“Things worth dying over?” I sipped my coffee, if only so the inside of the cup would give me something to look at.

“Things my mother gave me. Sentimental things.”

“And when he dies,” I said, “I’m sure they’ll still be there. Get them then.”

She shook her head. “By the time he dies, what I’m going to get might not be there anymore. One quick trip into the house on a night I know he’ll be away, and I’m free.”

“How do you know he’ll be away?”

“Tomorrow is the night of the annual stockholders’ meeting of his biggest company, Consolidated Petroleum. They hold it every year at the Harvard Club Room at One Federal. Same date, same time, rain or shine.”

“Why would he go? He’s not going to be able to make it next year.”

She leaned back, placed her coffee cup on the nightstand. “You don’t understand my father yet, do you?”

“No, Miss Stone, I guess I don’t.”

She nodded, used an index finger to absently wipe at a bead of water sliding down her left calf. “My father doesn’t honestly think he’s going to die. And if he does, he’s going to use every resource he has left to buy himself immortality. He’s the chief stockholder in over twenty corporations. The hard copy of his diversified portfolio for his United States interests alone is thicker than the phone book for Mexico City.”

“That’s some serious thick,” I said.

Something flashed through her jade eyes for a moment, something incensed. Then it was gone.

“Yes,” she said with a soft smile. “It is. His final months will be spent making sure each and every corporation allocates funds for something in his name—a library, a research lab, a public park, what have you.”

“And if he dies, how’s he going to make sure all this immortality-making gets done?”

“Danny,” she said.

“Danny?” I said.

Her lips parted slightly and she reached for her coffee cup. “Daniel Griffin, my father’s personal attorney.”

“Ah,” I said. “Even I’ve heard of him.”

“About the only attorney more powerful than your own, Patrick.”

It was the first time I’d heard my name pass from her lips. It had a disconcertingly sweet effect, like a warm hand pressed to my heart.

“How do you know who my attorney is?”

“Jay talked about you once.”

“Really?”

“For almost an hour one night. He looked on you like you were a little brother he’d never had. He said you were the only person in the world he truly trusted. He said if anything ever happened to him, I was to come to you.”