"Yeah," he said, and shrugged again, and drained what was left of his beer. "Took him a long time to get over it," he said. "For a while there, he wouldn't have any women on the team at all. Then he hired Georgia … I don't think you've met her . . . and Mary Beth. I don't know why he fired her, I thought she was doing a good job. Maybe he began feeling helpless again. A woman working the door, another woman contained, the entire situation a volatile one. Maybe he fired. Mary Beth because he was afraid something would happen to her."
"Mike …"
Using the name again, getting used to the name.
". . . however you slice it, that's a sexist attitude. Has he fired any men!"
"One. But the guy had a drinking problem."
"Well, there you are."
"I'm not sure it's that simple."
"Do you think he'll fire me?"
"I don't know."
"Well. . . did he feel I was in danger yesterday?"
"You were in danger. He shouldn't have put you on the door. I argued against it, in fact. Sending in either you or Martha."
"Why?"
"Too early. Not enough observation yet, not enough training."
"But it worked out."
"Luckily. I don't think Martha would have been successful, by the way. It's a good thing the old man turned her down."
"Why do you say that?"
"Too eager, too aggressive. I'm not sure she'll ever make a good negotiator, for that matter."
"Have you told that to Brady?"
"I have."
"How about me? Do you think I'll make a good one?"
"You're already a pretty good one. You handled some things clumsily, but it was an enormously difficult situation. I like to call a spade a spade, Eileen. A police negotiator is a police negotiator and we should never lie about that, whatever the taker may want. Pretending to be a hooker . . ."He shook his head. "I told Brady I didn't like the idea. When he insisted we go ahead with it, I told him we should call Georgia, get her to come in. If we were going to lie to the taker, then we needed an experienced negotiator to pull it off. Georgia's done undercover work, by the way, decoy work, too. I'm surprised you don't know her."
"What's her last name?"
"Mobry. M-O-B-R-Y. Georgia Mobry."
"Doesn't ring a bell."
"She works mostly with Narcotics."
"No."
"Anyway, she could've handled it nicely yesterday. Trouble is she's on vacation. But… as you said … it worked out."
"Luckily. As you said."
"Well. . . however."
"I was lucky, wasn't I?"
"I think it could have gone either way. We shouldn't have lied to him. If he'd found out…"
"I tried to keep it ambiguous. If that's the word."
"That's the word. But the fact is we were passing you off as a hooker. And if he once discovered we were deceiving him …" Goodman nodded knowingly. "There was a little girl in that apartment. And a shotgun."
"Why'd Brady take the chance?"
"On you? Or the whole deception?"
"Both."
"You because the old man turned down Martha. Brady preferred her, she was his first choice. The deception? I don't know. He probably thought it would work. And if it might save that little girl's life …"
"It did save her life."
"As it turned out."
"So why'd he want to fire me?"
"I'm not sure how his mind works. I've been with him for ten years now . . ."
"That long?"
"Yes. Why?"
"You look younger."
"I'm thirty-eight."
"You still look younger. Why'd he want to fire me?"
"I don't know. It came as a total surprise to me. First he picks Martha over you, and then he agrees to your terms for working the door. So you get the old man and the kid out without anybody getting hurt, and he decides to fire you. Meshugge, do you understand Yiddish?"
"I know what meshugge means. And I think I know why he wanted to fire me, too."
"Why?"
"Because I didn't do it his way."
"He knew you weren't going to do it his way when you told him nobody went in till the old man let go of the kid and the gun. That wasn't Brady's way, that was your way. His way was the kid comes out and you go in, an even trade."
"That's exactly what I'm …"
"You're missing my point. If he wanted to fire you because you didn't do it his way, then why didn't he fire you on the spot? When you refused to do it his way?"
"I don't know. Why didn't he?"
"Maybe he realized you were right. But then, after it was all over, he had to fire you to show he's still the boss."
"But he didn't fire me."
"Only because I talked him out of it."
"How'd you do that?"
"I told him you were fearless and honest and sympathetic and smart and that you'd probably turn out to be the best negotiator the team ever had, male or female."
"Fearless, huh? You should only know."
"Fearless," he said. "And all those other things, too."
"And that's why he gave me the thirty-day probation."
"Well, I also told him you were beautiful."
"You didn't," she said.
"I did," he said. "Want to go to a movie tonight?"
She looked at him.
"What do you say?"
"What's playing?" she asked.
