He stood up, stretched out his shoulders. Any second, Haupt would call. John knew very little about the man. Only that he paid well, and that job failure would be very dangerous for John’s health. John could live with that. He held himself to high professional standards. That was why he charged the big bucks.

The terms of this job were complicated. Not a cut-and-dried hit. John preferred to have half up front, but Haupt had only given him a third, plus expenses. The rest of his fee was contingent upon a successful outcome, but the promised sum was so large, he’d decided it was worth it. He hadn’t factored in what a pain in the ass Haupt was going to be. It was worse than dealing with his own mother.

His employer had been unimpressed with John for letting the Countess slip away, but was it his fault the old bitch croaked on him before he questioned her? Was that a reflection on his professionalism? In his line of work, he’d never bothered to learn CPR. Wily old hag. He wanted to punish her. Women did not thwart him, ever.

His only consolations were the Countess’s three extremely fuck-able daughters. He couldn’t decide which one he liked the best. They might try to thwart him, too, in the course of this job, if he was lucky.

And if they did, oh, man. He was so very ready for them.

He’d video-streamed a segment of last night’s drunken henfest in the kitchen to Haupt, but the humorless had prick been unamused. All that had interested the boss last night had been the jeweled pendants.

The three identical letters that John had taken from the Contessa’s house made cryptic references to some necklaces, but had offered no clear explanation. John had studied every piece of jewelry he had taken from Lucia D’Onofrio’s bureau, to no avail. None of it relevant to the fucking letter. He’d had the stuff delivered by courier to Haupt, but the old bastard hadn’t made any more sense of the jewelry than he had.

It seemed logical that this new delivery of pendants was significant. Goddamn letter, full of cryptic clues designed to annoy the shit out of a straightforward professional. “Music will open the door.” What the fuck did that mean? “It’s up to you three to decipher the key together,” the stupid hag had written. “Consider beauty, faith, and knowledge, and above all, love—the key to all secrets worth knowing.”

Fucking drivel. Beauty, faith, knowledge, and love? Not his field of expertise. He’d faxed the thing to his employer, who had been unable to make anything of it, either. But John hadn’t exhausted all possibilities yet. Given incentive, the daughters could probably figure out their batty old mother’s letter. And he had all the incentive necessary in the black plastic box under the bed.

Crafty bitch. Fucking with him from the grave. He flexed his knuckles. He wanted to wrap them around her stringy old neck and squeeze. But her daughters’ necks were velvety soft, he reminded himself. He could punish Lucia through them and have a juicy old time doing it. He took the cell in hand. His internal stopwatch had warned him that the time had come. Five till midnight—four…three…two…one…Beeep. Right on cue. John punched “talk.” “Yes?”

“What do you have to report?” came the soft, accented voice. “Something more interesting than weeping, bingeing females, I trust?”

John meditated for half a second upon the number of zeros that would be printed on his final bank draft. “Only that there’s a carpenter crew coming tomorrow morning to start renovating the place.”

“Renovating? Now?” The usually soft, dead-calm voice on the other end of the line rose in pitch to a gratifying squeak. “Did you search again?”

“As requested. I went through the place after the carpenters—”

“What? Carpenters? You mean they have already begun?”

“They unloaded their supplies,” John said. “Tomorrow they start.”

“Did you get the paperwork on the pendants, at least?”

At least? What was this “at least” shit? As if he’d failed? Asshole.

“Of course,” John said, his voice flat. “I found the delivery slip with the jeweler’s store address. I also found his home address.”

“And?” The German waited.

“Ah…and what? It was past business hours, and the guy was probably eating dinner, or fucking his mistress, so I figured I’d wait—”

“Wait? For what? For the carpenter’s crew to rip the house apart and find what you are unable to find? What then, John? What then?”

John’s mouth worked. The asshole went on before he could reply.

“Assume that the pendants are part of the Contessa’s puzzle. The daughters know nothing. The Contessa is dead, thanks to you—”

“I did not kill her!” John protested. “I just started to—”

“The only person who could conceivably know more is the jeweler,” the German said. And? So?

John blew a breath out flared nostrils. “All right. Tomorrow I’ll—”

“Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”

“You mean…now? But it’s past midnight, and I—”

“I know exactly what time it is. Past midnight is an ideal time for an interrogation. It’s an ideal time for many things. As you know, John.”

John reordered his mind around this new imperative. “You are implying an, ah…ultimate solution?”

The man sighed, as if John was being tiresome. “When you were recommended, I was told that I would not have to micromanage.”

John ground his teeth. “I will take care of it.”

“I do not want that crew in that house until we know more.”

A muscle twitched in John’s cheek. “I can’t stop it without making a mess,” he said. “I could arrange an accident for the carpenter…?”

“No. No more bodies unless it is necessary. A break-in, some vandalism. Delay the work. Search again, not that I hold up much hope after your failure so far.”

“Yes,” John said tightly after a pause.

“Very well, then. Until tomorrow.”

The connection broke. John laid the phone down. Back to work.

He dragged his black plastic box out from under the bed. It was full of curiosities that he’d acquired over the years, devices he’d made and adapted himself, even some original antiques. He selected some tried-and-true favorites and loaded his kit bag. The thought of the job ahead, his knives and picks, the jeweler screaming, begging…ah. He needed something to kick him up. But first, the bitch Contessa’s house.

He selected the lock drill. Even if the contents of the house were inanimate, smashing them would feel good.

It was a precursor of warmer, softer, juicier things to come.

Chapter

3

Nancy took a bracing gulp of her coffee, finished typing the latest edits into Peter’s CD liner notes in her laptop, and closed the program. She was already late. Moxie flung herself at Nancy’s feet and writhed. She picked the cat up and buried her face in the animal’s fur. Her kitty had been feeling neglected, and now Moxie had to spend yet another day alone while Nancy cleaned the stuff out of Lucia’s kitchen.

She had not asked her sisters to come help. Not that they could have, today. Nell was working, as always, teaching classes all morning and waitressing all afternoon, and Vivi was working a crafts show upstate. Of course, Nancy herself had a triple workday that she was canceling out to do all this. But the truth was, she preferred to see Liam Knightly alone. Nothing got past Vivi’s and Nell’s sharp eyes. Nancy didn’t want her sisters intercepting any smoldering glances, catching any stray waves of throbbing sexual heat. They would draw their shrewd conclusions, and, God forbid, tease her. Or worse, worry about her.