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In the weeks following their arrival at the airport in Panama City, Catalina Cato and Newton Waverly became inseparable. Binghamton's only suggestion to Waverly while he was in the field was that establishing strong contacts in the financial community in a developing nation was the key to high government officials. The success of any future democratic movement had to be economic renewal, and that would be based on American trade, aid, and investment. It would seem sheer coincidence to Waverly until it was too late, that Catalina Cato was the perfect answer.
For her part, she had agreed weeks before to once again become involved, only because she, too, could see the creeping influence of foreigners in her country. She had made a clean break years before from those who refused to accept the death of communism thirty years before. It had been a college fantasy originally to work with the Americans. They had educated her and she would always feel a debt to them, but undercover work had quickly become distasteful. Her country had a much greater need for her. The unexpected offer had been accepted weeks earlier, only because she could satisfy both countries. She knew there would be undercover people in Panama, but never once did she hear Waverly's name mentioned.
Neither Catalina Cato nor Newton Waverly had been looking for one another. There was no reason. Both were content with their lives. Complications were part and parcel of relationships. She only had one affair, in her college days before she transferred to the States that had ever affected her; after that, she became the initiator with any men who were attracted to her. Adventure had been Waverly's mistress from his earliest days in the service. And no woman had ever come along to change his mind. Binghamton felt a deep sense of security surrounding himself with people like Waverly.
Neither Catalina nor Newton considered the fact that physical attraction to each other could go any further than drinks, dinner, and a goodnight kiss. Yet they never missed an evening together from the first day. The kisses grew longer, quiet moments more intimate, and parting at the end of the evening more difficult. The realization that there was much more between them came quite suddenly, after weeks of overlooking the obvious. The shock was so abrupt, so overwhelming, that neither realized that their dinner had grown cold. It was too important to discuss what had happened to them and then to do something about it.
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Newton Waverly's eyes opened slowly, blinking two or three times as he tried to remember where he was. A ray of the sun filtered around the edge of the shade, outlining a clock radio on the bedside table. Lifting his head to avoid the sun's reflection on the clock's face, he saw it was 6:30.
It was morning, and he was in the apartment Catalina had found for him in Panama City. Though it was expensive and supposed to be fully furnished, the air conditioner wasn't working. That's what had awakened him; sultry, sticky heat so early in the morning. His hotel room had been maintained at a constant temperature for the previous weeks, and he'd always needed the alarm. But this morning was different. It was hot, and the stickiness of the day had drawn him from sleep.
But it was more than that. He rolled backward just a bit, and Catalina murmured in her sleep. That's what had pulled him back to consciousness---the fact that someone else was in bed with him.
Waverly sank back into the pillow, memories of the previous night flooding back. But it wasn't just the sex. It was her, Catalina, the woman he'd met only a few weeks ago. He'd known many women over the years, but Catalina Cato was exceptional. This morning it seemed to Waverly that they'd lived together for years. It seemed so natural to be waking up next to her. Yet up to the week before, it had only been a goodnight kiss outside her door or a casual nuzzle on the dance floor at the hotel.
Waverly rolled over slowly. She was lying on her side, legs drawn up. The sheet was down to her waist, but with her arms folded in front of her, little of her body was visible. He reached out gently and touched her shoulder, then ran his hand down her side to rest on her hip.
Catalina's eyes opened slowly. There was never any doubt in her mind where she was. Her mouth opened slightly as she smiled, her eyes crinkling at the corners. She touched two fingers to her lips then brushed them on Waverly's. "Good morning," she said softly.
"Good morning, yourself." He moved his head toward hers, kissing her on the tip of her nose. "I assume you know where you are this morning."
She nodded. "In bed with you, sir. And very pleased with myself, I might add...and with you, of course."
His hand ran up her back, gently pulling her toward him. "Why thank you, Ms. Cato. The compliment should be returned." He raised himself onto an elbow.
"Maybe this evening---if I luck out." Catalina kissed him quickly and leaped out of bed, padding off toward the bathroom. Looking back over her shoulder, she added, "Nothing to do with you, but look at that clock. I'm already late. I'm a working girl. Remember that 8:00 appointment I told you about last night?" The bathroom door shut behind her.
Waverly rolled onto his back, hands behind his head. Yes, he remembered an appointment. He recalled that and many other things, though he preferred to forget the appointment. The morning seemed to be starting so well....
His eyes traveled around the bedroom, familiarizing himself with his new home. It was only yesterday afternoon he'd moved in. Catalina was welcome, though unexpected. No woman had so enchanted him that his world would revolve around her own. Yet everything he now thought about included her.
Their first dinner together, the night he arrived in Panama, had been pleasant enough, perhaps with too much to drink after the events at the airport. He learned enough about Catalina Cato that first evening to feel that this might already be the source he was looking for. What were the odds against something like that? A hundred to one? A thousand to one? A million to one? She had the contacts he would need.
It seemed impossible that it could happen so easily, that she was likely the person he'd come to Panama to meet. She wasn't just a senior employee of the National Bank. In many ways, she was the bank. Major projects developed in Panama by outside sources, whether private or government, were her responsibility to evaluate financially. Catalina had been educated in the United States and took a master's degree in business at UCLA. Her concentration had been international banking.
Her interest in finance was a normal one. An only child, her mother died when Catalina was in her early teens. Her dad, a university professor, had influenced much of his brilliant daughter's thinking even before her mother died. Unlike her father, who likely was a millionaire, Catalina had been interested in business to help her country. She'd been in the local university when the students were marching against the U.S. war in Iraq, and her father had allowed her to march with them. But she had no communist or socialist leanings. Her education had been exacting enough for her to learn that poor countries became rich countries by attracting wealth if unable to generate it on their own. Panama was a poor country with little to fund industry or major agriculture, but money for those things was available.
Catalina Cato became famous and respected very quickly when she returned to her country and went to work with the National Bank. Her success attracted attention in both business and government circles, and with the military as well, since the military and government were hand-in-hand in Panama.
In a few short years, she became a powerful individual in the little country. The respect directed to Catalina Cato was genuine. There were also many men attracted to her because of her beauty, wit, and charm, yet no man was so successful that anyone was aware of. Her life seemed to be her work. She was often out of the country and had little time for social affairs.
She was captivated by Newton Waverly from that first day, for reasons she failed to understand at first. Waverly noticed the admiring glances wherever they went. He was amazed when he realized how many people looked at him with awe because he was with Senorita Cato. Of even more curiosity to Waverly was why she was attracted to him. It had to be obvious, what with her contacts in America, that he was more than he claimed. His credentials were real enough, and he could speak their business language as well as anyone. But she also had to know that in their world a man doesn't just drop into another country with no prior contacts and explain that he'd like to spend a little money. As he lay in bed considering the fact, it became more preposterous. Maybe it was true that women with class were attracted to men without it!
The bathroom door opened and Catalina stepped out, one towel wrapped around her head to keep her hair dry while she rubbed her back with the other. "I'll have to remember a shower cap." She winked at him. "I believe the saying is 'a penny for your thoughts.'"
"You are an extremely beautiful woman....a glorious creature, and I've been trying to figure out why I'm so attracted to you." He gestured at her dripping body. "Now I think I'm getting an idea."
"You can save your ideas until tonight, my dear. It's business during the day." She crossed over to a bureau, pulling open one of the drawers. Searching through the contents, she extracted a fresh change of clothes, laying the garments neatly on the bed.
"Where in the hell did those come from?"
"I brought them over here yesterday before you moved your things here. I don't like to go to the back in dirty clothes."
"You mean----you expected to wake up here this morning?"
"I got enough clothes so that I wouldn't miss them if I didn't stay here!" She bent over and kissed him on the forehead, then scurried away before he could touch her. "But I believe in looking ahead and better organized." She dressed quickly. Waverly noticed how little makeup she used, just enough to highlight her eyes, and some lipstick to set off her dark, clear complexion. And she was ready to go."
"That was fast. Guess we'll just have to wait for the weekends to sleep in."
"I don't know," she teased, sitting on the end of the bed, her eyebrows raised quizzically. "I've always been an early riser."
"Go on then, off to work."
She rose to go. "Don't forget. Noon, at the El Canal restaurant. I'll have Enrique Moore with me when I get there." And she was out the door.
"Enrique Moore," he murmured to himself. What luck! he thought, and so early in the game. Moore was a friend of Catalina's and an economic advisor to President Arosemena. He was a man that she insisted Waverly should meet----which stopped him for a second. He wondered why she thought he should be introduced to Moore if he hadn't bothered to explain why he was in Panama. He'd hinted only briefly two evenings before of the Cuban influence.
There was no point in going back to sleep, Waverly realized. His mind was now too active for that. Waverly did his best thinking in the shower, and there was now so much to think about. His first problem was one of Bull Binghamton's agents, a man who had come to him the day before at his hotel. The agent----Torres, he called himself---either spent time with the rebel forces or was in direct contact with someone who did. He knew all their movements and had come with information he considered vital, something that could tie in with Waverly's mission.
There was to be a raid two nights later on the port of Colon, a vital city at the northern entrance of the Canal. Colon was the gateway to the Caribbean, to the U.S., and Europe. There was no doubt about the purpose, a twofold and well-thought-out approach. President Arosemena must be convinced of the power of the rebel forces, that they could immobilize a major city as well as an airport. The second, and possibly more vital aspect, was to convince an undecided populace that neither the military nor the government in the Presidential Palace was in control. The intent was not to simply hit-and-run as in the past, but to hold off government forces as well. If they could hold the police station and city hall for twelve hours, the people would know. The instruments of accountability understood by the people----President Arosemena's government, the Guardia, even the judicial system---were helpless before a revolutionary movement capable of threatening, and then successfully carrying out, violence at any moment and in any place in their country.85Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTIYyiunA3u
