The Council of Ten by Jon Land Page A

brothers.”
    “Six bullets can go a long way.”
    “You’re fucking crazy.”
    “Yeah. Keep talking.”
    “Same table all the time. Rear corner. Trelana sits between the two monsters. Couple others wait in a car outside. Sure, no problem… .”
    “Can you get me in there?”
    “It’s a public restaurant.”
    “That’s not what I mean and you know it, Agent Masterson. I’ll need to be close to Trelana to be sure. His bodyguards gotta have a reason to let me do that.”
    “Like if you were a waiter? Sure, I can handle that. We place people in restaurants all the time. Just remember, if you’re closer to them, it’ll mean they’ll be closer to you.”
    “Yup.”
    “I’ve got a gun for you in my pocket. How you get it into Too-Jay’s is your problem. Giving you a reason to be there in the first place I guess is mine. Call you later on that one.”
    “Not bad. Now what about getting me out of there?”
    Masterson resisted, his mind changing tracks. “Kid, I wouldn’t be doing this if in the long run it wasn’t going to make my own life easier. We can’t touch Trelana. You’re going to be making lots of people happy.”
    “Just tell me about the escape.”
    “It’s like this. Frustration is a by-law at the agency these days. A couple other lifers feel like I do. It wasn’t hard to secure their help.” Masterson thought briefly. “I’ll have a man, a spotter, watching Too-Jay’s from outside at a point from where he can see the interior of the dining area. As soon as you approach Trelana’s table ready to use the gun, lean over and pretend to tie your shoe. That will be his signal to call for the getaway car. When the hit’s finished, hightail it out of the restaurant. The car will be waiting.”
    “If it’s not …”
    “Look, kid, if I get you that far, I’m not gonna screw you. You’ll have enough to feed me to both my own people and Trelana’s. We’ll get you out of Too-Jay’s, then out of the city and back home. Do this right and nobody’ll even get a look at you. If something fucks up, you’ve got my private number, which rings wherever I am. I’m not a hard man to find.”
    “Let’s hope I don’t have to look.”
    Masterson hesitated again. “I’d have done something like this, or hired someone to do it, a long time ago, except I never learned how not to be scared.”
    “Or how to hate,” Drew told him.
    “Ordering! One turkey club with extra mayo, one liverwurst on rye with onions… .”
    Drew’s head pounded from the constant sound of plates clapping against steel. He stepped to the raised counter; behind it two men were busy with a never-ending array of breads and contents to be stuffed between slices. Quickly he clipped his order in the first vacant slot. Across from the sandwich area, the activity was similarly hectic inside the kitchen where hot orders were being prepared. A continuous stream of khaki-clad waiters passed in and out through the swinging door. A collision seemed unavoidable. The Sunday lunchtime rush at Too-Jay’s deli had begun. The popular eating spot promised to be swarming with people for the next hour or so. Then things would quiet down considerably and Arthur Trelana would make his appearance.
    “Ordering! One BLT, one tongue special with melted swiss …”
    One of Drew’s orders came up and he loaded the four plates onto a tray, carting them carefully back into the dining area. He felt nearly as nervous about botching things in his cover as a waiter as he did about the more pressing task soon at hand. So far he had held his own, but the rush hour would sorely test him. Stand out too much and someone might make a point of mentioning him to Trelana upon the drug lord’s arrival.
    Masterson had arranged the cover of a substitute waiter. Drew was told to be at the deli by six A.M . He was expected. Masterson told him the restaurant would furnish him with a uniform. He had the cab leave him off on Coconut Row at the head of Royal Poinciana