Blaire

Jeffrey Hawkins was a man of about sixty. He had a head of gray hair that was balding at the crown. A man with a lanky build, he was slightly taller than me. He wore round spectacles that sat on the bridge of a fleshy nose. I took careful note of his appearance because there seemed to be a few men Grant would let near me, and I wondered if his choice of gallery had anything to do with his possessiveness.

Jeff was as scholarly as he looked. He also introduced me to his gallery manager, Sofia Ricci. I couldn’t place her age, probably fifty, but she looked like the glamorous movie stars of the gilded age. Full breasts and full hips were sheathed in a tight jersey dress. I guess Jeff wanted to be left alone with the artwork, while Sofia dealt with customers.

“Do you want some coffee, dear?” Sofia asked. Full lips too. I couldn’t help staring.

“Uh …”

“No, Sofia,” Jeff said. “You know what I think about drinks and food around all those paintings.”

His manager shrugged her elegant shoulders and pivoted on her three-inch heels. She brushed a finger on Tyler’s suit. “How about you, handsome?”

“I’ll be with her,” Tyler nodded to me. “So, no.”

Just then, the gallery door jingled and a man in a disheveled suit walked in. His skin was the color of caramel, but for some reason he looked pale. Tyler tensed beside me. I saw Bobby, my other bodyguard, follow in behind the newcomer.

Sofia clacked on the tiled floor as she moved to intercept Suit Guy even when his eyes were zeroed in on me.

“May I help you, sir?”

“I have a few questions for Ms. Callahan,” Suit Guy said and flashed an agency badge I didn’t catch. After passing Sofia, Tyler blocked him.

He flashed his badge again. “Special Agent Wilkes. I’m from the Miami field office. I remember you.” He eyed Tyler. “You were with Mr. Thorne that day.”

“Tyler?” I asked tentatively.

“You need to call Mr. Thorne’s PA and set up an appointment,” Tyler gritted out. “You can’t ambush Ms. Callahan like this.”

“Your boss’s office has been giving me the run-around,” Wilkes said. “I’m kinda sick of it.”

“As far as I know, the case has been transferred to the Boston field office.”

“Ah, that’s convenient, isn’t it?” Wilkes said. “But I’m not here for what happened with the ROC. But I do have questions about Liam Watts.”

I couldn’t stand behind Tyler anymore, so I walked around him. “Liam is dead, Agent Wilkes. What could you possibly want to know about him?”

The fed smiled, but there was malice in his grin. “A couple of weeks ago, we found the body of a missing FBI agent. He was six months from retirement.” The haunted flash in Wilkes’ eyes indicated that he knew the guy well. “We have evidence that links Watts to his murder.” His eyes sharpened and pinned me with a calculating stare. “Do you know why he killed him, Ms. Callahan?”

The dead guy must be the fed Liam was after who had the keys to the self-storage unit.

Oh, Liam, what did you do?

“I don’t think Liam killed him,” I replied, doing my best to hold Wilkes’ gaze. “But he can’t defend himself, can he? He’s dead.” I repeated, my voice hoarse. “What do you hope to accomplish by pursuing this?”

“The agent’s body showed signs that he was tortured for information.”

“Sounds like a ROC M.O.” I said.

“Ms. Callahan …”

“You’re done,” Tyler ordered. “Ms. Callahan has been through enough. I suggest you contact Mr. Thorne’s office if you want an audience, but the better option is to drop this if your suspect is Watts. The man is dead. You saw his body.”

“No, I didn’t,” the fed replied.

“What?” Blaire whispered.

“I never saw a body because it never arrived at the medical examiner’s office. Some bullshit agency whisked the bodies of Watts and his men away.”

“And Orlov?”

Wilkes smiled grimly. “Orlov and his crew are dead-dead. Don’t worry about that.” He searched my face, reading something in it and sighed. “I guess you know nothing.”

I wouldn’t say I knew nothing, but I didn’t know about Liam’s body never getting to the ME’s office. They took three weeks to process it. “Maybe it was the Boston Feds.”

“It’s not,” Wilkes said. “I guess I need to pay a visit to his daughter.”

He started to turn away, but I called his attention. “Agent Wilkes. Liam had not seen his daughter in six years. The next time she saw him, she had to bury him. Let this go.”

Wilkes studied me for long seconds before he inclined his head, walked past Bobby, and left.

I didn’t realize my heart was pounding until I leveled my gaze at Tyler. “Could Liam be …?”

“He had no pulse, Blaire,” my bodyguard reminded me. His voice was too gentle, almost as if he pitied me. “You attended his funeral.”

I kept my tears at bay and took several breaths to calm my racing heart. I needed to move on. When my composure returned, I looked at Jeff and pasted a smile on my face. “Shall we look at the paintings?”

* * *

The contents of the first crate lay before us. Six paintings, each secured in a tee-frame and wrapped in polyethylene. Jeff and I were crouched in front of one as he carefully sliced through the tape that secured the plastic.

“Shipping masterpieces internationally has become harder,” Jeff said as he reverently peeled the layers of covering from the three-foot by two-foot painting. “It’s fortunate Mr. Thorne has the money and connections to make things happen. Otherwise it would have taken months instead of weeks to get these pieces here.”

“That long?” I murmured as I turned the artwork on its length.

“Museums plan for a year. Galleries for a couple of months. Most of them have to pass through an airline subcontractor who may have to repack them if the crate tests for explosives.” Jeff shuddered at the thought and so did I. “A painting that costs millions could end up ruined with a slice from a box cutter.”

“Grant facilitated the transfer?”

“A man of Mr. Thorne’s caliber knows the right people and …Oh my God,” Jeff broke off as he peeled the last layer of plastic to reveal the painting underneath. Even without looking at the signature, we knew we were looking at the work of a painting legend. “Marie-Thérèse,” the older man breathed. Picasso’s muse and mistress during the 1930s. I was not familiar with the name of this painting, but it could be chalked up as the long lost work of the master.

We worked carefully to unwrap the next five paintings. Though Jeff needed to take these pieces under a magnifying glass to certify their authenticity, he told me that he was confident that three of the six were originals from the old masters. Hours passed. Tyler and I took a quick break for lunch while Jeff ate at his office. At two that afternoon, we returned to “The Vault” as Jeff liked to call it—an area separated from the main gallery by heavy curtains that dropped from the fifteen-foot ceiling—where all the paintings yet to be displayed were kept. He had the first Picasso we unwrapped under a lit table and was analyzing the brush strokes. Reproductions were usually flat, while some Giclée prints—fine art created on inkjet printers—may have some dabs of paint by the artist to pass as original work. However, there were also counterfeit paintings and it took a very experienced art dealer to validate its authenticity.

“Shall we uncrate the third box?” I asked. The second crate had contained two Renoirs.

Jeff looked at me distractedly. “Yes. Yes.” He reluctantly left the Picasso. Tyler helped us pry the boards off the crates with a crow bar. The first painting from that batch was from an unknown artist. “This collector has odd taste.” I could hear the frustration in his voice. We proceeded to the next one. When Jeff lifted the polyethylene to reveal the first half of the painting, I was struck with déjà vu. A familiar landscape of impressionist art stared back at me.

“What do we have here?” Jeff wondered as he removed the plastic veil to uncover the full view of the painting. “The style reminds me of Van Gogh, but the artist has his own unique strokes.”

“Sergei,” I whispered.

“What was that, dear?” Jeff asked absent-mindedly.

I shook my head as I helped remove the T-frame and when it was done, I looked for the signature. There, in its familiar cursive, it mocked me.

Sergei Kostin.

* * *

In total, there were twenty-four paintings unearthed from four crates. Half of them could be original works by the old masters and Jeff estimated their worth at more than seven-hundred-million dollars when all was said and done. Some of the priceless paintings were moved to a room secured with an electronic keypad lock.

I found three more paintings by Sergei.

Jeff went out on the floor to answer questions from some customers. I overheard Sofia telling Tyler that the shop’s busiest time was between five and seven. Expecting Jeff to be occupied for the next hour and a half, I asked to use his table with the overhead light. It had a swivel arm with a magnifying glass. I was anxious to see what Sergei was hiding underneath. Mounting one of Sergei’s paintings, I studied the brush strokes. It was a different medium, not watercolor, but I could almost see what it was trying to mask under layers of pigment.

My gut churned and I wasn’t sure if it was from hunger or excitement. Since Grant was working late, Tyler and I decided it was a good time to grab dinner.

“Bravo-niner-niner, you there?”

I turned to look at Tyler and noticed the grin on his face. I’d never heard that call sign before, but I figured he was messing with Bobby.

“Copy. Go ahead,” Bobby’s slightly amused voice answered.

“We have a situation,” Tyler continued speaking through his wrist comm. “Paintpixie needs to be fed or we’ll be having a crisis on our hands. Something of the high-sodium variety would be ideal.”

I scowled at Tyler as he winked at me.

“Copy that. Hotdogs, chief?”

“Affirmative. Four hotdogs and two Cokes.”

“She can eat four?” Bobby chuckled.

“Two are for me, dumbass,” Tyler shot back.

I shook my head at their continued banter and turned my attention back on the piece before me. After a few minutes, I heard Bobby tell Tyler that he would meet him at the entrance.

“You’ll be okay while I secure the package?” Tyler asked, deadpan.

I waved my arm without looking at him. “Shoo! Go play your spy games.”

Tyler’s bark of laughter echoed in the Vault. Poor guys. They were so bored being my bodyguards, they were trying to liven things up however they could.

I didn’t realize Tyler had been gone for a while until footsteps clicked behind me. It struck me as strange that no aroma of hotdogs hit me, but I was too engrossed in studying Sergei’s work to turn around. “You had to use a map to find your way back?” I teased Tyler.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” an unfamiliar voice said behind me.

I whipped around and saw a man dressed impeccably in a suit. He was tall but not quite six-feet. Thick dark hair was slicked back over his head. He had dark eyes, maybe brown, and a lean build. This man would have blended easily with the rest of Manhattan except for the jagged scar that ran across his right cheek.

“This area is off limits,” I told him. What happened to Tyler?

His eyes looked over Sergei’s paintings. “My boss wants those four.”

“Didn’t you hear me?” I hated that my voice grew shrill. “You can’t be here. Please leave.”

“Don’t you want to find out what’s underneath those, Paulina?”

Oh my God.

“Who are you?”

His head cocked to the side and I realized he was wearing an earpiece. “Your guard dog is on his way back. We’ll meet again.”

He disappeared behind the curtains. I ran after him and bumped into a couple. I apologized and searched frantically around the gallery. There were a few customers milling around, but the gallery was so big that it was impossible that he’d taken off so fast. Jeff was talking to an elderly couple in front of a colorful drip work piece. Sofia was assisting another man in a suit regarding a bronze sculpture, but the man I was looking for was nowhere in sight. I looked down the hallway on my right.

“Hey,” Tyler said, hurrying toward me. “Homeless guy took a swing at Bobby and tried to grab the hotdogs … Blaire, what’s wrong?” He looked around frowning. “And where’s Drew?”

“A man approached me in The Vault.”

“What?” Tyler’s brows furrowed as he led me back behind the curtains and lowered the hotdogs and drinks. “Just now?”

I nodded. “He just disappeared. I think he went in the direction of the restrooms, but I didn’t want to follow.”

“I told Drew to keep an eye on you,” Tyler said tightly as he drew his gun from behind him and held it low at his side. He spoke into his wrist comm and after a few seconds, he swore, “Drew’s not answering his radio. I told Bobby to check on him.”

“What’s going on?” Jeff asked, alarmed when he saw Tyler’s gun. His eyes widened at our hotdogs on the table. “I told you both that food is not allowed—”

“Shut up,” Tyler and I said in unison.

“Stay here,” my bodyguard told me.

“Nope, I’m coming with you.” I withdrew my own Beretta Pico from my ankle holster.

“Why are you both carrying guns?” Jeff asked, following us through the curtains and right to the hallway. Tyler ordered him to stay back. Following behind my bodyguard, we walked past the restrooms and headed to the exit. Tyler bumped his hip into the exit bar with his gun at the ready.

“What the fuck?” he cursed and I got right beside him to see what had unsettled him.

Bobby was crouched down over Drew. He glanced up at us. “He’s breathing.”

“Call 911!” Tyler ordered as he yanked the door to the gallery open and shoved me back inside. He was talking to me, but I wasn’t hearing him because Orlov’s words came back to haunt me.

You’re lucky I’m not allowed to kill you.

Make sure Marco is dead; we need Paulina alive.

Someone was still after me.