"Ready to come, lover?" she asked finally.
"Any time," he said.
He put his hands on her hips to steady her, and she began more vigorous thrusts, forcing him deeper and deeper into her and squeezing him almost painfully. His orgasm was powerful, enervating.
She lifted herself, then rose and walked out to the living room. Bat remained on the bed, satiated and exhausted. From where he lay he watched Glenda use an elbow to shove the sliding glass door open. She stepped out onto the balcony and stood staring moodily at the ocean — confident apparently that no one could see her, though he was not so sure. Maybe the idea that she could be seen occurred to her, because she turned abruptly and hurried back into the room.
"Bat — "
"What, baby?" he asked, still not rising.
She came to stand in the bedroom door. "What's going to become of us?"
"What do you have in mind?"
"For god's sake, if I have to tell you — "
"I don't know, Glenda," he interrupted. He rolled off the bed and stepped toward her, meaning to untie her.
She turned and walked back to the open sliding door. "There's nothing for us, is there? In the long run." She stared out over the moonlit sea. "I mean, anything permanent. We fuck. We fuck good. But that's all there is. Right? We say we love each other, but — "
"Glenda — "
"You wouldn't want me to bear a child for you, would you?"
"Are you telling me you're pregnant?" he asked.
"No. I've never been pregnant. I'm not going to get pregnant. I can't afford to be pregnant. I don't want to carry a bastard."
"My mother did."
"Oh, I'm sorry, Bat. Bad choice of words. I am truly sorry. But — "
He began to untie her.
"The whole deal," she said quietly, "is that we don't have any future. The biggest reason is, your father— "
"My father has nothing to do with — "
"No? Your father doesn't like me. Oh, I'm fine as a cash cow, but he wouldn't want his son to marry one."
"My father doesn't control my personal life!"
"The hell he doesn't."
6
The smell of cigar smoke wakened them. Bat woke first, but before he said a word, Glenda woke, too. Cigar smoke. Coming in through the air-conditioning vents? No. It was fresh and pungent. Someone was in the suite.
Actually, someone was in the bedroom. Bat first spotted the point of fire on the tip of the cigar. Then he saw the man, first as a shadow and then, as his eyes focused, distinctly.
Bat almost never suffered nightmares, and when he did there were just two. In the first he was running across the Ludendorff Bridge and was hit in the lower chest. In the second he awoke to find an intruder staring at him. This was that one, but it was no dream; it was real.
The man was sitting on a chair facing their bed. He was dressed in an open-collared pleated white shirt and nondescript trousers. An automatic pistol in its holster hung from a wide web belt. The man himself was anything but prepossessing. He wore a scraggly dark beard, as if he were not old enough to grow a solid beard but had let whiskers grow out where they would. He puffed with an air of thoughtfulness on his oversized cigar.
"You have not to worry, señor, señorita, "he said. "I come to do you no harm." His English was Spanish-accented.
"Then why are you here?" Bat asked as he drew himself up in bed. He spoke Spanish. "And who are you?"
"I am nobody, señor. That is the point. And that is why I am here."
"You'll have to explain that."
"You are Señor Jonas Enrique Raul Cord y Batista," the man said. "The señorita is Glenda Grayson, the famous American television star. 'Cord y Batista.' You are the grand-nephew of our dictator. You have come to Havana to gather facts and to advise your father whether or not your family should invest more money in Cuba and in the Batista regime."
"You know a great deal," said Bat.
The man nodded. "It is essential to know everything," he said. "That is how wars are won."
"But — "
The man raised his hand. "The purpose of my visit is to demonstrate to you how very shaky the Batista regime is. You know we kidnapped a famous American racing driver?"
"Yes."
"And we released him unharmed. Our only purpose was to demonstrate to the world that this corrupt regime cannot protect Americans who come to Cuba."
"So, are we kidnapped?"
"No, no. We simply wanted you to see that the vaunted Batista secret police cannot even surround you with protection in a luxury suite in the Riviera Hotel. We have no interest in harming you, certainly not to murder you. But I could have done it, you see."
"It is your ... recommendation, then, that we not invest in this hotel," said Bat.
"That is my suggestion, Señor Cord. If you do, you will not be in danger. But you will lose your money."
"Suppose you take control of the country," said Bat. "This hotel will still be an important asset. Surely — "
"Batista has attempted to turn Cuba into the whorehouse of the Western Hemisphere," said the man, raising his voice. "Every kind of criminal is welcomed to Havana. The dignity of the nation and of its people has been sacrificed. We will restore our national honor, even at the sacrifice of the money these places bring."
"You are Marxists," said Bat.
"Our struggle is the people's struggle," the man said.
"Well ... You have delivered your message. Now?"
The man rose from the chair. He shrugged. "You are right. I leave now. I — Oh. Incidentally, feel free to call hotel security as soon as I am out the door. They will not catch me, and that will be additional evidence of what I have been telling you."
Bat shook his head. "You are an interesting man, Senor ... ?"
"Guevara," the man said. "Ernesto Guevara. I am more often known as Che Guevara."
21
1
WHEN JONAS WAS RELEASED FROM THE HOSPITAL HE went to the apartment in the Waldorf Towers. After two weeks there he called for an Inter-Continental plane and flew to the ranch in Nevada. He stayed there a week, then moved again into the fifth-floor suite at The Seven Voyages. Angie was with him all the time.
When Bat arrived, Jonas sat in the living room of the suite, surrounded by heaps of files. Clint McClintock and Bill Shaw were with him. Shaw, the former test pilot for the Air Force, had flown him from New York and had a Beech Baron waiting at the airport to take Jonas anywhere he wanted to go.
"You're looking good," Bat said to his father. "Like you're making a fast recovery."
Jonas looked comfortable in a dark-blue polo shirt and khaki slacks. "I'm drinkin' a little, again. Fuckin' a little, again," he said. "They want to keep me on a short leash." He shook his head. "Rather chuck it."
"I think you have other alternatives," said Bat.
"Well, anyway, sit down. What did you tell Lansky?"
"I told him no. My mother put the word in with the President, to help him get his licenses. I'm not at all sure he needed help, but he got it. But I said no to investing any more money in Cuba. My mother thinks her uncle is riding for a fall, and from what I observed in Havana I have to agree with her."
"Lansky's been trying to reach me on the phone, so I figured you'd said no to him."
"He wants you to overrule me."
Jonas nodded. "You've bet your ass on this one, my boy. You may have said no to a damned profitable venture. But I'm not going to overrule you."
"Why not, if you want to?"
Jonas ignored that. "On the whole," he said, "I like the architect's design for the Intercontinental Vegas Hotel. But I don't think you've got the slot-machine arcade placed right. The people who play the slots are small-timers. We don't want them walking around in the casino just to gawk. Put the arcade near an outside door, so they can come in and play the slots without even entering the rest of the hotel. Also, the plan shows the arcade with windows. No windows, none in the casino, none in the arcade. The idea is for players to forget what time it is, which they won't do if they see the light changing outside."