Page 44 of Ford

Now, to wait.

She pulled out her phone and pretended to be scrolling.

Watched the man with the paper leave.

Saw the couple laughing as they ate the hoof over fake candlelight.

She’d like to be eating a hoof over candlelight—

Head in the game!

“Here’s our guy,” Ford said quietly as a man entered the threshold. Big guy, yeah, he radiated former military off him in the way he scanned the room, spotted Ford, then walked over to the bar.

He had his shirt sleeves pushed up.

“See the bone frog tattoo?” she asked. Ford had told her about the tat he’d seen on the Skype video.

“I can’t, not from here.”

“Let me see…”

“Red.”

She got up and walked to the bar. Stood next to the man but addressed the bartender. “Can I have a glass of water?”

She glanced over at their target, smiled. “Parched.”

“Red, what are you doing?” Ford hissed into her ear.

The bartender handed her a glass of tap water, warm. She thanked him, casting a surreptitious look at the man’s arm.

Green outline of a frog from his wrist to his elbow.

She walked back to the table. “Confirmed.”

But as she turned to sit down, she startled.

The man had followed her.

“Um…can I help you?”

He stood an easy six foot three, had nearly black hair cut short and dark brown eyes. She placed him in his early thirties.

He wasn’t smiling. “I think I’m here to help you.” He sat down opposite her.

Oh. Um.

“What’s he doing?” Ford said, but she couldn’t exactly answer him back.

“Roy?” she said instead.

“I have to admit, I don’t know why Randall keeps sending the rookies. She’s going to get you all killed.”

Who was Randall? A couple of quick words of panic flashed into Scarlett’s brain. But, hello, she’d spent years rehearsing roles with her mother.

She could do this. Really. Scarlett folded her arms and leaned back, looked at the former SEAL. She knew how to talk to operators. Straight up. No punches pulled. “I’m not quite as fresh as you think. You can’t judge someone by what you see. You should know that.Roy.”

One brow flickered down, then he sighed and nodded. “Whatever. But your friend—Ruby Jane—wasn’t prepared to go in-country. I told her to stay put, let York handle the issue. Now she’s on the run, and she’s not going to make it out of Russia alive.”