Beaumont stared at him for exactly three seconds.
Then he laughed.
It started as a wheeze deep in his gut and erupted into a full belly laugh that shook his entire frame. The kind of laugh that came from men who thought they'd heard the funniest joke of their lives.
Elijah started laughing too.
The sound bounced off the walls of the cramped office. Two men sharing a moment of pure absurdity. The thugs with guns looked at each other like their boss had finally lost it.
Oh man. This is great. He really thinks this is funny.
Beaumont wiped tears from his eyes. "You! You work for yourself! That is the joke, yes?"
"Yeah." Elijah's grin was still plastered on his face. "That's the joke."
He stopped laughing.
"Yo, Pierre?"
Static crackled in his ear. Then a voice, smooth and professional. "Yes, boss?"
Elijah didn't look at the window. He raised one finger and pointed directly at the thug standing there. "Drop him."
The window exploded.
The window exploded inward, glass biting into everything. The man by the window never even had time to turn around. His body just... stopped. One moment he was there, hand wrapped around the Beretta, and the next he was sliding down the wall, leaving a slow smear of red against the expensive wallpaper.
Door guy's brain finally caught up to what his eyes were seeing. He swung the Glock toward Elijah.
Elijah dropped.
The shot went wide. Wood splinters exploded from the doorframe above where his head had been half a second ago. Elijah tucked his shoulder and rolled, came up inside door guy's reach, and drove his fist into the man's face.
Cartilage crunched. The Glock hit the floor.
Door guy staggered back but didn't go down. Big guys never went down easy. Elijah grabbed for the dropped Glock.
His fingers closed around the grip.
Door guy's forehead came at him fast.
Oh shit!
The headbutt caught him square on the nose. Pain exploded across Elijah's face. Hot blood poured down his lips. The world tilted sideways for a second.
"FUCK!" Elijah's voice came out nasal. "THAT WAS MY BEST PART!"
He pulled the trigger three times.
The first shot caught door guy low. He folded with a sound that was almost indignant, like the bullet had been rude rather than fatal. The next two were quick. He went down and stayed down.
Elijah lowered the Glock. Brought his free hand up to his nose and immediately regretted it. The pain hit somewhere behind his eyes and radiated outward, hot and unpleasant, and he stood there for a moment just breathing through it. A week, minimum. Maybe two.
Blood had gotten onto his collar at some point. He noticed it the way you notice a parking ticket.
Beaumont's hand was moving toward something under the desk.
"Tsk tsk tsk." Elijah swung the Glock toward him. "No can do, my guy."
The fat man froze. His hand hovered over whatever panic button or hidden piece he'd been going for.
"The money. Now."
"I... I don't..."
"You're testing my patience Mr. Beaumont." Elijah wiped blood from his nose. "Just give me the cash before things get messy for you, okay?"
Beaumont stared at Elijah.
"Yo Pierre?"
"OKAY! Okay. Je le ferai."
Beaumont stood up slowly, hands visible, and waddled to the painting on the wall. Behind the painting sat a wall safe.
His fingers shook as he worked the combination.
Come on, come on. I don't have all night and my nose is killing me.
The safe door swung open. Beaumont pulled out a black duffel bag. The way he handled it screamed heavy. He set it on the desk with a thud that rattled the lamp.
Footsteps pounded up the stairs.
The bartender filled the doorway with a baseball bat and a mustache full of conviction.
Elijah didn't turn around. Just lifted the Glock and pointed it back over his shoulder, more or less in the man's direction.
"Ne sois pas un héros. Laisse Robin des Bois faire son truc."
Don't be a hero. Let Robin Hood do his thing.
The bartender's eyes did what eyes do in rooms like this. They moved without permission. To the bodies. To the blood. To the place where the window used to be. Then to Beaumont, still on his feet, still breathing, looking like a man who'd just seen something he was going to be seeing for a long time.
The legs figured it out before the rest of him did.
The bartender found the first step. Then the second. He went down slow, the way you do when you're trying to convince yourself you're in control of the decision.
Smart guy.
Beaumont zipped up the duffel bag with trembling hands. He pushed it across the desk. "There. Eight million. Just... just take it and go."
Elijah grabbed the bag with his free hand. Heavy. Probably actually had the money in it. He unzipped it halfway to check. Stacks of euros in neat bundles. Beautiful.
He sighed. "Now see? How hard was that, man?"
Beaumont said nothing. Sweat rolled down his temples.
Elijah reached into his coat pocket and pulled out the velvet case that contained the necklace. He tossed it leisurely onto the desk.
"I'm a fair man, Mr. Beaumont." Elijah shouldered the duffel. "Business is business."
He walked to the door. Stepped over door guy's body. Blood was already soaking into the cheap carpet. Someone's insurance company was gonna have a field day with this.
"Elijah?"
He paused at the threshold. Looked back.
Beaumont had opened the velvet case. The emerald and diamond necklace caught the light from the broken window. Forty-seven stones that had once belonged to an Empress. Now they belonged to a fat fence with delusions of grandeur.
"We're done, yes? No more... complications?"
Elijah smiled. The same smile that had gotten him out of worse situations in fourteen different countries.
"Yeah. We're done."
He shot Beaumont in the leg.
The fat man hit the floor loud, both hands going straight to his thigh, and the sound he made was less a scream and more something that had outgrown that word. The bullet had gone through muscle. It would hurt for months. It wasn't going to kill him.
That was the point.
"That's for wasting my time," Elijah said.
He went down the stairs two at a time. The bar was completely empty, drinks still on the counter and not a patron in sight. Elijah took another sip of his drink on the counter and looked at the news still running his blurry picture on the television.
Sirens came through in the distance. Time to bounce.
The back exit put him in a piss soaked alley. The duffel bag knocked against his hip with each step and he saw blue lights coming at the far end of the alley.
He went the other way.
The cops were fast. He'd give them that. Ninety seconds, maybe less, between the first shot and the first siren. Someone had done their job tonight.
Just not well enough.
The chain-link fence came up fast. He took it in stride, hands catching the top rail, body swinging over.
A dog started barking somewhere close. Big dog, by the sound of it.
He didn't slow down.
The gap between buildings was barely wide enough. He turned sideways and pushed through anyway. Over a wall on the other side, his palm catching the rough edge on the way down and leaving some skin behind. The fire escape groaned under him, shaking with each step.
The sirens weren't fading.
They weren't gaining. In this line of work, that was close enough to winning.
Left at the corner. The fountain. Right at the market, stalls shut down for the night, tarps over everything, the smell of old produce and wet stone hanging in the air.
The duffel pulled at his shoulder. His nose had caught the top of that last fence and it was making him pay for it now, one steady throb after another.
He was still grinning.
He'd never found the right word for it. Fever came close. That place you got to when everything stripped back and the noise went somewhere else and it was just you and the next step. Some people spent their whole lives trying to avoid it. He'd spent fifteen years trying to get there faster.
The garage was three blocks from the Seine. He pushed through the stairwell door onto level four and the sedan was already there, engine running, Pierre not even turning his head. Just ready.
He pulled out his phone. Speed dial.
One ring.
Something in him went still before he could say why. Not thought. Older than that.
Then the steel at the base of his skull. Cold. Placed by someone who knew what they were doing.
He didn't move. Didn't tense up. Just stood there with the phone in his hand, the engine humming somewhere behind him.
"Really." His voice came out almost tired. "The back of the head."