SSC (2011) The Road to Hell by Paul Levine Read Free Book Online

orange jumpsuits and shower shoes.
    With one wrist handcuffed to the rail at the rear of the bridge, Cruz had been berating Steve for the past twenty minutes. “Know what, Solomon? She hits harder than you do.”
    “ Mr. Cruz,” Victoria said, “if you begin to feel dizzy or nauseous, let me know. Head trauma can be very dangerous.”
    “ What about my head?” Steve demanded.
    “ It’s impervious to trauma. Or reason.”
    The Wet Dream was planing across the tops of small whitecaps when Steve said: “Take the wheel, Vic. Keep it on two-zero-two.”
    “ Please ,” she said, irritated.
    “ What?”
    “‘ Keep it on two-zero-two, please .’”
    “ A captain doesn’t say ‘please.’”
    “ Maybe not Captain Bligh.” Victoria slid behind the wheel, thinking maybe she’d hit the wrong man with the gaff. She still didn’t know where they were headed, and Steve’s behavior was becoming increasingly bizarre. He had the beginning of a lump on his head, and blood trickled from his skinned elbows and knees.
    “ Kidnaping,” Cruz said. “Assault. Boat theft. You two are gonna be busy little shysters.”
    “ Shut up,” Steve said. “Under the law of the sea, I’m master of this craft.”
    “ What law? You stole my fucking boat.”
    * * *
    Once past Key West, they entered the Florida Straits, the water growing deeper, the color turning from light green to aquamarine to cobalt blue. No reefs here, and a five-foot chop slapped at the hull of the boat. The wavecaps sparkled, as if studded with diamonds in the late afternoon sun.
    “ Gonna tell you a story, Cruz,” Steve said, “and when I’m done, you’re gonna cry and beg forgiveness and give back all the money you stole.’”
    “ Yeah, right.”
    “ Story starts forty-some years ago in Havana. A beautiful lady named Teresa Toraño lost her husband who was brave enough to oppose Fidel Castro.”
    “ Tough shit,” Cruz said. “Happened to a lot of people.”
    “ Teresa came to Miami with nothing. Worked minimum wage, mopped floors in a car dealership, ended up owning Toraño Chevrolet.”
    “ My papi always told me hard work pays off,” Cruz said, smirking. “Too bad he never got out of the cane fields.”
    “ A few years ago, she hires a new controller. A fellow exilado. This guy’s got a fancy computer system that will revolutionize their books. It also lets him steal three million bucks before anybody knows what hit them. Now, the banks have pulled Teresa’s line of credit, and she could go under.”
    “ I’m not crying, Solomon.”
    “ Not done yet. See, this lady is damn important to me. If it hadn’t been for Teresa giving me work my first year out of school, I’d have gone broke.”
    “ Lo único que logró la dama fue posponer lo inevitable,” Cruz said. “She only postponed the inevitable.”
    Victoria knew there was more to it than just a financial relationship. Teresa had virtually adopted Steve and his nephew Bobby, and the Solomon Boys loved her in return. After Victoria entered the picture, she was added to the extended Toraño family. Now, each year at Christmas, they all gathered at Teresa’s estate in Coral Gables for her homemade crema de vie, an anise drink so rich it made eggnog seem like diet soda. All of which meant that Steve would do anything for Teresa. One of Steve’s self-proclaimed laws expressed the principle:
    “ I won’t break the law, breach legal ethics, or risk jail time…unless it’s for someone I love. ”
    Now that Victoria thought about it, the question wasn’t: Just what would Steve do for Teresa Toraño? It was: What wouldn’t he do?
    “ That sleazy accountant,” Steve said. “In Cuba, he kept the books for the student worker program, the students who cut sugar cane. Ran the whole food services division. But he had a nasty habit of cutting the pineapple juice with water and selling the meat off the back of trucks. The kids went hungry and he got fat. When the authorities found out, he