Amazon
Barnes and Noble
From USA TODAY bestselling author Ritter Ames...
Laurel Beacham made working solo a habit and a personal success story. The world's leading art recovery expert, she is known for her nerve, instincts, and the ability to do whatever it takes to bring each masterpiece back safely. Museums applaud her while thieves admire the cunning way she operates. No matter the odds against her, she listens to her instinct when challenges mount.
Right now, those instincts are screaming a warning.
Laurel's last job landed her the head position over the London branch of the Beacham Foundation. All well and good, except bringing one case to a close only opened another even bigger one. And more importantly, the new case inextricably connects to Jack Hawkes, a man smart enough to be her equal, but one who keeps her trust meter hovering in the red zone. The pair leap headlong into a plot that gets more dangerous and illusive by the minute. As the bodies and forgeries add up and the clock counts down, will Laurel's skills help her make it out of this job alive?
Bodies of Art Mysteries:
Counterfeit Conspiracies
Marked Masters
CHAPTER
ONE EXCERPT
Two
black-and-whites screamed to the curb, paralleling each other and
blocking off any possibility of retreat. Brakes screeched. Sirens
blared. My blood pressure ratcheted up a notch. The flashing lights
alone set my heart pounding so hard I could swear the beats showed
through my black Lycra.
One
step and I bled back into the shadows of the house's side wall.
A
simple pickup on a limited time frame. That's what the job had been.
My objective was a medium-sized nude, which had reclined over the
headboard of a blackmailer's bed for decades. A painting and
headboard currently residing inside the townhouse that was the focal
point of this Orlando PD team.
"He's
been extorting money from my mother since before I was born,"
Kat Gleeson had explained earlier in the afternoon. "The
blackmailer picked up the portrait at a sale after the artist died,
playing a hunch it would be worth bigger bucks later. Mother received
the first demand as soon as my father started in political life.
Laurel, you have to help us."
A
longtime friend from my Cornell years, and daughter to Senator
Gleeson, R-FL, Kat called me, frantic, to meet for lunch after
hearing I was in the city. When I'd said my Miami flight was first
thing in the morning, she'd turned from frantic to panicked, and I
promised to be at her favorite cocktail bar in ten minutes time. I'd
met her there.
Now,
twelve hours later, this new dilemma forced me to contemplate an
alternate route inside the house for the nude painted when Kat's
mother was an ingénue and the artist undiscovered. In his later
years, before his final drug overdose, the once up-and-coming artist
became best known for his erotic subjects and a penchant for the
rock-and-roll lifestyle of the 1970s. Now, a single moment captured
in brushstrokes kept Kat's mother chronically worried and perpetually
broke.
As
political pundit-buzz hummed about Senator Gleeson's prospective run
for the presidency, the hush-money stakes had risen sharply. The next
installment had hit a price Mrs. Gleeson couldn't deliver without her
husband's knowledge and cooperation.
"She's
devastated," Kat had said as she'd toyed with her second mojito.
I'd decided if my friend's ragged expression in any way resembled her
mother's, devastated was probably putting it mildly.
In
the past few years I’d gained the reputation as the best person to
call when a legitimate piece of art went missing. I’d climbed the
ranks of the Beacham Foundation, from internship at the New York
office during college, to field work and troubleshooting the last
five-plus years since graduation, rising in the eyes of the art world
as my skills sharpened and the wins mounted on my record. However,
people who knew me well—or like Kat, had known me in my wilder
college days—were also aware of my “special” talents, and that
I always stayed ready to jump into a non-work venue when a wrong
needed to be righted. I dubbed these pro bono efforts my “reclamation
projects.” Given my more visible status since a promotion a few
weeks ago to head of the London office of Beacham Ltd., I knew such
forays may have to be reduced in the future, but there was no way I
could turn my back when someone like Kat appealed to me for help.
My
prep time on this particular reclamation was understandably limited,
but the facts that came back were solid—the owner was a Luddite who
didn't know a silent alarm from a silent movie. An absolute
anachronism today, but the attribute served him well as a blackmailer
since the practice left little risk of his digital fingerprint
getting lifted anywhere.
What
had alerted the cops?
The
head-to-toe unrelieved black I wore dovetailed into the shadows and
afforded me a bit of invisibility. I contemplated the peripheral
shrubbery but waited to see the officers' game plan. A peek at my
watch, hidden by the hood of my sleeve, showed less than a half hour
to either accomplish what I came to do or cut and run.
Car
doors slammed and voices rose as authoritative tones ordered a blue
scramble to search for whatever tipped them off to the location.
Another
scan of the back wall showed the basement window I'd initially
dismissed as too small for a final escape. But it could get me into
the house as long as I sucked in my gut and visualized being very,
very small. I also had
to maneuver without being seen or heard across the white ribbon
obligatory to so many Sunshine State homes; the oyster-shell path
that ringed the grounds around the house walls like fluorescence in
the moonglow.
They
drew their guns and headed for the porch. I made my move, using
long-latent childhood gymnastic muscles to clear the wide, crushed
path and stick a quiet landing on the tiny strip of grass along the
foundation.
I
pulled the penlight I'd stashed in my bra and scoped out the basement
in two-point-six seconds—or thereabouts. Any longer carried too
much risk, but the quickly lighted view told me I'd be dropping about
six feet onto bare cement. That was doable.
The
extended beam of a Maglite flashed from around the corner as I
started feet first down the rabbit hole. When my soles hit concrete,
I reached up to softly set the window back into a closed position.
Then I crouched into a dark ball and held my breath. Even with the
locked window, I heard the cop's feet pass by, then stop. He flashed
his light through the glass, across the cellar, floor to ceiling. I
hugged the wall tighter and hoped he wouldn't try to look straight
down.
"Nah."
I heard him talking into his radio. "There's a tiny window back
here, but it's locked, and I can't imagine anyone getting through it
anyway. Over."
Still,
it wasn't time to sigh in relief. The mark was due home from a NASA
event soon. No need to look at my watch again to know the minutes
were flying. I continued to hold my breath until I heard the oyster
shells crunch when the cop resumed his recon.
A
cursory scan for infrared, trip wires, or motion detectors came up
zero. The house was as technology-free as I'd been told. No doubt I
was taking a chance going in before the cops left, but if I'd stayed
outside I was pretty much guaranteed to get caught. And a ride in the
back of a squad car to explain why I was dressed in black in a dark
yard near midnight was not on my agenda for the evening.
The
open floor plan in the living space made it relatively easy to
navigate without lights. Moonlight streamed through huge windows
dressed in nothing but sheers. I kept to the beige and taupe walls
and the larger pieces of furniture as much as possible, using the
moving shadows of the cops outside to know where and when to scoot to
the next spot. So far, the boys in blue only appeared to be doing
reconnaissance, leaving me to hope for a rapid departure when they
found the house secured. At least I hoped
it was completely secure. I hadn't had time to do a whole house
perimeter before they showed up.
I
crept up the stairs, and the landing opened to a full-wall window
that overlooked the front yard. Staying back as far as possible, I
watched the blue crew huddle again at the curb.
Please,
please, please leave. I don't have much time left.
Just
as my limbs started to cramp from standing so still, I saw one give
the "move 'em out" swing of the arm, and both teams
returned to their respective cars. I didn't start breathing again
until I saw the revolving lights stop and the headlights turn back
down the boulevard.
The
master suite was exactly where I expected, and I was probably feeling
a bit too cocky as I closed the door behind me and pulled from my
pocket the sharp little tool used to extract canvasses from frames. I
spun around and approached the bed—and got my next shock of the
night. A gorgeous baroque frame hung on the wall over the
headboard…but it was empty.
No comments:
Post a Comment