Ghost Sickness

by Amber Foxx

  Don’t crowd her, his mother had said.

  I don’t crowd her.

  Yes you do, love, you’re like a crowd all by yourself. Trust me. You take up a lot of space.

  Before writing his message to Mae, Jamie scanned the ones he’d received. Seeing one from Melody alarmed him. Had she asked Mae to find Zak’s secret? Was it bad?

  To his relief, the message was “The Chino sisters rock!” followed by a link to some YouTube videos. The first was of Misty and another young woman fire dancing. The second video showed Melody talking with her mother’s band in an art gallery, then stepping up to the mic and easing into the country classic “Crazy.” Melody was performing. After all these years. He turned up the volume, cherishing the way her rich contralto caressed the song. Singing transformed her, bringing out her beauty and power.

  Wishing he could have been there, Jamie applauded so loudly at the end that Gasser laid his ears back and thudded down from his lap. “Sorry, mate.” Jamie stooped to pet him, then called Melody. She couldn’t have gone to sleep yet, not after something this exciting.

  His friend answered her phone almost the second it rang. He showered her with praise, added a good word about Misty’s performance, and asked, “What did Zak think of your song? Did you dedicate it to him?”

  “He wasn’t there. He got called for a fire.”

  “Too bad he didn’t hear you.” Jamie drank his beer, belched as quietly as possible, and ate a handful of nuts. “Everything all right with you two? Couldn’t tell by your choice of song.”

  “It wasn’t ‘Your Cheating Heart.’ ”

  “Is that good, then? I mean—I hate to ask, but did you have Mae find out what he’s up to?”

  “Hang on.” Melody spoke aside with Misty, muffled, as if she’d covered her phone, and then came back to him. “How would you feel if someone was pirating your music?”

  “Bloody hell. Where did that come from?”

  “Just answer me.”

  “I’d be pissed. What’s that got to do with Zak? Fuck. Is that what’s going on?”

  “No. This is a what-if. What if someone was pirating it and you were about to die any day?”

  “That’s gloomy. I don’t like to talk about death.”

  “I’m serious, Pudge. I need to know what you’d feel.”

  Reluctantly, Jamie imagined being old and sick, close to the end, and hearing about the piracy. “Don’t think I’d care. Be more pissed off at the inconsiderate idiot who told me. When you’re dying, it’s time to deal with big stuff. Your soul. Your family. Not crap like that. All I’d want is love. People. As long as I didn’t die alone, not much else would matter.”

  Melody had another side conversation with Misty and came back. “Okay, you passed the quiz. Here’s why I gave it to you. Mae did some psychic work for me. I know you didn’t want me to ask her, but listen before you get mad. She thinks Reno’s been forging his teacher’s work. Not copies. Fake originals in her style. And that Zak’s been helping him get them to a gallery.”

  “Bloody hell. Is she sure?”

  “Not quite. But it explains a lot and I believe it. Having Zak as the middleman would put some distance between Reno and the gallery. Make it harder to trace. It was an awful thing to do, but I don’t want them to get caught. It would be a disaster for Zak. So many people count on him and look up to him. We agreed not to tell anybody, since we think Reno’s stopped doing it.”

  “Mae agreed to this?”

  “She didn’t argue with it.”

  “She takes time to think about stuff. Don’t think that meant she agreed.”

  “Of course she would. We couldn’t talk more because I had to start my song.”

  “Did you talk with her after?”

  “No. She danced with this older guy—” Melody paused for an interruption from Misty. “Chuck Brady. And then she went to see her father and his partner at some other gallery. I guess she went home after that or did something with them. She didn’t make it back for Misty’s dancing.”

  “Fuck.”

  “What’s wrong? You don’t think she’d turn them in, do you?”

  “Dunno. She’s got a different horse in the race than you do. Her dad’s partner is real close to Orville’s first wife. If Niall wouldn’t like it—and I don’t think he would—and if he thought his friend wouldn’t like it—fuck.” Jamie chugged more beer and got up to fetch his cat. Sitting with Gasser in his lap again, he petted him and tried to calm his thoughts. “Zak could be in trouble.”

  “You’re scaring me. How can we help him?”

  “I have no fucking idea.” Stealing someone’s creative identity was appalling. Outside of the near-death scenario, Jamie would be outraged if it happened to him. He was disappointed in Zak, in all of them, especially Reno, but at the same time he didn’t want to see their lives destroyed. He didn’t want to see Niall hurt, either. “I need to talk to someone who can think.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Sorry. I meant someone calm, y’know? Logical. But it can’t be Mae or my parents until I know what to do. Everyone’s connected, like six degrees of Niall Kerrigan.”

  “Maybe you should talk to Mae. Find out if she told him.”

  “I’d wake her up. It has to be an emergency, if I call at night.”

  “Pudge! This is Zak’s life. That’s not an emergency? I’ll call her if you won’t.”

  “Sorry. You’re right.” Jamie suspected he would only make things worse, but so would Melody. “I’ll do it. Get back to you in a bit.”

  Anxious, Jamie finished his beer and got up for another. Somehow, he was going to have to be his own calm person to talk to. If he wasn’t going to fuck things up, he needed to know what he was talking about before he called. He returned to his laptop and googled “penalties for art forgery.”

  Bloody hell. No wonder they’d been so paranoid.

  Where the damage caused by a person convicted of forgery amounts to more than $20,000, the defendant is guilty of a second-degree felony. (N. M. Stat. Ann. §30-16-10.) A person convicted of a second degree felony faces a possible prison sentence of up to nine years in prison, a fine of $10,000, or both. (N. M. Stat. Ann. §31-18-15.)

  He found an article about copyright law and creativity. It was in legal language so hard to follow he had to read it out loud to wade through it, but he understood enough of it to worry. If Reno hadn’t copied anything, he hadn’t violated his teacher’s copyright on her work, so a prosecutor would have to prove he had done his in-the-style-of works with intent to defraud. Obviously he had, if he’d signed her name. There were cases in which forgers had altered the work of innocent, unknown artists to pass for masters, but he would have a hard time claiming that had happened. In short, Reno was fucked.

  So was Zak, and by extension so were Melody and the twins. And David’s mother, David, and Shelli. What would happen to Star if both her parents went to jail? They could get caught with the stolen parrots as well as the forgery scheme if someone raided the gallery, adding a third degree felony, punishable by up to three years in prison. Would it get tacked on to the nine? Star would be a teenager by the time Shelli was free. Letitia couldn’t afford the fines or the jail time, either. And if Will got caught, there went the money he owed Montana. It would go to lawyers, to fines, to restitution.

  No wonder Melody had given Jamie that quiz. She wanted him to side with her and not the artist Reno had exploited. What a choice. Especially after Jamie had promised to help the dying woman go in peace.

  *****

  Feeling hopeless and confused, Mae kept walking long after leaving Niall and Marty at the Brady and Brady office. The law practice dealt in property and real estate, not criminal law, but Chuck and Daphne knew and had contacted people in the field, and they had a library of law books.

  Mae hadn’t objected to being excluded from the meeting. It could only have made her feel worse. She’d put things in motion, done what she thought was right for Florencia, but the process was more
complicated than she’d imagined, with greater consequences. Going back to Art Hop was out of the question. Much as she wanted to watch Misty’s fire dancing, she wasn’t ready to tell Melody the turn things had taken. Instead, Mae walked up Foch from the law office, along Third Street past the library and the back of the Civic Center, and down the commercial corridor of Date Street to Ralph Edwards Park, where she paced along the river bank, hoping to calm her heart and clear her head.

  Earlier in the evening while she’d danced with Chuck, she had been so worried about what to say to Niall, she’d barely been able to focus on Melody’s great moment. She’d hugged Melody at the end of her song, said goodbye, and walked to Rio Bravo Fine Art to find Niall and Marty. Dreading to bring Niall such a problem, she’d tried to come up with a solution on her way, a plan to end the forgeries and get them off the market.

  The Art Hop crowd had filled the front room on the street level, socializing and viewing the newest exhibit, so Niall had taken her and Marty up to the second floor where they could be more private, surrounded by Delmas Howe's blossoms and cowboys, Dave Barnett's fields of flowers, and Florencia Mirabal’s Acoma scenes.

  When Mae finished sharing her suspicions, Niall clenched his fists and turned to one of Florencia’s paintings, an image of the ancient staircase, full of shadows and shapes that might have been people, or spirits, or splashes of rain. “Reno. Damn him. This would break her heart. And make her furious. Especially if her family is part of it. I hope you’re wrong. But—” He hissed a sigh through gritted teeth. “I hate to say it—you could be right. It makes a lot more sense than stealing. Every detail fits.”

  Eager to relieve him a little, she offered her plan. “We can stop them, though, can’t we? If we get an expert to the Chavez-Mirabal gallery to identify the fakes. Alan Pacheco would have a reason to ask to see the family’s collection. He’s got the Eight Northern Pueblos show this weekend, but if he could go Monday—”

  “Slow down.” Niall faced her. “He may know her work, but that doesn’t mean he could tell a good fake from the real thing. Reno spent two years with her. His forgeries could be excellent. She might even have had him copy her work to teach him. They have you do that in art school—copy the masters. When I was in college, I had to go to museums in Boston for practice.” He broke off when a lone woman appeared and began browsing, and then resumed more quietly. “We’d need to hire an authenticator. They look at brushstrokes, look at the way she layers the paint. Morellian analysis. Every artist has a signature beyond their name, if that makes sense. And there are other methods where they find hair and dust and things in the paint that help prove it’s the artist’s work.”

  Mae’s hopes for a simple solution collapsed. “Seriously? Like DNA?”

  Niall nodded. “I have no idea how long it takes to get an appointment or what it costs, but that’s the only way you can prove what’s what. There are also radioactive fingerprints that you can embed in your work, but she wouldn’t have done that when she was in college. We need an authenticator.”

  In the silence while the woman contemplated paintings nearby, Mae studied the prices on Florencia’s work—the highest in the gallery. She could see why Reno had been tempted. One Mirabal was worth more than Mae earned in a year.

  These paintings were as big as the ones in Florencia’s living room, around four feet high. The ones in the Chavez-Mirabal gallery had been much smaller, probably in keeping with the size of the artist’s early works, and also small enough to transport easily. They might cost less, but then again Kathy might talk collectors into high prices to make her part with these family treasures.

  How many had she already sold? Reno hadn’t seemed to be rolling in wealth, but he was smart enough to hide it except for buying Misty’s ring.

  On top of being ignorant about authenticating art, Mae hadn’t even thought about the paintings that had been sold when she’d come up with her plan. Was it even possible to authenticate them? That went beyond stopping the sales and into some sort of investigation.

  When the woman left, Marty asked, “Wouldn’t the authenticator need one of Reno’s paintings to compare his brushstrokes with Florencia’s?”

  “If we want to prosecute him,” Niall said.

  “Prosecute?” For a second, Mae felt as if her heart had stopped. “Not just get them to stop selling?”

  “Art fraud is a crime,” Niall said. “If someone was forging my work, I’d take them to court. So, who has one of Reno’s paintings? He never had a show, and he took them out of Florencia’s house, even the memorial to Violet.”

  Mae had already checked with Misty. She had nothing. “He took his tabletop out of Passion Pie, and he claimed all his sales were to tourists.” She thought of Refugio Baca’s truck but couldn’t bring herself to mention it.

  Marty spoke up. “His daddy must have a ton of Reno’s work. Heck, I still have a birthday card Mae drew me when she was in kindergarten. He’s bound to have kept things. Of course, he might not want to help you catch Reno in a crime. Or believe he did it.”

  Niall winced. “I wouldn’t suggest it to him unless we had proof.”

  They took a quiet moment as a group of visitors came in to look at the paintings. Niall spent the time texting. Who was he contacting? Authenticators? Some kind of investigator?

  Although Mae understood why Niall was taking this route, she felt guilty for starting it—but if she hadn’t told him her concerns, she would have felt even worse.

  Two trim middle-aged men excused themselves, asking to get closer to the painting Mae was standing by, and she stepped back. She didn’t recognize them as local, and they dressed more fashionably than the average T or C resident in midsummer. Even their haircuts looked expensive. They stood shoulder to shoulder, and one spoke in a confiding tone to his companion. “It might be the best time to buy, if we’re going to acquire a Mirabal. I heard someone downstairs say she’s terminally ill. God knows what the price will hit after she dies.”

  Mae had a troubling image of the whole group of scammers going through their inventory of forgeries and tallying up the potential profits from Florencia’s death. Could they be that cold? Wouldn’t that bother them? Reno especially would have to be disturbed by it. Even if he’d ceased to love her, he had known her well. He had probably started forging her work when she’d been healthy and not thought beyond the money and the present moment.

  As the well-dressed men began to debate their choice between two paintings, Niall answered his phone, told someone he was on his way, and said in an undertone, “We’d better finish this conversation outside.”

  Walking toward the Brady and Brady office, Niall explained that Daphne had contacted a law school friend, a criminal lawyer who specialized in art fraud. Mae froze. “Criminal lawyer? Can’t you just get them to quit?”

  They were in front of the Ellis building. Niall nodded toward the old neon sign on the roof displaying the healer’s name. “Mae. Would you claim you were the reincarnation of Magnolia? Try to make money off her?”

  “Of course not. I’d be lying. And I’m good enough on my own. Not as good as her, but I wouldn’t need to lay claim to her. Anyway, it wouldn’t be fair to her spirit. Her memory.”

  “And that’s how Reno should have thought as an artist. I don’t want to distress Flo at this point in her life by telling her, especially when we haven’t got proof yet, but if Reno betrayed her the way you think he did, she’d want him to pay for it. And if her family was involved, she’d want them to pay for it, too. She may die before we can sort this out, but I’ll owe it to her spirit to see it through.”

  “Are you sure? I mean, if you don’t ask her ...”

  “I know her. She’s not interested in last-minute forgiveness. Anyway, whatever I decide to do, Daphne says I can’t let you in on it. It has to be between me and the art fraud lawyer.” Niall glanced at Marty. “And your father. We don’t keep anything from each other.”

  Marty put his arm around Mae’s shoulders. “Noth
ing against you, baby. You know that.”

  “I know.” Of course they couldn’t include her. She had already compromised whatever steps they might take by telling her suspicions to the Chino sisters.

  Mae walked with Niall and Marty in near silence the rest of the way to the law office. On her long walk that followed, her thoughts and feelings seesawed, torn between a sense of justice for Florencia and fear for what might happen to the people who had exploited her art. Will concerned Mae the most. He was her healing client, a man who had messed up but was trying to turn his life around.

  They probably hadn’t thought about their punishment any more clearly than she had when she’d set them up for it. What was it going to be, if they got caught? She turned toward home. The answer might not reassure her, but she had to look it up.

  Her phone rang as she drew near her house. Jamie. At least he didn’t know this latest development. Or had he talked to Melody?

  His words rushed out. “Did you tell Niall?”

  Mae took a deep breath and let it out. “I’m sorry. I had to. Reno’s teacher is his friend. And Niall is family.”

  “You know Reno could go to jail for nine fucking years?”

  “I was gonna look it up. Are you sure it’s that bad?” Jamie tended to scramble numbers and letters. She wanted to think he’d read it wrong.

  “Yeah, I’m sure. Got it right in front of me. What’s Niall going to do?”

  “I don’t know.” Mae turned in at her driveway and realized her legs were shaking as she climbed the porch steps. Was this what Jamie felt like when he had panic attacks? She dropped into a metal chair. “He’s got to check it all out before he tells his friend. It could take a long time. She’ll probably die before they can prove anything. But he can’t tell me his plans. It’s between him and some lawyer Chuck and Daphne found him.”