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He stole from his employers. He kept something for himself and tried to move it through a fence in Amsterdam. He still wasn't sure how he'd been discovered, not that it mattered now. He'd expected to die, then, but they only smiled.

He stared at the black ring of grounds in his empty cup.

He smoothed it automatically, under the table, folded it in quarters, and passed it to her. You need that, honey.

He saw Case and smiled, his teeth a web work of East European steel and brown decay. Case found a place at the bar, between the unlikely tan on one of Lonny Zone's whores and the crisp naval uniform of a tall African whose cheekbones were ridged with precise rows of tribal scars. Wage was in here early, with two Joe boys, Ratz said, shoving a draft across the bar with his good hand.

It was a flat pink octagon, a potent species of Brazilian dex he bought from one of Zone's girls. The Jarre was walled with mirrors, each panel framed in red neon.