Page 10 of Safe Enough

“I’d be nuts. Why should I trust you?”

“You shouldn’t. You don’t have to.”

“You could disappear with my two million.”

“I could, but I won’t. Because if I did, you’d call Octavian and tell him that a face just came back to you. You’d describe me, and then your problem would become my problem. And if Octavian is as bad as you say, that’s a problem I don’t want.”

“You better believe it.”

“I do believe it.”

“Where would I find you afterward?”

“Right here,” I said. “You know I use this place. You’ve seen me in here before.”

“Method acting,” he said.

“You can’t betray what you don’t know,” I said.

He went quiet for a long time. I sat still and thought about putting one million dollars in cash and ten keys of uncut cocaine in the trunk of my car.

“OK,” he said.

“There would be a fee,” I said, to be plausible.

“How much?” he asked.

“Fifty grand,” I said.

He smiled.

“OK,” he said again.

“Like a penny under the sofa cushion,” I said.

“You got that right.”

“We’re all winners.”

The bar door opened and a guy walked in on a blast of warm air. Hispanic, small and wide, big hands, an ugly scar high on his cheek.

“You know him?” my new best friend asked.

“Never saw him before,” I said.

The new guy walked to the bar and sat on a stool.

“We should do this thing right now,” my new best friend said.

Sometimes, things just fall in your lap.

“Where’s the stuff?” I asked.

“In an old trailer in the woods,” he said.

“Is it big?” I asked. “I’m new to this.”

“Ten kilos is twenty-two pounds,” the guy said. “About the same for the money. Two duffels, is all.”

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