Confidence Tricks

by Tamara Morgan

  “Winston doesn’t approve of my lifestyle,” Asprey offered by way of explanation. “He finds me frivolous.”

  She turned to him, trying to make out his meaning without giving anything away. “And by lifestyle you mean…?” The tendency to rob people of their most prized possessions?

  “Mostly that I went to art school instead of business school,” Asprey said. “He prefers crunching the numbers over actually appreciating the pieces that come through here. But he’s also jealous that people actually like me.”

  There was an obvious challenge between the brothers, but there was also quite a bit of subtext. All was not cozy in Charles-town.

  “Since we’re all here,” Asprey added, “I should probably mention that Veronica has just signed an exclusive deal with the executor from the Roget estate. Her gallery is going to handle the dissolution of the entire Warhol collection they’ve accumulated over the years.”

  As he spoke, Asprey’s tone was clipped and professional—and sent shivers down Poppy’s spine. Stern, commanding Asprey was kind of hot.

  “The Roget estate?” Winston’s already heavy brow drew closer. “But I thought they were deep in probate.”

  “They are,” Asprey said. “Hence the need for a third-party gallery to step in. Isn’t that right, Veronica?”

  “Absolutely,” she said warmly. She had no idea what they were talking about, but she had the feeling Asprey needed her to be on his side for this. So she would. “And I naturally thought of Asprey, first thing.”

  “We go way back,” Asprey confirmed, his eyes twinkling. “She once tried to stab me with her shoe.”

  “If you’re going to tell the story, tell it right,” Poppy returned, finding it hard to avoid his humor. “Asprey took something of mine—something I very much wanted to get back. My shoe happened to be the nearest weapon at hand. That’s all.”

  “Shall we set up a meeting?” Winston asked, ignoring their banter. “I’d love to talk more about—”

  “I’ll take care of it, Winston.” Asprey’s voice was firm.

  “I prefer not to work with assholes,” she added. “If I can help it, anyway.”

  Asprey laughed. “And I believe Veronica said something about needing to get to the airport soon.”

  “But I can call my secretary right now—”

  “She has to go.”

  “I have to go!” Poppy said brightly. No one would ever accuse her of missing her cue. “I wish I could say it was nice to meet you, Winston, but it’s obvious your brother got all the personality in the family. Asprey…until we meet again.”

  Feeling a handshake was the best way to go in this situation, she extended her hand. He studied it carefully before finally deciding to clasp the appendage lightly in his own, bringing it to his lips as though he once again wore the black mask, all gentleman thief and highwayman to the core.

  “It’s been an enlightening day for the both of us,” Asprey murmured, pressing his mouth softly against the skin of her hand. The room seemed to swell and shrink in succession, her body undergoing some dramatic flushes along with it. “Thank you, Veronica.”

  It was her turn to pause, to watch him carefully, looking for clues.

  But there weren’t any. He was thanking her for preserving their charade, for playing along.

  As she murmured a few more pleasantries and made her way out of the office door, she had to stop herself from turning back and telling Asprey he had nothing to thank her for.

  She liked playing along. She liked their game.

  And even though all the rules told her to drop this man before things got any more tangled, she was eager to find out what happened next.

  “I’ll say this about you, Asprey.” Winston showed few signs of leaving Asprey’s office, lingering near the windows, presumably watching the little people come and go. “You might not be the hardest-working employee here, but you’re personally responsible for bringing in at least a third of our female clientele under the age of forty.”

  Asprey forced himself to smile and leaned back in his chair. Although he hated that the entire office had been remodeled in the sleek metals that Winston favored, the chairs were both flexible and comfortable. “We all have our strengths. Mine just happen to rest below the belt. Was there something you wanted?”

  Winston turned to face him, his eyes clouded. Older than Asprey by fifteen years and worn with the worries of running a forgery scam for half that long, Winston was the poster boy for what Graff would become if he didn’t learn to relax. In fact, there was the telltale redness on the tip of his nose, as though he’d spent a considerable amount of time rubbing it.

  Their father had done that too. Whenever he’d been stressed out or working long hours, Manchester Charles could be seen at his desk, pulling at the tip of his nose with worry.

  The sight of it was almost enough to make Asprey feel bad for all the anxiety they must be causing Winston. Almost.

  “We had to pay out another claim this week.”

  “So I heard,” Asprey replied, lifting his feet so they rested on the desk. He grabbed a hacky sack that he always kept in his top desk drawer and started tossing it negligently into the air. “I do read the memos you send me from time to time.”

  “That’s the third one this month alone—all of the items stolen, and all of them by the same men in black masks. It’s like they’re leaving a calling card.”

  Asprey switched hands, tossing the ball even higher. “I can’t imagine what this world is coming to, Winston. Masked crusaders? In this day and age?”

  His eldest brother let out a snorting sound that belonged on a creature with cloven hooves. Not too far off, actually. “Laugh it up, Asprey, but you won’t like it when the company has to start liquidating assets to cover the costs.”

  Asprey swung his legs down and pretended to look outraged—which wasn’t too far of a stretch. He’d always known Winston would eventually target Ruby with his greed. He just wasn’t ready for it yet. “My plane?”

  “Technically it’s company property. I don’t have a choice. People aren’t buying or selling art these days, which slows our business down quite a bit, I’ve got claims piling up in the millions now, and it’s getting harder to…”

  “Harder to what?” Asprey asked, struggling to keep his voice flat.

  Winston got to his feet. “It’s nothing. You wouldn’t understand—what with all the flitting in and out of here like work is some kind of party. And where is Graff? I haven’t seen him in months.”

  That’s because Graff is a ticking time bomb. Asprey might be able to face Winston and pretend to be his normal, carefree self, but Graff’s frown was a permanent fixture these days. One wrong twitch and his whole head was bound to go off. The closest he got to the place was having breakfast every morning at a restaurant across the street. He said he liked to keep an eye on the place—and on Winston—if only from a distance.

  “Last I heard, he was in Hawaii, nursing his wounded pride.”

  “Hawaii?”

  Asprey pulled an innocent face. “Don’t look at me. You’re the one who won’t let him help run the company—what did you expect? You know Dad always intended for you two to be partners.”

  “Yeah, well, Dad didn’t exactly leave things in a good way, did he?” Winston raised his voice, clearly losing his calm.

  “Nope, I guess not.”

  “I do appreciate you landing the Roget estate,” Winston ventured.

  “It’s not landed yet,” Asprey warned. The last thing he needed was for Winston to go nosing around that account. It was a real estate, and it was in probate, but it would take the total sum of a five-minute phone call for Winston to realize Asprey had been lying about Veronica.

  “If you see Graff, tell him the offer still stands.”

  Asprey pretended to look thoughtful. “Do you mean the offer to let him bail the company out in exchange for yet another nominal title with no real power, or do you mean the offer to ’bury his goddamned tig
htfisted morality somewhere you won’t ever have to see it again’?”

  Winston lifted up his finger, pointing it at Asprey like he was about to mutter yet another ineffective and blustery curse. But all he said was, “You’ve always taken his side in things. Always.”

  Asprey shrugged into his coat jacket and gestured with his head, indicating he was on his way out. “That’s because no matter how many times Graff might act like a dick, his motivations are in the right place. How many of us can say that?”

  Not me, that’s for sure.

  “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a hot date with a cool blonde, and I don’t intend to miss it.”

  Winston moved out of the way, letting Asprey by. “I bet you do.” He paused, calling after him, “You know, I sometimes think that being you must be the nicest thing in the world. You don’t care about anything or anyone, do you?”

  “You know me,” Asprey said, his face almost cracking with the effort it took to remain unconcerned. “Always there for a good time—and never for anything else. You should try it sometime, Winston. You’re looking a little rough around the edges.”

  Chapter Eight

  As predicted, the reconnaissance portion of the VanHuett job made Asprey long to stab a fork into his eyes, if only to alleviate the boredom for a while. He’d gone with birdwatcher for this particular stakeout, which meant he could carry binoculars through the park without attracting too much attention. Unfortunately, it also meant he had to pretend to be interested in birds.

  They chirped. They flew. He had yet to find anything else remotely interesting about them.

  He settled onto a rock that provided him with a view of both an elm tree at its full leafy height and the apartment building he needed to watch. Thanks to Tiffany’s handiwork accessing the mainframe of the firm where the woman worked, he had a copy of her daily schedule and a list of contacts for all the people she chatted with on Facebook, in addition to more concrete facts like place of residence and birthdate. Still—there was only so much paperwork could tell a person.

  Asprey subscribed to the old-school method of recon, where real groundwork trumped technology. Sure, there was something to be said for the flash and bang of Tiffany zipping through the web to pull out private and eerily personal information, but that didn’t tell them who Ms. Cindy VanHuett really was. This was where he learned how punctual she was or how predictable her actions were, how likely she was to be swayed by a friendly face or an emergency distraction fabricated in the heat of the moment.

  Asprey was good at this part. Maybe Graff thought he was wasting his time out here, but his brother also thought that Asprey’s art history degree was as effective as underwear worn outside the clothes with a matching cape. Graff’s perspective was slightly skewed in favor of pragmatism.

  But the watching had worked with Poppy, and so far, things with Cindy VanHuett were looking equally good.

  At just thirty-six and with a trust fund that put Asprey’s to shame, Cindy could have easily been flighty and unreliable, keener on parties and shopping than punching a time clock. Not Ms. VanHuett. She worked in her father’s real estate development firm every day until six. She came home with a bag of takeout, which it took her about an hour to eat and enjoy before she came down to walk her wheezy Bichon through the park.

  He’d even stopped her on his last visit to ask the time. Polite but cool, she was clearly more interested in matching her dog’s sweater to her own than chatting up handsome strangers. After she took exactly three turns around the park, it was back home by eight, when she presumably settled in for the night.

  Not an exciting life, but Asprey wasn’t about to complain. Now that they could count on Poppy’s help, it was just a matter of finding the right moment. The painting they were after hung a whopping eight feet by ten in her twelfth-floor apartment, and the trick to getting it was finding a way in—and out—of the guarded building undetected. So far, Cindy hadn’t proven herself very open to persuasion.

  “That is the ugliest sweater I’ve ever seen in my life,” a female voice said, drawing up beside him. “Like the yarn was dragged through mud before someone decided to knit with it. And what is with the binoculars?”

  “I’m being inconspicuous.” Asprey turned to take in the sight of Poppy standing over him, her mouth crooked in a smile. Today, she’d opted for a short skirt that seemed to be made entirely of baby pink feathers, topped with a shredded AC/DC T-shirt and a cropped leather jacket. The same teal cowboy boots from before also graced her feet.

  Inconspicuous was going to be difficult if she was planning on sticking around.

  “You look like a serial killer,” she offered. Without waiting for an invitation, she plopped next to him on the rock. “Seriously. If I looked out the window and saw a guy with a Mr. Rogers sweater staring at me with a pair of laser rangefinder binoculars, I’d skip the police and go straight for my gun.”

  Asprey looked over her with renewed interest. There was only one place he could imagine she could conceal a weapon under a skirt like that. “You carry a gun? Thanks for the warning.”

  “Well, not lately,” she admitted. “That was many lifetimes ago.”

  “I see.” He lifted a hand to her cheek. “You’re a woman of many mysteries. I don’t suppose any of them have to do with the giant glob of red paint under your eye?”

  “What?” She scrambled to wipe the offending item off, smearing it into a kind of cheerful war paint under her eye. Leaning to wipe her fingers on the grass, she added, “It’s make-up. Blush.”

  “Hold still.”

  He wrapped one hand around the back of her neck and forced her to look up, surprised to find how warm she was to the touch. Or maybe he was just cold from sitting and waiting, inert for so long. “No sudden movements,” he warned, softening his words with a smile. “My shoulder is finally back to normal.”

  “Maybe you should keep your hands to yourself, then.” The words carried a hint of a threat, but she didn’t pull away. Before his brain—or his instincts—could think better of it, Asprey used the wide pad of his thumb to wipe at her cheek. Her face grew red, but he couldn’t tell if it was from his touch or whatever dye was in what she called blush but was clearly paint.

  He hoped it was his touch—God, how he hoped that.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked when he was finished, reluctantly drawing away. “Not that I don’t love the company, but you’re kind of blowing my cover.”

  “Your cover sucks—it’s even worse than the trench coat.”

  “And yet my question remains.”

  She tucked strands of hair and feathers behind one ear. “Graff told me to come get you.”

  That sounded relatively…sane, especially considering he’d left Graff pacing circles around Tiffany, promises of fratricide spewing from his lips. To say he wasn’t exactly delighted with the way Asprey handled things was an understatement. “Oh? You two have a nice chat?”

  “Let’s just say I think you exaggerated your family’s willingness to agree to this arrangement of ours.” Her gaze flicked over him, stopping briefly at his crotch before finally settling on his face. “It makes me wonder what else you might have been overselling.”

  The challenge of it was too much to let slide, stakeouts and the folly of public displays of affection notwithstanding. Letting his binoculars fall to the ground, he wrapped one arm around her, the other gripping the back of her neck, his thumb tilting her chin to meet his. It was a short kiss but a good one, designed to show her that of all the things Asprey bragged about—this was not something he failed to deliver.

  He pulled away abruptly, before she could do more than yield underneath him, the soft parting of lips all the sign he needed to know his point had been made.

  But when he took in her face, flushed but just as impassive as ever, he was forced to concede that when it came to sharing a kiss with this woman, he was the one who stood on shaky ground. “Nothing?”

  The corners of her mouth lifted.
“I never said you couldn’t kiss.”

  Damn. Poppy took this round.

  A blur of movement out of the corner of Asprey’s eye pulled his attention away. The man in a dark suit entering the apartment building—he looked familiar in that general business man sort of way, but it was hard to place him. Definitely worth looking into later.

  Poppy noticed and shifted her attention with him. “Do you need to stick around a bit longer? I can go.”

  “I thought you said Graff sent you to get me.”

  “He did, but I’d happily go back there and tell him he’s not some king of old who can order his peasants around. If you think for one second that man can intimidate me, you have no idea who you’re up against.”

  He tried for a joke: “Those prison matrons must be pretty tough.” But the words fell flat of his goal. She’d only been out four months. Too soon?

  “Among other things,” she said, shifting so that she faced him. Her brows drew together. “Look—you and your family obviously have a different approach to this than I do. I don’t appraise jewelry or own a multimillion dollar company or have huge computer systems set up in my home office. I don’t plan big heists, and I don’t rely on shotguns to get results. It’s just me and the con. It always has been.”

  “This is about me wearing vests, isn’t it?”

  She laughed and flashed her crooked smile, eyes opening wide as though her own amusement caught her off guard. “You have freakishly good posture too.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  “I guess I can’t stop you.”

  “You aren’t all that bad, you know.” Asprey turned all of his focus on the woman next to him. There was no use pretending he was interested in the apartment building anymore. “You haven’t turned us in yet. You saw our enormous table of bounty and, like the truly noble human being you are, asked no questions about where it came from. You’re willing to help us, and you don’t even know what it is we’re asking.”