Will blinked. “Oh. Uh.” He shook himself. “Sure. Yeah. The caretaker’s code.” He waved a hand. “What was I thinking?” He looked around the kitchen and living room. “So, uh, I assume this one has more bedrooms than the place in Vermont?”
“A few, yes. Come on.”
Cole led Will up the stairs to the third floor. The beds were bare, of course, but he pulled sheets, blankets, pillowcases, and duvets from the linen closet. He also found towels for their respective en suite bathrooms.
“That should be everything,” he said as he pushed a stack of towels into Will’s hands. “If you need anything else…” He tipped his head toward the closet.
Will still seemed a bit dumbstruck. “Uh. Okay. Cool. Should we, uh… I don’t suppose the kitchen stays stocked while your family isn’t here.”
Cole shook his head. “No, it doesn’t. I can put in an order for groceries. And dinner.”
“And that won’t raise any—” Will paused. “Don’t tell me you use your caretaker’s DoorDash account.”
“I mean, it gets the job done…”
Will blinked. Then he shook his head and started toward the room he’d be using. “Rich people.” He shouldered open the door. “I will never understand—wait, wait, wait.” He dropped the stack of linens on the floor and strode into the room. “What the fuck?”
Cole huffed with annoyance and followed, stepping over the heap of sheets and towels. “What?”
But then he understood—Will was staring at a painting on the wall, and Cole had to bite back a laugh.
“Is that—” Will leaned even closer. “This isn’t a fake, is it? This is…” He whirled around, eyes huge as he stabbed a finger atthe painting and demanded, “Is that Barlow’sCenturion? Like, the real thing?”
Cole grinned as he came closer, admiring the painting as if he hadn’t seen it a million times. “The real thing.”
Will opened and closed his mouth like a fish’s, looking at Cole, then the painting, then Cole again. “I… how?How?”He flailed his hand at the piece. “I can’t fucking believeyougot that piece. I was right there—why didn’t I see you?”
Cole snorted. “Because you have the spatial awareness of a sloth?”
Will glared at him. “Are you suggesting that sloths don’t have spatial awareness? Do you understand how many predators sloths have? Many of which move a lot faster than they do because, you know,sloths?”
Cole pinched the bridge of his nose, hating himself for how hard he had to fight not to laugh.
“Seriously, though,” Will said. “I was at that gallery specifically to get that piece. And then it was just… gone. And I didn’t evenseeyou!”
Grinning, Cole shrugged. “You snooze, you lose.”
That earned him a disgruntled huff that was probably more satisfying than it had any right to be.
“Anyway.” Cole clapped Will’s shoulder. “You enjoy the view. I’m going to go order some food.” He paused. “Just, uh, text me with whatever you want, I guess?”
Will nodded, still staring at the painting. “Yeah. I’m probably going to grab a shower and—how the fuck many other stolen pieces do you have here, anyway?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Cole was in a decidedly shittier mood an hour later.
Food had arrived, and they’d stocked the fridge and eaten some sandwiches. Now Will was standing out on the deck overlooking Seal Harbor. He’d just been gazing out at the water, thinking God only knew what. Maybe he was considering their next move. Maybe he was wondering if their pursuers had found their trail. Or, hell, maybe he was pondering how Cole had managed to get theCenturionout of that gallery in Milan before anyone noticed.
Oh, wouldn’t he like to know how Cole had seduced, blown, and bribed a pair of security guards to help him finish that job?
Normally, that memory gave Cole a pleasant shiver, but right now, he wasn’t in the mood for fond memories.
Because someone had infiltrated his Strawberry Mansion safehouse, and it wasn’t a couple of tweakers looking for a place to fuck this time. The men—four of them, decked out in tactical gear—had tossed the apartment like a prison cell. They’d found nothing, of course, including the very well-hidden security cameras. Still, Cole didn’t like that they’d found the apartment in the first place, least of all after he’d told Lilith he was heading there.
He was especially displeased because someone had also found the Larkinville safehouse. That location was a rented office in a commercial building—definitely not the kind of place cops or thugs could go swarming into without being noticed.
The intruders had been noticed, but no one would think for a second that there was anything nefarious going on. Instead of masked cop-thugs, it was a team of firefighters responding to an alarm. They’d evacuated the building and dutifully gone doorto door, making sure everyone was out. They hadn’t tossed the office like the Philly cops had, but they’d forced open the door and checked every nook and cranny for anyone who might still be there.
