Jessica blinked and wet her lips with her tongue.
“But I should have done it on my own. For Landon Parker. For S/CRU. For me. For us.”
“I understand, Judd.”
“Assist, avoid, admit,” Judd said, “the Ryker rules of engagement. I know we agreed that we could assist each other, but—”
“Aunt Lulu isn’t my aunt!” Jessica blurted out.
“What?”
“She’s not my aunt.”
“I figured,” he said.
“And the man who burst into the house this morning and woke us up—”
“He’s got nothing to do with your college friend, does he?”
“No. Sharon was a lie, too. That was my boss this morning. We’re staying in his place,” she said.
“Okay . . .”
“I didn’t want to lie to you, Judd, but I couldn’t help it. That’s why I’m telling you now. Neither of us are perfect.”
Judd shook his head in agreement. “What else? Any more lies you need to get off your chest?”
“Eight.”
“Eight lies? You counted them?”
“Since Tuesday. Eight. How about you?”
Judd started to run through everything that had happened over the past four days and all the people in the web—the Soccer Dad Four, Landon Parker, Melanie Eisenberg, Brenda Adelman-Zamora, Oswaldo Guerrero, Jessica Ryker—his head hurt. “None.”
“So you win.”
“That’s not the point, Jess. We aren’t in a competition. We’re supposed to be a team.”
“We are a team, Judd. We just got those four Americans free. We just helped give Cuba a chance at a better future. We succeeded, Judd. Again. And we did it together.”
“We did.” He nodded. “But what about . . . us? What about our rules to keep it all together? To keep our family together?”
“We have to keep trying. I’ll keep trying. You too.”
“So . . . who were those guys on The Big Pig? What were they doing?”
Jessica kissed him.
“What about Ruben Sandoval?” he asked. “And Ricardo Cabrera? Who was he working for? I still don’t understand how it’s all connected.”
She kissed him again.
“And what about you? If you were here in Florida for your boss, what were you really doing down here, Jess?”
One more kiss, this time long and deep and soft, both eyes shut.
When she finally pulled away, he cleared his throat. “So . . . now what?” he asked.
“Tomorrow”—she shrugged—“we go home. Back to work. Back to life.”
“Just like that?”
“Right now,” Jessica said, picking up her book, “you’re going swimming.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many friends contributed in big and small ways to this book: Mike Burk, Domingo Campuzano, Francesca Contiguglia, Mvemba Dizolele, Jim Fanjoy, Amanda Glassman, Markus Goldstein, Sara Kass, Jeffrey Krilla, and BJ Pittman. Special thanks to Aida Campuzano, a real-life Peter Pan who generously shared her private memoirs with me. I also benefitted greatly from Michael Grunwald’s The Swamp, Wayne Smith’s The Closest of Enemies, Peter Kornbluh’s Bay of Pigs Declassified, and the extremely timely Back Channel to Cuba by William LeoGrande and Peter Kornbluh. Huge appreciation to my always wise editor Neil Nyren and the whole team at Putnam, especially Ashley Hewlett, Elena Hershey, Anna Romig, and Alexis Sattler. Hat tip and a hug to my agent, Josh Getzler. Most of all, I’m eternally grateful for the love, support, and sensible editing from Donna Moss. Viva!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Todd Moss is Chief Operating Officer and Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development, a Washington, D.C., think tank, and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. From 2007 to 2008, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, where he was responsible for diplomatic relations with sixteen West African countries.
Previously, Moss worked at the World Bank and the Economist Intelligence Unit and taught at the London School of Economics. The author of the novels The Golden Hour and Minute Zero, as well as four nonfiction books on international economic affairs, he lives in Maryland.