Havana Run Read Free

spend more and more of his time here. It had fallen to Russell to do much of the running back and forth.
    “I don’t get into fish,” Russell said.
    “It’s a bird,” Deal said. “Eagle of the sea. There’s one right out there, perched on the mast of that ship.”
    Russell glanced out the window. “Looks like a crow to me,” he said.
    “It’s bigger than a crow,” Deal said. “Not to mention of a different color.”
    “Whatever,” Russell said.
    “I don’t know that I’ve ever seen an osprey on a boat mast before,” Deal said, thinking that there couldn’t possibly be anyone on board. He looked at Russell. “Have you ever read
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
? It takes up the matter of birds and boats.”
    “Every time I went to the prison library, they said that one was out,” Russell said.
    Deal nodded. “I’ve got a copy. I’ll lend it to you.”
    “My stack is pretty thick right now,” Russell said. He glanced toward the bar. “What’s it take to get a drink around here?”
    Deal raised his hand. In moments, a tall curly-haired guy with a square jaw, piercing eyes and wearing a floral-print shirt appeared from the service passage, wiping his hands on a towel. “What’ll you have, Mr. Deal?”
    “The usual for me,” Deal said. “I’m not sure about my associate. He seems thirsty.”
    “We can fix that,” the guy said, giving Russell his professional smile.
    “Tom Selleck, meet Russell Straight,” Deal said.
    The bartender extended his hand. “Good to meet you. Tom is right, actually, but the Selleck part, that’s just Mr. Deal’s joke.”
    “He looks just like him, though, wouldn’t you say?”
    Russell looked at Selleck quizzically. “Now you mention it,” he told Deal. “How about a beer, Tom?”
    “You have a preference?”
    “Give him a Red Stripe,” Deal said. The bartender nodded and went off.
    “Who’s Tom Selleck?” Russell asked, watching the bartender duck into a cooler for the beer.
    Deal thought about it. “Did they have television in prison, Russell?”
    “Wasn’t anybody like
him
on it,” Russell said, glancing toward the bar. He turned back to Deal. “You know what they do to guys who say
actually
in the joint?”
    “I can guess,” Deal said. “Tom Selleck is an actor. He had a series a few years back. He played a private detective who lived in Hawaii.”
    “So you say,” Russell answered. “Instead of fat and ugly like your pal Driscoll, he looks like our bartender?”
    The affable Tom was back by then, with Deal’s tea and a squatty bottle of Red Stripe and a glass for Russell. “More or less,” Deal said, downing half of his tea. He’d been out on the site since seven, and it had been hot even then.
    Russell had a drink of his Red Stripe, then held the bottle away for inspection. His hand was so big he had to rearrange the bottle to finish reading the painted-on label. “This is from Jamaica,” he said.
    “So it is,” Deal said.
    “What are
you
drinking?” Suspicion was heavy in Russell’s voice.
    Deal held up his glass. “Iced tea,” he said. “With Sweet’N Low.” He patted his stomach.
    “That’s
all
you put in it?”
    Deal leaned his glass toward Russell in answer.
    “Sometimes you sound like you got a load on,” Russell said.
    “Sometimes I do,” Deal said.
    Russell shook his head. “Driscoll is like that,” he said, after a moment.
    “Like what?”
    “Always wants to be the last man talking, you know?”
    “I hadn’t thought about it,” Deal said. “But I am going to watch that about myself, from now on.”
    Russell had another swig of his beer. “Maybe you been spending too much time down here in the tropics. The heat cooks your brain.”
    “You’d be spending more of your time in Key West if Denise were still here.”
    Russell allowed himself a smile. “She likes Miami just fine,” he said.
    Deal smiled himself, thinking how the two had met in this very bar, how Russell had steadfastly denied any