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rubber gloves and tapped a bulging vein on Earl’s red, swollen neck and said, “Hmmmm.” John Eisenhower, the Washington County sheriff, walked into the room. Broker had worked undercover with Eisenhower years back in St. Paul. Eisenhower proceeded to study the situation, alert blue eyes in his blunt blond features. Broker knew the look. John was learning something…new.
    “What are you going to give him?” asked Eisenhower.
    The doctor held a syringe in one hand, a vial in the other. “Ketamine,” mused the doctor. “The question is how much.”
    “Knock him out,” urged J.T. “Fast.”
    The doctor shook his head. “Give him too much, he could go into spasm. Cardiac arrest.”
    “So?” J.T. was impatient. He gestured with the big black Glock automatic in his hand.
    The doctor smiled, enjoying himself. “There’s a liability question,” he said.
    “Stick him,” ordered J.T.
    “What if his teeth are loose and he swallows one and chokes?” speculated the doctor, inserting the needle in the vial, playing with the pressure on the plunger, estimating his dose.
    Broker, his eyes pin dots in a waterfall of sweat, muttered, “Nothing wrong with his fuckin’ teeth.”
    “I could get sued,” pondered the doctor.
    “All these nervous coppers, you could get shot,” explained J.T.
    Ed Ryan squatted next to the doctor. “I’m the ATF special agent in charge. Give the shot. Now .”
    “Yeah, but who backs me up if I get sued?” replied the doctor.
    “ Now ,” said Ryan, in an icy voice.
    Earl, imprisoned in a dozen pairs of hands, shied back from the needle. The doctor pointed to Earl’s upper right arm. Earl’s shirt exploded away in J.T.’s hands. It reminded Broker of a bunch of cowboys and cowgirls hog-tying a steer. Earl snorted as the needle popped into his deltoid. He seemed to levitate, thrashing in the imprisoning hands. There was an audible snap. A huge ATF guy spoke up apologetically: “Sorry ’bout that.”
    “A wrist,” offered a calm detached female voice. Nina.
    “About three minutes to kick in,” said the doctor. He smiled. “One possible side effect of ketamine is that he could go into a psychotic delirium for as long as twenty-four hours.”
    “Nice touch,” admired J.T.
    “I thought you’d like it,” said the doctor.
    Broker puffed mightily on the cigarette and watched the drug seep into Earl’s mad eyes. Everyone took a strong hold and waited. Earl tried to beat the clock. Tried to grind through the wood splints. Broker flashed on Jaws —watching the shark come over the transom. Nina wiped sweat from his forehead. She held his free hand.
    Finally, Earl’s snarls began to moderate into a ghastly yawn. Slowly the pressure on Broker’s thumb cranked back. Earl’s eyes fluttered and the steely muscles of his face drooped. Broker felt a gruesome suckling sensation as Earl’s loose, bloody lips slipped over his thumb. Earl made a sound like a drooling baby. Ga ga goo.
    Earl began breathing in anesthetized, blood-smeared dopery. “Aha,” said the doctor serenely as he removed something from Broker’s bloody thumb. “Did someone hit this guy in the mouth before the bite?”
    “You could say that,” said J.T. Merryweather.
    “Loose canine,” said the doctor, holding up Earl’s tooth. “That’s probably what saved your thumb.” One of the medics moved in and irrigated the wound with stinging disinfectant. “Move it,” the doctor ordered Broker.
    Broker gritted his teeth and sent messages into the gashed flesh. The digit moved.
    “Okay, we have intact tendons. Don’t know about nerves. Clean it like hell all the way to the ER. The human mouth is the dirtiest thing there is.”
     
    Squads and unmarked cars from the Washington, Dakota, and Ramsey counties’ Task Force jammed the brick emergency entrance portico of the Riverview Memorial Hospital. Rodney, who’d been arrested at Broker’s house—Broker had been arrested with him to keep his cover