“But why would he hang on to it all those years and never say anything to anyone?” She stopped. Blinked. “Oh, my God.” She put her fingers over her lips as though trying to stifle her words, but then she dropped her hand and spoke clearly. “He kept saying he had a special bequest for Gillian and me. He talked about a letter that went along with his will. But after he passed on and we found his will, there was no letter.”
“I’m guessing somebody has it.”
She swallowed audibly. “Who?”
“Isn’t that the ten-million-dollar question.”
24
After he left Alex, Duncan rode his new bike to the library. He tried to work on his book, but it was hopeless. He couldn’t concentrate. The library didn’t inspire him to work when Alex wasn’t there. When he stared at his computer screen, or the page of a book, he kept seeing her, banged up and traumatized, waving that foolish pink pepper spray at him. And then seeing her today, pale and bruised. Somebody was going to pay for hurting her, damn it.
But who?
On impulse he strode next door to the police station. Tom Perkins was sipping a coffee and pecking on a computer in his office. A female officer asked Duncan his business but he walked right past her. She followed, but when Tom saw him he motioned her back. “It’s okay, Raeanne.”
The cop settled back in his chair and didn’t invite his intruder to sit down. “Well?”
“What do you know about that gun found in Alex’s drawer?”
He could hear Perkins’ thoughts as easily as if the man were saying them aloud. He wasn’t a cop, he had no right to the intel. Neither of them spoke for a long moment, then Perkins ended the standoff. “It was the gun used to kill Plotnik.”
He nodded.
Perkins saved him the trouble of asking the next questions. “No prints. Gun was reported stolen a year ago.”
“Where?”
“L.A.”
“Any idea who rented the car that tried to kill Alexander Forrest?”
“Yep.”
“You got a name?”
Perkins rose so they were facing each other. There was an odd expression on his face. “Yeah. I got a name. Duncan Forbes.”
He stared at the impassive face on the other side of the desk. “What the fuck?”
“Car rental clerk took the booking over the phone. They already had your license and rental application on file. You said you needed a second car for your wife who was visiting for a couple of days. You gave your credit card information over the phone. Picked the car up at the airport. Dropped it off after hours.”
He could feel a vein ticking in his temple like a time bomb. “And?”
“There was some damage to the front end. They’ll be charging your credit card.”
He swore long and fluently. Perkins heard him out in silence. When he was finally done, the cop said, “Somebody’s trying pretty hard to set you up. Anything you want to tell me?”
For a second Duncan was tempted. Perkins knew this town and he might be a stolid small town cop, but he wasn’t stupid. However, Duncan didn’t see that he had enough information that Perkins could help him. Not yet. So he merely said, “Yeah. Thanks for not arresting me. Oh, and I bought a motorcycle. I won’t be using an easily duplicated rental car any more.”
For a second Perkins looked more like his one day climbing buddy than a cop. “What kind of bike?”
“Indian Chief ’41.”
“Nice.” Then, immediately jumping back to bad cop, Perkins leaned right over his desk, his fists planted. “Ever since you arrived in Swiftcurrent there’s been trouble. You planning to leave soon?”
Duncan narrowed his gaze realizing that if Alex ever got over her mad and realized she was in love with him too, that Swiftcurrent was going to be a big part of his life. He didn’t believe in lying to cops. He also didn’t believe in blabbing secrets. He said, “No comment.”
As he roared back to his place, he could see the sun setting behind the mountains. He’d barely done any of the climbing he’d promised himself. After being shot at the last time he climbed, he somehow hadn’t got out there again.
But he would and soon. In the meantime, he needed to do something physical. He dragged on running gear and headed out knowing a good few miles might help him pound out some of the frustration.
Five miles later, he returned, still as frustrated. He showered and was thinking about dinner. Wondering if he should take a quick trip to L.A. to see some people when somebody knocked on his door.
He slipped his pistol out of his pack and checked the peep hole. He put the gun away before opening his door to Alex.
“Shouldn’t you be resting?” he asked as he caught her pale cheeks and the fatigue behind her eyes.
“I’m sick of resting.”
“Come in,” he said. “Let me take your coat.”
“No. I can’t stay.” She hugged herself into her blue raincoat as though it could protect her from the ugly truth. “I wasn’t sure you were here. The rental’s gone. There’s a motorcycle in your usual spot.”
He couldn’t help his slow grin. “It’s my new ride. Like it?”
“It’s hard to see in the dark.”
“I’ll take you for a ride sometime. I bought a second helmet.” Just the thought of her wrapped behind him as they sped down some country road had him glad once more he’d bought that bike.
She looked less than thrilled about his new purchase or about him.
“How are you doing?” It was a stupid question, since it was painfully obvious she wasn’t doing all that well, but at least she was here.
“How am I doing?” She stalked past him and stood facing the sliding doors, so he saw her wavy reflection in the darkened glass. “I’m thirty years old and I found out today that my beloved grandfather might be a thief. How do you think I feel?”
He guessed it sucked to find out at the ripe old age of thirty that your grandfather was a thief. “I couldn’t say. I’ve known my grandfather was a thief ever since I understood what a thief was.”
She turned from the window, shock and suspicion widening her eyes. “Your grandfather was a thief?”
He nodded and went to the fridge for a bottle of wine. While he uncorked it and poured two glasses, he said, “I come from a noble line of thieves. My great great grandfather was a highwayman. They hanged him.” He passed her a glass of wine and she accepted it, with a quiet thank you. “I’ve got family in Australia who arrived there on a convict ship,” he said cheerfully. “They ended up with their own cattle station.”
“I can’t believe this,” she said.
“My Uncle Simon was another black sheep. It’s a veritable herd. He became the family fence. But I really let down the family tradition. I went straight.”
“Your entire family are thieves?”
“Not the women. We’re traditional like that.”
“That’s a cozy little system you’ve got going. They steal the goods and you conveniently recover those same treasures for a nice, fat fee? Is that how Forbes enterprises works?”
“No. That is not how it works. I stay out of the family business altogether except we have an understanding that they’ll pass on any rumors or information that might be useful in my work. In return, I keep my mouth shut about their affairs.” He shrugged. “We’re no more dysfunctional than most families.”
Only Duncan had let down the tradition. His relatives still shook their heads over him. “You’re an absolute abe-r-r-r-ation, laddie, that’s what ye are,” his Uncle Patrick was fond of saying. Paddy could have stolen jewels reset so not even their true owners would recognize them.
“Are you saying that to make me feel better?”
“Yes. But it also happens to be true.”
She chuckled, a bit creakily, but it was a start. Her coat was still on, but she’d sipped the wine and now she sat. On the couch where he’d sketched her naked, but he tried not to think about that.
“If my grandfather was involved in taking
a Van Gogh, then I want to help you find it,” she said, “because it needs to go back to its rightful owners.”
He nodded and wondered why he hadn’t confided in her earlier. Had he really thought she was concealing stolen property? This woman who wouldn’t jay walk in a ghost town? “Okay,” he said. “From now on, we work together.”
She settled back, looking much more like a sexual fantasy come to life than a co-solver of crime. But, at the moment, she was the best co-solver he could imagine. “What do you know so far?”
He winced. “Not a lot.”
“Well, things should go quicker now that you’re no longer convinced I have the painting.” She gave him a snooty look. “I assume you are no longer convinced I have the painting?”
He glared. “Give it a rest, Alex.”
“Well, because your apologetic demeanor leaves me speechless, I will agree to help you. On one condition.”
He was pretty sure he wasn’t going to like this. “What’s the condition?”
“Neither my grandfather nor anyone else in this town is to be named as being involved in any sort of criminal action. If it turns out there was any criminal action which I doubt.”
It went against his nature to leave crime unpunished, but, on the other hand, given his family background, he wasn’t a stranger to reshaping the truth like so much pizza dough into a more convenient shape. He’d presented pizza in every flavor and shape imaginable and his clients and the media ate it up, so long as the recovered artifact was on the table as well.
“Agreed. But you have to promise me in exchange to share any information you have, any detail you remember, no matter how insignificant.”
She thought about it for a second, then nodded. She shucked her coat, reached into her bag and pulled out a spiral-bound notebook—a new one with the cover still shiny—and a ballpoint that he would have guessed was also new from the way its blue plastic cap gleamed. Then he noticed the ink was half gone. She’d used half the ink and still had the cap? And it wasn’t dulled, scratched, or chewed?
“So,” she said, “what do we know?”
“We know your grandfather leaked information about the Van Gogh—an easy thing to do with his connections. I’m assuming he planned to sell the painting privately.”
She looked as though she might argue, then dropped her gaze to her notebook and began drumming her pen against the paper.
“We know that Jerzy Plotnik was killed in or near Swiftcurrent and the body dumped in your library. Plotnik worked for a guy in L.A., a shady art dealer named Hector Mendes.”
He caught her quick glance. “What?”
“You knew who the dead man was all along, didn’t you?’
Promising to be completely open with Alex had seemed like a good idea when he’d proposed they work together. Now he wasn’t so sure. “Yes.” He held up a hand. “Spare me the good citizenship speech.”
“Do you know who killed him?”
He didn’t think he deserved that. “No. If I did, I’d tell the police. ”
She sniffed. “And we know that the gun was put in my drawer.”
“Which Tom Perkins confirmed as the murder weapon. It was reported stolen a year ago.”
“From where?” It was the same question he’d asked. He liked the way his co-solver thought.
“L.A.”
“Where Mendes operates.”
“Exactly.” He could see the outline of the bandage on her arm. “And we know someone tried to run you down in a car that looked suspiciously like mine.”
She nodded.
He blew out a breath then revealed what Perkins had told him. That whoever rented the car had impersonated him.
“So it’s someone who knows you and knows that you’re here.”
“Who wanted you to think I was a killer.”
She winced. “I’m sorry about that.”
“Someone tried to kill me, too, by the way.”
Her head came up and she stopped scribbling. “What?”
“When Tom and I went climbing. Somebody shot at me. They missed, but hit my rope.”
“You never told me.”
“I wasn’t hurt. And believe me, that night when you came over with dinner, I had other things on my mind.”
A little more color highlighted her cheeks. “And all this, this murder, shooting, and running people over is for a painting?”
“Yep. Or for the money it will bring.”
She rose, then sat again. “None of us is safe until that painting is found.”
“Agreed.” He thought about what that strange guy had said in the bike shop, about a treasure hiding in plain sight.
“So, if Plotnik stole Grandpa’s letter, then whoever murdered him took the letter since it wasn’t found on his body.”
“Or Plotnik couldn’t find the letter.”
“Or there is no letter. Think about it. If someone stole the letter, they’d have the painting.” She went back to drumming her pen on the notebook, and he did a little pacing.
“Who is the executor of the will?”
“I am.”
“No safety deposit box?”
“Yes, but it was a small one. With the deed to the house, some stock certificates, that kind of thing.”
“No paintings.”
She shook her head.
She ran a thumb along her fingernails as though checking her manicure. Still, it wasn’t as irritating as turning her notebook into a bongo drum. “Where was the will kept?”
“At home. In his desk drawer in his office. So, the letter must have been kept somewhere else,” she said. “There haven’t been any break-ins.”
He took a deep slug of wine, knowing he had to tell her something she wasn’t going to like. “Actually, there have been break-ins.”
“What do you–” Her eyes opened wide as she put together his statement with what he’d told her about his family. “You broke into my grandparents’ home?”
“I could hardly ask permission to search for a missing painting when I suspected you of harboring it. If I could get in and out of your grandparents’ house without you noticing, so could a number of other people with similar skills.”
Alex wasn’t stupid and after staring at him for another long moment, she said, “Where else did you search?”
He rubbed a hand over his face, half wishing he’d kept his mouth shut. “Forrest Art and Antiques. Your place.” He ought to apologize. He knew that, but sorry didn’t come easy. “Gillian’s house.”
She rose and once more stared at the dark glass sliding door. “You have betrayed my trust on every level,” she said, her voice shaking.
“Not every level,” he said, rising to his feet and joining her at the window, standing behind her so both reflections were visible. “I’ve been intimate with you in a way I never have with another woman.” He wanted to tell her he loved her, and now that he felt he was close to losing her, the need to share his feelings grew desperate. “Alex, I—”
She swung to face him and he saw her jaw set. “I can’t even think about that right now. I want to find that painting so I can help right a wrong. Once you’ve got what you came for, you leave town. Understood?”
It was exactly his plan in coming to town, so why should he suddenly feel so desolate at the idea?
“Alex, please, I need to explain.” Although he wasn’t certain himself what he wanted to tell her, except that he couldn’t stand the way she was looking at him, and he wanted to pull her into his arms and the hell with everything else.
He must have telegraphed his intention, for she stepped around him. “Fun and games,” she reminded him. “That’s all we were to each other. And now the fun and games are over.” She reseated herself, once more staring at her notebook.
“It’s not over between us. Nowhere near. You know that as well as I do.”
“Maybe Grandpa meant to write the letter and never got around to it, or he misplaced it. Years from now it could turn up,” she said.
A
ll right. For now, he’d let her avoid the personal stuff, but he wasn’t going to lose her easily. He brought his mind back to the puzzle at hand. “Maybe. Or we could go looking for it.”
Her gaze was cool and level. “The letter or the painting?”
“Hey, a letter’s paper and ink. That Van Gogh is–”
“Canvas and oil.”
“You know better than that. It’s a masterpiece painted by one of the great artists of all time.”
“That painting is also loot. And if you find it you earn a fat fee. According to my research, you’ve become wealthy by finding and returning stolen art.”
“Olive Trees rightfully belongs to someone else.”
She nodded. “I know. How do you suggest we find it? You’ve already searched Grandpa’s house and half of Swiftcurrent.”
“True. But I don’t know your grandparents’ house or this town the way you do. The old homestead is the obvious place to start.” He paused and then, feeling a little foolish, related what the strange guy at the bike shop had said.
“Do you think the people of Swifcurrent are that backward? That someone could hang a priceless Van Gogh on their wall and no one would notice?”
“I think you’d be surprised what people don’t notice.” Like a man standing in front of her so in love with her he hurt all over.
“Let me call Gillian. She’s staying in the house. I want to make sure she’s okay with us turning up there.”
He felt his jaw tighten. “She could be involved.”
“No, Duncan. She’s not involved. She’s been looking after me for three days. She’s not getting drunk or high or visiting a stolen Van Gogh. She’s been cooking me soup and baking muffins.”
“And sleeping with the town detective,” he admitted.
She settled against the couch with her feet curled under her. He realized he hadn’t eaten and, opening the fridge, by process of elimination decided to cook up some eggs.
“Do you think Grandpa went to those L.A. people and died before he could hand over the painting? Then they came to the same asinine conclusion you did and went after me?”
Wild Ride: A Changing Gears Novel Page 26