“I stopped one of his attempted thefts and recovered other stolen artwork from his holdings when I was with Interpol,” Erik answered. “I testified against him in court, and my team tracked the sources for the laundered money he used to pay for his art on the shadow market. So yeah, he remembers me.”
“Well, I’ve got to give you credit for brass balls.” Hendricks sipped his coffee and was quiet for a moment.
Erik had left out that Gusev was a witch, undeterred from using deeply questionable magical traditions to aid his undertakings.
“Do you think he was behind the two murders linked to that ‘haunted’ window?” Hendricks didn’t use finger quotes, but the distinction was clear in his voice.
“No. Too small potatoes for him. Ben and I believe it was the Newark Mob. Specifically, a boss who goes by The Collector.”
“What’s up with the fancy nicknames? Oligarch. Collector. Pretty fancy for career criminals,” Hendricks groused.
“The mobsters who make it to the top have a grandiose streak,” Erik told him. “They never get that completely right in the movies.”
Erik heard Ben’s key in the lock and looked up as his partner came inside and shrugged out of his soaked raincoat.
“I’m guessing you or Nolan know something about this Collector, too?” Hendricks looked like he felt a headache coming on.
Hearing The Collector and The Oligarch’s names come up rattled Erik more than he hoped he had let on. It frustrated Erikthat despite their best efforts to leave the past behind them, neither he nor his partner could seem to evade the shadows from their former jobs.
“Way too much,” Ben answered, having heard the chief’s last comment. “What do you want me to tell you?”
Ben came into the break room and poured himself a cup of coffee. He greeted Erik with a peck on the lips and then sat next to him across from Hendricks.
“Erik filled me in about this Oligarch guy. What do I need to know about The Collector? And who the hell comes up with the pretentious nicknames?” Hendricks asked.
“It’s part of the mobster ego and posturing,” Erik replied. “They’ve all watchedThe GodfatherandScarfacetoo many times.”
“The Collector’s real name is Remo Barone,” Ben said. “His people have been in the Family for generations, and they think they’re Mafia gentry. Lots of money, patrons of the arts, they send their kids to expensive colleges and donate a lot of laundered money to things like the ballet and symphony. Which doesn’t change the fact that they’re stone-cold killers.”
“I guess people can ignore a lot when someone writes a big check,” Hendricks grumbled.
“Barone must have gone to a lot of art museums growing up, because that’s what he stole,” Ben continued.
“Erik probably ran across him on international busts. I chased his ass around New Jersey. Sometimes it wasn’t about breaking into a museum. The owner of a piece of art died suddenly, and Barone could swoop in and buy the art below market rate. We’d hear later that other potential bidders had their lives threatened if they outbid him,” Ben said.
“We saw the same kind of things with his European activity,” Erik chimed in. “He managed to dodge the harsher penalties and seemed to consider lesser charges a cost of doing business.”
“Barone knew how to set things up so they were legal enough to skate past scrutiny,” Ben added.
“And when the money trail or the provenance was shaky, my team and I got pulled in,” Erik said.
“Barone isn’t going to remember either of us fondly.” Ben finished his coffee and set the cup aside.
Erik didn’t mention that, like The Oligarch, Barone employed a witch to help cover his tracks and eliminate rivals. He always wondered if that was why Barone’s taste in artwork gravitated toward dark supernatural themes.
He had never figured out whether Barone truly liked the art he pursued so ruthlessly, wanted to show off his wealth, or thought that acquiring rare and valuable pieces created legitimacy.
“You both have had very…colorful…lives,” Hendricks said. “And I appreciate the briefing. But if no one knows where the Commodore Wilson Tiffany dome is, why the sudden Mafia interest in something that vanished thirty years ago?”
Erik strongly suspected that magic had something to do with it, but he knew that wasn’t what Hendricks wanted to hear.
“We’ve put out some feelers to our contacts who are still in the business,” Erik said. “He may have found out that we were looking for it. And the thirtieth anniversary of the Commodore Wilson’s implosion may have brought the dome back to people’s minds. The haunted window wasn’t related, but maybe it was a reminder.”
“What are they going to do? Ransack Cape May until they find the dome?” Hendricks asked.
“Only if they can’t make Ben or me tell them what they think we know,” Erik said. “And they’ll take Samuels’s window as a consolation prize if they can’t get the dome.”
Hendricks pushed his now-cold coffee to the side. “Much as I hate to admit it, that means that the two of you are going tohave to figure out a plan to send the goons packing with as little bloodshed as possible, preferably before the big festival.”
