I got off the desk. He leaned back in his chair, pushing its wheels back from me, but I turned away from him and headed for the door. I looked back at him. “In five minutes when I call Trevor Stone to tell him that his lawyer is fucking his daughter, should I give him a message on your behalf?”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Wouldn’t? I got pictures, Danny.”

You gotta love the bluffs that work.

Daniel Griffin held up a hand and swallowed several times. He stood up so quickly the chair spun away from him, and then he placed his hands on his desk for a moment, sucked oxygen from the air.

“You work for Trevor?” he said.

“Used to,” I said. “Not anymore. But I still have his number.”

“Are you,” he said, his voice rising, “loyal to him?”

“You’re not,” I said with a chuckle.

“Are you?”

I shook my head. “I don’t like him and I don’t like his daughter, and as far as I know both of them might want me dead by six o’clock tonight.”

He nodded. “They’re dangerous people.”

“Yeah, Danny? Tell me something I don’t know. What are you supposed to do for Desiree?”

“I…” He shook his head and walked to a small fridge in the corner. He bent by it, and I drew my gun, released the safety.

But all he pulled out was a bottle of Evian. He guzzled half of it, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes widened when he saw the gun. I shrugged.

“He’s a mean, evil man and he’s going to die,” he said. “I have to think of the future. I have to think of who’s going to handle his money when he’s gone. Who’s going to control the purse, if you will.”

“Big purse,” I said.

“Yes. One billion, one hundred and seventy-five million dollars at last count.”

The figure rocked me a bit. There’s the kind of money you can envision filling a truck or a bank vault. And then there’s the kind of money that is too big for either.

“That’s not a purse,” I said. “That’s a gross national product.”

He nodded. “And it has to go somewhere when he dies.”

“Jesus,” I said. “You’re going to alter his will.”

His eyes dropped from mine and he stared out the window.

“Or you’ve altered it already,” I said. “He changed his will after the attempt on his life, didn’t he?”

He stared out at State Street and the back of City Hall Plaza and nodded.

“He cut Desiree out of it?”

Another nod.

“Who’s the money go to now?”

Nothing.

“Daniel,” I said. “Who’s the money go to now?”

He waved his hand. “A variety of interests—university endowments, libraries, medical research, things like that.”

“Bullshit. He’s not that nice.”