He continued prattling on to himself as Jordan texted the client to let her know she was on the doorstep. It was an impressive doorstep, a stone-clad threshold double their height. The grand old stone Boston church had been converted to four massive luxury condos, each as large as most suburban mansions. Tastefully expensive cars sat on the curb. A nanny shot them wary looks as she pushed a stroller down the sidewalk. Matthew waved at the little girl following the nanny; the little girl waved back.

There was a little hum of an electric door lock, and then the door came open.

The woman in the doorway matched the cars on the sidewalk. Tastefully expensive. Her smile was free for all, though. “Hi, I’m Sherry. Jordan Hennessy?”

Jordan grinned back. “And my assistant, Matthew. This is a great location.”

“We love it,” said Sherry. “Still smells like contrition. Come on in.”

They came on in. Jordan was combining business and pleasure, or at least business and personal. As far as Sherry knew, Jordan was just there to get reference photos for a gimmick commission. But Jordan had also discovered that Sherry and her husband, Donald, had probably purchased a sweetmetal through one of Boudicca’s auctions years before. Probably because Jordan wasn’t one hundred percent sure the collection it came from was made up of sweetmetals. All she knew was that it had been a similarly eclectic assemblage of works that went for unexpected prices. And that it was very, very secret. More secret than one would expect a collection that included bed frames, lamps, and fine art photography to be. It had taken a lot of legwork and social pull to get even that much information. It felt like a lot of hours invested for the possibility of looking at maybe another sweetmetal to see what it had in common with El Jaleo and the other sweetmetals she’d seen. This one was a photograph, so that was unique, at least. And what other leads did she have, anyway?

Inside, the condo was modern and spare, taking advantage of the church’s soaring ceilings to incorporate sleek, tall sculpture and dripping, laser-clean lighting. Not Jordan’s style, but she could appreciate it. Declan would probably have been wild for it. It was a grown-up, very expensive, very specific version of his blank townhome, combined with the abstract art he’d hidden away in his attic.

“I know this is kind of corny,” Sherry said. “This whole thing. But I’ve just loved the idea of it ever since I was a kid, and I got too old to be in it myself, and now that Harlow’s just big enough to be painted, I thought, I’m going to do it, I’m going to pull the trigger before I change my mind or Donald talks me out of it.”