‘I am curious as to your objection,’ I said. ‘If she helps us kill Jack Ming, what do you care?’
‘Is that what she’s going to help us do? I thought she wanted to bring Nine Suns down.’
‘The lives of your children trump my sense of revenge,’ Mila said.
‘Yes. We’re sticking to the letter of what was demanded of us.’ I glanced at Mila; she didn’t look at me.
Leonie and she stared at each other, taking the measure. ‘I am not comfortable with this, but, Sam, if you can control her and make her useful to us, that is fine with me.’
‘Warmest greeting ever,’ Mila said. ‘I tingle.’
‘Two guns are better than one, Leonie,’ I said.
She looked at us both and then she surrendered. ‘All right. Thank you, Mila. If we get Taylor and Daniel back I will be eternally grateful.’
‘You said you had an idea on finding Jack?’ I said.
‘His phone number is the first step,’ she said. ‘If I can get that I can get his call log. I can start on that right now. Maybe I can find a way to see if any new numbers are calling anyone he knows, via his Facebook network or any of his family or other contacts.’
‘All right.’ I got up, somewhat painfully.
‘Where are you going?’ Mila said.
‘I’m going to see if I can use an old friend.’
‘Everyone can use a friend,’ Leonie said.
‘I mean literally use him, God forgive me.’
I walked downstairs, and I noticed the older, elegant, spare man in the corner drinking a pint. I noticed everyone but everyone else at a table was in a group. He was the only one flying solo. Someone who might want to observe the bar but garner less attention would not sit at the bar. You are kind of front and center sitting at the bar; everyone can see you and you craning your neck around to watch the rest of the room is noticeable. This may sound paranoid but this is how my mind works, especially with the thought that August might be watching the bar to see if I turned up here. I didn’t like the look of him. He watched me, but in the mirrored back of the bar.
When I left The Last Minute, I waited at the next corner for him to exit. Five minutes. Ten minutes. He didn’t. He wasn’t tailing me.
I called Bertrand. ‘The guy in the corner drinking his beer.’
‘Yes.’
‘Anything odd about him?’
‘No.’
‘Have you seen him before?’
‘No, never. He has ordered one Harp and he drinks it slowly. He’s not stirred from his table since you left.’
Well, then if… Mila. ‘Did Mila get here before or after he did?’
‘Before.’
‘We need to be very cautious of anyone alone watching for Mila or for me.’
‘Go do what you need to do,’ Bertrand said. ‘Mila and I can handle any trouble that arises.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘are you sure?’
‘Did she tell you about when we had the bathroom soundproofed?’
‘Uh, sort of. All right. I’ll be back soon.’
I walked into the night.
PART FOUR
72
Ollie’s Bar, Brooklyn
I sat on the crates of beer and when Ollie came in and switched on the light and saw me, he nearly had a heart attack.
‘Jesus and Mary!’ he yelled. Then he stared at me. ‘ You! What the hell are you doing here?’
‘I owe you a gun.’
‘Christ almighty. You could have given me notice when you left.’ A few months ago, when the Company decided to take me out of their private prison in Poland and dangle me as bait for Nine Suns, they’d gotten me a job bartending here at Ollie’s. My decision to slip the Company’s leash to go hunt for my wife necessitated I give Ollie no notice when I left my job. I had also stolen the gun from his safe, but, to my credit, I left an IOU.
‘You know it hurts. It hurts to lose my only good bartender.’ Ollie was famous for bemoaning the sad quality of his hired help. ‘And for you to be a thief.’
‘I left an IOU.’
‘Which I believed, oddly,’ Ollie said. ‘I didn’t call the cops on you.’
‘The gun wasn’t registered anyway, Ollie,’ I said dryly. ‘I lost it but I brought you a better one.’ I handed him a sleek Beretta and a box of ammo I’d taken from The Last Minute.
‘This is fancy,’ he said. ‘I’ll never learn to shoot it.’
‘You never learned to shoot the other one,’ I said.
‘True. Where did you go?’
‘I went to go find my wife and my son.’ For some reason I was done lying with Ollie. I’d answer a direct question as much as I could. He was a good man. Mila adored him, had wanted to buy his bar for years. She and I had first met here; she was scouting me as a possible recruit.
This confession made Ollie blink. ‘Did you?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s good.’
‘I’m trying to find August without using a phone,’ I said. ‘I thought you might be willing to pass him a message for me.’
‘Are you allergic to phones?’
‘No.’
‘I hear they might cause brain cancer.’ Ollie was happiest when worrying. ‘He’s out front and he’s had a bit much.’
‘Is he alone?’
‘Yes, although there’s a good-looking lady eyeing him up four stools down.’
‘I am not one to interfere with the course of true love but do you think you could get him back here to talk to me without anyone knowing?’
‘Why should I do you a favor, Sam? After how you treated me?’
‘Ollie, do you want to retire?’
‘Yes.’
‘I will buy this bar from you when you retire. You don’t have to worry about that, I’ll pay a more than fair price.’
He blinked. ‘Quit your joshing.’
‘How many guys would come back and make stealing a gun right?’
‘Not many, but could I get that in writing?’
‘Like the IOU I was good for?’
‘Yep.’
I tore a label off a case of Newcastle Brown Ale and wrote on the back: I promise to buy Ollie’s Bar at a fair price when he’s ready to retire. Samuel Clemens Capra.
