Chapter 5 #2
Jansen drew back. “Did you… You didn’t kill them, did you?”
“What?” Cole scoffed and stared at him, features contorted so hard with offense that he looked a lot like his mother. “I wouldn’t kill anyone, least of all to get access to you.”
“So… how are all the attorneys indisposed at once? Or is that just a convenient coincidence?”
“I mean…” Cole half-shrugged. “It’s not likely but also not impossible for one partner to have a burst pipe, one to have all four tires flat, and another to have her catalytic converter stolen, all on the same day.
Especially not when one of the other partners had a minor but cosmetically disastrous fender bender in his Aston Martin this morning. ”
Jansen cocked his head. “You did all that. Just to get to me.”
“I had some help.”
“You? Help?” Jansen was about to say “that’ll be the day.” But… well, maybe it was today, because here was Cole, and apparently the entire law firm was out of commission. “You did all of that to—Jesus, man. Are you some kind of psychopath? Oh, wait. You’re a billionaire. Of course you are.”
Cole narrowed his eyes. After a moment, he shrugged and rose. “Fine. I’ll leave you in the hands of New York’s finest.” He started toward the door. “I’m sure they’ll take care of that arm.”
“Wait!” Jansen sprang to his feet—wavering of course, because he was still dizzy—and grabbed Cole’s arm. “Okay. Okay. You win.” He nodded toward Cole’s chair. “You said we don’t have much time, so let’s do this.”
The frosty stare held for a moment, and Jansen was sure his mouth had gotten him in trouble again. He’d blown his chance. And shit, even if Cole wanted something, he was getting him medical help, but of course Jansen had to fuck that up.
Cole glanced at the clock on the wall, then met Jansen’s gaze again. “Here’s the deal. I’ll make sure you get out, get medical attention, and have any charges dropped. All I need from you in return is one answer.”
Jansen watched him silently. Cole looked like he was waiting for a smartass retort, which… fair. But Cole had all the cards right now and Jansen was pretty fucked, not to mention in pain. Not many options other than playing Cole’s game.
“Fine. What’s the question?”
Cole pinned him with that cold stare. “Where is Marcus Ekstrom?”
A laugh almost burst out of Jansen. No one hated anyone like Cole Dalton hated Marcus Ekstrom, so whatever he wanted with the guy, it couldn’t be good.
Then again, Jansen wasn’t crazy about Marcus right now either. He’d duped Jansen and Eli into going after the penguin, and it hadn’t even been the real goddamned penguin. Had Marcus known?
Shit… had Marcus known?
“Did Marcus know the penguin was fake?” Jansen demanded.
Cole blinked. “I’m sorry, did you think you were the one asking quest—”
“I want to know how bad he fucked me over before I decide how much to fuck him over,” Jansen growled.
“You’re in jail with a broken arm after trying to steal a copy of the Iberian Puffin.” Cole shrugged so indifferently, Jansen wanted to deck him. “I think he pretty well fucked you over.”
“But did he know the—”
“Marcus has the real one,” Cole growled, patience clearly gone.
Jansen’s teeth snapped together. He clenched his fists, the movement making the pain in his arm a million times worse. “That… son of a…”
“Uh-huh. Exactly.” Cole rolled his hand in the air. “So… where is he?”
“Maybe I want to be the one to kill him.”
“From here in your jail cell with a broken wing?”
Ugh. Fine. He had a point. Jansen scowled. “He didn’t tell us much. He was going to meet us in Newark today, but…” He waved his uninjured hand. “Anyway. He’s planning to sell the penguin to Jacques-Louis Campeau.”
Cole pinched the bridge of his nose and released a string of profanity that would’ve made a sailor blush. “Fuck’s sake. Not that guy.”
Jansen snorted. “Who else could it be? Campeau’s got the money, and he lives to be a walking, talking fuck-you to Alders. Of course he’s going to buy something that Alders lost.”
“Except Jacques-Louis isn’t stupid enough to buy something that hot.” Cole wiped a hand over his face and sat back in his chair, suddenly looking about as exhausted as Jansen felt. “He knows damn well it would get confiscated in a heartbeat.”
Jansen pursed his lips, wondering how far he should tip his hand.
Cole cocked a brow. “If you’ve got something…”
Jansen considered it. He fucking hated that Cole had his balls in a vise right now, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. “One condition.”
Annoyance darkened Cole’s features. “Pretty sure you’re not in a position to—”
“One condition.”
Cole worked his jaw. “Fine.”
“You spring Eli out of here.”
“He’s already out,” Cole said with a shrug.
“He—what?”
Another shrug. “I was planning to talk to him first, but his attorney sprung him last night. He never even saw the inside of a holding cell.”
It was Jansen’s turn to curse up a storm. That motherfucker! They were partners, for God’s sake! In this one job, anyway, and they definitely weren’t friends, but come on. He huffed sharply. “That dickhole.”
“Uh-huh. So…” Cole rolled his hand again. “What’s this extra tidbit you’ve got for me?”
Jansen took a deep breath. “Marcus has documentation that the penguin is a fake. He’s going to submit it to Alders’s insurance and to the cops to prove it was fake.”
“But we know it’s fake,” Cole said. “Everyone saw it shatter. And I thought you didn’t know the one you were stealing was fake.”
“I didn’t. I thought the one we were grabbing was real. But he’s got documentation he was going to use to tell Alders’ insurance it was fake to screw him out of the payout.”
Cole whistled. “That’s dickish even by Marcus’s standards.”
“Right? So if he’s got the real one like you say, then if he gets caught with it, he’s probably going to use those documents to say that one is fake.”
Cole seemed to chew on that. “Then quietly sell the real one to Jacques-Louis, who is smart enough to sit on it long enough that no one will connect it to what happened last night, and…” He sighed. “Fucking hell. I hate it when he’s actually smart.”
“I know, right?” Jansen shifted in his chair, wincing when he jostled his arm. “Anyway, that’s all I know.” He paused. “Assuming he didn’t lie about that, too.”
Cole grunted. He of all people had to have considered that by this point.
Everyone knew Marcus was a lying liar who lied, and a thieving scumbag even by thieving scumbag standards.
Jansen had always been curious how Cole and Marcus hadn’t killed each other while they were dating.
Did two insufferable twatwaffles really get along that well?
Did they calm each other down like sodium and chlorine ions?
Or had it been World War Dickbag the whole time?
He was curious, but he didn’t care enough to ask.
And anyway, right then, the door swung open. To Jansen’s great relief, a pair of EMTs walked in with the guards. The first zeroed right in on Jansen’s arm. Her eyes widened with horror, and she whirled on the guards.
“What the actual fuck is wrong with you people?” she snarled. “How could you not get him medical attention? My God, this man could have compartment syndrome by now!”
Compartment syndrome? The fuck was that?
The other EMT crouched beside Jansen. “Let me have a look at that.”
He did, and it hurt. It fucking hurt like a motherfucker. Fuuuck.
About the time the guy stopped prodding at it like the sadistic butthole he was, the other medic had stopped screaming at the shell-shocked guards. As Jansen forced his eyes open and blinked past the tears, the woman leaned over to peer at his arm.
And Cole?
He was gone.