Alberto managed to stifle the<em>'Yeah, sure, I can do that'</em>that threatened to escape his treasonous lips and accepted the photo, regarding the poker player with a slight frown as Andrei detailed his desires.  This, at last, was the clatter of the other shoe falling he'd been looking forward to finally seeing.  From anyone else, he would have outright presumed that an object, in a mahogany case, in a safe, was probably jewelry, drugs, cash, or blackmail.  With Andrei... probably blackmail.  Maybe something else for some esoteric collection, the kind that rich people usually started making because they were bored and had way too much goddamn money to spend.<br/><br/>"You want me to do a bit of getting into places," Alberto said, turning the photo over to read the address again, "and get you a case from a locked safe.  I want it first established that you're asking me to do something significantly outside the scope of our initial deal -- which was just to keep this place, and you, safe when you asked me.  I'm not saying no, Mr. Sokolov -- but I am saying you're going to have to sweeten the deal.  Significantly."<br/><br/>He should have been saying no.  He really, really should have been saying<em>no, no thank you, I'll be on my way now, goodbye forever</em>.  He'd suspected Andrei was involved in underhanded activities -- in Vegas, they had a word for people who weren't, and that word was 'victim' -- but finding out what the man treasured enough to send someone out to steal it would be a good first step in finding out just who this guy really was.  If he was going to decipher the enigma that was Andrei Sokolov, Alberto was going to at least nibble at the bait.