Heron's Cove

by Carla Neggers

  “And it ended up with Dmitri Rusakov’s ex-wife in Arizona?”

  “Apparently,” Emma said.

  Colin lifted a small, misshapen dish Emma had made for her grandparents in a pottery class in fifth grade. Her grandfather had given specific instructions that the dish wasn’t to go into the garbage or off to a yard sale. Colin seemed to guess, and put it to one side on the counter.

  “I gather that Renee Rusakov was quite a character,” he said. “What did she do, just walk off with this collection?”

  “Basically, or at least that was my assessment when Dmitri asked us to look into its disappearance four years ago. I think Renee took it a piece or two at a time with her back to Tucson. She never gave up her house there. Dmitri didn’t believe it and sent me back to Dublin.” Emma shivered in a sudden cold draft. “Colin, this isn’t your problem.”

  He didn’t seem to hear her. “Why did your grandfather send you to London? Why didn’t he go himself?”

  “I was learning the business. It made sense for me to go. It’s not as if there were any danger.”

  Colin frowned. “You’re cold.” He adjusted the collar on her jacket, touched the back of his hand to her jaw. “Even your skin is cool.”

  “No red nose, I hope.”

  He smiled. “No red nose.”

  “There’s no heat with the renovations.”

  “It was hotter than hell in Florida. Unseasonably so, they tell me. I swore I wouldn’t complain about the cold until it’s at least ten below.” He threaded his fingers into her hair, then cupped the back of her head. “I have a lot of questions about you and your Russian friends, Emma.”

  “I understand that. Give me time. Let me deal with them. You’re decompressing after a difficult experience.”

  “A difficult experience?” He gave a short laugh and lowered his hand back to her side. “Sweetheart, kayaking against the wind in choppy water is a difficult experience. Escaping arms traffickers out to kill me was one hell of a tough night.” He walked over to the kitchen door and pulled his jacket off a peg. “How much of this does Yank know?”

  “I called him the same time I called you. I told him all I know.”

  “Did you tell him about you and Ivan?”

  “There is no me and Ivan.” Emma stood back from the sink, warmer now. “Lucas is flying to London in the morning to see what he can learn about Tatiana Pavlova. He didn’t recognize her name. Neither did my grandfather.”

  “Who does she think will steal the collection?”

  “She didn’t say.”

  “Rusakov wants it back?”

  “He seems to, yes. I don’t think he wants to upset Natalie, though.”

  “And Ivan?”

  “I haven’t talked to him enough to know why he’s here, but I imagine it’s because Dmitri wants him here.”

  “Ivan told me he’s here because of you.”

  Emma rolled her eyes. “He did not. Go home, Colin. I’ll finish up here. We can talk tomorrow.”

  “Where do you plan to sleep?”

  “I’ll make a bed on the floor here. There are enough blankets lying around. I’ll be fine.”

  “You could stay in a guest cabin on the Nightingale.”

  She gave him a cool look. “Maybe I could, but I won’t.”

  He glanced out at the dark waterfront. “Do you Sharpes have any normal friends?”

  “I wouldn’t call Dmitri a friend.”

  “Ivan?”

  Emma sighed. “You’re relentless, Special Agent Donovan.”

  He winked at her. “Might keep that in mind.”

  She said nothing.

  He shrugged on his jacket, left it unbuttoned. “Even if Vladimir Bulgov were a Russian schoolteacher and not an arms trafficker, I wouldn’t like having a Russian tycoon with a history with your family on a big damn yacht within spitting distance of your back porch.”

  “I get that, Colin, but I’m a fully qualified, experienced federal agent. I can take care of myself.”

  “Didn’t say you couldn’t. You and I don’t operate in the same circles, Emma. We didn’t as kids, either, with you growing up here in Heron’s Cove, me in Rock Point.”

  “Our lives have more in common than many people’s lives do.”

  “When’s the last time you caught a lobster?”

  “Never,” she said. “That’s not my point.”

  He grinned. “Your point’s probably way too complicated for my simple mind. I think in straight lines. You think in mazes.” He took her by the shoulders, no humor in his smoky eyes now. “I can handle whatever trouble you cause for me.”

  “I’m not trying to cause you trouble.”

  “I know.” He tightened his hold on her. “What about you, Emma? Can you handle whatever trouble I cause for you?”

  “I can. And I can handle you.”

  “Think so, huh?” He took a few strands of her windblown hair and tucked them behind her ear. “Sister Brigid, Wendell Sharpe’s granddaughter, Special Agent Sharpe. Who are you, Emma?”

  “I’m not confused about who I am.”

  “Maybe so. Maybe with your background you’ve had to think about who you are more than the rest of us. I’ve had to pretend to be someone I’m not.”

  “I don’t know anything about your undercover identity. I suppose it’s unsavory.”

  “Unsavory.” His eyes again sparked with humor. “Yeah. You could say that.”

  “One day maybe you’ll be able to tell me more about who you were, what you did. The kind of things that won’t be in any briefing on your mission.”

  “There was no other woman in my undercover life. You’re it, Emma.” He let go of her shoulders but kept his gaze steady on her. “Does that scare you?”

  “Not even a little.”

  He kissed her on the forehead. “I didn’t think so.”

  She caught his hand into hers. “I need to figure out what’s going on here.”

  “I know. Sleep well, Sister Brigid.” He squeezed her hand, then opened the door, looking back at her. “Call me if your Russians give you any trouble.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To become one with a bottle of Bracken’s finest.”

  When the door shut behind him, Emma opened another cupboard and cleaned out plastic containers and tops, heaping them into the sink. She had no illusions that Colin was just off to drink whiskey with his brothers and Finian Bracken. He would be looking into those aboard the Nightingale.

  He clearly wasn’t concerned about leaving her on her own in Heron’s Cove.

  She lasted two minutes before she abandoned her cupboard cleaning. She had eaten little aboard the yacht but she wasn’t hungry. She wasn’t used to being in Heron’s Cove alone. Most often, her parents, her brother or even her grandfather would be there—or she would be at the convent visiting with the sisters.

  Of course, she didn’t have to stay in Heron’s Cove. She could always follow Colin to Rock Point.

  She flipped on the porch light and went outside. It was cool, but there was no wind.

  She could take another crack at a watercolor flat wash and give herself a chance to think.

  * * *

  The evening had turned downright cold, and Emma blamed that for her three attempts at flat washes in a row turning to mush. Too much water, or too much paint. She wasn’t frustrated, just mystified that it could be so hard to make a simple flat wash work the way she wanted it to. The work itself was restful, and she loved the rich shade of burgundy she had chosen. It reminded her of the late-autumn oak leaves, and the colors of the hydrangea blossoms in the yard.

  The fourth wash turning to mush she blamed on Ivan Alexander. She had watched him cross the yard against the backdrop of the village lights and the tidal river and ocean against the dark sky.

  He walked slowly up the porch steps and then to the corner where she had set up her easel. “Did you learn to paint when you were a nun?”

  She swished her brush in a mason jar of
water. “I can’t say I know how to paint now. I only painted walls as a sister. I am taking lessons, though.”

  “Is it relaxing to paint?”

  “Sometimes. I get frustrated when it all turns to mud.”

  He studied her flat wash, which she had tried again with the cerulean-blue. “How are you, Emma?” he asked quietly.

  “Just fine, thanks.”

  “You speak with clenched jaw,” he said with a slight smile.

  “You must know Dmitri’s presence—your presence—here is provocative.”

  “Dmitri was already planning to take the yacht to the Bahamas when he found out Natalie was on her way here. I told him it was unwise to come but he insisted. He never believed Renee took this collection.”

  “Who did he think did, then? Has he ever told you?”

  Ivan shrugged. “Does it matter now? The Sharpes can’t help at this point.”

  “I hope Dmitri and Natalie will talk and work out a solution.” Emma set the brush on the edge of the dresser, as Tatiana Pavlova had instructed her, and gave Ivan a pleasant smile. “At least it’s never a waste of time to come to Heron’s Cove.”

  “Or to visit you.” Ivan nodded to the fresh sheet of heavy watercolor paper she had clipped to the easel. “Is that supposed to be…what? The ocean?”

  “Nothing. I’m practicing flat washes. I managed to keep them from running into each other this time.” Relieved she had put Tatiana’s great blue heron into a dresser drawer, out of Ivan’s sight, Emma turned from the easel and sat on the porch rail. “Why didn’t you warn me you were on your way here?”

  He stood at the rail next to her, facing the water. “I was still trying to talk Dmitri out of coming, and I hadn’t decided if it would be wise for me to join him.”

  “I could bring you in,” Emma said.

  “Holding me as a witness would do you no good.”

  She felt a breeze stir behind her, off the water. “I can’t lie about you, Ivan. I can’t pretend I don’t know you when you turn up on my doorstep with a Russian tycoon.”

  “You will do the right thing, Emma. You always do, even when it’s difficult.”

  “I try to, but that doesn’t mean I always succeed. You help the FBI for your own reasons.”

  “I help you. No one else.”

  She doubted her look was casual just then. “Were you in Fort Lauderdale?”

  “The men who grabbed your agent continue to elude capture.”

  “Is that a statement or a question?”

  “I’ve done what I can to help you. Dmitri is here about expensive trinkets from the past. He isn’t involved in the illegal weapons trade, and none of the Nightingale crew is, either.”

  “Are you involved, Ivan?”

  “I have broken none of your laws.”

  “Not quite a direct answer, is it?” Emma pushed her hands through her hair. “Ivan…”

  “You trust me, Emma.”

  She didn’t respond at once. Ivan had been the first to suspect Renee had taken the collection. Emma didn’t have to understand his friendship with Dmitri to appreciate their loyalty to each other. When she was in London four years ago, Dmitri had let Ivan explain to her the difficulties of his marriage and divorce, the varied nature of his enemies and the importance of the collection to him, and of her discretion.

  That didn’t mean she knew everything. Dmitri, through Ivan, had told her only as much as he wanted her to know. But she suspected that her grandfather had done the same, and there was so much left unsaid. She remembered when she flew back to Dublin, she had felt both a sense of relief and frustration. Relief that she didn’t have to peel back the layers of all that lay behind the mysterious and intriguing Rusakov collection. Frustration that she didn’t have the whole story.

  “I have trusted you, Ivan, yes,” she said finally, “but if you have anything to do with arms trafficking, I’ll find out and arrest you myself. If you’ve so much as had a beer with Vladimir Bulgov and haven’t told me—”

  “Vodka,” Ivan said. “Once, long before his arrest.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  His eyes were flat, without emotion. “A couple of months.”

  “You know the exact date, Ivan.”

  “April fifth. We ran into each other in London. We were both there on business. We had a drink together. Grey Goose Vodka.”

  “Where?”

  “My hotel.”

  “What did you and Bulgov talk about?”

  “Russia.” Ivan stood back from the porch rail. “Anything else, Special Agent Sharpe?”

  “What do you know about the address you gave me in Fort Lauderdale?”

  “The house is rented by a private pilot who once flew planes for Bulgov. Pete Horner. It’s a big house. He lives above his means.”

  “Do you do business with him?”

  “No.”

  It was a curt answer even for Ivan.

  “Security is my business, Emma. It’s what I do. It allowed me to help you.”

  Ivan wasn’t rattled by her questions. Not even close. He didn’t rattle easily. He stood straight, the porch light catching the lines in his face. He knew how to create a threatening presence with his posture, his expression. His eyes alone suggested he was a man with lethal capabilities. Emma couldn’t imagine anyone thinking he was in Heron’s Cove for a whale watch or fried clams.

  She deliberately didn’t mention Tatiana Pavlova.

  “How is your FBI agent?” he asked. “He is good to you?”

  “Colin’s good.”

  “He wants to know everything about Dmitri, about me,” Ivan said without making it a question. “About your relationship with us.”

  Emma wasn’t going there and jumped lightly from the rail. “You do what you have to do, Ivan, but if you cross the line, I’m coming after you.”

  “The dilemma of a badge. Sometimes one has to break rules to do right.”

  “That might be the world you live in—”

  “It’s the world you live in, too, Emma. Are you sure you belong with the FBI? Can you stay in that box?”

  “We’re not discussing me.”

  “Perhaps you don’t belong with the FBI any more than you belonged with the nuns. Are you running from being a Sharpe?”

  “I’m not running from anything.”

  “You investigate art crimes. Be careful, my friend.”

  “Threatening me, Ivan?”

  Again came that near-imperceptible smile. “I would never threaten an FBI agent.”

  “I’m not afraid of you. I never have been.”

  “I take your position with the FBI seriously, Special Agent Sharpe. Emma, Dmitri asked me to invite you to stay aboard the Nightingale.”

  “I can’t, Ivan.”

  “You would have your own cabin,” Ivan added, a spark of warmth in his dark eyes.

  Emma felt her throat tighten. “Please thank Dmitri for me, but I’ll be staying here tonight.”

  “Not in Rock Point?” he asked, shifting, his eyes suddenly lost in the shadows.

  “None of your business. And for the record, you’d be well advised to stay out of Rock Point. You’ve caused enough problems showing up here in Heron’s Cove.”

  Ivan kissed her on the cheek. “Be safe, Emma. Keep your man safe.”

  He descended the porch steps without making a sound. Emma waited until he disappeared down on the pier before she returned to the kitchen. A sleeping mat was doable, and she’d be fine with no heat. Fine another night without Colin. He needed this time to himself, she told herself. It wasn’t rejection.

  No, she thought. The real reason she wanted to stay put was having the Nightingale on her doorstep.

  She found an empty cardboard box in a side hall.

  Might as well get busy, she thought, and started packing dishes.

  11

  COLIN RESISTED OPENING his bottle of Bracken Distillers 15 year old and instead settled on a beer. He took it into his living room, where the only sound
was the ticking of the old cuckoo clock his grandmother had given him. Hurley’s was deserted on a Sunday night, even Finian Bracken nowhere to be found, so Colin had walked back home.

  Not a good night for whiskey, he had decided.

  Just as well, since Matt Yankowski had been waiting for him in the driveway.

  “I hate cuckoo clocks,” Yank said from his chair by the fireplace.

  “You get used to them.”

  “Not me. I’d shoot it.”

  The house smelled closed up, dusty. Colin figured he probably should have gotten out the mop and bucket today instead of messing with Emma and her Russians. He needed to regroup, clear his head, trust that his colleagues in Washington and Boston were on the trail of Pete Horner and his Russian accomplices.

  He stood by the small white-painted brick fireplace with its brass-trimmed glass front. Even if he had spent the day cleaning house, Yank would still likely be here, in his crisp suit and polished shoes. Colin imagined Emma there instead, stretched out in front of a crackling fire, her cheeks flushed, her green eyes warm with laughter. His house could be her refuge, too.

  “Hell,” he muttered, drinking some of his beer.

  Yank sighed. “You must be thinking about Emma.”

  “I’m becoming a romantic sap, Yank.”

  “It’s the adrenaline dump from escaping sharks, snakes and thugs.”

  “Alligators. No sharks.”

  “Sharks were next. Drinking beer out of a bottle will help. If you came in here with a glass, I’d worry.”

  Colin sank into a chair across from his friend and senior agent. “It’s time I take the blinders off and see what’s in front of me. The Sharpes are renowned art crime experts with contacts all over the world—including Russia. And Emma’s one of them.”

  “Most days that’s a plus. It’s probably what got us to you before those bastards in Florida could come back and finish what they started.” Yank settled back, thoughtful. “Our work isn’t easy on relationships. You’d think it’d be easier with another agent, but I don’t know. I think it’s even more complicated.”

  “How’s Lucy’s trip to Paris with her sister going?”

  “She called on my drive up here. They’d just come back to their hotel after a late night and a little too much to drink. Lucy’s homesick.”