, chico.”
“A who sucker?”
“Never mind. What happened to your lip?”
“You should see the other guy,” he said, liking how fast it came out.
“Yeah, that doctor. You broke his jaw. You’re the one who caused all that trouble at the hospital, right?”
He looked at her.
“You were there? I thought I’d seen you before.”
“My sister is head nurse there. She’s the one who told you about the embassy.”
“So you—like, what, followed me over here?”
“Don’t flatter yourself, chico. I had some business at the embassy, too—something to deliver for my brother.” She pulled a manila envelope out of her shoulder bag.
“Stick it under the door,” Gomez said.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“It’s full of money.”
“Oh,” he said, thinking, definitely not a working girl delivering cash to an embassy.
“So, adios,” she said, sticking the envelope back in her bag. He wondered how much money was in there. He could grab it and run. The Malecón was only a block away. He could melt into the crowds. Could she catch him wearing those bright yellow fuck-me shoes? I don’t think so.
“Hey, wait a minute, baby! Where you going?”
“Back to work.”
“You work on Sunday? Christ.”
“My brother has a club. I work there.”
“Yeah, what do you do?”
“Whatever it takes.”
“Hey, that sounds good. Can I come?”
“It’s very exclusive. Members only.”
“I could join.”
She laughed so hard it pissed him off.
“You think I can’t afford it?”
“I know you can’t afford it. It’s the most expensive club in Havana. On the other hand—”
“What?”
“My brother might like you.”
“Why’s that?”
“He likes guys who like to beat the shit out of other guys. They’re always useful.”
Five seconds after she put two fingers in her mouth and blew the loudest whistle he’d ever heard, the biggest, blackest Chrysler Imperial on earth pulled up in front of the embassy. The driver, some muscleman in a black T-shirt, reached over and swung the door open for her. She hopped in the front, leaned over, and gave the guy a big kiss.
Gomez didn’t see her sliding over for him up front so he climbed in the back. The car was mint, like just off the showroom floor. Even had that smell.
“What year is this?” Gomez asked as the guy took off down the narrow street.
“Fifty-nine,” the guy said, and turned around and smiled at him. Big gold tooth up front. “Está bueno, no?”
“This is my cousin Santos,” the chick said, squeezing the back of the guy’s neck. “Sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Gomez.”
“I’m Ling-Ling,” she said.
“Ling-Ling,” Gomez said, liking the sound of it. “You know how Chinese people name their kids?” he asked. “They throw all their silverware up in the air and name the kids after the sound it makes when it hits the floor. Ling-Ling, huh? Sounds like a salad fork.”
Nobody said another word until they pulled up in front of a big wooden gate set in a high pink wall. Gomez had been following their route on his map. They’d driven all along the Malecón with the Castillo del Morro on his far right, looking like an ocean liner entering the stormy harbor. Big rollers came in from the Atlantic, crashing over the seawall at Punta Brava, the spray misting the Chrysler’s windshield.
Now they were in the shady El Vedado section where all the big old houses were. Most of them built sometime before 1959 B.C. Before Castro.
Gomez and the chick climbed out.
“Hasta mañana,” her cousin said, slapping his meaty brown hand on the door a couple of times. Guy must have been wearing ten gold bracelets. Gomez watched the Imperial slide off into a tunnel of green branches hanging dark and heavy, brushing the top of the car as it slid away.
“Well, this is it,” Ling-Ling said, pushing a button in the wall and waving up at one of the video cameras.
“What’s the club called?” Gomez asked as the heavy doors started to swing inward.
“The Mao-Mao Club.”
They stepped through the gates, and Gomez said, “This isn’t a club, it’s a jungle.”
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it? We have every kind of bird and animal. Even jaguars and leopards.”