Hot Money (23 page)

“More than likely, though Raul says he has heard nothing of such plans. Such men operate in secret, but there is almost always gossip.”

As the boat churned through the choppy waters, they emerged beneath bluer skies. The wind settled into little more than a breeze that barely stirred the humid tropical air. But even with the improved weather, the tension didn’t lessen.

The one question Molly didn’t dare to ask was whether Raul would risk carrying them all the way into Cuban waters. Nor was she sure she wanted to know whether Michael would allow him to do any less. Fortunately, with nothing but open water in all directions, Molly had no real sense of how close she might be to having both questions answered.

For all she knew there was little purpose to the zigzagging course they seemed to be on as the sun slipped below the horizon in a blaze of orange.

“There!” Michael said, gesturing to Raul as he kept his binoculars pinned on some tiny speck in the dimming light.

To Molly the boat in the distance was indistinguishable from dozens of others they had seen since leaving the marina. Only as they drew closer did she realize the boat’s engine was still, that its movement was propelled by no more than the drifting currents.

“Tío! Tío Miguel!”

Michael’s shouts carried across the water as they pulled alongside the boat.
Niña Pilar
had been painted on the boat’s bow in neat bright blue letters.

“Can you get any closer?” he asked Raul.

“Sí
,” he said, maneuvering until the boats were touching.

Michael threw a rope across, then looped it through the railing of his uncle’s boat until the two were pontooned together. Only then did he leap from Raul’s boat to the deck of his uncle’s.

Molly’s breath caught in her throat as he made his way carefully from bow to stern. She nearly panicked when he disappeared inside the cabin and failed to return. She had one hand on the railing and was preparing to leap herself, when he reappeared.

“Michael?” she said softly, her heart hammering as she tried to read the expression on his face.

He swallowed hard before he finally lifted his gaze to meet hers.

“He’s gone,” he said bleakly. “The inflatable raft is missing, too.”

“You’re sure he’s gone back to Cuba, though? Maybe the boat ran out of gas and he took the dinghy to get help,” she said, searching desperately for another explanation.

Raul greeted Michael’s announcement with a barrage of Spanish. He hurriedly sketched a cross over his chest, his gaze flashing toward heaven. Though she could understand only about one word in ten, something in the fisherman’s voice told Molly he disagreed with Michael’s interpretation.

Michael questioned him in impatient, rapid-fire Spanish.

“What?” Molly said. “Michael, what is he saying?”

“Muy loco,”
Michael said derisively to the other man.
“No es posible.”

“
Sí
,” Raul said just as adamantly.

“What, dammit?” Molly said, shouting over the pair of them.

Michael finally looked at her. “Raul seems to think it is not possible that my uncle went back to Cuba.”

“Then what does he think happened?”

“He thinks he was murdered,” he said in a clipped tone.

“Murdered?”

“You see why I say he is crazy. Who would want to murder an old man who has never done anything to hurt anyone in his life?”

“Can you dismiss what he is saying so easily?” Molly asked, though she didn’t want to believe Raul’s theory any more than Michael did. “You’re a homicide detective, Michael. You of all people know how important it is to look beyond the obvious.”

He glared at her. “Maybe just this once I don’t want to,” he snapped. “Maybe just thisonce I don’t want to know anything about someone who might be sick enough to hurt an old man.”

“But I know you, Michael. You won’t rest until you know the truth. Not about something as important as this.”

A sigh shuddered through him. He slid his sunglasses back into place though it was long past any need for them. Without another word, he secured Tío Miguel’s boat to be towed back to Miami, then gestured to Raul.

The fishing boat turned to the north and began chugging through the choppy Atlantic. Molly could no longer read Michael’s expression in the darkness closing in around them, but he was facing south—toward his homeland. Toward Cuba.