There was an ominous crack from above, and Alex looked up.
Emanating from the fixture that secured the chandelier, a spider-web of fissures started to spread in every direction across the glass ceiling above them.
Thin sprays of water started erupting everywhere. You could almost hear the tiny creakings of each little fissure zigzagging across the dome.
“What the devil—” Alex said, looking at Stoke.
“Your new friend Boomer,” Stoke said. “His diversionary tactic, remember? Get everybody safely off the beach? Boomer must have just blown the satchel charges of C-4 and limpet mines that Bravo attached beneath the submarine’s hull. The main shock wave from that explosion should reach upriver to this grotto in about, oh, three seconds—One!”
Hawke and Stokely sprinted around opposite ends of the desk, smashing through the dazed guards just getting to their feet, headed towards the open door. They saw the massive chandelier hurtling to the floor and dodged it by inches.
“Two!” Stoke screamed, as they dove through the door.
A few of the guards were raising their weapons to fire.
“Three!” They were through!
Behind them the unbearable screeching sound of all that glass finally giving way put paid to any notion of the guards bringing down the two men. Alex, in desperation, tried to slam the wooden door shut behind them, but it was too late. A wall of water was already pouring through the doorway, threatening to overwhelm them. They flew down the narrow stone steps, slipping and sliding all the way to the bottom.
The onrushing tide of water now flooded down the stairwell and into the little foyer with the pretty Picasso. There were pillows, documents, all manner of flotsam and jetsam surrounding him. Alex was totally disoriented. How did we get here? Elevator? Right. He noticed that water had already risen above his knees.
“Ain’t no time to wait for that little Chinaman,” Stoke said. “Look, here’s a door!” The door was invisible, save a thin seam that outlined it. Miraculously, Stoke had seen it, and they slammed into it, splintering it open.
Another stairway, seemingly for service staff, led down into darkness.
Again they descended, the flood of water on their heels, and found another door at the bottom. “Ready?” Stoke said, and they put their shoulders to the wood, breaching it.
This was good. The red-carpeted hallway that led to the main stairway. Which way? Left, Alex decided suddenly. “This way!” he shouted, and Stokely followed. “This is it!” Alex cried. “Hurry!”
They were climbing now, up the great curving staircase they’d descended earlier with the late General Juan de Herreras.
“Good thing about water,” Stoke said. “Don’t climb steps too good.”
They gained the main hallway where they’d first met the recently deceased Juanito and his guards. It was wholly deserted. Both men wished they had grabbed weapons from the guards as they’d left the collapsing room. Alex still had his dive knife at least. Stoke had nothing.
They both knew there had to be tangos gathering outside, perhaps hundreds of them.
With extreme caution, they peered around the massive doors of the entrance. The moon was out now, and the whole compound was bathed in its blue-gold glow. A breeze swayed the palms in a lazy dance.
There was no one inside the perimeter wall that they could see. No one in either guardhouse. Beyond, only the dark wall of jungle. They could see the moonlit sea off to their left. Something was burning out there, sending great tendrils of fire and black smoke licking high into the air.
Nighthawke?
Hawke pushed the thought out of his mind as he and Stoke gingerly made their way down the broad stone steps of the entrance. Unarmed, they had no choice now but to simply make a run for the sea and hope to God somebody was out there waiting in an IBS.
They hadn’t taken three steps when the wall of jungle beyond erupted with automatic weapons fire. Hundreds of winking muzzles in the blackness. The air was instantly full of lead, ringing off the iron-work of the gates and fence, kicking up sand at their feet. They dropped to the ground and scrambled back up the steps and inside the entrance of the finca, slamming the heavy wooden doors behind them.
“Holy shit!” Stoke said. “The whole damn Cuban army must be out there waiting for us!”
They knelt beneath a window, a hail of bullets showering them with broken glass. Alex saw Stoke pull something from inside his flak vest.
“What the hell is that?” Hawke asked.
“SatCom phone,” Stoke said, flicking a switch that lit the thing up. “We get lucky, I can raise Fitz or Boomer.”
“Get lucky,” Hawke said.
“Bravo, you copy?” Stoke said into the handheld device.
“Copy, Stoke. What’s going on?”
“Unexpected delay here. What’s burning out there at the LZ? Ain’t you, is it?”
“No. Another nosy Cuban patrol boat. We’ve sunk four. All accounted for here, aboard Nighthawke. We’re in a holding pattern. An IBS is on its way in for your E&E.”
“Yeah, well that’s the problem. We ain’t evading and we certainly ain’t evacuating. We pinned down inside the main hacienda.”
“No problem. We’ll come ashore and pull you out.”
“Belay that, you’d never get ashore. The whole fucking jungle’s full of los tangos cubanos, amigo.”
“Fuck.”
“I was thinking that, too.”
“Stoke,” Hawke said, tapping him on the shoulder. He had risen and was peering out just above the sill of the shattered window.
“They’re moving up into position for a frontal assault. I’ve got an idea.”
“All our problems are over, Boomer,” Stoke said into the SatCom. “Mr. Hawke here has an idea. Stay tuned. Over.”
“Standing by, Skipper, over.”
“Follow me,” Hawke said.
The rounds were zinging overhead with ever increasing intensity as Hawke motioned for Stoke to follow him. They both ran in a low crouch toward the stairway leading up.
“Remember that terrace we saw?” Hawke said, taking the steps two at a time. “The one built out over the sea?”
“Right,” Stoke replied. “What about it?”
“It has to be this way.”
“So?”
“If we can reach it, we go over the wall. Can’t be more than a fifty-foot drop into the sea from up there.”
“Well, it ain’t rocket surgery, boss, but it’s all we got. Let’s go!”
There was a problem with the terrace. The Cubans had thought of it first. Stoke and Alex raced across the broad expanse of white marble and peered down over the edge. There were at least twenty soldiers down there on the rocks with automatic weapons, waiting in case anyone should try to leave the island without saying good-bye. At least ten of them had already started climbing up the rocky cliff that would bring them up to the terrace.
Shots rang out, and pieces of stone just beneath them exploded outwards.
Both men ducked behind the four-foot crushed stone wall that ringed the large patio. The moon was so bright on the expanse of white marble that, if they remained standing, they were as good as dead. Hawke held his breath, waiting to see a grenade come flying over the wall.
“Next idea?” Stoke said.
“I’m thinking,” Hawke replied.
“Think faster,” Stoke said, but Hawke never heard him.
There was an earth-shattering explosion in the rooms just behind them followed by a deafening roar just over their heads. They caught a glimpse of a massive winged shadow that blocked out the sky, something huge screaming over the rooftops.