Lennie raises his glass of club soda and offers a toast: "To Mickey Scott, may he rot in hell." To a quick appeal and righteous justice. To Governor Pataki. Rey says an amen and they toast, but the click of their glasses gets lost in the din of the bar at Odessa. That's what Lennie hates most about this place: so many people, you can barely hear the person next to you.

Lennie can see the guilt on Rey's face when he checks his watch, so he tells him to go home, and stays to finish up his drink. Once upon a time, that meant at least two more rounds, but the drinks are blander now and besides, who'd want to get drunk in a place like this? Too many lawyers.

He puts a bill or two down, and the bartender, a woman, raises an eyebrow. "Leaving so soon?"

He makes some remark about hard-working civil servants, and she smiles, charmed, but he leaves it at that.

He moves quickly through the restaurant, trying not to stand out, and he might've just whizzed straight into a cab if it weren't for the way people were instinctually ducking in the front door. Sure enough, he reaches the glass in time to see several couples ducking under the veranda, trying to avoid the sudden August shower. He sighs--he wants nothing more than to leave. The front door divides the veranda in half, and Lennie chooses to wait on the side where no one seems to be standing.

He hears her before he can turn his head: a soft laughter, rare but distinctly familiar. And then her voice comes, a low alto mingling with the sound of raindrops dancing on pavement: "That isn't funny."

Her companion's reply sticks out among the quiet musings of the rain. "But you're laughing."

He's not the only one celebrating tonight.

He watches as Jack steps in front of her, enough to put him past the protection of the veranda, and Clare's hand is on his arm, pulling him back. "You'll get wet."

He leans in close, and Lennie can't miss the telltale signs of intoxication. "So?"

"So, you'll get me wet, too, in the cab."

Lennie doesn't hear what he whispers in her ear next, but he's pretty sure he has an idea. He feels like such an intruder, even if they are standing here on a public sidewalk, in plain-sight of everyone and anyone, like a couple of necking teenagers.

And then Jack says he'll be right back, and she says she'll wait for the valet, and he disappears into the restaurant. Lennie glances over, and watches it play on her face: desire mixed with the fear of getting caught. Just then, a yellow cab pulls up, at the valet's behest, and maybe he likes this place a little more than he thought.

He walks toward the open door, and he's pretty sure she's too wrapped up in her own thoughts to notice him there.