Chapter 21 #2
Will made sure Cole was down first before sitting himself.
He let his eyes drift a bit, taking in the people in the room—four more, all of them in matching black suits—and the way Alders held himself.
He sat straight, but not rigidly; confident, not louche.
When he noticed Cole staring a bit too long at the bottle, Alders smiled. Something he wanted to show off, then?
“You recognize the vintage, I take it.” His voice was a bit raspy, like he’d already had several drinks.
“It’s a Valerio Adami bottle,” Cole said. “One of the 1926 batches of Macallan, I take it?”
“Mm, you have a good eye,” Alders agreed.
“I bought it from a collector a few decades ago. I never planned on drinking it, honestly, but recent events have forced me to reevaluate my stance on collectibles.” He waved a heavy hand at the bottle.
“What’s the point of having something precious and never taking the opportunity to enjoy it to the fullest?
” He reached out and grabbed up the full whiskey glass, swirling the amber liquid around a few times as he inhaled.
“I suppose I should be grateful to you boys for that lesson.”
With that, he threw the contents of the glass to the back of his throat like it was rotgut, coughing once he swallowed. “A little rough going down, but that’s what happens when you get hasty,” Alders said. “I hope you see where I’m going with this, gentlemen.”
Will wasn’t so sure he did, but that was fine; Cole seemed happy to take the lead here. “Neither of us stole anything from you at the party you threw, least of all the Iberian Puffin.”
“I have evidence that says differently.”
“You have a con artist who’s made a career of winnowing himself into the good graces of people more intelligent and powerful than he is telling you that we’re responsible,” Cole said firmly.
“Maybe he’s shown you video, maybe he’s got an audio file that sounds vaguely like one of us.
I can counter anything he says with video that’s at least as verifiable, and I can do better than that.
I can tell you who actually has the Puffin. ”
Alders shifted in his chair. “Not you, then?”
“No. Lilith Gowan, actually.”
“Lilith…Gowan.” Alders considered that for a moment, then poured himself another drink. “Interesting choice for a scapegoat.”
“Accurate, I think you’ll find.” Cole smiled slightly. “In fact, I’d be surprised if Marcus hasn’t already asked you to start looking for her. If he hasn’t thrown her under the bus yet, he will shortly. He just wants you to try and take the pair of us out before you make that connection.”
“I don’t do whatever Mr. Ekstrom tells me to do.”
“And yet you believed him without compunction when he set you on us,” Cole continued.
“I’m sure I was the first person he mentioned as a possible suspect, with Will just a step behind me.
You know he and I have a history together; you probably know that many of the people who ended up at your party, who were there at Marcus’s invitation, are people he had issues with.
Is it so impossible to believe that he was using you to clear the field of competitors?
And that his mistakes led to the owner of the actual Puffin deciding that discretion was the better part of valor and fleeing? ”
Alders eyed Cole but didn’t speak.
“Get surveillance footage of Ms. Gowan’s loft,” Cole challenged. “Watch her make her escape. Ask Marcus about her missing persons act and see how he responds.” Cole shrugged. “I bet he’ll change his tune in an instant.”
Alders steepled his fingers and stared between the two of them. “You seem confident that she’s gotten away with it.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
“Because she was the last person I thought would do this, even though she should have been the first.” There was more Cole could have said, but he didn’t volunteer it and Alders didn’t seem to care to push. He turned to look at Will, instead.
“And what do you have to say for yourself in all this?”
What are you, my fucking school principal? Probably not the best way to start the conversation.
“A lot of people went to a lot of trouble to go after the Puffin,” Will said mildly.
“Lots of smart people. I’ll be the first to admit that my skillset is more smash and grab than high-end heist, but Marcus?
He’s about as useful as a bag of soup once you shut his mouth.
He isn’t a mastermind, he isn’t inspiring, and he isn’t original.
He’s the paint-by-numbers of the art crime world, and that’s what this all seems like to me.
He followed a set path and forgot to color himself a way out of it. ”
“Hmm.”
Will held Alders’s gaze without blinking until the man finally turned back to his bottle.
“Well. You two have certainly given me a lot to think about tonight.” Alders refilled his own glass, then flipped the others over and filled them as well.
“The fact that you reached out on your own is promising, although it’s clear you’ve had this story prepared for a while.
That said, there’s too much fact in it for me not to investigate.
I’ll see what I can find on the matter of Ms. Gowan and postpone any…
plans I have for the rest of you until further notice.
” He gestured to Cole’s leg as he handed a glass to him.
“I daresay you could use the time to rest and recuperate.
“That said.” He handed the other glass to Will.
“I know who you two are. I know what you do. I might not know everything about you, but there are no stones I can’t overturn.
Case in point, Mr. Dalton, I’ve had your father’s failed business dealings with the Hu company on my radar for over a decade now.
The repercussions from that are still being felt across multiple sectors in Malaysia, and if I were to reveal what I know to the wrong people? ”
Will had no idea what Alders was referencing, but Cole clearly did if the way his shoulders had tightened was any indicator.
Blackmail. Always back to the blackmail.
“What I propose is simple,” Alders went on.
“In exchange for your liberty now, the pair of you come immediately when I call you next, ready to work for me.” His eyes glittered in the low light, full of malice.
“Because I’m getting the Iberian Puffin back, whatever the cost. And the cost to you is the destruction of your family’s reputation, everything they’ve worked for and built for the past seven decades.
” He glanced dismissively at Will. “And you, I’ll just have killed.
Not before I find your mythical brother and kill him as well, though. Do you understand me?”
Fuck. You. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck—
It took everything Will had not to leap for the bottle on the table and smash it into Alders’s head until it caved in, but that would only get him, and likely Cole, shot dead in an instant by one of the men in black.
“We understand,” Cole said, speaking for the pair of them. His voice was even, perfectly calm, but it was the gentle press of his foot against Will’s calf that finally freed him from the rage spiral he’d fallen into.
“Excellent.” Alders raised his glass in a mocking toast. “To a partnership based on honesty.” He drank, and they followed suit.
Will hated that it was the best whiskey he’d ever tasted.
They left just a few minutes later, and Will could already tell that things were different.
The odd sense of pressure he’d felt earlier, the prickle across the back of his neck that told him he was being watched, was gone.
Of course, he was still being watched, but not with lethal intent any longer.
Good, because at least until Alders summoned them again, he was done with this fucking city, done with everything about the goddamn Puffin and Alders and Marcus and—
“I’m sorry.”
Will turned and looked at Cole with raised eyebrows even as he flagged down a taxi. “What do you have to be sorry for?”
“He threatened your brother.” Cole’s jaw was so tight his teeth had to be on the verge of cracking. “I can—we can make him safe. It’s not—”
Will held up a hand. “Gonna stop you right there,” he said briskly.
“That rich asshole is far from the first person to threaten my family, and he probably won’t be the last. I don’t let it get to me anymore.
Baby Boy is as safe as he can be in this world, and I’m not passin’ responsibility for my family off to anyone else.
I chose this life, he didn’t, and I’ll happily die for him and his, but really.
” He winked. “There’s off the grid, and then there’s my brother. He takes it to a whole new level.”
Cole relaxed a little. “You should go see him.”
“I plan to.” After taking about thirty different detours to make sure he wasn’t being followed. Actually… He slipped his hand beneath Cole’s jacket to press against the small of his back. “You should come along. Do you like Bluey?”
Well, I’ll be damned. Cole Dalton, dumbfounded.
It was a look Will could get used to.