He could hardly hear her. He was trying hard to remember what Fred had said about their little harbor problem. Literal shit into the water. Likely from a new building. One built in the last year. And then there was the personal angle, something he bet neither Thomas nor the prince had considered.

What if someone was fucking up Boston Harbor to wreck things for the NEA? Tough to get tourists down to shitville. Tough to do much of anything when the entire harbor smelled like a Porta Potti.

“Your ex. What’s his name?”

“Phillip King.”

“So you’ve always had your own name.”

“Jonas, what’s the matter?”

He ignored the question. “Think this one over before you answer, Barb. Did you guys really part amicably?”

“Yes. Although—it’s quite funny you should bring this up, because a year ago he started trying to, I guess woo me would be the word. But I wasn’t going down that road again, and I told him so. There were some pretty hard feelings that time, and he left a few nasty messages on my machine, but I had my lawyer tell him to cease and desist and that was really the end of—Jonas, what’s the matter? You look like you’re going to faint.”

He could hear his cell phone ringing from somewhere and sat up, gently pushing Barb away. “Help me find my pants,” he said urgently.

“But what’s the—”

“My pants, woman!”

She hopped off the bed and they both looked in the bedroom and the sitting area. On the third ring he found them hanging from the front doorknob. He lunged for them, found his phone, fumbled with it, dropped it, bent, picked it up, clawed it open.

“Fred, don’t hang up!”

“That’s not your midorgasm voice, is it?”

He slid to the floor, relieved. “No, but I did just give your boss the banging of a lifetime.”

“Oh, Jonas!” she shrieked. “Stop that! I have to work with the woman, you know.”

“Ow!”

“What? Did you bruise a testicle?”

“No, she pinched me. Guess she didn’t care for my confession either.” She went in for another pinch and he batted her away. “Listen, you guys have any luck?”

“No we did not, dammit, and everybody’s pooped—except the King of the Ocean, here, who looks ready to take on the Chicago Bulls—so we’re all coming back to the room for a nap and you’d by God better be finished and fully dressed when we get there because one more shock my heart cannot take and if you had any sensitivity at all you wouldn’t have had sex with my boss in the water fellow’s—”

“Fred, shut the hell up and listen, goddammit!”

Barb, bending over to shake out her skirt, froze.

“Did you have an aneurysm for lunch?” Fred demanded. “Because—”