“Way to go, face man,” Grace said to Tor, who gave a smug smile.
“I’d say I’m more than a pretty face,” he said, “but it’s my pretty face that’s getting me into the museum.”
“I still say I could go in as J.D.Morgan,” Josh said.“I was a legit art dealer in Chicago—I have credentials under that name and the whole nine yards.Why can’t I be the negotiator for Tor for one of the lesser-known paintings on sale while Grace and Tienne lift the Klimt?”
“Because it took three weeks for that man’s fingerprints to fade from your shoulder,” Liam snapped.“No.”
“Liam’s right,” Danny said, the pencil making more scratching movements on the legal pad.“That man had a really unhealthy fixation on you, Josh.And I know I’m probably the least reliable person on this subject, but….”Danny shook his head.“IswearI didn’t mention a word of you to him while we were together.Not Fox, not your mother, and certainly not you.I was thrilled about throwing my own life down the toilet, but I didn’t want even the breath of you touching him, not then, not ever.But from the moment he sat up and said hi to us when we were online, I’ve been living interrorthat he’d figure out a connection, or that I had a family in the Chicago area.Whether he was trying to hit on you because you’re his type—and you are—or whether he’s got a suspicion because he’s closer than we ever wanted you to be, I just don’t want him to even know we’re in the same hemisphere, much less the same latitude and longitude.Do we understand?”
“I get it, Uncle Danny,” Josh said, and to his credit, Liam didn’t hear a breath of resentment there.
“In fact,” Danny muttered, “maybeIshould do the museum job—”
“No,” Felix said, putting a hand on Danny’s shoulder that Liam could tell was designed to keep Danny from simply lifting up fueled by nervous energy alone and helicoptering around the room.“We need someone to distract the muscle from our end of the docks.That’s you and me.I’ve got the businessman’s cachet and the broad shoulders for working the equipment, and you’ve got the thief chops to slip in and doctor the docking records and manifests.We haven’t had a chance to prep for this job, Danny.We need someone who can crack their computerordoctor their paperwork as well as charm them silly.Leon’s needed to help with the victims, and there’s going to be an awful lot of us armed with foil blankets and wearing hip-waders helping those poor kids across the river floor while they try not to freeze to death.All hands means all hands.”
“Fucking gala,” Danny muttered, tilting his head back.“I mean, it was hard enough we were planning to do this on the same night, but….”He glanced around the full room, where the crew had broken into small groups, everybody planning what they’d have to be doing the next day.Between Marco’s information and Hunter and Liam’s casing of Decin, they’d realized that theSpelyy Presikwas leaving the day after the Prague National Museum gala, which Kadjic was planning to attend.It made sense.Kadjic would conclude his business with the Gustav Klimt painting and then follow his own boatload of trafficked humans to make sure it arrived safely before the ports in Prague were blocked by snow.Marco had picked up on enough gossip to know that rumors of the “Kadjic Curse” were beginning to circulate.
“You would be amazed at what we’re being blamed for,” Marco had told them the day before, after arriving at the suite with two giant pastry boxes of heaven.“Apparently police have cracked down on Kadjic’s distributors in the States—”
“Oh, that’s us,” Josh said.“Did you miss that meeting?We gave all our info to Nick so after the thing in Colombia he could really put on the pressure.”
“Oh,” Marco had replied, setting the boxes down and allowing the group to attack and scavenge, which was something that apparently gave him great pleasure when he’d been baking.“Well, he also blames us for a ship leaving the Middle East full of opium that apparently blew up—”
“My bad,” Leon said.“Do you have a marzipan croissant?”he asked rather wistfully.
“Your bad?”Marco said, offering him that very thing.“How is it that’s your bad?”
Leon had taken the croissant from him and shrugged.“Well, Chuck and Hunter were planning something, but they were spread quite thin.I, as you know, have left the more brutal parts of the import/export business behind me.However, a certain… acquaintance, who also wanted to go straight, asked me how I might trust him, and I said to not do any dealings with Kadjic.”Leon shrugged and took a bite of the pastry, his savagely handsome features melting like a child’s with pure bliss.“I had no idea he’d blow Kadjic’s ship out of the water.”
“Oh dear God,” Julia said, as they’d all stared at Leon, appalled.“I hope he didn’t get… or do I hope he did get…?I am both aghast and strangely heartened by this news, Leon.I have no idea what to hope for.”
Leon grinned at her, flakes of butter croissant still in his beard.“Hope my colleague can stay straight and doesn’t get caught,” he said.“I certainly hadn’t anticipated the move, and the colleague had been trying to make a name for himself, so I don’t even owe him a favor.”
Julia blew out a breath and moved forward to help brush the crumbs from her lover’s beard, and Marco continued on with the list of things that had happened to Kadjic since the Salingers had begun their campaign, starting with the painting in Chicago.While the Salingers were really only culpable for about three-quarters of the list, what had come from the bit of gossip was the knowledge that Kadjic was definitely feeling the pressure.It was why he would negotiate the painting and then follow the shipment of girls out in what would ordinarily be a routine operation he’d have nothing at all to do with.
“Excellent,” Danny muttered.“If Marco’s right, this will do it.His empire is dissolving, his passion will have just betrayed him, and he won’t be able to pin the fallout on a single person.This is when he’ll go to his den to pout.”
“How do you know for sure?”Molly asked, and for a moment Liam held his breath, thinking that this was the height of cheek, interfering with someone as cyclonic as Danny Lightfingers and the man who’d almost broken him.
But Danny proved, once again, why he had a room full of talented geniuses following him around the world to get rid of a monster—one Danny refused to take personally anymore.
“Because his empire is his ego,” Danny said.Tienne and Stirling were in a quiet corner, each working on a different project, but within touching distance so their knees and shoulders bumped.“The thing that drove him to order Tienne killed was embarrassment.Tienne’s father had made a fool of him when all the poor man had wanted to do was keep his son away from Kadjic’s nasty fingers.Think about it.We have embarrassed him on a global stage many, many times.And while he still has more money than God, we have seriously disabled his ability to makemore.When I met him he was just coming into his own, just becoming the boogeyman he is today.I remember asking him when it was going to be enough, and do you know what he said?”
Molly shook her head.
“He said when his footsteps make the world burn.Well, now they’re makinghisworld laugh.He’s going to need to lick his wounds from that.And when he does, Liam’s crew will have him.”
“We could have him,” Grace said, seemingly out of nowhere.The truth was, Liam had realized, Grace did his share of the planning, but in surprising places.While Josh was always solidly planted with his laptop, Grace was often dancing around other people’s conversations.Liam had just finished hearing him do physics problems in his head to help Chuck and Michael figure out how much power the pumps would need to clear out the water for a pathway for their fleeing victims.While the water was cold, their risk of being discovered or of something going wrong with the equipment doubled for every yard of pathway they carved below the river’s surface.It was imperative that they balance how much water they had to pump with the well-being of victims that they had to assume were underfed and weakened by captivity, so Grace’s quick—and deadly accurate—calculations probably saved lives.
Now here he was, smiling waifishly at Danny and offering to… what?
“What would we do with him if we had him, precious?”Danny asked carefully.
The smile went from waifish to wolfish.“We’re not angels, Uncle Danny.And Kadjic is averybad man.”
Danny nodded, taking Grace seriously as so many of the crew had learned to do.“It’s a legitimate proposal,” he said, and Liam was aware that the room had gone still around him.“And, in the heat of the moment, a number of us have dirtied our hands in such a matter.”Liam had a memory of Gunrunner’s Island and a small but significant body count, including a man who had assaulted Tienne.“But….”Danny swallowed and cupped Grace’s cheek in a gesture that was pure affection.“No, my darling boy,” he said softly.“I would never, in a million years, want you to put a thing like that on your soul.”
Grace swallowed in turn, and the whole room could see his eyes grow shiny.In a move like a darting fish, he gave Danny a short, fierce hug before coming to sit next to Josh.
