Master of Illusion

by Nupur Tustin

  Her throat tightened; her chest constricted.

  “Grayson is in danger.”

  “All the more reason to get him out of that church, then,” Julia said grimly.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  “I’m not doing it.” Grayson stared at them, his eyes cold and determined. “I’m not testifying against them.” He pointed to the photos in Celine’s hand.

  Celine and Julia had been in Grayson’s tiny room at the Church of the Advent for nearly twenty minutes now, arguing with him. But Grayson hadn’t budged.

  He had cast a reluctant eye over both mug shots. He’d even admitted that Agnelli and Bruno just might have been the men he’d seen torturing Dirck. But he’d steadfastly refused to handle the photos.

  “You can’t hide here forever,” Julia pointed out. “Don’t you want to go back home?”

  Grayson looked at the former fed as though she’d lost her mind. “You seriously think helping to put the General’s men away is a good strategy to get him off my back?”

  He waited for them to respond. Neither of them did. In all honesty, there was no effective argument to counter what he’d said.

  “Do you know they’ve already sent people here?” he demanded. “Ask Father Donegal.”

  “I know,” Celine whispered. She’d seen the Lady hovering by the door to Grayson’s room the moment they’d come in. Heard the nun’s voice warning her of danger.

  The Lady lingered by his chair now. If Grayson chose to stay in this room, he would die.

  He’s in danger, Celine, Sister Mary Catherine warned her again.

  Celine clenched her fists. I know, I know. But he won’t listen. They never do.

  “All right.” Celine met Grayson’s eyes. “What do you suggest? How do we get the General off your back?”

  He looked at her, an amused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You really want to know?”

  “Yes, Grayson.” Celine forced herself to be patient. “We want to help you.”

  “Okay.” He leaned back. “Give him what he wants, then. Return the art Duarte and Bramer stole from him.”

  “There’s just one problem with that, Grayson,” Julia said. “The art doesn’t belong to the General. It belongs to the Gardner Museum. If you know where it is . . .”

  “I don’t. I’ve already told you that.” Grayson turned to Celine. “He’ll never stop looking for me until he gets what he wants. And what he wants is in your possession. Just return the art to him. All of it.”

  Celine shook her head.

  “If Dirck knew where the rest of the art was, he would’ve mentioned it when he called in his tip. But he only mentioned the Vermeer. I’m inclined to believe that’s all he had.”

  “Oh yeah?” A sardonic smile spread over Grayson’s sunken cheeks. “How did Duarte and Bramer get the money to start their wine business? Land was cheap in the nineties. It wasn’t dirt cheap.”

  “No, they . . .” Celine paused.

  She exchanged a glance with Julia. They’d surmised that Dirck and John had sold the Vermeer in exchange for the money and the papers they needed to make their escape. But in that case, how had had they ended up with the genuine Vermeer?

  Unless . . .

  “They conned someone into buying Underwood’s copy.” Julia straightened up in her chair. “They kept the original—for whatever reason. As proof of their story, perhaps. And they got someone to buy Underwood’s work.”

  “And that someone took it to the General,” Celine said. “That’s why Simon Underwood is dead.”

  “Glad you figured that all out,” Grayson interrupted their conversation. “Now, how are we going to get the General’s men off my back?”

  Celine looked at him. “Grayson, they know you’re here. You’re not safe here. You know, you’re not. Father Donegal won’t betray you.”

  “No, he won’t.” Grayson’s lips were set in an obdurate line. He set his head back defiantly.

  “But you know these men,” Celine continued. “They’ll kill him—the Rector of a church—to get to you. That’s how desperate they are.”

  She knew she’d gotten to him. Grayson’s lips trembled and his eyes widened as her words sank in.

  “You don’t want to be the cause of Father Donegal’s death, do you, Grayson?” Julia pressed the point. “A man who’s gone out of his way to help you?”

  “No. No, I don’t. But . . .” Alarm flickered in his pale blue eyes. He looked old and uncertain.

  “There’s an armored vehicle waiting outside for us, Grayson.” Julia took out her phone. “Blake Markham’s in it. All I have to do is tell him you’re ready to come with us, and the car will be at the church steps.”

  He’s in danger, Celine, Sister Mary Catherine repeated her warning. He’s in danger.

  It’s okay. He’s coming with us, Celine assured the nun.

  She could see the hesitation in Grayson’s eyes crystallize into a decision.

  “It’s okay,” she whispered to him and to Sister Mary Catherine.

  “Okay.” Grayson stood up. “I’ll come with you. Let’s do this.”

  Blake wasn’t happy to be on Pinckney Street. It was farther than he would have preferred from the church Grayson was holed up in on 30 Brimmer Street.

  But the entire length of Brimmer—from Mount Vernon Street to Pinckney—had been lined on both sides with parked cars.

  Mount Vernon had been equally devoid of available parking spots.

  Worse still Pinckney was a one-way street.

  Blake clutched his phone. Julia and Celine and their charge were on their way out of the church. His phone would start buzzing as soon as they were at the church door.

  “When the call comes, back up to make the turn onto Brimmer,” he instructed his driver.

  “No problem, boss.” The driver, a recent FBI recruit, gave him a quick thumbs-up in the rear-view mirror.

  The driver looked idly out the window.

  “Looks quiet today. But I’m sure glad we have the other unit closer to the church.”

  “What other unit?”

  The driver swiveled around, taken aback by the sharpness of Blake’s tone.

  “The FBI vehicle—”

  Blake was out of the car before his driver could complete the sentence. There was no other vehicle. He hadn’t thought to deploy another unit. Hadn’t thought they’d need it.

  He sprinted back up the street to Brimmer. He’d just turned the corner when he felt his phone buzzing.

  He hesitated, undecided whether to return to the car or to continue on foot to investigate?

  Probably quicker in the vehicle.

  He’d just made the decision when a loud ttha-TTTHHUUUD jolted his senses, forcing him down.

  As the sound ricocheted away from him, he eased himself up.

  Goddammit!

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Celine was out the church door, sprinting down the steps, when she heard Sister Mary Catherine’s voice.

  Stay back, Celine. Back.

  She whirled around, not understanding the reason for the warning. But the nun’s tone was too urgent to ignore.

  Before she could wave Julia and Grayson back, a single explosive bang—like a car backfiring—reverberated through the narrow, car-filled street. Instinctively, she began to duck down, wincing as a flash of scalding heat streaked past her ear.

  Too stunned to call out a warning, she saw Grayson lurch back as though struck by a powerful force, his midriff crumpling. His chest opened up in a spray of red just as her knees finally hit the ground.

  “Oh my God, no!” She tried to rise.

  “Stay down, Celine. Stay down.” Julia tugged Grayson’s lifeless, bleeding form back through the church doors.

  Still crouching, Celine turned to face the street. Where the hell was Blake?

  “Ms. Skye.” A pair of arms helped her to her feet. She took in the blue trousers of the men before her, the blue windbreakers with FBI inscribed on them in yellow letters.r />
  “He’s hurt.” She gestured back toward the church. “You’ve got to help him. Grayson’s hurt.”

  “Get into the car, ma’am.” The man holding her propelled her toward the black SUV parked on the curb. Hands pulled her into the vehicle; the door slammed shut behind her. Then the car powered forward.

  “Celine.”

  Who was that calling her? Julia?

  Celine looked through the tinted rear window.

  The last thing she remembered was the stinging sensation in the back of her neck, and the chaos on Brimmer Street that swam in and out of view and then faded out.

  “Go, go, go,” Blake yelled as he climbed back into the vehicle, his gun already in his hand, cocked and ready to fire. “Shots fired. Go.”

  His startled driver slammed the Suburban into reverse, peeled back and then squealed forward into Brimmer.

  A black Chevy was pulling away from the curb up ahead.

  “That’s the car I was telling you about, sir.”

  “Follow it.”

  But a parked sedan a few cars ahead of them swerved out into the street, then went back and forward in a valiant attempt to execute a three-point turn on the narrow, car-packed street. A curly-haired, flustered woman peered out the driver’s side window and mouthed an apology.

  Jesus F’in’ Christ!

  Blake maneuvered himself halfway out of the car and roared, “Get the hell outta the way, lady!” Unaware that he had a gun in his hand, he lunged his arm repeatedly in the direction of Mount Vernon Street.

  The woman’s jaw dropped; she stared petrified at the gun.

  “Please don’t kill me.”

  “Police business, ma’am.” The driver took over, speaking in a calm, firm tone. “Head that way.”

  The woman nodded, eyeing them warily as she re-started her engine. Swiftly, she turned her car’s nose toward Brimmer. But it was too late.

  “She’s gone, Blake.” Julia rushed toward him. She gestured helplessly at the empty spot by the curb where his driver had seen the black Suburban that had taken Celine.

  His car had turned right onto Vernon, but there’d been no sign of the SUV they’d been following. And as usual in a big city, no one seemed to have heard or seen anything.

  At first he thought they’d taken Grayson. But Grayson was . . .

  Blake’s eyes veered past Julia to the blood pooling on the church floor.

  “Grayson’s gone,” Julia informed him. “Sorry . . .”

  “Don’t be. Mailand called back. The fingerprints are a match. Agnelli and Bruno aren’t going anywhere.” But it was a hollow victory.

  Grayson was dead. And Celine was . . .

  Kidnapped.

  Why? Because she could lead them—whoever they were—to the Vermeer?

  “What about Celine?” Julia looked up at him anxiously. “We need to get her back.”

  “I have agents pinging her phone.”

  Julia nodded. “Good thought. Although . . .” She hesitated, looking up at him again.

  His phone rang before he could wonder what had given her pause.

  “Yes.”

  “Bad news, sir.”

  “You lost her phone?”

  “No sir. Her kidnappers did. We traced the cell to the Charles River. They must’ve tossed the phone out.”

  The Charles River. Jesus Christ. He turned away, unable to face Julia.

  “I should’ve had backup. We were using her as bait. I should’ve . . .” He fisted his right hand and crashed it into his left palm.

  Why hadn’t he, an experienced agent, considered the possibility that Celine might—no, make that would—be a target? He’d lost control. Once again, he’d lost control. Because he hadn’t been thinking.

  Just like he hadn’t been thinking when he’d let those kids he’d been in charge of at boy-scout camp play hide-and-seek in the woods. He’d been fourteen, then. Too young, his therapist had said, for such a heavy responsibility.

  But he was thirty-five now. That excuse wouldn’t fly any longer.

  “I don’t know how we’ll find her,” he said softly.

  He’d gotten lucky at fourteen. Charlie had been found—not uninjured and not immediately, but at least not dead. Hard to believe he’d get lucky again.

  He felt the pressure of Julia’s hand on his upper arm.

  “We’ll find her, Blake.”

  He nodded. Of course, they’d find her. They had to find her. He wasn’t going to let the mission go south like this.

  “If her phone’s in the Charles River, they must have taken her to the other side. That’s where we concentrate our efforts.”

  “Good thinking,” Julia said. “But there might be a better way.”

  He looked at her, startled. She was speaking to herself now, but he caught the words.

  “As long as her kidnappers don’t realize what she has on her.”

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Celine, wake up. A voice tugged at her consciousness.

  Sister Mary Catherine?

  Uneasily, Celine stirred, aware of the woozy feeling in her head, the heaviness of her neck.

  Questions drifted in and out through the fog in her brain.

  What day was it? How long had she been asleep? The Delft? Was there something that needed to be done there? The clean-up?

  She sank back into the comforting depths of fog, unable to remember. Whatever it was, it could wait.

  Celine, wake up.

  Why, Sister?

  Celine moaned, reluctantly willing her head to move.

  The pain of the effort jabbed at her sagging senses. Memory returned. Her eyelids, scratchy and heavy, opened to . . .

  Blackness . . .

  It took a moment for her brain to put it together. She was under a rough-textured blanket. It covered her face as though she . . . was a corpse?

  The shock of realization propelled her upright. Her body was aching and sore. She ignored the sensations, forcing her mind to take stock of her surroundings.

  She was in the cargo area of what seemed to be a van.

  She frowned. So they’d changed vehicles? Why? And Julia, Grayson? Had someone gone to their aid?

  Grayson is beyond help, Celine. Sister Mary Catherine’s voice seemed to come from a great distance. Look outside. Observe your surroundings.

  Look outside?

  It was only when Celine tried to turn that she realized that under the blanket her wrists were bound together.

  She jerked her body, desperate to get the blanket off her. Then she looked down.

  She’d been . . . No, that wasn’t possible.

  She stared at the shiny gray duct tape wound tightly around her wrists. She tried to prise her arms apart, but the duct tape refused to yield.

  She’d been restrained. Why?

  She remembered being herded into a vehicle by . . . She closed her eyes, recalling the baggy blue windbreakers, the yellow lettering.

  If they’d been federal agents, why had they taken her prisoner? Had she been kidnapped?

  Yes, Celine. By the General’s men. Now for God’s sake, look out.

  The nun’s urgent tone got her attention.

  Obediently, she twisted her body around, moving her head closer to the sliver of window near the top of the van.

  The vehicle curved around providing a panoramic view. A pier-like structure projecting out over a body of water. Chain link fences. Rough, pockmarked road. Blue dumpsters.

  It had all the charm of an industrial area wasteland.

  Owww!

  Her head slammed against the side of the van as it thudded up and down. A few more bone-shattering jolts later, they scrunched to a halt in front of an enormous shed. Celine committed the rusting corrugated iron and the dull green-brown patches of disrepair to memory.

  Jesus Christ, where was she? She didn’t recognize this place.

  Stay calm, Celine. Julia will find you.

  “I don’t believe in micromanaging my agents, Blake, but . . .” Spe
cial Agent-in-Charge James Patrick Walsh paused and leaned back in his chair.

  The softly worded objection lingered in the air like a threat.

  But a CI had been killed—in the open, in Blake’s presence, and he’d been able to do nothing to prevent it. Worse still, a civilian had been kidnapped. Walsh’s criticism didn’t have to be voiced. It was self-evident.

  Blake gripped the armrests of his chair, feeling the rising onset of a panic attack. He idly wondered if the large glass window behind the SAC’s chair let in any air at all. Had the SAC’s office ever been ventilated?

  He took a deep breath of what was probably stale, regurgitated air.

  “We’re doing everything we can, sir.” And they were, dammit!

  Walsh regarded him quietly, his fingers steepled upon his midriff. He was a lean, gray-haired man with a deeply wrinkled face that now wore an expression of extreme concern.

  “What have we got so far?”

  It’s in the report, Blake wanted to yell, but he forced himself to take another breath instead. The act did nothing to calm him. The room seemed hermetically sealed, its oxygen supply rapidly depleting.

  Breathe. Easy, breathe.

  “Both the killing and the kidnapping were well planned, sir.” He clenched his teeth, willing himself not to start shaking like an addict in desperate need of a hit. “Extremely well planned.”

  Goddammit, they must have been lying in wait for Grayson to emerge from hiding. Figuring he eventually would. Although how they’d traced Grayson there was another question altogether.

  Walsh said nothing, waiting for Blake to continue.

  “The shot came from an upper unit at 27 Brimmer Street. Hunting rifle. Reported stolen a week back.”

  “The condo belonged to the woman who blocked your car?”

  He’d been expecting criticism. Walsh’s statement—or was it a question?—eased Blake’s mind. The SAC was either confirming what he knew or seeking more information. Either way, Blake was okay with it.

  “Amy Hudson. She was an unwilling accomplice in all of this,” he explained, somewhat calmer now. “She’s a single mother. The killer threatened to kill her and her baby if she didn’t cooperate.”