Page 7 of Lord of Justice

Rose makes a small, terrified sound. "Are you fucking kidding right now? We're athome.Do you know what Roman will do if he catches us doing business here? Never mind Roman, do you know whatVioletwill do to us? Fuck! We're gonna die."

"We will not!" Iris hisses. "We'll do the 'cry and switch maneuver' if we're caught."

"Who has to cry?" Rose says, already resigned.

"Well, youcancall tears up on command." Iris sounds like she approves of this. "But it may not be necessary."

I find myself wanting to chuckle, though there is nothing amusing about this.

Thirty minutes later, a car pulls up about halfway down the street and the twins pounce on it like hyenas on a gazelle. There is a swift exchange of words and a big wad of cash is given to the driver, he hands them a wooden case, about half the size of a shoebox.

Roman is standing at the open front door andcatches sight of Rose first. "What have you been up to?" He's not happy about anything that could disturb Violet's big night. While he's focused on a quivering Rose, Iris steps into the trees lining his side yard and disappears. "I saw you give the driver money, Rose. What was it for?"

These two are outrageous.

They're putting the rest of this crime family to shame. As Rose looks up innocently at a scowling Roman, biting her lip, she keeps him occupied as Iris quietly moves through the crowd, with the box wedged under her arm.

This has nothing to do with me.

Still, I put my hands in my pockets and stroll after Iris, watching her head to her Range Rover. Standing in the shadows, I pull out a cigar I've been saving - a good Cohiba Behike - and light it, letting the fragrant smoke circulate through my lungs. I rarely allow myself one of these, but the party has been boring as hell.

Well, until now.

Iris secures the package in the back of the SUV and throws a blanket on top of it, shutting the tailgate with a wicked little smile.

"Do you think that's going to fool your bodyguards?"

She jumps half a foot with a startled little yelp,whirling around until she spots the glow of my cigar. Striding toward me, hands fisted, she snaps, "Don't you have some judgment to overturn or murderers to set free?"

Interesting. She doesn't seem to have the same awe and fear of me that those I'm not related to by blood always have. Likely because she's too foolish to know better.

"Illegalityismy specialty," I say, blowing the cigar smoke out the corner of my mouth and away from her.

"Surely, something this small and insignificant is beneath your attention." She brushes the dirt off her hands and turns, as if to head back inside.

"If you were my responsibility, you would not leave the house until your streak of felonious behavior died off."

Iris glances over her shoulder at me with a bit of a snarl. "Thank you for giving me one more thing to be grateful for." She hurries back into the party, and I take one last puff of the cigar before dropping it and crushing it underfoot. Heading over to her SUV, I eye the locks. They're good ones. Roman must have had the car upgraded.

Still, I have an elaborate app on my phone that is capable of releasing nearly any electronic lock. It was created by Kolya, the brilliant and over-caffeinated head of our Digital Defense department.Pulling the app up and holding it over the lock on the back latch, it disengages immediately.

"What do you have here?" I murmur, sifting through the blanket until I find the box, opening it.

My brow rises in respect. There are dozens of silver coins stacked in here. Very old. I hold one up to the light. It's in mint condition. A box of coins like this runs well over a million dollars. Is this their biggest heist to date?

"Hey! What do you –" Vitali, her bodyguard, stops short at the sight of me. "I'm sorry, Mr. Morozov. I didn't know it was you. I was just checking on…" He pauses, looking behind him uncomfortably and then back at me.

"Just checking on the stolen goods that she put in her car?" I ask acidly. "Do you help her with these little jobs?"

He releases a bit of a sigh. "Well, Mr. Morozov, I mean, Mr. Roman Morozov, theVor-"

"Get on with it." My words should be giving him frostbite.

"He says as long as the girls keep under one million jobs and stay out of black-market lanes, let them go for it. He calls it more like… play crime." He shrugs awkwardly with a little grin, watching myface for a returning smile, which I do not give.

"Then you might want to examine that chest of mint condition coins," I say. "Because the value is well over one million. It's time for Roman to become involved in this again."

Vitali knows when he's been chastised, his shoulders slump and he nods, looking at the flower beds lining the street. "Yes, Mr. Morozov."