Page 115 of The Picasso Heist

“They’re doing right by us, making good on a mistake. They’ve also been watching your six. My six as well. Which is how I got the tip and why you ended up in that trunk today,” he says, pointing over my shoulder.

The Lincoln Town Car, engine still idling, is the only vehicle remaining in the alley. No sooner did Skip help me out of the trunk than Nikolov’s guys disappeared in the Escalade. More on that in a minute.

“Oh, great,” I say. “You’ve officially drunk their Kool-Aid. Those so-called friends of ours are just protecting their investment—that’s it, nothing more. All we are to them is a means to an end. If it weren’t for what they’re getting out of this whole thing, the FBI wouldn’t give a shit about your six or mine.”

“I think I liked it better when your mouth was taped,” says Skip.

“And I think you still haven’t told me anything.”

“Maybe if you’d let me?”

“I’m listening,” I say.

He points again over my shoulder. “I’ll explain on the way there.”

“Where?”

“You’ll see,” he says. “We can’t hang around here any longer.”

That much he doesn’t have to explain. In a few minutes Elise Joyce will be back with an entire SWAT team and detectives.

Skip gets behind the wheel of the Town Car, and I grab shotgun. He peels out and I turn to him, all ears.

“I was able to identify every key guy in Lugieri’s crew,” he begins.

What makes someone a key guy? The answer’s very straightforward for my brother. If you’re someone, anyone, who might want revenge on Lugieri, congratulations, you’re officially a key guy.

But with every foolproof plan to bring down a mob boss, there’s still the possibility of a fool you didn’t count on. When Skip walked into Osteria Contorni to meet Dominick Lugieri for the first time, he had no idea that Lugieri would be killing one of his crew in cold blood. Mind you, the victim was hardly innocent. The only thing uglier than the guy himself was his rap sheet, says Skip. Meth dealing, aggravated assault, endangering a minor… the world hardly weeps for him.

Save for one person.

Lugieri’s private dining room at Osteria Contorni is supposed to be like Vegas: What happens in there, stays in there. And it would’ve too. No one would’ve known about the murder had Lugieri notfoolishly gotten in bed with Bergamo to launder oodles of money. But once he did, all bets were off. The room was no longer Vegas. The truth escaped.

And landed squarely on Antonio Franchero.

“Who’s that?” I ask.

“The brother of the guy Lugieri killed,” says Skip. “And for the record, he’s just as ugly. And he blames me for his brother’s death.”

“But Lugieri pulled the trigger. Why’s the brother blaming you?”

“He’s blaming everybody. But he can’t get to Lugieri, especially with him in custody. You and me, on the other hand, he can get to.”

I know Skip’s not worried about himself. “You mean he can get to me,” I say.

“Whatever. The brother wants us both dead, and according to ourfriends,the chatter they’ve picked up on, he’s willing to die trying.”

“So you figured—”

“He can’t kill us if we’ve already been killed,” he says. “And all we needed was a reliable witness.”

“The next governor from the great state of New York, huh?”

Skip nods. “She recorded the whole thing.”

Our original plan was good old-fashioned entrapment. Elise Joyce was supposed to waltz into that warehouse in New Jersey thinking she was taking down Anton Nikolov for the planned murder of one Halston Graham, aka Halston Greer, aka me.

Surprise. The only one who’d be getting arrested was her. The two men backing up Skip in the warehouse were FBI, and the mistake they were correcting on behalf of the Bureau was allowing— or, more accurately, being oblivious to—the lead prosecutor in our father’s case to suppress evidence that would’ve supported the defense. Of course, that prosecutor was Elise Joyce, and the evidence was a series of email exchanges between our father and Enzio Bergamo that suggested Dad wasn’t initially aware he was participating in a major art scam.