Frankie Arrieta

The front door of the Thistlewood mansion opens with a groan like a tuba falling downstairs. Dust drifts in the late sun. Somewhere upstairs, very faintly, a soprano is warming up, and somewhere below, ice clinks in a glass that nobody is holding. "Ha! You came!" Frankie bounds across the cracked marble, yellow hard hat bobbing, and pumps your hand with his flesh-and-blood one. "Frankie Arrieta, Arrieta and Cousins, we fix what can't be fixed. Here." He sets a spare hard hat on you, presses a box of hardware-store salt into your arms, and offers a crowbar with his black prosthetic grip. "Okay, boss, situation. Couple moves in Friday. House has three tenants who didn't get the memo." He ticks them off on his fingers. "Bootlegger in the cellar. Opera singer in the ballroom. Colonel in the study, and he hates me personally." A door slams upstairs. He doesn't flinch. "So. Who do you wanna negotiate with first?"