and a naked lady who was sitting on his lap, wearing his cowboy hat. Brodie said to Luis, “I don’t think Miss Taylor would have appreciated this place.”
Luis forced a smile. He was still sweating.
As Brodie’s eyes adjusted to the dim light, he noticed two burly guys at a table at the far end of the room. They wore dark T-shirts, and each wore the distinctive red beret and arm bandana of MBR-200. They seemed to be looking at him and Luis, but then went back to their conversation. Before Brodie turned away, he spotted an AK-47 propped against the couch near their table. There were probably more handguns in this place than there were people, but the AK fully automatic assault rifle was the equalizer.
Brodie also noticed four men in suits. Their ties were loosened and their jackets hung on the backs of their chairs. They were smoking cigars and sharing a bottle of rum. One of them patted the bare ass of a passing waitress and they all laughed.
Luis said, “Regime men.”
Right. They looked the same all over the world. The assholes at the top of the food chain. In fact, these four were a bit too plump for a country that was on short rations. More interestingly, they seemed at home in the Hen House, like they were silent partners—maybe along with the MBR-200 guys. Well, Brodie thought, at least this place wasn’t going to get raided by the police tonight.
Brodie sat back and sipped his beer. He pictured Kyle Mercer suddenly showing up, and he ran a few scenarios through his mind: Go talk to him as he’d done a few times with other fugitives in public places? Ask him to come along peacefully and assure him he’d get a fair hearing? That worked well in the States, but not so well overseas. And probably not well with a rogue Delta Force guy anywhere.
The best thing to do if he saw Mercer was what Dombroski had suggested—get out of there quickly and quietly and wait for Mercer to exit, hopefully drunk. Or at least depleted of some of his precious bodily fluids, which reminded Brodie to remind Luis, “You have to take a pee, amigo.”
Luis nodded and stood, looked around, and began heading toward a curtained doorway near the bar at the far end of the lounge. The two MBR-200 guys watched him as he approached. Luis hesitated, then disappeared through the curtain.
Given the size of the lounge area and based on the exterior of the building, Brodie figured there was another thirty or forty more feet of space on the other side of the curtain, and since the Hen House didn’t seem to serve dinner or provide quiet places for meditation, Brodie guessed that the unseen space was divided into a number of fuckie rooms. In fact, the cowboy on the couch was now making his way toward the curtain with his lap lady, who must have aroused his interest, though for Brodie the big thrill was watching the clothes come off. These girls didn’t leave much to the imagination.
Brodie tried to picture Al Simpson here—if this was the place—along with Pete, his partner, and the Venezuelans from the state oil company. Simpson might have been shocked by what he saw, and he was nervous, but excited. And just as he was getting over his shock and thinking about what to do with his whiskey dick, he was shocked again to see Kyle Mercer sitting at a table. And then Mercer stood and disappeared through what Simpson described as a side door. But Brodie couldn’t see a side door.
Then he spotted the door, painted red like the walls, and nearly invisible in the dim, smoky room. The door—a steel exit door—would lead outside about where the generator was, and also where the garbage was tossed—which probably included customers. It was good to know where that door was.
To the left of the exit door was a curtain on the rear wall that matched the one that led to the baño, so it appeared there were two entrances from the lounge to the back rooms.
Brodie stood to join Luis in the baño, get his gun, and release Luis from the Hen House.
As he started for the curtained doorway, a tall, thin man of about his age came over to him and said, in good English, “Do you see a girl you like, señor?”
Brodie looked at the guy. He wore tight pants and a loose black silk shirt,