Carla tells me and of course it is the same time as Frankie Leclerc and his emeralds. That would not hold in a court of law but I am not one and I already know. If you join the dots in the money you find the same thing that is in the picture: the guy in the nice suit standing a little way off and behind Mrs. Van der Zee and totally not her date or her friend he just happens to be in proximity…why that is François Leclerc.

This is not about me at all.

(I know weird right?)

It is not about me at all.

And most specifically this whole thing—this whole thing is not about money or even politics. Volodya is dead and Reinhard and Sharkey and Agent Hannah’s left-hand guy and her right-hand guy and some of the G-Wagen guys and a lot—really a lot—of other people are about to die because of one thing and that thing—

Tycho the saluki’s questionable libido.

Tycho does not fuck Mrs. Van der Zee’s dog and Mrs. Van der Zee takes offense and so obviously—OBVIOUSLY this is just what you do in that situation OF COURSE—she buys a shit ton of conflict emeralds and puts them in Eiger’s bank and uses them to hire Frankie Leclerc to do horrible things to Doc’s friends. She lets him see the stones and she lets him hold them but unless he wants to try and kill her right here in Bogotá against whatever precautions she has taken—I am guessing big sturdy Dutch security assholes—he cannot have them unless he does what she wants and even then she is going to keep him on retainer. A billion is a lot of money when you are trying to make your way in the world so Frankie swallows the hook and on her instruction he nudges up to Eiger to hire us and kill us off because that will solve his money problems. It’s like stupidly complex but she is Mrs. Van der Zee and no one ever tells her no.

Mrs. Van der Zee set us up—she made all this happen—because Tycho did not bone her dog.

She did all this to hurt Doc. Just to be mean.

And if this is all about Doc…

…then they will be looking for the subtle move behind the loud stupid Banjo thing…

…and Doc’s plan to rob Die Festung is probably about to get the same treatment as Mrs. Van der Zee’s Semper Augustus. Which means we need a new plan and Doc cannot be a part of it. She cannot even know until after.

I do not know what she will think about that.

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