Sparrman took a seat and called the waitress over. He ordered another beer for himself and asked the ladies what they wanted. They ordered Amstel Lights. There was no telling how long they would be drinking. The lower the alcohol content of what they were consuming, the better.
Sloane elaborated on their cover story, going into more detail about where they were from, and what they were doing in Sweden.
When she asked Sparrman what he did for a living, he told her he owned one of the biggest ranches on the island. She said she didn’t believe him and asked to see his hands. When he showed her, she lightly traced the lines and calluses with one of her fingers. If the man wasn’t hot already, his temperature was definitely beginning to climb. And, she had learned something about him, something he hadn’t said.
They finished their beers and Sparrman bought another round. They continued to laugh and make small talk.
When the third round came, Jasinski excused herself to use the ladies’ room. While there, she texted Harvath a SITREP. Everything was going well, but Sparrman seemed content to just sit with a pretty woman, drink beer, and glance up at the TV whenever he heard his colleagues at the bar cheer or let out a collective groan.
Harvath texted back that Jasinski needed to get Sloane to dial up the heat. Jasinski refused, telling him that Sloane was doing a great job and that he would just need to be patient.
After leaving the ladies’ room, she stopped by the bar to break a large bill so she could have money for the jukebox. One of the Russians was ogling her and so she asked him, in English, if there were any songs he wanted to hear.
The question seemed to have taken him by surprise. She could almost hear the gears grinding away in his head. The man’s response finally came in a thick, unquestionably Russian accent. “Bruce Springsteen,” he said.
“The Boss,” Jasinski replied, with a smile.
“Yes. The Boss.”
“I’ll see if they have him,” she said, as she accepted her change from the barman. Noticing the ink on the man’s arm, she added, “Nice tattoo,” before leaving the bar and walking over to the jukebox.
Springsteen, she thought to herself as she walked. Interesting choice, especially for a Russian, but that was the power of American culture.
There were only a handful of Springsteen songs she actually enjoyed, and she was glad to see they had at least one of them. Inserting a bill into the machine, she made her selections.
As she walked back to her table, the horns from “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out” began playing. It was obvious by the look on the Russian’s face that he’d never heard it before. She flashed him the thumbs-up. Confused, he flashed a thumbs-up back.
Laughing, Jasinski sat back down.
“What’s so funny?” Sparrman asked.
“That guy at the bar,” she replied, nodding toward the Russian.
“What about him?”
“I asked what kind of music I should play. He said Springsteen. I don’t think he knows this one. Maybe I should have played “Born in the USA.”
“His name is Nikolai. You should go back to talk to him,” Sparrman suggested, obviously trying to get rid of her.
Jasinski looked over at the Russian. “I don’t know. He’s not much of a conversationalist and is even a little scary, to be honest. He’s got a tattoo, of a scorpion, on the inside of his arm.”
“No. He’s very kind. He’s in charge of the animals on the farm.”
“You have animals? What kind?”
“Go ask Nikolai.”
“Oh, I get it,” Jasinski replied. “You two want to be alone. Not a problem. I’ll be at the bar with Nikolai, I guess.”
“Thank you,” said Sparrman, who was enthralled with Sloane and not even looking at Jasinski. “Have him buy you a beer. Tell him I said so.”
“I’ll do that,” she said, standing up and stepping away from the table. She hoped that Sloane had understood her message. Sparrman’s farmhands were definitely Spetsnaz. The scorpion was a popular tattoo in a lot of their units.
Just as Monika had noticed the tattoo, Sloane had noticed that Sparrman had stains on his fingertips. As his leg bounced up and down under the table, she could tell he was jonesing.
“How long ago did you quit?” she asked.
“Quit?”
“Smoking.”
“How did you know?”
Sloane smiled coyly, “I can read your mind.”
“I’m in big trouble then,” Sparrman said with a grin.
“We’ll see about that. In the meantime, answer my question. How long has it been?”
“I quit a week ago. Very few Swedes actually smoke, maybe 10 percent of the country. That’s it. My mother, though, hates that I’m part of that 10 percent. I don’t much care what she thinks, but whenever I see her, she bothers me about it. I thought it would be cool, the next time I see her, to be able to say I had quit.”
Sloane continued to play coy. “You may have quit a week ago, but have you been a good boy? Or have you cheated?” She drew out the word cheated as if she was asking him if he had been sexually mischievous.
Sparrman’s grin broadened. “I may have cheated once or twice.”
“I have a secret,” she said, beckoning him closer. She playfully bit her bottom lip, as if she had been bad herself and was contemplating whether to confess. And then she did. “I quit two years ago and I still cheat.”
“You do?”
“I do.”
“When,” asked Sparrman, leaning in more closely and trying desperately to be suave, “have you cheated?”
“There’s really only two occasions when it happens. When I’m drinking,” she replied, running her finger around the lip of her beer bottle, “or if I’ve had really good sex.”
Though Sparrman tried to hide it, she could see his Adam’s apple move in a quiet gulp. Not only had she hooked him, but he had swallowed the lure. It was time to reel him in.
“You know what I would love right now?” she asked.
In his mind, the Swede was saying, Please say sex. What came out of his mouth, though, was. “I don’t know. What would you love?”
“To share just one cigarette. You and me. The way I look at it, it wouldn’t really be cheating. Not if we shared it. Does that sound like fun?”
Sparrman wasn’t an idiot. His mother be damned. He was going to have a cigarette with this woman. He could get back on the wagon tomorrow. “It sounds delicious.”
“Wonderful. Do you have any?”
“No, but I’ll be right back. Don’t move,” he said.
Getting up from the table, he quickly crossed to the bar and interrupted Jasinski and Nikolai, asking the muscular Russian for a cigarette.
The Spetsnaz operative must have known his colleague had been trying to quit smoking, because he rolled his eyes and made a half-hearted attempt at dissuading him. But as he really didn’t care what happened to Sparrman, he removed a pack from his coat pocket and handed it to him along with a cheap plastic orange disposable lighter.
“Thank you,” said Sparrman, as he tapped out a lone cigarette and handed the pack back.
“Take the whole thing,” Nikolai insisted in his heavy accent.
“I only need one.”