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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All person(s) depicted on the cover are model(s) used for illustrative purposes only.
The Artist’s Touch
Copyright © 2013 (Under Northern Light), 2018 by E.J. Russell
Cover art: L.C. Chase, lcchase.com/design.htm
Editors: Rachel Haimowitz, Carole-ann Galloway
Layout: L.C. Chase, lcchase.com/design.htm
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ISBN: 978-1-62649-758-0
Second edition
February, 2018
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Two men haunted by more than the past.
Painter Stefan Cobbe was homeless and debt-ridden after the death of his wealthy partner, but the worst loss of all was his artistic inspiration. After two years of nothing, he’s offered patronage by an eccentric gallery owner and starts to produce again, canvas after canvas. The only problem? He can’t remember painting any of them—not one single brushstroke.
Luke Morganstern’s reputation as an art-fraud investigator is in tatters. He can’t afford to turn down any job, even a lousy one for an anonymous client who sends him after an unidentified forger in a remote cabin in Oregon. When the alleged forger turns out to be Stefan, the man he never stopped loving, Luke’s professional ethics are stretched beyond the breaking point.
As the two men take tentative steps toward reconciliation, evidence begins to mount that they’re not alone in the woods. Someone—or something—is watching. Something with sinister plans for them both. To escape, Luke must overcome his suspicions and Stefan must trust Luke with his deepest fears. Otherwise they could forfeit their relationship, their sanity—and their lives.
Publisher’s note: This is a heavily revised and significantly expanded reprint of Northern Light.
As before—for Jim, for all the dinners and patience.
In our life there is a single color, as on an artist’s palette, which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.
— Marc Chagall
About The Artist’s Touch
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Dear Reader
Acknowledgments
Also by E.J. Russell
About the Author
More like this
This stretch of the Oregon Coast couldn’t be more different from the manicured white sand in front of Luke Morganstern’s high-rise condo in Sarasota. In place of the fragile shoal of sea shells, the beach sported sea wrack and piles of driftwood the height of stadium bleachers. Instead of the soft lap of Gulf wavelets, the surf beat itself to death on jetties made of rocks the size of Volkswagens.
The windshield wipers of the rental car thwapped and screeched in the never-ending, half-hearted drizzle, Oregon’s default weather setting ever since he’d arrived, as if the clouds couldn’t be bothered to muster up a real storm.
The weather sucked. The lousy rental car sucked. The road sucked. And anonymous clients teasing him with hints of a major forgery really sucked.
Damn it, he could be back on his balcony, sipping a beer, watching the sun set over the Gulf at the end of a liquid trail of crimson. But his mystery client—who doled out information in dribbles like there was an alphabet shortage—wanted to pay him to risk terminal mildew in soggy Oregon. Money talked, and if Luke wanted to hold on to that condo and balcony, not to mention the beer, he had to listen.
This was his first time on the left coast since he’d turned down the commission from the Prescott Gallery in Palm Springs five years ago. He’d gotten such satisfaction out of wording his snide refusal, flipping the professional bird at Marius Worthington Prescott the fucking Fifth, the asshole who’d stolen the only man Luke had ever loved. “Stole”? You practically handed him Stefan on a platter when you ran out like a fucking emo teen.
Now though . . . he’d grovel for the chance at a Prescott job, even if Marius were still at the helm and not two years dead. With a Prescott commission, he could have turned down this one and laughed all the way to the bank.
Luke’s mocking laugh cut off in a hard inhale as another semi tore past in the other lane, its draft rocking his rental car and making him regret the greasy eggs he’d eaten at the diner in Tillamook. Not so superior now, are you, you pathetic son of a bitch? Gone were the days when he could afford to turn down cases for trivial reasons like his broken heart.
Luke finally made it into Wheeler and pulled the car to a stop at the address Mystery Client had deigned to text to him. He peered through the rain-spattered window at the building behind its metal mask of scaffolding. Luke recognized the name, North Coast Gallery: Marius had invested in this place once, like he had in so many other small galleries. The tentacles of his influence had snaked through the art world until Luke hadn’t been able to turn around without seeing another instance of how much worthier Marius was of the man that they’d both wanted.
You won, you pretentious SOB, and a lot of good it did you. You’re dead. And Luke was a disgraced art-fraud investigator, one month away from flat broke.
He sighed, opening the door and using it to lever himself out of the car, his hip more wonky than usual after so many hours of tense driving. He crossed the street, scowling as he tried to remember who owned this place.
Boardman. That was it. Thomas Boardman, but for the life of him, Luke couldn’t put a face to the name. Which was odd— Luke never forgot a face, and once upon a time, he’d have been able to recite every independent gallery in the US and pick their owners out of any given cocktail party lineup.
He’d let that slide after the Hernandez fiasco too.
A trio of brawny workmen on the top tier of the scaffolding were giving the gallery sign a face-lift, removing the three-foot-high gold letters. North Coast Gallery was currently No Cost Gall. Maybe the workmen had a sense of humor lurking behind those stoic expressions, Carhartt jackets, and—whoa—Utilikilts.
&n
bsp; Nice. Calves.
Luke’s scowl transformed into an appreciative grin. Maybe Oregon had its good points after all.
He crossed the street, ignored the orange detour signs, and ducked under the scaffolding to get to the door. He pulled out his cell phone to check Mystery Client’s text message. Not that he needed to. M.C. wasn’t exactly verbose.
Third gallery, east wall.
Luke didn’t hurry because why bother? He doubted M.C. knew a forgery from a Frappuccino. So he strolled, checking out the place.
The gallery was almost empty this early on a gloomy Tuesday. A trio of teenagers who probably should have been in school hovered in the corner, sneaking peeks at a larger-than-life male nude in acrylic on canvas. An elderly man leaned on a cane, studying a morose bronze salmon. A woman jostling a stroller holding her snoozing infant twins sat on a bench and slumped against the wall, glassy-eyed, under a triptych of Mapplethorpe photo reproductions.
Clearly, No Cost Gall wasn’t fighting off the crowds, which begged the question of how Boardman could afford the upgrades to the facade. No matter how slick the exterior, it couldn’t compensate for the lackluster contents. The pieces on display were an odd mix of quaint, intriguing, and just plain awful—and whoever handled the lighting should be shot.
Once he got to the third gallery, he could barely see the east wall because of the menagerie of chainsaw animal sculptures that crowded the floor. How anybody imagined this layout was—
Holy shit on a palette knife.
The picture in pride of place at the end of the room drew Luke like the promise of sunshine.
An Arcoletti.
With a chainsaw grizzly looming at his back, Luke forgave Mystery Client everything: the bogus secrecy, the white-knuckled drive on substandard roads, even the relentless Oregon damp.
Because fuck me blind. An Arcoletti. An actual, honest-to-God, genuine fake Arcoletti. Luke’s personal Holy Grail of art fraud.
He pulled out his cell phone and texted Mystery Client. I’m in.
Good old M.C. responded with a link to a map resembling a diagram of the large intestine. Luke’s grip on his cell phone tightened. A road that tortuous screamed mountain. He rubbed his hip to ease the never-absent ache, tempted to back out, hop on the next plane back to Sarasota, and tag Mystery Client with a Screw you and your games. Find another art investigator.
His thumbs hovered over the keypad. Two years ago, he’d have sent that arrogant text—or worse. Two years ago, he’d had his pick of plum jobs all over Europe. Now, his anemic bank account shared dwindling life support with his battered reputation.
But the memory of Jean-Pierre’s parting taunt, his voice mocking as only the pain-free and stupidly confident could be, was the kicker that made Luke tuck the phone in his coat pocket. “Afraid of a little hill? Did you break your balls as well as your leg? You are not the man you were, cher.”
Maybe not.
But an Arcoletti, damn it. Mountain or no mountain, switchbacks or no switchbacks, it was the one lure he couldn’t resist.
And bum leg or no bum leg, he’d prove to the skeptical art world that he could still kick major forger ass.
Stefan Cobbe peered out the cabin window, across the expanse of matted weeds to the blind end of the studio. No windows on this side—eastern light played hell with color and shadow—and he couldn’t see the door on the south side either, so why couldn’t he tear himself away?
Thomas Boardman, his benefactor and lately his agent, had been inside the studio for twenty minutes, each second ticked off by the camelback clock on the sideboard and the skitter of Stefan’s nerves.
Something’s in there. Something I can’t remember. Something I’m not sure I want to know about.
Dread squirmed in his belly like a colony of maggots, nearly as bad as the morning he’d refused to set foot in Marius’s plane on that last fateful Vegas trip. Don’t be an idiot. The studio can’t very well crash and burn on the hillside. Thomas was in no danger. Only Stefan’s artistic vision and livelihood—not to mention his sanity—were at risk this time.
A trio of crows rose, cawing, from the tree outside the studio door, and Stefan leaned forward, balancing on the balls of his bare feet, his fingernails jabbing his palms. Please. God, please. But when Thomas stepped out into the drizzle and frowned at the sky, brushing at the shoulders of his black duster, he was empty-handed. Stefan sank onto his heels, shoulders slumped, and let his forehead fall against the chilly windowpane with a thump.
He slid his left hand out of his pocket and uncurled it. In the gray light, a splotch of cobalt winked at him from the crease at the base of his ring finger, a sly flicker hinting he’d done something last night other than simply pass out. Stupid of him to believe a spot of paint. Doubly stupid to believe in the welling apprehension, the anxious certainty that something had happened in that studio during the dark missing hours.
At the first slap of Thomas’s shoes on the porch, Stefan opened the door, tugging it past the warped spot on the floor, then stood aside like an unkempt butler.
Thomas took one look at him and laughed. “Good morning, Merry Sunshine. A bit hungover, are we?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” Stefan didn’t remember drinking any more than he remembered anything else, although a bender might explain why his eyes burned and his skull felt too small to contain his brain. Headache didn’t begin to describe it.
Thomas sailed past Stefan, trailing a too-heavy cloud of L’Homme. Marius’s cologne. The scent didn’t blend well with the smoke from the woodstove or the inescapable smell of paint solvent clinging to Stefan’s clothing. Thomas’s scarf, fringed silk in delicate lemon, mocked his pale-blond hair, turning it drab and colorless, although it complemented the pastel pink of his bald spot.
Stefan dropped his gaze to the floor and contemplated his bare toes while contempt warred with gratitude in his chest. Thomas was a nice guy. Generous, as Stefan had ample reason to be thankful for. But he obviously had a picture in his head of himself as the successful gallery owner, entrepreneur, influencer—in other words, Marius—that he wasn’t able to pull off. It made him a bit pathetic, and Stefan was embarrassed for him on his behalf.
Stop it. Don’t be an ungrateful asshole.
After all, if it weren’t for his chance encounter with Thomas, who’d remembered him from one of Marius’s gallery galas, Stefan would still be living in his dead car in the parking lot behind Karla’s Krab Korner, waiting for those Vegas goons to extract from his flesh what they couldn’t get from his wallet. Thomas’s unexpected offer of patronage, complete with studio, room, board, and unlimited art supplies, had seemed like a gift from the art gods.
But with each visit to the cabin, Thomas borrowed one more trick, one more affectation, from Marius. Marius’s cologne, Marius’s coat—Marius’s scarf color, for God’s sake. As if he were auditioning for the part of Marius now that Marius was dead and couldn’t fill the role himself.
“Hair of the dog?” Thomas held up the bottle of Scotch from the sideboard.
Stefan’s stomach rebelled at the suggestion. “God, no.”
Thomas’s colorless eyebrows rose an inch, but he shrugged and set the bottle down. “Your choice, of course. Groceries are on the porch. Here’s your mail.” Thomas pulled a handful of envelopes out of the inner pocket of his coat and tossed them onto the kitchen island counter. “I stowed the art supplies in the studio. Good thing I made it up here today. You were getting low.”
Stefan’s breath caught. Supplies. He’d used supplies. “Did you . . . Was there . . .” Ask him, you cowardly piece of shit. “Did you like . . . it?”
“The new painting? Yes, indeed.” Thomas’s round face creased in a smile.
Stefan took his first deep breath of the day. The studio held a painting. He clenched his left fist around the tiny blot of blue that hadn’t lied after all. “I wasn’t sure if anything—” He coughed to cover his near-confession. “I mean, if it was ready. You didn’t bring it out.”
>
“It’s dry. Ready to go. But I didn’t want to carry it outside in the rain.”
“Oh.” How can it be dry when I only painted it last night? Except somehow they always were. Even the first ones, the ones Thomas didn’t know about. The ones Stefan refused to think about. The ones that terrified him so much he couldn’t enter the studio in daylight. “Of course not.”
“I’ve got some waterproof wraps in the Caddy. I’ll collect it before I go.” Thomas patted Stefan’s shoulder, his touch lingering just a shade too long, and Stefan forced himself not to pull away. “Don’t worry. I’m sure we’ll sell something soon.”
Stefan didn’t flinch at the condescension in Thomas’s tone. Hell, he’d jettisoned his pride two years ago on his first visit to a pawn shop. “I’ll pay you back first thing. For the supplies, the food, the rent. Everything.”
“I’m sure we’ll come to a mutually acceptable arrangement.” Thomas chuckled and gave Stefan’s shoulder another squeeze, then—thankfully—released him and stepped back. “As they say, I know where you live.” He pulled on a pair of leather driving gloves. Marius’s brand. “Could you manage two more by the end of next week?”
Stefan’s belly roiled at the idea of entering the studio. He squeezed his fist tighter, clutching the stray dot of paint like a talisman. “I . . . don’t know. I’ll try.”
“Excellent. I have big, big plans for November.” Thomas waggled his nearly invisible eyebrows and bustled out. Ten minutes later, his black Cadillac purred past the cabin on the way down the hill.
Shivering in the damp chill of the morning, the wooden slats of the porch rough against his feet, Stefan asked himself what he would do if Thomas took that last step into Marius’s empty shoes and added Marius’s lover to his list of must-have accessories. He clamped his lips shut against a surge of nausea. Man up, Stefan. You’ll do what you must. You owe him whatever he cares to ask for. Because thanks to Thomas, Stefan was finally painting again.
Even if he couldn’t remember a single brushstroke.
The Artist's Touch Page 1
