Chapter 9

Nico arrived at work around the same time Stone's jet left Teterboro that morning.

Angry and wound up about the failed mission at Barrington's house, he'd managed only a couple of hours of sleep. His mood was not improved when he woke up to several missed calls from Petry. Nico hadn't called back. As much as he wasn't looking forward to it, informing his boss what had happened would best be done in person, where he might be able to direct his boss's ire somewhere other than at Nico himself.

Petry's assistant was waiting for him when he stepped off the elevator on the fourteenth floor.

"I know," he said. "He wants to see me."

The assistant nodded. "He said you are to go straight to his office."

Nico motioned toward the hallway. "After you."

Petry Innovations occupied the entire floor, and Petry's office was in a corner, far from the elevators. When they arrived, the assistant pulled the door open and said, "Mr. Savage is here."

Petry grunted from somewhere inside, and the woman stepped out of the way so that Nico could enter.

Petry was standing at the floor-to-ceiling window behind his desk, looking out at the city. As soon as the door closed, he whipped around.

"Why didn't you answer my calls?"

"I was gathering information." This was true to a point. Nico had talked to a contact at the police station to get details of what had gone down, but that had happened before Petry had tried to reach him.

"I didn't see anything on the news. Did it happen or not?"

"There was a…complication."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"Barrington's security system was better than expected." This Nico'd learned from his friend with the NYPD, something he wished he'd known prior to the job.

"And?"

"And the people we sent must have set off an alarm that woke up Barrington."

Petry's face began to flush. "Are you saying they didn't do anything?"

"Barrington was waiting for them with a gun. He killed one of them, and the others got away."

Petry stared at him, slack-jawed. "Are you shitting me?"

"I wish I were."

Petry grabbed a tablet computer off his desk and hurled it at the wall. "It was a simple job and you fucked it up!"

It was not a simple job, nor did Nico fuck it up, but he wasn't going to say that.

"There'd better be no way my name gets dragged into this!" Petry said, his tone harsh and threatening.

"The only person on the team I had direct contact with is the man who was killed."

"Well, that's a small miracle. You're sure none of the others knew about us?"

"I'm sure. I set it up that way on purpose."

"Can the police find us through your contact?"

Nico shook his head. "I never met him in person, and for all calls, I used a burner that's already been destroyed."

Petry turned back to the window. "When are you going to try again?"

"Again? I don't think that's a good idea. Getting through his security isn't going to get any easier. I'm told even the officers on scene were impressed by it. And I wouldn't be surprised if, after this, Barrington beefs up what he already has."

"Do you think I care about any of that? Figure out a way to get this done or start praying you can find a new job after I nuke your reputation. Or worse."

"Yes, sir."

Nico made a hasty exit and hoofed it to his own office at the opposite end of the floor.

His assistant, who always introduced herself as "Karol with a K," shot out of her seat the second she saw him, a look of worry on her face. "M-M-Mr. Petry has been looking for you all morning."

"I just saw him."

"Oh." She glanced past Nico, as if expecting to see Petry heading this way. "Is everything okay?"

"Couldn't be better. Get me some coffee."

"Coffee. Sure."

He entered his office and shut the door behind him.

Petry was out of his mind. There was no way Nico would send anyone back to Barrington's house. Doing so would only end in another disaster, making connecting the job back to them even more likely.

The very definition of a fixer's job was to never let who he was working for get caught. But Nico was sure Petry would not let this go. There was more to his boss's desire to hurt Barrington than mere retaliation for the trial's outcome. Nico didn't know what it was, nor did he want to. What he needed to concentrate on was finding a compromise that would sate his boss, or he could kiss his highly paid career goodbye. Or, as Petry had so eloquently put it, worse.

Karol brought him his coffee and left again as quickly as she came. He sipped it as he went back through the reports about Barrington that his contacts had given him, trying to come up with a solution that would satisfy Petry.

The paintings were such an obvious answer. Damn Toby for messing that up!

A page near the back of one of the reports caught his eye. It was a photo of a document found at a gallery that Barrington had asked to be on the lookout for more of his mother's work.

While Barrington had apparently made it clear he was interested in any of her pieces, he had also provided a list of the paintings he was most keen on acquiring.

Nico had only glanced at it before as it had no relevance to his plan to break into the lawyer's house. Now, however, he realized the paintings were the answer, and a new plan formed in his mind.

Implementing it would require a resource he didn't have direct access to, but he knew someone who could point him to the right people.

Grinning, he called Eddie Benitez, the man who'd gotten Nico into the fixer business.