Page 18 of Fastest Kill

"Now I'm interested in him too. Can you pull the rest of his files for me?"

"Sure." Tore went back to the study. Dario and Frederica looked at each other across the table.

"Who is Morosini?" Dario asked.

"Another name that keeps popping up. Same kind of interests in magical and old spooky shit like Foscari is."

"You think they are friends? Like another Aurora member?" Dario really fucking hoped not.

Lucius Foscari had not only masqueraded as a member of their family for years, but he also led the occult group for decades under his other name, Serapis, before he decided he wanted them dead.

No one, not even Altun, knew how old he really was. He could have had another occult group working for him this entire time.

"I don't know what Morosini's connection to Serapis is, if there is any at all. Something about this guy's purchases is annoying me. Like a scratch on the roof of my mouth," Frederica replied and rubbed the bridge of her nose.

Dario didn't point out that they were only meant to be looking for Serapis to find him and kill him. Who Tore's other regular clients were wasn't why they were here, but Dario liked the strange kind of peace they had going on for the moment, and if she wanted to look into another collector, he didn't care.

Tore came back with a separate leather folder, thinner than the others. He set it on the table and opened it.

Frederica took the first page, and Dario took the second, and they read in silence.

The Morosini acquisitions were different in every way. Where Serapis's requests had been specific to curses, necromancy, or containment, Morosini's were power-storing objects, anything bound to an energy source, and amplification relics.

"Different client, but just as regular. Like clockwork," Frederica said, frowning at the page. "Both hunting magical objects that are real and not bullshit fakes. They know the difference, which means they know how to use them."

Dario laid both pages on the table side by side. Serapis/Foscari's requests in one column and Morosini's in the other.

"If we are right about what all these things do, then one of them is building defenses," Frederica said thoughtfully.

"And one of them is building an arsenal," Dario replied.

Tore studied the two columns for a long moment. He set his coffee down very carefully. "Please tell me they're not connected to each other."

"I don't know. It's just…weird," Frederica said.

Tore took his glasses off and cleaned them with the corner of his shirt. "Well, what's your gut telling you? You've always had a good one."

Frederica looked back at the pages. "Maybe it's nothing. You really don't know who this guy Morosini is?"

"I didn't ask." Tore put his glasses back on. "There is a difference between not knowing and not asking. I know which one keeps the bills paid. He was just a guy with an interest in unique things. He didn't seem any weirder than anyone else I've acquired things for."

Nobody argued with that. Dario thought about Serapis telling them through Vincenzo's mouth that he wasn't the real enemy. He had dismissed it at the time. Dario had been certain that he was just talking bullshit to throw them off. He was less certain now.

"We need to know what these objects actually do," he said finally. "Not just our guesswork and the history we can find online, but the magical shit they do."

"Kon or Altun?" Frederica asked, guessing where his mind was already heading.

"Kon." He was already reaching for his phone. "He'll know the magical properties, and Athena will if he doesn't. They might even know who this guy is. Both of them moved in collector circles for years."

"I don't know if we should tell them about Morosini until we know he's connected to Foscari. I don't want Rodrigo to get wind of the name before we have the full picture of who he is, in case we are wrong."

Dario paused with the phone in his hand. "Rodrigo should know there are two clients."

"Rodrigo should know everything or nothing. Half a story will send him straight into combat mode, and we lose any chance of working this carefully and using Morosini as a lead to find Serapis." She gave him an uneasy look. "We don't want your brother going nuclear on some random old rich guy because he just happens to have regular buying habits like Serapis. We call Kon, and when we know it's really connected and not my sleep-deprived brain, we call Rodrigo with something concrete."

"Fine," he said, giving in to the wisdom of it. "Kon first."

"Dario, why are you in Rhodes?" Kon answered on the second ring.