He came down, his breath pluming in the cold-the temperature had dropped some-and slipped an arm around her shoulders and led her up and inside. She had a little brown briefcase with her, so perhaps they were just going to work.

Three hours later they were still in there.

I probably shouldn’t have done it, but I was getting bored. Surveillance was not what I’d bargained for, though the Broker had made it clear sitting watch would come into play from time to time in this line of work. Anyway, I was getting bored and itchy and frankly curious.

So I stuffed the nine millimeter in my waistband, zipped the cord jacket over it, and went out the back way and cut through some undeveloped wooded property until I could cross the street a quarter of a mile away, and come up behind the cobblestone house and peek in a window or two.

Which is exactly what I did.

They were in a small room that I would best describe as a study-lots of books on shelves, and a big rolltop desk littered with more books and manuscript pages and a typewriter with a ream of white typing paper next to it. That’s where he was sitting.

So maybe they were working, right?

Well, she was anyway. She was in pink panties on her knees, blowing the guy, his leisure suit pants around his ankles.

Fuck, I would have killed this lucky prick for free.

TWO

I have a pretty good memory. I can recall conversations well, at least well enough to write them down for your benefit and have them pass muster. Same is true of people, their physical descriptions and the sounds of their voices and even what they were wearing-it all seems to stick.

But I don’t remember the exact words when the Broker came around to that little two-room apartment and recruited me for his team, even though it was one of the more important conversations of my life.