Josh stopped his relentless tapping to wrap an arm around Grace’s shoulder and whisper in his hair, and Hunter left his stand as sentinel of the room to Carl and came to sit down on the floor by Grace’s feet.
And Liam felt a contentment, an easiness, because these people he’d come to love weren’t going to change in this endeavor—Gracecouldbe a first-rate, terrifying assassin.
But he wasn’t going to be, because the people who loved him wanted him to remain Grace.
And Josh—his Josh—had always been focused, always been super competent, always been their mastermind.And he’d always done his best for those he loved.
Liam thought that maybe they would be okay.
“So, Josh,” Danny said, and Josh glanced up from the one-handed work he’d been doing on his computer.“How’s the gala job going?”
“Well,” Josh said, “lucky for us, Kadjic has a hard-on for somebody really well-known this time.That last artist was a little obscure, so we had to go into her house and break into her loft to search for lost canvases.This is Gustav fucking Klimt, and it’s one of his most famous paintings, so it’s in the middle of the Trade Fair Palace.And the reason this is good, Carl?”
Liam grinned because he’d originally been in on the gala job and had gotten to scope out the entire National Gallery of Prague.
“Because the Trade Fair Palace is in the dead center of town,” Carl said.“And the gala is for another Klimt masterpiece,Prince William Nii Nortey Dowuona—”
“No,” Molly said, turning her attention from the yacht schematics that Stirling had brought up for her.“Is that really the name of the painting?”
“It’s a very handsome painting of Prince William, who was a prince of Ghana in the 1890s,” Carl said.“It was stolen by Nazis and disappeared—many feared it was destroyed.The painting was marvelous, but the subject was Black, and we know the Nazis were fuckheads about that.”
“Still are,” Stirling muttered.“Only now they’re paid by the US government.”
“One crisis at a time,” Danny said.“Kadjic today, the mobsters in the White House tomorrow.”
“Deal,” everybody breathed, and Carl continued.
“So the gala is for the Prince William painting, which Kadjic doesn’t want—”
“Because in spite of his fascination with Dizzy Gillespie,” Danny added, “he is very much a Nazi fuckhead.”
“Exactly,” Carl said.“And this gives us some drawbacks and some bennies.One of the drawbacks, of course, is that the Klimt part of the museum is going to be rather full.”
“And the bennies?”Danny prodded.
“The attention is going to be on the Prince William painting,” Carl said.
“Also,” Josh said, “thatThe Maidenis going to be in a slightly darkened corner of the museum because the Prince William is everybody’s darling—as it should be.Now I’ve been directed to stay in the van, but Grace, Carl, and Tienne have been in and out of the museum, pretty much scouring the Klimt exhibit in its entirety, while I’ve been looking at schematics.Part of our problem is thatThe Maidenisn’t a small painting—it’s slightly larger than six by six feet, and hefting it out of there is going to be a challenge.But I think we’ve got an in—unfortunately it’s tomorrow night and not the night after.”
“What’s our in?”Felix asked.
“A special cleaning crew,” Julia said.While Carl had been asking questions as himself, she and Tor had simply been wandering around the museum like tourists, albeit Julia wore a disguise.Between them they’d managed a thorough casing of the place without exposing Grace, Tienne, Josh, and Molly, who had been getting a lot of exposure as of late.“They will be escorted by a docent with key privileges to get the nooks and crannies.It’s my understanding that some of the, uhm, finer points of the alarm systems will be shut off so they can clean the frames of the paintings in that section of the museum.”
“What’s our gambit?”Danny asked.
“I made a painting!”Tienne said excitedly, breaking up the rhythm, but given the fond looks aimed his way, nobody seemed to care.
“Of course you did,” Danny said, offering him a radiant smile.“And in record time too, precious—how did you do that?”
“Two weeks, Uncle Danny,” Tienne said.“But it is fine.As soon as I heard Kadjic had been bidding on the painting, I started to research and plan.Stirling got me a studio—it’s very pretty.I would like to paint there next summer.May I?”
“Of course,” Danny said.“But for now, the painting….”
“Oh.”Tienne gave a shy smile.“It is not my best, but,” he gave a truly Gallic shrug, “it shall suffice.”
“I’m sure it shall,” Danny agreed with a nod.“Now, is it perfect, or….”
Tienne shook his head negative, quite pleased with himself.“A teeny tiny flaw,” he said, almost purring like a kitten.“In one corner, where Kadjic’s letters were before, I placed the Lightfingers logo.It’s almost invisible, but I think….”
