Spy in a Little Black Dress - By Maxine Kenneth Page 0,60

is worth the price you pay in blood.”

Her fervor took even Jackie by surprise. “You see, Emiliano, that’s why I don’t believe violence is the necessary response to any political problem.”

Emiliano looked over at her and nodded. “I understand your position perfectly. And I think you understand mine. So, at least for now, can we just agree to disagree?”

Jackie nodded in return. “A truce,” she said.

“A truce,” he agreed.

The town was a small collection of whitewashed buildings radiating from a dusty central square with a rusted fountain that had stopped dispensing water many years ago. One of the buildings turned out to be a hotel, and Jackie and Emiliano decided to take a room there. Because he didn’t want to let her out of his sight, Emiliano insisted that they pass themselves off to the desk clerk, a small man with a big mustache, as husband and wife.

But once in the room, the first thing Emiliano did was take a blanket off one of the twin beds and use a clothesline he found in one of the dresser drawers to rig up a curtain to divide the room in two to give Jackie her privacy. Jackie smiled inwardly at Emiliano’s constant deference to decorum.

“You make me feel just like Claudette Colbert in It Happened One Night,” Jackie said, referring to Clark Gable’s similar solution to sharing a room with his unmarried traveling companion.

“Well, if you’re expecting me to act like Clark Gable and take off my shirt, you’ll be disappointed,” Emiliano said. Jackie was surprised. Here was Emiliano displaying a hide-and-seek sense of humor again, as well as his familiarity with a romantic comedy. And beyond that, revealing that maybe he was more shy about sharing a room with her than she was about sharing a room with him. It was an odd turnabout of gender roles, but Jackie found Emiliano’s modesty completely endearing.

The hotel had no dining room, but they found a cantina nearby that was still open. Jackie thought that it was the equivalent of the twenty-four-hour diners back home. The place was rustic, with a menu to match. Jackie and Emiliano both ordered arroz con pollo and fried plantains, a dinner that turned out to be rather tasty. Afterward, they returned to their hotel room, where they retired to their beds on either side of the makeshift curtain.

Jackie closed her eyes but found that sleep just wouldn’t come, partly because a chain of events kept playing out in her mind. First, there were the events of the day, then the events of the last few days after her arrival at the airport, and then the events of the past year—starting with the discovery of the diary—that had led to her being here, in this hotel room, in a small nameless Cuban town in the province of Matanzas, with this stand-in for Fernando Lamas. And that, she had to admit to herself, was the other reason she was finding it so hard to fall asleep: having the gorgeously handsome man lying on the other side of the curtain.

After what seemed like several hours of tossing and turning, Jackie gave up all thoughts of sleep. In a small voice, she called out, “Emiliano?”

At first there was no response. Then, from the other side of the curtain, came, “Yes?”

“Are you awake?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, you can’t sleep either?”

“Well, frankly, all your tossing and turning is keeping me awake.”

“Sorry,” Jackie said contritely. “Well, since we’re both up, would you like to talk?”

Before he could answer, Jackie drew back the curtain, hoping the sight of her would encourage Emiliano to say yes.

“I guess so,” Emiliano said, sitting up in bed. His shirt was off, but unlike Clark Gable, he was wearing a sleeveless undershirt. Even so, the sight of his muscular biceps and chest rippling beneath the shirt made Jackie’s eyes widen. “What would you like to talk about?”

Jackie thought about it. “Why don’t you tell me a story?”

“What kind of story?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Then a thought occurred to her: “Why don’t you tell me about your childhood? You said you were from Oriente, and so was Fidel Castro. Did you grow up together?”

“We played together as boys even though my father was a poor campesino and Fidel’s father owned a sugar plantation. But you see, Fidel wasn’t raised at home. He spent most of his childhood in foster homes and private Catholic boarding schools.”

“How sad,” Jackie said. “Why was that?”

Emiliano seem reluctant to go on, but he finally said, “Well, it’s common knowledge