How’s Paris, beautiful? H x

I put down the bobby pins, take a sip of coffee and glare at the message. You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

Of course I get a message from Harrison today, just as I need to focus. The man has fucking antennae, I tell you. This is because I never called to say thank you for the roses, so now he’s terrified that maybe, finally, I’m healing.

I should just block him. That would be one way to stop his fake-nice overtures. He wouldn’t even know. He’d keep sending his Trojan horses, and never know why they stopped working.

And then it happens.

The way ideas always happen.

One thought links to another and boom.

My breath is quick as I reach for my phone, go to Notes and start to type before the idea deserts me.

That bond. 100 million euro. Klimt. Trojan Horse.

And just like that I know why Sabine had those two videos in the same folder. Philip Crawford-White was selling something, but it wasn’t a bond. Not really. It was a painting. A painting that didn’t exist. He just needed a solid cover story for why that money was going into his account.

A cover story like a bond worth about the same.

But is that sane? Would it even work?

Philip Crawford-White is an uber wealthy guy, so nobody would question the amount, but what about the buyer? What if one day he decided to collect on that bond?

My breath is quick as I reach for my phone and text Thomas.

What would happen if someone went to collect on a bond and the company had no money?

A split second later: typing bubbles.

Then they lose their money. That’s the risk of business. But we can talk about all this when we meet. Tomorrow?

I can’t do tomorrow, of course, because I’ll be breaking into Le Voltage with Noah then. He’s bringing the duct tape. I’m bringing the locksmithery. I wanted to do it tonight, but Noah said that was too risky. The gallery is closed on Mondays, like much else in Paris. So if we do it on Sunday night we’ll have a twenty-four hour grace period before anyone realises the CCTV outside was compromised.

And at least now I know what we’ll be looking for: something, anything, to link Agnès Bisset to Genovexa. And I know it was Agnès who set it up. Because, let’s be fair, Philip would be pretty stupid to set up a company then issue himself a fake bond as a cover story. But what sort of evidence would prove that?

I imagine Thomas sitting there, on that brown leather sofa of his, waiting for my reply. I don’t really want to see him unless I have to, so I give myself a wide girth and type back: Tuesday?