The job that pushed me into the art market full-time. Talent, at least those who don’t work for Azar, are reluctant to kill you—attempted robbery is an easier rap than murder—but spies and terrorists? They don’t care. They’ll shoot at you. And they’ll hit you. And it will hurt much worse, and for much longer, than you think it will.

20

A bit of a whopper, actually. No one really has an immunity to Nix. What makes it such a nasty customer? Nix has incredible bioavailability—nearly instantaneous—and the antidote requires several applications at thirty-second intervals, which means that the cure often loses the race to the fast-acting toxin. So if you’ve got any last words before your entire body is paralyzed, you’d better spit them out, pronto. It’s brand-new, too, a hybrid of the natural maculotoxin found in blue-ringed octopods and some kind of synthetic. You get all the pain and paralysis of the former but, thanks to the latter, not death. If you want to paralyze someone for the rest of his life, and you want to do it with maximum discomfort, Nix is for you. I’ve been working hard to build up a resistance, but because it’s so new, and a hybrid, it’s tricky. I’m only up to one ten-milligram pill, and even that amount makes my lips and tongue tingle with numbness. So I really shouldn’t say I have an immunity to Nix. Even saying “resistance” is a stretcher. It’s a work in progress.

21

Attempted to use trained ball python to infiltrate air shaft; busted when I discovered the snake coiled under heater for warmth.

22

Drilled up through concrete flooring; I detected vibrations through bare feet on the tile.

23

Failed to lubricate the soles of his shoes and when he tried to walk across tiles that had been sprayed with movie butter—an old favorite of mine—I heard, from several rooms away, the sticky, riplike sound of rubber separating from adhesive.

24

Cut green wire.

25