“One minute, down at the end,” Lucas said.
At the end of the bar, Lucas pointed out Capslock and White: “Those two are going to be leaning on the bar, as soon as they can get to it. Might drink one beer in an hour. You gotta leave them be.”
“They’re undercover?”
“Yes.”
“There’s not going to be trouble?” the manager asked.
“Not here,” Lucas said.
“Then, if they don’t get shoved out the door by the crowd, okay with me,” the manager said. “Now I gotta get back to work.”
• • •
Sherwood looked athis watch: “Ten-forty. This is a fuckin’ zoo. I’m gonna be pissed if he doesn’t show. Maybe we ought to wait outside, by the door.” He was chewing on a brat, with a greenish relish leaking out of the bun, along with mustard.
“Just as bad out there as it is in here,” Lucas said. A man tried to push between them, but they fended him off. “We don’t know what he looks like, but he knows what I look like, and we said we’d be inside. I’d hate to have him come in the back, or something, and miss us.”
“All right. Well, grab a brat. These are pretty damn good. Crispy.”
An elbow hit Lucas in the back, right in the spine, hard, and he lurched forward, turned, half expecting to see the Russian, but it wasthe woman he’d thrown the hip-check at, on her way out. She said, “Sorry,” but didn’t mean it.
Sherwood was gagging on the brat and Lucas said, “Shut up.”
• • •
They waited, millingaround in the sweaty crowd, eyeballing anyone who might be a candidate. A few minutes before eleven o’clock, a man walked in wearing a red hat, peering at faces as he came. Lucas said to Sherwood, “Look at this,” and Sherwood turned to look at the same time as the man saw Lucas. He nodded and pushed toward them.
“You’re Davenport,” he said. “I saw you on television.”
“You’re…”
“Titov. I have no time. What are we doing? What are you offering?”
“We’re offering to maybe not shoot you where you stand,” Lucas said. He could see White and Capslock closing in on them.
Titov said, “Don’t waste my time because I don’t have any. Where is the CIA man?” He checked out Sherwood: “You him?”
“I am,” Sherwood said. “How much time do you have to talk?”
“I can’t talk ten minutes. Maybe five, then I have to run.”
“What do you want?” Sherwood asked. White and Capslock closed up, boxing Titov.
“I will give you Katerina Abramova, the leader of the assassination team, and Bernard Sokolov, who you know. I want what Sokolov got: witness protection and a house in the West.”
Lucas: “Where’s Katerina and Bernie?”
“In a car. Before I tell you, I want to know if I get what I want.”
“What if we just say ‘fuck you’ and put the cuffs on?” Lucas asked.
Titov shrugged: “I’m not part of the team. I have shot nobody. I don’t want to shoot anybody, that’s why I called you. I don’t want to go back to Russia. But, if you put the cuffs on, you can do that, and you will never see Kat or Bernie again. A year from now, two years in prison, and I’ll be traded back to Russia, where I’ll be a hero and you’ll be standing there wondering why you wasted everybody’s time.”
“We will give you a deal, a good deal, a great deal,” Sherwood said, moving so his side and shoulder were in front of Lucas. A man pushed between Sherwood and Titov carrying two beers; he was wearing a ski cap with floppy hang-down ear coverings, like a hound’s. He slopped a little beer and said, “Sorry, dude.”
Sherwood stepped around him toward Titov. “I need to ask, are you really headed for the Canadian border, like you told Lucas?”
