If you’re nice I’ll even let you touch it."
She laughed. "I like that you just so nonchalantly say that. Of course, you can buy one. Fine, Mr. Billionaire, what do you need?"
"Well, you're not going to believe this, but I need to find a fucking needle in a haystack."
"Okay, what are you trying to find?"
"Who."
Telly frowned and crossed her arms. "What's going on? When Livy said you needed my help, she didn’t say why. So I need to know what you need my help with exactly. I can't find a needle if I don't even know if it's silver, black, or gold. You need to be specific."
I had trust issues. I knew that. But Telly had been instrumental in our plot and plan a few months ago. And I needed her now. Because while I could look, two brains were better than one. And I wanted to be certain. "All right, well, for starters, the boys and I got a video message."
"Right. Okay, Liv showed it to me this morning. Can I see your phone? I want to make sure I’ve seen the whole thing."
I took out my phone and played the video for her. For the duration, she stood there and watched it. When it was done, she nodded slowly and then proceeded to laugh. "Oh my God. What, is this a thing with you billionaires? Always with the crazy hijinks?"
"Can you help or not?"
"Ugh, gosh, don't get your knickers in a twist. I got you. So, you want to find out about this Francois Theroux?"
"Yes. Who he is and everything you can find out about him. I’ll be working on how to clear the footage he has of us, uh, behaving badly."
She grinned. "Is that what we’re calling it? Okay, but I don't need my hacking skills to tell you about Theroux." She scooped up some of the crudité I’d laid out and popped it in her mouth. “Hell, I’ll be back home with the fiancée in no time.”
I indicated the couch, and she plopped down on it, sending her inky dark hair bouncing over her shoulders. "I can tell you everything about Theroux. Well, not everything, because obviously, I don't know who he actually is, but I was obsessed with heists as a teenager."
I lifted my brows. "Heists?"
“Yeah. Trust me, I know this stuff. You think you and the lads are gangsters, but you’ve got nothing on this bloke.” Settling in, she picked up a throw pillow and held it against her chest as she leaned forward in animated fashion. “Look, Theroux is one of the best thieves in the world. He’s legendary. He’s stolen things from under people's noses without anybody even realizing they were gone. No alarms. No police. No nothing. If he is poking at you lot, he's probably bored."
That got my attention, and I sat up straight. "What do you mean, bored?"
"Okay, look. If everything they say is correct about him... He's what, maybe sixty? He probably can't heist things anymore because he's older. Probably less mobile. And I haven't heard anything about a good Theroux heist in a while. He always claims his heists, you know. Maybe he's just tired, or bored, or… whatever, I don't know. But the point is, he has been pretty quiet for the last five years at least."
"You think this guy could be an imposter?"
"I mean, that guy kind of looks like he could be Theroux. He's the right age. We can run him through a facial app, but it’s likely that's not Theroux but an actor. Chances are he's dicking with you. But if he says he has the painting, a missing painting at that, an important one, and he wants you to come and get it, it's an invitation from Francois Theroux. You can't ignore it."
"I fully intend to ignore it."
"Well, you can if you want. But there's a reason he's sending it to you. He could get a lot showier with his request, and maybe that is not what the London Lords need right now, considering there was just a whole, you know, heist and coup d’état. You don't want him connecting the dots, yeah?"
I frowned. "Right. So what do you suggest we do, then?"
Telly shrugged. "I don't know. I'm not going to tell you to mess with him. But I do think that maybe he wants to wage a battle with someone. The problem is you don't want to get involved in that."
No. No, we did not. "Can we at least trace where