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“I don’t think he’s bluffing.”
“Then we need to dive into the entire history, the ownership isn’t something I came across, just a museum had it, and should have it,” she says. “And it’s a convoluted past, like most infamous gems.”
“I don’t understand…” I pick up my mug and cup it in my hands. “How does it matter?”
“Two things, Lena. I think you need to get to the bottom of the bad blood. You’re a pawn in their games against each other and until you know—not just what they told you, but know independently—you won’t be able to let it go. Break the magic hold, break this whole bullshit of their power over you.”
“You said two things…” I trail off, my head snaps up. “You’re not thinking what I’m thinking?”
Harry shrugs smugly. “Depends on what you’re thinking.”
“That if I can find out the history and what this Heart of Dark Desires means, I can auction it to the highest bidder of the two for more money. Which is insane.”
“Not if we get the money while we’re far away,” she says.
“Quinate.”
“Us. We can beat the Quinate.” She pauses. “Or you know, replace the necklace with a better fake and walk with the real deal.”
“Oh shit,” I whisper.
“I know,” Harry says with an indulgent smile, “I’m a genius.”
* * *
The job for Bobby’s going to be easy to do. New Jersey, and it’s not urgent, a mansion of bad taste and crap alarms and run of the mill security. He wants paintings and jewels that are worth a lot of money for payment he’s not getting from a client. And it’s going to be the kind of thing to clean up twice for him.
He gets the goods.
They get the insurance payout.
He goes and takes that money as payment.
It’s a win-win for him.
And, as Harry says, brilliant cover for us pulling up roots when we need to. If we need to.
The research that we do that night from Harry’s basement workshop gives me about a month before the perfect time for the job comes up. They’ll be getting ready for a vacation they can’t afford, and for that couple, it means a number of parties for…I don’t care.
This kind of so-called rich person annoys me. They spend up bigger than what they have, and make huge splashes, get into trouble and parade around like they don’t know the meaning of the word.
Robbing them is almost community service.
“See this?” Harry looks up from her laptop and turns it, showing me an old site of collected articles on another necklace.
“That’s not the Heart of Dark Desires.”
“I know, Magdalena,” she says. “But this for a while was theitjewel. There are earrings and a bracelet with this. And that got caught up in a war over ownership. It’s in a museum. They just call it the Everton Collection, which is boring AF, but whatever.”
She’s already fencing this Everton Collection in her head.
“But in the articles, they keep talking about the Heart of Dark Desires and who owns it. It’s someone by the name of Vanderland, by the way, which totally sounds made up. Anyway,” she says, “the Heart of Dark Desires has been warred over for years.”
“Between the Agnossios and Millers?”
“No,” she says. “Between the Fairgoods and Beaumonts, whoever they are.”
She turns the computer back to face her, and I scroll through the dark web feed on the other one as I lean up against the workbench.
