Tokyo Heist

by Diana Renn

  I need a Big Thing, to make my dad and Edge and everyone else finally notice me. Suddenly, it’s not enough to find a lead or two on the van Gogh case. I want to find that art.

  And Edge and I could solve this mystery together, just like Kyo and Mika.

  “I thought the band’s song was kind of depressing, you know?” Edge is saying. “But Mardi convinced me it’s actually atmospheric, kind of mysterious.”

  “Speaking of mysterious, here’s a mystery. A real one.” I set down the comics, and I tell him everything that went down last night.

  “Zounds!” he exclaims when I’m done. “And you’re really going to Japan next week?”

  “No joke.” I take out my sketchbook and show Edge the characters I was working on last night—the Scarf, Sockeye, the Cormorant. I explain how their real-life counterparts might be suspects. “But Skye Connolly is the prime suspect in my mind.”

  Edge studies my pictures. “Yeah, maybe she used your dad to get a job with the Yamadas and get access to their private collection. Now she has the art. She doesn’t need your dad. So she ditches him and plans her getaway. Which she’ll finance with her ‘cash windfall.’”

  “Exactly!” I smile. I love how talking to Edge always feels like building something.

  Edge is looking at my sketches. “These are really good, by the way.”

  “Thanks.” I smile wider. “So. Where do we start looking for clues?”

  “We?” Edge puts down my sketchbook. “You said the FBI was on the case.”

  “They are. But does that mean we can’t look for the drawings or tail a suspect?”

  “We don’t have police badges. We can’t get search warrants. We can’t wiretap phones. We can’t analyze forensic evidence. Hell’s bells, we can’t even drive!”

  “That’s all TV and movie stuff. There are other ways to look for stolen art. Plus, it’s not against the law to look for lost objects if you’re a concerned citizen.”

  “I guess not.” Edge looks doubtful.

  “Did I mention the Yamadas are offering a one hundred thousand–dollar reward?”

  “Crikey. That’s a lot of dough.”

  “It is.” Edge’s family, like mine, does not exactly have a lot of extra money lying around; he’s going to camp on scholarship. “Think of the film equipment you could buy.”

  He tips his head. He seems to be thinking.

  “And if we recovered the van Gogh drawings, drawings that most of the world hasn’t seen, it would be a really big deal for the art world. It’s important.”

  Edge is looking at me intently now. “Okay. I’m in. You have to get to that meeting at the Yamadas’ house this Sunday, with your dad. View the crime scene. Ask questions. And we need to get on Skye’s trail. See if she’s up to anything suspicious. Where did you say she worked?”

  “Some art conservation firm in Belltown. I’ll look it up.”

  On the computer, only one link comes up for art conservation in this small downtown neighborhood. Moore and Leavey Fine Art Conservation, on First Avenue and Virginia.

  Edge jots the address on a sticky note.

  Jerry opens his office door with a bang. He stands in the doorway, Big Gulp in hand. “This guy again?” He glares at Edge. “Violet, didn’t I talk to you just last week about your friends hanging out here? If they’re not buying, they have to go.” He waves at Edge. “Bye-bye.”

  “There aren’t any customers here. I’m getting the restock done.”

  “Are you working or are you wasting time gabbing?” Jerry demands.

  I look past him, at the racks. At Superman. At all the other heroes flying on covers, punching through barriers, slashing at bad guys with swords or ray guns, with waves of energy. With webs. I think of Kimono Girl, and how I want her to be really tough.

  “Actually, neither.” I set down the box cutter. “I’m quitting.”

  8

  I’m not sure how much we accomplished by following Skye around downtown Seattle all afternoon, but least Edge didn’t talk about Mardi. And it was fun.

  As Edge sits down at his computer later that same day and uploads the video from his camera, I sit in a chair beside him and reluctantly slide the blonde wig off my head. I’m almost sorry our stakeout is over. I loved feeling like somebody else.

  While Edge connects the video camera to the computer and starts the upload, I comb out the tangled wig with my fingers and mentally replay our day.

  After I walked out of Jet City Comics, Edge and I hopped a bus downtown. We camped out at a Tully’s Coffee across the street from Moore and Leavey Conservation. Near lunchtime, Skye came into the Tully’s and ordered a drink. She was carrying a large black portfolio case tucked under one arm, with a brown portfolio peeking out from the top. “Mitsue said the drawings were in a portfolio!” I whispered. “And that brown one in there looks old, doesn’t it?”

  Edge whipped out his camcorder, and we were on her tail fast. We followed Skye down Pine Street and into Pike Place Market, pretending we were tourists in case she happened to turn and notice us with a camera.

  She stopped in a seating area to eat a sandwich wrap and to call someone on her cell. Then we followed her several blocks to First and University, and into the Seattle Art Museum. We pooled our money and bought two student-rate tickets. We checked all the galleries and exhibit halls, but we’d lost her. Then Edge spotted her going down the escalator to the lobby . . . without the big black portfolio case. Then she hurried back to her office.

  “I burned you a DVD.” Edge hands me a jewel case. “Let’s see if we got anything.”

  Clip by clip, we go through the footage on his computer and relive our stakeout. We grin at each other when we discover the audio feed picked up her phone conversation.

  “Do you think they’ll offer that much?” Skye says with a mouthful of sandwich. “Anything less, it’s just not worth all the work that I . . . Okay, then, wish me luck!”

  In the next scene, Skye passes the magazine stand on First and Pike. I lean forward. I notice two Japanese men in blue raincoats. One man is thin, the other stocky. They duck behind a magazine rack when she passes, then emerge and follow her down First Avenue.

  “Edge, these guys were near Margo’s gallery last night. For two hours.”

  “At your dad’s show?”

  “No. They just stood in the rain by their car. A green Prius. I saw them during the reception, near an alley, and I saw them across from the gallery when my dad and I were leaving. I don’t think it’s a coincidence we got them on film today. Let’s go back to the beginning.”

  We review all the footage. This time, I keep an eye out for the men. Sure enough, a green Prius drives down Pine Street as Skye heads to the Market. It passes Skye slowly, then parks on Pine. Two men in blue raincoats get out. In the Market, I glimpse the men again as Skye goes to buy her sandwich; they’re at a booth of Native American tribal art, inspecting a mask of a raven. Then we forward to the museum. The men show up again in the museum lobby. There we can see them more clearly as they linger by the escalator. The tall, stocky man has ears that stick out, and it looks like his nose has been broken. The short, thin guy has an angry rash on his cheeks, either a flaming case of acne or scars from God knows what.

  “You think they were following us?” Edge asks.

  “No. I think they were following Skye. Hey, what’s weird about the short guy’s hand?”

  Edge hits some buttons on the keyboard and zooms in close. I clap my hands to my mouth. Now we can see that the shorter man, holding a coffee cup, is missing most of his pinky finger on his left hand. Only a stub remains. I get chills.

  As Skye heads out of the museum, the men follow. But outside the door they go left when she goes right, veering toward the Hammering Man sculpture and disappearing by the sculpture’s enormous iron f
oot. They do not appear again.

  Edge drums his fingers on the desk. “This is big, V. Really big.”

  “Seriously, right? We have evidence on film that these guys were following Skye. Oh my God. Remember I said someone broke a window at my dad’s house yesterday?”

  “Yeah. You think those guys did it?”

  “No. I think Skye did.”

  “How could she get to Fremont so fast and break a window?”

  “We stopped to get gas. She might have had just enough time.”

  “But why would she try to break into his house? Why not just walk in?”

  “Because my dad never gave her a key. He has commitment issues. Edge.” I clutch his arm. “Listen. I think that Skye had hidden the stolen van Gogh drawings in my dad’s house. For safekeeping. Then, when they broke up, she hurried over there to retrieve them.”

  “Wait, you really think your dad could have unknowingly had van Goghs in his house?”

  “The place looks like an art supply store exploded. I bet he doesn’t know what he has. It’s the perfect hiding place for art.”

  Edge nods. “So maybe these guys in the Prius are undercover policemen, trying to get enough evidence to arrest Skye.”

  “They don’t look like policemen to me. Especially the guy with the missing finger.”

  “What kind of villains wear REI gear and drive an eco-friendly hybrid car?”

  “I don’t know. But I think they knew Skye had cleaned Kenji’s van Gogh drawings. I bet they knew or suspected that she stole the art, and now they want to steal it from her. That’s why they were hanging around outside the art reception last night: because they were tailing her.”

  “If they had their suspicions, why wouldn’t they intercept her and grab the portfolio when she was walking around with it today?”

  “Broad daylight. Too obvious.”

  Edge nods. “Okay. But last night, if they followed Skye to your dad’s reception, why didn’t they just demand the drawings then? Or later, when she broke into your dad’s house?”

  “Maybe she was never alone long enough. And that big fight with my dad could have thrown them. Maybe she went over there so fast they couldn’t catch up.”

  Edge replays the final image of the two men on the screen as they turn toward Hammering Man, leaving the frame. “Why would they follow her all the way to the museum and then stop?”

  “Because she left the portfolio there,” I say. “Maybe she met someone and handed it over, either in an exhibit somewhere or in an office.”

  “We have to find out who Skye left them with.”

  “How? Just knock on some office doors and ask for them? ‘Excuse me, did a woman with a cormorant tattoo give you anything to sell anything on the black market recently?’”

  “You’re right. That’s ridiculous.” Edge sighs. “Museums have good security. It’d be much harder for those guys to break into SAM and steal the drawings from there. Besides, if Skye took the drawings to a museum, and everyone in the city knows about this art theft, she probably wanted the art to get returned.”

  I sit up straighter. “Yeah, maybe her ‘cash windfall’ had something to do with getting that reward money! Maybe she pulled off this whole stunt as a scam, and she’s having someone else return the drawings for her. Maybe they’ll split the reward.”

  Edge snaps his fingers. “An inside job. With someone working at SAM.”

  I think for a moment. “But why are we assuming Skye’s going to turn in the art? What if her connection at the museum is really someone who will sell it to the black market and split the money with her?”

  “That’s a great theory, Violet. You know what? I think you’re a natural sleuth.”

  “Really?” Am I imagining it, or is he now leaning a millimeter closer to me?

  My heart is beating so fast, I’m sure he can hear it. He has a funny, soft look on his face, like he might be about to zoom in. To me. His lips part. His breath feels warm.

  I lean closer to Edge. The case of the missing art fades away. For a moment, there is only Edge’s face, tilting toward mine, and the cool green of his eyes.

  Taps at the door. We jerk away from each other.

  “Edge? I need a word with you.”

  Chikuso! When did Mrs. Downey get home from work?

  “Okay, Mom. Just a sec.”

  “Now. It’s important.”

  Edge sighs and pushes his chair back. “Fine.”

  I pop the DVD Edge burned for me into a jewel case while he and his mom talk in the hall.

  “Edge, I don’t want you two in there with the door closed. It’s inappropriate.”

  “But Mom—”

  “And frankly, I don’t feel comfortable with you entertaining her here when nobody’s home. You and Mardi have been spending lots of time in there these past few days.”

  “Mom. Give it a rest, okay? Mardi’s not here. It’s Violet.”

  “Oh!” Mrs. Downey’s tone completely changes. I mean, completely. You’d think the sun had just burst through the clouds and unicorns were dancing over rainbows. “Hello, Violet!”

  “Hi.” I can barely manage to croak that one word. Edge’s tone of voice said it all. I’m not the kind of girl his mom has to worry about. I’m not a temptation. I’m safe.

  Worse, yesterday evening’s little tutorial session with Mardi was not the first. She and Edge have hung out before. At his house. In his room.

  When Edge comes back in, I’m standing up, slinging my backpack over one shoulder.

  “Whoa. Rewind. I missed something.”

  The words fly out. “How long have you been hanging out with Mardi? It wasn’t just last night. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “See, you are mad. I knew it. Why did you tell me you were fine with it, if you’re not?”

  “I didn’t think you guys would actually be friends.”

  “She’s not that bad, Violet. You two just had some misunderstanding. You should talk.”

  “You’re the one with the misunderstanding. She’s getting you to do all this stuff for her to make her look good at film camp. She’s using you. And then she’s going to ditch you.” I hear my next words as if I’m floating up by the ceiling, but I can’t stop myself. “Her friends think it’s this big joke, that she’s hanging with Spielberg. They’re all cracking up over it.”

  Edge steps back as if I’ve slapped him. His face flushes.

  This is the worst thing I’ve ever said to him. To anyone. But now my nasty, hideous words sit there between us, like an ugly rock hurled through a window.

  He gives me a long look. “I get it. You just don’t want me to make new friends.”

  “What?”

  “It’s easier for you, isn’t it, if I’m always available. Good old reliable Edge. He’ll show up at a moment’s notice. He’ll be a sounding board for all your ideas. He’ll bring you coffee. He’ll film your suspect.”

  “Look, if you don’t want to help me solve this mystery, then don’t. Nobody’s forcing you to do anything.”

  “So you don’t want my help?”

  “I don’t. I can do this on my own.”

  “That’s what you want?”

  “That’s what I want. Go to film camp with Mardi. Have a nice summer.”

  “Fine. I will.”

  “Fine.”

  “Great.”

  I run out the door, out of the house, past Mrs. Downey, whose mouth drops in astonishment. I run all the way to the bus stop, imagining I’m Kimono Girl, running so fast she becomes airborne, surrounded by radial speed lines and sparks.

  9

  Sunday morning, the brakes complain as my dad coaxes the Volvo down a steep private drive. I should be excited as my dad pulls up beside an iron gate. Soon I’ll be
viewing a real crime scene. But mostly I feel nauseated. I can’t stop replaying my fight with Edge.

  I haven’t even wanted to think about the van Gogh mystery since then. After I got back to my dad’s on Friday evening, I cried for a couple of hours, trying to figure out how a great day with Edge turned so ugly so fast. I don’t know how we’ll ever erase the mean things we both said and start over.

  Eventually, I escaped into Kimono Girl, a story I could control. I picked up on page eleven. I managed to storyboard four more pages. In my story, a van Gogh painting called Sunrise Bridge is swiped off the wall of the Seattle Art Museum. The suspected thief is a notorious Seattle art criminal, the Cormorant, so called because she always leaves a sketch of a cormorant behind, the curved neck shaped like a question mark.

  Kimono Girl resolves to catch her. She hides in the museum paintings, studying the people who work there, thinking this might be an inside job. She gradually begins to suspect a freelance conservator named Kara Mirant, who comes and goes at odd times, always lingering in the gallery of nineteenth-century European paintings. One day, KG follows Kara to her studio in Belltown to look for clues. She watches Kara work at a drafting table late into the night, then leave, walking briskly down to Alaskan Way and the piers. She follows the art conservator onto Pier 43, then gasps as she morphs into the Cormorant and flies out over Elliott Bay. Now KG knows she has to find that painting. And she’s dying to see what Kara was working on at that drafting table.

  Well, KG wouldn’t sit in a car gaping at a fancy house. Neither would Kyo and Mika in Vampire Sleuths. They’d all get inside to view the crime scene and start asking questions. Just because Edge is off the case doesn’t mean I should quit, too. I don’t have much time left. My mom gave her permission for me to go to Japan, and we’re leaving in just four days.