Marked Masters

by Ritter Ames

  "Are you listening, Laurel?" And I realized I wasn't—listening, that is.

  "No, Cassie, I'm sorry. I zoned out again when I heard you doing the e-mail thing. But I'm back now. I promise."

  "You need to find an espresso."

  "What I need is some caffeine rocket fuel. Let me walk around while we talk. Maybe that will help. Okay, go."

  "Well, the mark is one used by the particular forger Nico knew about, but more importantly, the forger's mark is forged."

  "What?"

  "Right. The forger's mark on the snuffbox is almost the same as the Florentine forger, but two things give its provenance some major problems. One is there's an extra curlicue on the lower end of the mark. One never made before by this forger."

  "But he could have just gotten careless—"

  "I thought of that, but nope. I called Nico." Cassie giggled. "I would say I'd awakened him, but I don't think he was sleeping, if you know what I mean. He apparently was 'entertaining' the rock group's publicist. To thank her for helping you."

  Was the man a machine, for heaven's sake? I couldn't even think about sex at the moment. If my body went horizontal, I would be comatose. Maybe that was it. They did it standing up.

  "Laurel! Earth to Laurel."

  Damn! Did it again. "Sorry. What did Nico say?"

  "He gave me some names and numbers, and I made a few calls. Turns out, several more forgeries with this same kind of new mark have been appearing on the scene lately, from small items like the snuffbox to paintings and sculptures. Each one a better copy than this particular forger had been known for throughout his career."

  "So, he's been getting better?"

  "No, he's been getting dead."

  I must have heard her wrong. "Come again, Cass?"

  "He died. Almost a year ago. Under most mysterious circumstances, I might add. And less than a month later the first of the forgeries with this new mark appeared at Sotheby's. In all, Nico's contacts told me about almost a dozen pieces that have now been discovered, and with the quality of the work, the fear is there are many more out there that people are taking as the real thing."

  "And…the new forger…is taking the signature…of the dead forger?"

  "Or using the dead forger to keep people from realizing someone new is in the game."

  Yes, my brain felt fried and fuzzy, but this was strangely starting to make sense. "As long as people recognized the older forger's mark, any items discovered as fake would be attributed to a dead man, and the new forger could continue working merrily along. Is that the idea?"

  "What I figure, anyway."

  "But, Cass, if he's as good as everyone says, and as good as the snuffbox implies, why didn't he forge the forger's mark truer. Why the extra curlicue?"

  "Ego?"

  "Yeah, I could see that."

  "Have you seen Jack yet?"

  I looked at my watch. I had just over a half hour, and it would take me almost that long to cross the Arno River and make it to the Piazza del Duomo. Unless I hurried. No, he might see me, and him thinking I was hurrying to meet his mandate would never do. A stroll was positively a necessity.

  Plus, it was much easier to watch for people following me if I wasn't running headlong into crowds of tourists. And there would definitely be tourists.

  "Okay, Cassie, this is good information. Send anything you want Jack and me to see on my foundation e-mail address. Send anything for my eyes only to my personal addy. I'll share this forger info with Jack and see what he's come up with in the meantime."

  My own final word reminded me. I had more for her to do in the interim.

  "Speaking of which, while Jack and I are starting things going here, I need you to do a little judicious charming of the Max Monster." I filled her in about the Tony B problem and gave her carte blanche to spin the story so Max understood his mistake without completely revealing Tony B's larceny. I knew I might need to tell Max everything later, and if I did, I would have Jack and Nico beside me to back up the story. But in the meantime, I needed Cassie to stress to our boss that my current location needed to always stay confidential until this entire operation ended. Too many twists continued forming in our plotline, and I didn't need old loose lips creating any new traps.

  "Also, remind him Nico saved him airfare to get me to Italy. That alone should send the man over the moon with happiness and get him to agree to most everything you ask."

  "Will do. What should I tell him if he wants to talk to you?"

  I thought over my current fiscal state and how Max ordered all of my monetary requests must go through my personal assistant, even though I was supposedly the new head of the London office. A glance at the mirror over the bureau revealed my face wearing its most evil smile as my blue eyes glowed. "Tell Mr. Max we'll use the same go-between procedure he authorized for my budgetary needs. If he needs to speak to me, he has to ask you to initiate the request."

  "Feeling a little vindictive, Laurel?"

  "Feeling a lot vindictive, Cassie. Talk to you soon. I'm behind schedule to face a volcano."

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  As fast as I walked—okay, as quickly as I strolled—Jack still beat me to the east doors of the Baptistery. I figured he'd been waiting there the whole time.

  The Gates of Paradise are the famous fifteenth-century doors of the octagonal Baptistery of Saint John, crafted in bronze by Lorenzo Ghiberti over a fifty-year time span. Of course, the doors on display are copies, but the original masterpieces—believed by art historians, my humble self included, as heralding the beginning of the Renaissance due to their masterful work of perspective—those magnificent doors are now behind protective walls in the cathedral museum adjacent to the Baptistery. But no matter. One look at the copies was enough to take a person inside the vision as the images leapt out in a manner defining Renaissance art. This was the beginning use of the three-dimensional perspective, and Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise gave the art world its new sense of depth.

  At twenty-one when he began the commission, Ghiberti learned as he worked, producing tiles projecting a vanishing point where the lines in each image converged. Creative points in the designs were shortened because Ghiberti realized that doing so extenuated the depth of the scene and defined a distinct foreground, middle, and background. The best part? Anyone viewing the doors became part of the scene.

  Copies or original, the way the images leapt out not only offered significance to art history, but I'd always found studying them to be an amazing way to spend an afternoon. Despite the other tourists jostling for their chance to see.

  Equally breathtaking, but for other reasons, was the thunderous look Jack shot my way when I caught his attention. My gaze made a quick sweep of the perimeter in case I needed an escape plan. Though the calendar showed it was past the height of the summer tourist season, the crowds were still thick enough in the Piazza del Duomo. I could get away from him if I really wanted to. From the furrowing of his brows, I assumed he came to the same conclusion. Though his actual greeting surprised me.

  "You have no idea how worried I was."

  I couldn't win, whatever way I answered. A glib quip would sound crass, and a simple thank you would come across as stupid or sarcastic. So I smiled and patted his arm, and it surprisingly seemed to work. He slipped my hand into the crook of his elbow, and we headed for the Giotto Bell Tower. Without another word of lecture, I might add.

  "I know what you're doing," I said as we neared the spot to trade our euros for gaining entrance to the two-hundred-and-seventy-seven-foot bell tower.

  "You do, do you?" Jack dropped my hand and pulled out his wallet.

  "You don't want to be overheard when you read me the riot act and then try to find out how much I know that you don't."

  He cocked an eyebrow at me, then he put a hand at the small of my back, and we walked to the entrance. "Or I'm going to throw you over the side once we get up there because I'm tired of you giving me a heart attack nearly every day."

  I laughed.
"I still have a portable chute in my purse. I may break a leg, but I wouldn't die."

  "One more thing I have to thank Nico for doing."

  The bell tower, like the dome staircase by the way, can feel a little claustrophobic, especially if there's a pack of people climbing along at the same time. For that reason, I was happy to see the closest tourists gamely attempting the trek were quite a distance above us. I shifted the Fendi on my shoulder and grabbed the handrail to start the circular journey skyward. "I take it Nico provided our reasoning for the split flights, and you disapproved."

  "Hard to disapprove of a plan when one isn't given the option."

  I straightened a bit taller. "Max told me Cassie is my keeper now. I never received the memo I report to you as well."

  He took hold of my arm and pulled me around. Though he was a step down, we were eye to eye. "This isn't about you spending too much money, Laurel. That's between you and Max. This is about watching each other's backs. We need to back each other at all times, and I can't back you up if I don't know where you are or how you're going to get there until you've already disappeared."

  "In that case, where did you go yesterday morning after you left the yacht?"

  "What?"

  Oh, good. He saw the trap he waltzed himself into. "You know, Jack, back in Miami? Before you met me outside Tina's condo building. The errand you had to leave for so early, despite the fact you said we needed to talk?"

  A French couple entered the tower below us, laughing and chattering as they mounted the staircase. I pivoted and resumed our trek. But I did say over my shoulder, "I do appreciate your choosing the bell tower instead of the dome. The double dome always feels a bit close to me, and this route saved us about fifty steps."

  "It costs the same, whichever view I'd chosen," Jack said. "Figured there would be fewer people heading up the tower since the dome is the better bargain for the euros."

  "Don't mention the extravagance to Cecil. If he's anything like Max, he'll give you a money monitor like Cassie."

  "That's really bothering you, isn't it?"

  "Wouldn't it bug you?" I looked back at him as the stairs turned.

  He nodded, looking skyward as he spoke. "Probably. I'll speak to him on your behalf if it would help."

  "Just the fact you suggest the possibility increases my distrust of you."

  "But—"

  "Max is the reason Tony B knew I was in Miami." My voice dropped to a whisper. "Trust me. That will be one of the first items discussed when we reach the top. Oh, and what about the Welshman at Gatwick?"

  "Last I heard, he's not talking. But good catch on your part, spotting him."

  "We Beachams have always been a sharp-eyed bunch. Hopefully he'll spill something on Simon."

  I wasn't a virgin at climbing the Florence fifteenth-century version of a StairMaster, so I knew to pace myself. I also took advantage of the lovely little rest stops conveniently placed every couple of stories and remained grateful the crowds in the piazza hadn't followed us for our tower escapade.

  "Could give one a touch of vertigo," Jack said at our final rest stop. I saw the way his hand clutched the railing, and I smiled. Big, tough Jack Hawkes bothered by a tightly wound staircase a couple of hundred feet high. I could have taken pity on him. After all, he'd probably had less sleep than I, and it had to affect the lug. Nah, no pity from me.

  I clapped my hands. "Come on, Jack—last one to the top has to tell a truth the other person doesn't know." Then I took off like a shot. I wasn't going to lose after suggesting that kind of wager.

  Views of central Florence unfurled from the windows at the top. Personally, I preferred the panorama of this tower as opposed to the top of the dome, though a host of visitors would likely disagree. Both views are awe inspiring; however, here the sights were not only more spectacular to my mind due to its closer proximity to the ground, but the vistas included the dome as well. I stood at one of the openings and just breathed in the majesty, putting one hand up to the rough wall to help contain the adrenalin coursing through my veins. I wasn't afraid of heights. On the contrary, I knew their genius for offering new information from a previously thwarted angle. We'd had so many things hitting us to this point, things that seemed to herd us from one exciting end of Florida to the other, then across the ocean, and now to the most singular city of Florence. I wanted the disparate parts to make sense. I wanted to hear what Jack had learned and to put his intel together with what Cassie sent. We needed to agree on a connection. The change in altitude couldn't hurt.

  I let my gaze sweep again over the Florentine landscape below, wishing I had X-ray vision to penetrate the hidden sights under the terra-cotta roofs. I wasn't a voyeur. Rather, I wanted vindication of how our reasoning for coming here was sound. Cassie's data not only included the info on the forger brought back from the grave, but detailed bills of lading furnished by those whose imitations received the dreaded spotlight when the fakes were revealed. Each time, the stepping off point for all of the found frauds began in Florence, regardless of where the works were ultimately headed.

  Jack arrived just before the French couple. I think he stopped to plan his argument since he knew I couldn't be beaten. I played the grownup and didn't mention the wager. It wasn't like I believed he would honestly answer any question I really wanted to know anyway.

  "It is nice," he said softly. He stood behind me and reached a hand to the stone opening, placing his just above the one I used to brace myself, so he leaned into me a little. "Play along. Make sure we look like a couple to anyone watching. Anyone who might be questioned as they leave."

  Damn! He was right. I hadn't thought of that. After zoning out with Cassie, I should have known sleep was more important than reconnaissance, yet here I was playing Miss Scarlet in the bell tower. Or, no, I guessed Mata Hari offered a better analogy, since Miss Scarlet was a killer, and the only person I'd thought of killing lately was Max. I pasted on my fake happy grin and said, "Yes, I knew we needed to come up here to see the city."

  One of the couples who came ahead of us chose to leave right then. The other remained to take pictures and point at landmarks below. The French couple stood close enough to be conjoined, and I worried they might be a problem as they seemed more interested in the dark corners of the space than they did the city view. I inclined my head to the farthest corner from them and Jack nodded.

  I pulled a guidebook out of my purse to use as a prop as we spoke. I briefed him on what information Cassie provided, then we walked back to a window and pretended to take pictures with my phone so we could scan the e-mails together undercover. When the French couple became the only hangers on, Jack pulled out his phone and said, "Here, let's get some shots of you with the view behind. Make a perfect photo for my desk back home, love."

  No way could I keep from raising an eyebrow, but I did control the laugh bubbling inside me as I moved to look thoughtfully out at the horizon. There was a lot of activity on the flat roof of one of the neighboring palazzos, but I couldn't really get any detail without pulling out binoculars, and I'd left the mini-but-mighty lenses Cassie thoughtfully added back in my luggage at the pension. Besides, most of the roof was covered with dark awnings. But I could see busy workmen flitting back and forth under the canvases. Probably nothing. But still…

  I turned and smiled as Jack continued snapping digital photos. The French couple watched us and giggled, and I started to get a little nervous about the interest of the pair. Leaning close to Jack's ear, I whispered, "I'll note the characteristics of her face. You take his."

  "No need." Jack's voice rumbled as he kept the volume low. "I've never seen them before. It's not likely they're from either camp."

  "How can you be sure?" I shot back, stepping away to cross my arms.

  Jack took two slow steps closer. "I know for the same reason I could track you on CCTV. I remember faces. It's a gift. Trust me when I say those two have no previous connection with Moran or Tony B."

  I kept walking toward the o
ther end of the space. "You've memorized every confederate either of them has?" I whispered.

  "Yes. I've been following the careers of both men for some time. You're not the only one who knows every crook in the art world."

  I stared into those teal eyes. "Yeah, but am I the only person right now looking at one?"

  He opened his mouth, then shut it again without speaking. Instead, he started flipping screens in his phone until he found his own saved e-mails, and we resumed the charade of oohing and ahhing over e-mails as if they were photos of me and Florence. The French couple finally chose to leave, kissing and squeezing until they got to the edge of the first step. I could hear voices coming from down below and knew there wasn't much time before the next set of tourists arrived. I took the opportunity to give him the scoop on Max's role in Tony B kidnapping me.

  Jack's face reddened. "Of all the stupid—"

  I shushed him. "Max doesn't see Tony B as a hood. And we've all been at benefits together. As irritated as I am with my boss, I can't blame him for answering what he obviously felt was a simple question. I don't doubt Tony B was very smooth."

  "So Cassie has your back on this?"

  "Everything from me goes through her to Max. And we'll make sure his knowledge of my location is at least a day late."

  "Good."

  "What info do you have from your sources?" I asked.

  Jack tensed his shoulders, then let them drop and pulled me back to one of the openings. He flipped three screens very fast, but I recognized two sculptures and the painting as ones Cassie included in my e-mail info dump.

  "Are those the real works or the fakes?"

  He sighed. "That's just it. These works were recently deemed frauds but were in place instead of the originals. And they're brilliantly done. If not for the cursed mark, they would likely still pass all tests. Which also makes the task of determining when the switch was made infinitely more difficult."

  "Yet duplicates were forgeries and had the 'new' makers mark of the dead forger from here in Florence," I mused. The terra-cotta roofs below offered a lovely uniform pattern to rest my gaze and soothe the challenges to my brain. For the last twenty-four hours, I'd been thinking about all of the pieces of this case and how they did and didn't fit together. This new information simply made it more complex. Or something entirely new.