That was the way it was. A death settled problems, cleared the air, and Milos believed in doing his own wetwork when he could. Not because it was personal—never personal. It simply kept everyone on their toes.

But with Petar it had been personal, too personal to allow anyone else to do. He’d grieved for months, and to this day he missed his older brother.

Ah, Petar, he thought looking at the photo in Cino’s hands, if only I could have seen the future then. Had I known of Loki and the millions it would bring, I would not have bothered with the KLA deal, and you would be here with me today to share in the bounty.

Milos’s throat tightened as he lifted his glass to the photo. “To my beloved brother.”

Wishing to hell it was vodka, he forced the rest of the Petrus past the lump in his throat.

16

Nadia blinked and bolted upright to a sitting position. Dark. Where were her clothes? Where was she?

She glanced out the window and saw the underside of the Manhattan Bridge and remembered. She was in Doug’s bed—alone.

God, what time was it? The red LED digits on the clock said it was late.

Where was Doug? She called his name.

“Is that Sleeping Beauty I hear?” he called back from somewhere in the apartment.

“Where are you?”

“I’m in the office. Come here. I want to show you something.”

She stretched, arching her back under the sheets. She and Doug had returned to his place with the intention of hacking into the GEM mainframe together, but made a detour to the bedroom on their way to the computer. She smiled at the memory. Doug hadn’t been the least bit distracted during their lovemaking. She’d had his full attention then.

And afterward, lying snuggled in his arms, she’d dozed off. She never did that. Well, almost never. But she hadn’t been getting enough sleep lately.

She slipped out of the bed, pulled on her clothes, and detoured to the kitchen where she found a Jolt Cola in the fridge. She preferred Diet Pepsi, but this would do. She carried it to the second bedroom that Doug had converted to an office.

She found him, dressed only in his boxer shorts, munching cereal from a blue box as he stared at the monitor. She loved the broad wedge of his shoulders.

“Eating something good?” she said, leaning against his back and watching the numbers run across the screen.

He handed her the box without looking up. She was startled to see a familiar cross-eyed propeller-headed alien on the front.

“Quisp?” She flashed back to the cute Quisp versus Quake commercials of her childhood. “I thought they stopped making this ages ago.”

“So did I, but apparently it’s still sold in a couple of places around the country. I ordered some on the Net.”

She tried a few of the crunchy saucer-shaped pieces and nearly gagged. “I don’t remember it being this sweet.”