by Fiona Quinn
Striker’s eyes crinkled at the corner as he gave me that slow simmering smile that makes me melt inside. “Are you afraid I love you because I secreted adrenaline around you?”
I pointed a stern finger. “Don’t make me sound like that.”
He pushed himself over closer to me and touched his nose to mine. “Like what?” he grinned.
“I don’t know…irrational, I guess.”
Striker pulled me into his lap and full-body hugged me. “The very last thing anyone could ever accuse you of being is irrational. But let me remind you. I felt attracted to you when I met you in the hospital. No adrenaline. No cortisol.” He grasped my chin between his fingers and tipped my head back so we could see each other’s face. “My feelings for you were wrong because you and Angel were married. So, of course, I tried to hide them from you.” He kissed the tip of my nose. “When we were sitting at the table in the safe house the very first night we were there to protect you from your stalker, Travis Wilson, and my guys said they hadn’t found the flash drive at one of our target’s houses, you told them they should have looked for it in the bottom of her tampon box. That little blush at saying tampon in front of a bunch of guys, and the triumph in your eyes, knowing you were right, made me want to grab you and kiss you right then and there.”
“Kiss me how?” I asked, wrapping my arms around his neck.
“Something like this.” He leaned me back to take full advantage of my lips and tongue. His lips were cool, and he tasted sweet and yeasty from his beer.
He ended the kiss and lifted me back upright, though I still wanted more. “I promise you, what I was feeling at that moment didn’t include adrenaline or cortisol—just testosterone. And lots of it. As a matter of fact, there were only three times before I told you I was in love with you that I felt adrenaline.” He took my hand and counted these off on my fingers. “When you saved my sister Lynda and my niece Cammy’s lives from the gang members. When you got word that your husband died. And when Travis Wilson attacked you in the park.” He moved to hold my head, so we were looking into each other’s eyes. “Not for one millisecond in any of those scenarios did I have the tiniest thought about sex. All I could think was: I need to keep her safe.”
I heard the words, but I also saw a little thought that looked like it wanted to hide. “But?” I asked.
“But to be perfectly honest, I claimed you from the beginning. I guess it’s the most psychic thing I’ve ever experienced in my life. From the moment I pushed open the door of your hospital room, I knew you were mine, to have and to hold, for better and for worse. I also knew you were already married and deeply in love with Angel, so the ‘to have and to hold’ part was going to be as a friend.” He stared straight into my eyes, straight into my soul. “Chica, I want you to understand how committed I am to my one and only psychic knowing. I will hold only you in my heart, always. And I would never hurt you purposely or break faith with you. Can you understand what I’m saying?”
I nodded and curled myself into his lap. “Your heart is beating faster than normal,” I said with my ear pressed against his chest.
“I’m experiencing an adrenaline, cortisol, testosterone surge right now.”
“Yeah?” I tipped my head back to see him.
“Yeah.”
“Scientists say you would feel better if you took me to bed.”
“Oh, Chica.” He chuckled. “I don’t think I could possibly make it that far.” He flipped me down on the couch and settled between my legs.
Chapter Fourteen
“Got it.” Deep’s voice rose from my cell phone speaker. “Yup, I’ll cover your six. What’s the dress code?”
“Thanks. Urban grad student from a wealthy family,” I said, rifling through the closet, wondering what the heck that actually looked like.
“I am not wearing tweed. Not for you, not for anybody.”
I pulled out a no-fail pair of tailored black pants and reached for a gray angora turtleneck. “All right, I guess. But you know I’d do it for you.”
“When do you need me?”
“We’re supposed to be downtown for an appointment in an hour. I signed out for a Land Cruiser. It’s already in the garage.”
***
I’d been nervous about approaching Martha Schwartz. It felt like treading on Striker’s territory. When I called the Bartholomew Winslow Gallery, I was glad someone else answered the phone. The woman in charge of collecting the Tsukamoto works was one Lacey Stuart, Masters from Georgetown University in Art and Museum Studies, twenty-seven years old and Bartholomew Winslow’s great-niece.
I had explained to Lacey that I was doing a paper about gathering collections for exhibitions for my art history class. I hoped having Deep with me would distract her from any probing questions like where do you go to school?
As Deep adjusted our car in the parking space, I inspected the white marble building with its Corinthian columns and patrician air and had to bolster myself against feeling intimidated. I wrinkled my nose at Deep. “Ready? Your job is to charm the stuffing out of this woman, so she tells me everything I want to know.”
“I thought the phrase was ‘charm the pants off her.’”
I held up a hand. “Not on a first shakedown.”
Deep laughed as he unbuckled his seatbelt.
Lacey Stuart was petite and athletic. She had an accent with the underpinnings of Georgian belle that she had smoothed over with urban chic. She wore a tailored black silk suit; her chunky necklace took up the whole neckline.
“Ms. Stuart, it was kind of you to let me come and talk to you.” I held out my hand, which she shook with a little frown.
“Lacey, please. How did you even come to contact me? Do we have a mutual friend?”
“Actually, I have an Instagram friend in Tokyo who was telling me about an artist that she admires, Dyozo Tsukamoto. When I did a Google search on his art, I realized that Hisako Museum of Modern Art was putting together a retrospective. Such a shame that he died. Oh, look, isn’t that gorgeous?” I moved toward a painting of a mushroom and tilted my head.
I peeked around and saw Deep extend his hand. “I’m Joseph Del Toro.”
My eyes grew wide. Deep had just used his real name in the field.
“You’re kidding.” Lacey laughed, her hand still held in his. “Your name is Joey the Bull? It sounds like something out of a mafia film. Please tell me you don’t kill people for a living.”
Deep flashed his sexiest smile, his eyes dancing. “I don’t go in with that intention, but I make no guarantees.”
She chuckled as if charmed by his wit. If only she knew he was telling her the truth there, too.
“Do people call you Joseph? Joe…?”
“My friends call me Deep.”
I scrubbed my fingers over my eyes. What the heck was he doing?
“Deep?” She shook her head. “There must be a story behind that.”
“Not an interesting one. When I was a kid, I was quiet. My mom used to tell people that ‘still waters run deep.’ And it stuck, the way that kind of thing does in big Italian families.”
I knew that wasn’t true. Deep’s family called him Joey, all except his mom, who called him Joseph Pasquale to distinguish him from all of the other Josephs in the neighborhood.
Lacey took a step closer, still holding his hand. “Do you have a lot of brothers and sisters?”
“Brothers, sisters, cousins, nieces and nephews, dogs, and cats. Our house was always a circus.”
She looked down and smiled as she extracted her hand. “I was an only child and dreamed of living with a big family with all of the noise and commotion. A library was loud compared to my house.”
His gaze scanned the gallery. “So you made up for it by working here?”
Uh-oh. Deep was using his big guns. His chocolate brown eyes filled with laughter, and he blinked his long eyelashes. The sweep of his arm showed off his broad shoulders and pecs. A lesser woman would have melted into a puddle at Deep�
�s feet. I’ve seen it happen. But Lacey seemed to be holding her own.
The door opened, and in walked none other than Martha Schwartz. I turned at an angle so she couldn’t see my face. Deep ducked his head and coughed into his fist.
“Oh, there you are.” Lacey stepped to the side to address Martha. “The engraver sent the invitations over. I’d like you to start stuffing the envelopes and addressing them, please. I have the finalized list on my desk.”
“I’ll take care of it.” Martha turned to the stairs.
“Sorry about that, Deep.” She reached out and touched his arm. “So you had some questions about procuring art for foreign shows and the shipping process.”
“Not me.” He pointed over to me. “Jane wanted to speak with you.”
“Oh.” Lacey covered her disappointment. “Of course, it was Jane who telephoned.” She turned back to Deep with a tentative smile. “Is this a class project you’re working on together?”
“I’m not at the university. Jane’s boyfriend is a good friend of mine, and she was having trouble with her car, so I gave her a lift.”
Nicely done, Deep. You let her know you’re a good guy and that I’m staking no claims in the same breath. I smiled at Deep, but the look he sent back to me wasn’t as pleasant. Deep would have known that Martha was part of Striker’s mission. Whether Deep knew I was at the ball or not was uncertain. But because I commanded this operation, Deep couldn’t tell anyone that I had poked my nose into Striker’s case file. And I hadn’t, really — I didn’t care about Martha. I just cared about the weird coincidences that kept popping up around this artwork. I was sure Deep was worried about me muddying the contact. I’d do my best not to let that happen.
I walked back over. “Yes, I’m writing a paper on how one borrows priceless pieces from various entities in order to put a show together. Since I am mesmerized my Tsukamoto’s work, I thought I would use his retrospective as a case study.”
“Let’s go to my office, so I can pull the file out.” Lacey focused up on Deep’s eyes for a hair’s breadth too long, then reached out and touched Deep’s arm to start him in the same direction. They walked side by side as I trailed behind.
Works for me.
Lacey’s office was impressive by design. Her elaborately carved desk sat at the far end of the room with windows behind and to the right, offering a view of a church and a park. Though two Chippendale chairs rested neatly in front of the desk, Lacey waved her hand graciously toward the sofa and wingback chairs. While we seated ourselves, Lacey moved to a table stacked with several leather folders.
I settled myself in and sent Deep a raised eyebrow. Deep blushed. That got him two raised eyebrows; I couldn’t recall Deep blushing before. He really liked this girl. He wasn’t acting.
Lacey came over and sat between Deep and me, spreading the folder and arranging two photographs of Tsukamoto’s work for us to see. I moved over to give her more room; Deep did not. Boy, was I going to have fun with this on our ride home.
“My first question is, how do you go about finding who owns the pieces that you’re trying to procure?”
“That depends on the age of the pieces and the celebrity of the artist. Since Tsukamoto is a contemporary, we had his files with the pieces listed. There is a company in town named Iniquus whose owner was an avid collector. And all but five of the pieces from the lists were housed in their headquarters.”
“How did you convince the owner to lend them out?”
“Many corporations are willing to do that. Museums will include the lender’s name on the signage and indicate in their print that this was part of, for example, the Iniquus collection. It’s a subtle form of corporate advertisement. People of position align themselves, so an event such as this would bring the right eyes to the Iniquus name.”
“So you approached Iniquus’ owner? How does that work? Do you find someone who makes an introduction for you? Do you cold call?”
“General Elliot is the person who had commissioned Tsukamoto’s work. Out of respect, I approached his office first and found he was on vacation when I made my first inquiries. It seems that he fell ill on his trip and sadly has not returned to the office. I spoke with his partner Colonel Grant, who was amenable as long as we didn’t disrupt business, and as long as we replaced the paintings with other works.”
“Did you meet with Colonel Grant at Iniquus?”
“No, he was traveling. I spoke with him on the phone. The contracts were handled by the lawyers.”
“And you replaced the paintings? What did you replace them with?”
“My contractor arranged for that. They felt that since Iniquus collected Tsukamoto, it would be best to substitute the paintings with works by other Japanese artists. Of course, sculptures and mobiles comprised most of the collection. Those were not replaced.”
“And you were commissioned by the museum itself? That’s your contractor? Did Bartholomew Winslow have a relationship with them already? How does one come about a contract of this magnitude?” I looked up with an encouraging smile from the pad on which I had my prepared questions.
Lacey’s face rearranged itself as she thought through my question. She gave a slight shake to her head, a body language tell. I knew whatever came out of her mouth next would be a seat-of-the-pants answer and not fact. “Bartholomew Winslow has a stellar reputation. I’m sure that the Smithsonian or another like museum recommended us for this opportunity.”
Nope — Lacey had no clue how their name came up as the gallery who should do the collection. Interesting. “After Colonel Grant signed a contract allowing you to borrow the pieces, what happened next?”
“I personally oversaw their removal, packaging, and warehousing. Then placed the new art.”
“Warehousing? Have they not been shipped yet?”
“No, not as of yet. I am still working on obtaining five of the six remaining pieces.”
“Five of the six?”
“One piece in the Iniquus collection is not available. I cannot comment on that, as it pertains to the company’s security.”
I nodded and scribbled dutifully on my pad the way a student would when scratching out notes for a report. “And you need all of them in order to ship?”
“It is cost-effective, and the paperwork is much easier if I consolidate all of the crates into one shipping container rather than sending them piecemeal. And too, I will be going to Japan when the ship is scheduled to arrive, so I can inspect the pieces as they are being curated at the Hisako. So again, it is cost-effective if I only need to make the one trip.”
“Wow, that’s quite a perk, getting to travel around the world.” I smiled.
“Yes, I’m really looking forward to this trip. I will be accompanying Bartholomew Winslow, the founder of this gallery. This is his project.” She gestured toward an oil portrait that hung on the wall least affected by sunlight.
I wandered over to take a closer look, wondering how I was going to get a peek into her files. I wanted a copy of the Iniquus contract. “This was beautifully rendered,” I said, pulling up the art vocabulary my mom used when she taught me how to draw. My eye caught on Winslow’s lapel, where he wore an Assembly pin. Fly away home. Your house is on fire. My sixth sense of knowing flashed in oscillating red letters. A rush of adrenaline sent me momentarily off-balance. I had to step out, widening my stance, to regain my equilibrium.
“Jane?” I heard Deep call and turned my head to see him getting up to help me.
“Ha. I stood up too fast and got a head rush.” I swept my wrist over my brow. Lacey watched us closely as Deep led me to the wingback chair, three steps away.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked. “You’ve lost the color in your face. Perhaps a glass of water?”
“Yes, thank you.”
Lacey left the room. Deep flipped the file open, jerked a camera from his pocket, and snapped pictures of the pages at a frantic speed. “Listen for her footsteps, Lynx,” he said. He finished up and stuck the
camera back in his pocket. His eyes searched over me. “Was that just for show, or did you almost crash to the floor?” There was nothing mild about the worry in his eyes.
Lacey came through the door, balancing a tray. Deep popped up to take it from her, setting it on the coffee table as Lacey swept her leather file out of the way. She poured a glass of iced water for me and handed it over with a napkin.
I took a sip. “Thank you.”
“You look better,” she said as she handed Deep a glass and poured one for herself.
I noticed she had freshened her lipstick and smoothed her long black hair while she was gone. “Yes, thank you for your concern.”
Now that there weren’t three bodies sitting on the couch, Lacey and Deep were no longer thigh to thigh. The two of them jostled around, trying to find the happy medium between close and not too close. After a minute, they seemed to have decided on the appropriate social distance for the occasion. And I could take up my questioning again.
“You said a moment ago, Lacey, that you’re trying to procure five additional pieces. Are they owned by a single person?”
“From what we can tell, there are two owners. One we have been in negotiations with. The other, we are still trying to find the owner’s name.”
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“Tsukamoto’s records indicate that four pieces were commissioned six years ago. They were sent to an address. Our inquiries to the address indicate that the pieces are not housed there.”
“Did they have a forwarding address?”
“The owners said that they never owned Tsukamoto’s art.”
“This is an individual?”
“A corporation. Omega Defense International.”
