The Becić Connection

by Estelle Ryan

I glared at her. “That’s vague.”

  “I know!” She pulled at her braid in mock frustration. “Damn. I wish I could give you more, but I thought Colin would know something about stolen treasures in Croatia.”

  “Are you sure the words used were ‘stolen treasure’ and ‘treasure map’?”

  “Yes to the latter, I don’t know to the former.” She looked up and left. “Treasure! Yup. That’s what she said. Stolen treasure.”

  “She?”

  Bree pressed her full lips together so hard, they formed a thin line. She shook her head. “Nope. Not yet. Hmm-mmm. Please give me time to check out the new guys. You know I know people who know people who can tell us if we can trust that Luka and Zork. Hey! What kind of name is Zork anyway?”

  “Bree.” I paused to give myself time to gather my thoughts. “You know Manny is going to insist on meeting your source. I don’t know Luka and Zork well at all, but I can assume they will too.”

  “No way.” She shook her head so strongly, her braid flew over her shoulder. “You know I don’t reveal my sources.”

  Something in her expression gave me pause. “You think she would be open to speaking to us?”

  “Dammit, Genevieve!” She crossed her arms. “I hate when you read my secret thoughts.”

  I smiled at her agitation. “Then you shouldn’t speak to me.”

  “Yeah, I know.” She uncrossed her arms, rolled her head on her neck and gave a dramatic sigh. “Fine! I’ll ask her. But I’m not making any promises. And I’m only going to ask her after I check out Luka and Zork. Hmph. Zork.”

  “The sooner we have more information, the better.” I gave her a condensed briefing on what had happened to Nikki and Martin. I did, however, withhold any mention of the paintings and Nikki’s work. “I can’t tell you much more. Not without clearing it with Manny first. But I will very likely tell you everything when we see each other tomorrow. You need to bring your source to meet us, Bree.”

  “Dammit.” She nodded. “This is much bigger than a treasure map, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Like how much bigger?”

  I didn’t answer her.

  “Okay. It’s really, really bad then. I’ll get onto it here and I’ll see you tomorrow.” She leaned closer to the camera. “Keep your phone with you, madam.”

  I smiled. “See you tomorrow, Bree.”

  When I got downstairs, Vinnie was putting steaming coffee mugs on the table. In the centre was a large container with what looked like homemade cookies.

  “Doc!” Manny started getting up, then slumped back in his chair. “What the bleeding hell was that?”

  I handed Pink his tablet and sat down next to Colin. He put his hand on my back and rubbed a slow circle. I took a sip of the coffee to give me time to organise my thoughts. “Bree will try to convince her source to speak to us tomorrow.” I turned to Colin. “What do you know about stolen treasures in Croatia?”

  “Hmm.” He relaxed back into his chair and looked at the ceiling for a few seconds. “If we’re talking art, I don’t know of a heist that can be called a treasure. But if we’re talking silver—”

  Manny straightened. “Silver?”

  “Bree said that the treasure map is connected to a stolen treasure.” I looked at Colin. “What do you know?”

  “Well, there is the Seuso Treasure.”

  “That’s the Hungarian name for it.” Zork lowered the cookie he was about to bite into. “We call it Seusovo blago.”

  Colin nodded. “I don’t know a lot about it, but I know that there has been a lot of disagreement between Hungary, Lebanon and Croatia about the ownership.”

  “Disagreement is a soft word for what happened,” Zork said. “When the whole thing started, this was still Yugoslavia. Like you, I also don’t know much about it. The last I heard was that half of the treasure was returned to Hungary.”

  “What is this bloody treasure?” Manny put his empty mug down on the table and nodded his thanks to Vinnie.

  “It’s a hoard of silver objects from the late Roman Empire.” Colin narrowed his eyes and looked at Zork. “Fourteen? Fifteen items?”

  Zork shrugged.

  “Fourteen.” Pink pointed at his tablet. He hid a huge yawn behind both hands. “Sorry guys. It’s been a long-ass day.”

  “That it has.” Luka looked at Pink’s tablet, then at us. “You know, maybe we should call it a day. I’ll take Martin to the hospital for his check-up and you can go to bed. I can see you are all exhausted.”

  He was right. I was exhausted. Not only had it been an excessively stressful day, it had also been a day without my calming routines.

  Pink also immediately agreed while looking at Nikki leaning against his side. “I know you want to look at the paintings, but maybe a few hours of sleep will help you look at it with fresh eyes?”

  “You don’t have to handle me, my handsomest pinkest Pink. I’m way too tired to be all stubborn and ridiculous. I just want to go and fall onto that bed.” She looked at me. “Tomorrow?”

  I nodded.

  “Then that’s that.” Manny saw Martin and the two Croatians out while making the two officers take an oath on the lives of everyone they loved that they would take care of Martin.

  We got up and I reached for my coffee mug, but Vinnie stopped me. “None of that, Jen-girl. I’ll clear the table and get everything spick and span for breakfast. You guys need the rest.”

  “I’ll shout at you tomorrow, big punk.” Nikki hugged Vinnie. “Today, I sleep. Tomorrow, I’ll clean the table, and you and your beastly punk army won’t stop me.”

  “We’ll see about that, little punk.” Vinnie kissed the top of her head and handed her back to Pink. “Take this tired woman to her room. And behave yourselves.”

  “Eew!” Nikki giggled. “No energy tonight. But tomorrow... tomorrow, I’ll be back.”

  I didn’t understand her sudden strange accent and deep voice, but decided to put it down to her overtiredness. I had hoped to see Francine when she arrived, but my own exhaustion was pulling at me. I hoped I was tired enough to sleep well in this strange and unplanned environment.

  As I followed Colin up the stairs, I wondered if we would find answers tomorrow. I had so many questions about Nikki’s kidnapping, the recent changes to the paintings and how all of this connected to Bree’s client and this purported stolen treasure.

  Chapter TWELVE

  “YEAH, BUT THEN WE HAVE the trolling that follows the big data theft.” Zork stretched his legs out and crossed his feet. “If only people would learn how to protect themselves better, right?”

  “You’re preaching to the choir here.” Pink had stopped tapping on his tablet and was fully engaged in the conversation with Zork.

  We were in the well-equipped fine arts department of the University of Pula. Despite my best intentions, I had managed to sleep only five hours last night. Nikki had joined me downstairs at twenty minutes past four this morning. She’d given the two paintings on the sofa one look and had asked if it was possible to start working.

  By six o’clock this morning, we’d arrived at the university to be met by an extremely excited head of the art faculty. Professor Zuliani had reassured Colin numerous times that he had been ready for us since last night when Luka had informed him to expect a call at any time. He was more than happy to give us access to anything Nikki needed to work on the paintings. He’d heard about Nikki’s skill and was honoured to have her work in his university.

  He hadn’t shown any surprise at the large group of people who’d arrived, not even at the heavily armed Luka, Zork and Bruno. All three men had insisted on joining Pink, Nikki, Colin and me. Manny, Francine and Vinnie had promised to bring breakfast. We’d left Francine working on her laptop at the dining room table and Manny grumbling into his phone.

  Nikki had set up in the corner of the spacious room we were in. The high ceiling and large windows made the room feel open and, to my untrained eye, it was an obvious choice for an art stu
dio. I was sitting at the table next to Nikki’s, my laptop in front of me. Colin had sent me a long list of links with information about the Munich Four. I was taking my time reading articles and blogs on my tablet.

  I’d finished reading about Becić and Račić and was about to click on a link to a website dedicated to Oskar Herman when Zork and Pink’s animated conversation had caught my attention.

  “What gets me is that people don’t change their passwords.”

  “Yeah, that’s the biggest weakness of all things IoT.” Zork’s levator labii superioris muscle lifted his top lip in disgust. “I mean, how hard is it to change the password from one, two, three, four to something different when you set up your new smart TV or fridge or printer? But no, people just want to plug in and play. Strong passwords, people. Strong passwords.”

  “Right? I mean, I get the convenience of having everything connected.” Pink lifted one shoulder. “I have a bunch of smart devices and a lot of them are synced, but I make it impossible for someone from outside to get into any of my devices. And my first step is passwords. No, wait. My first step is to make sure I buy my device from someone with a good track record for security. Hardware and software.”

  “Okay, I get the password thing.” Bruno looked from Pink to Zork and back. “Zork goes on about it all the time. And it’s obvious you think the same. But Zork hasn’t explained to me how having my printer hacked can be dangerous.”

  “Easy.” Pink shrugged. “Let’s say you use Google Chrome on your tablet, your smartphone and your computer. You very likely logged into your Google account on all three devices. Right? Well, if you have a smart TV, you likely also logged into your YouTube account using your Google account. The nice thing is that everything is in one place. The dangerous thing is that your computer has a great anti-virus programme, but your smart TV probably doesn’t have much protection against any kind of virus.

  “So, one day, a black hatter gets into your smart TV. That gives him access to your Google account via YouTube. That then gives him access to your life. Through that account, he can get into your computer, hack your whole system, gain access to your banking, your everything. He can steal your identity, open new bank accounts, new credit cards in your name. Drain your bank account. Shop until he drops on your Amazon account.”

  “Okay, okay.” Bruno shifted in his chair. “I get it. Wow.”

  “But this is small thinking.” Zork smirked. “Pink’s black hat hacker is lazy. My black hatter will get into the printer or photocopier of a large financial institution. The headquarters of a bank or something like that. Then he’d work his way into their system and bam! He has access to the finances of millions of bank clients.”

  “Or an online shop like Amazon. Access to their database would be hitting gold.” Pink scratched his head. “It actually scares me when I think about how vulnerable our data is in every single online transaction we complete.”

  “So now, my superior hacker has all Amazon’s client data.” Zork ignored Pink’s snort. “He sells it to a troll farm and another bam! He can influence a whole society.”

  “Troll farm?” Bruno winced. “I’m feeling very stupid.”

  “Not many people know about this”—Pink shrugged—“and most people have far too much to worry about between work, children and home life to pay attention to this, but troll farms are a breeding ground for bad, bad, bad things.”

  “Explain that to me.” Bruno pointed at himself. “In words and sentences that will make sense.”

  I was glad that Bruno had asked. I had rudimentary knowledge of troll farms at best.

  “A troll farm is basically a group of people who create a legion of false identities online,” Pink said. “These identities come from catfishing, outright identity theft or simply buying a US driver’s licence for less than a hundred dollars. These people use these identities to spread false news about politics, health, you name it.”

  “They are really good at creating realistic social media profiles so it looks like they’re real people.”

  Pink nodded. “If you have enough of these legit-looking people saying that garlic can cure a brain tumour, people are going to start believing it.”

  This made perfect sense to me. “Neurotypical people respond positively to word-of-mouth recommendations and personal experience stories. The more people sharing the same type of experience, the more believable it will become. And the more value a theory, idea, truth or”—I looked at Bruno—“misinformation will grow to have.”

  “That is why social media stars are called ‘influencers’.” The corners of Pink’s mouth turned down. “They have immense power when it comes to making or breaking trends—the latest and best travel spot, restaurant or club.”

  “That has already caused a lot of problems here,” Luka said. “We have these people coming into Croatia, posting on social media and the next thing we know, a small village is flooded with people who want to take photos only so they can post online and look cool.”

  “Villages need the tourist money, but they don’t have the infrastructure.”

  Luka lifted a finger to stop Zork. “Tourists don’t spend their money there. They just rush in to take photos and rush out.”

  “Cruise ships.” Bruno crossed his arms, but relaxed when he noticed his leader’s expression.

  “Tourism has been good for Croatia,” Luka said. “Fifteen years ago, we were very far behind the rest of Europe. The inflow of visitors and money has helped a lot with our development.”

  “Yes.” Zork’s smile was wide and completely insincere. “Tourists are wonderful. And they’re already here.”

  “Already? As in now?” Pink frowned. “Isn’t it a bit early? Tourist season only hits us at the end of July. We’re in March now.”

  “And look at the weather.” Zork nodded towards one of the windows. Sunlight was streaming in, the blue sky visible from where I was sitting. It was indeed a beautiful morning.

  “True dat.” Pink nodded. “The weather is really nice for so early in the spring.”

  “It’s good for tourism.” Luka’s micro-expressions caught my attention.

  I studied him. His top lip was slightly curled, his body leaning back—away from this conversation. “Your nonverbal cues tell me that you don’t approve of tourism.”

  He blinked a few times and shook his head. “The official line is that we love tourists.”

  “We’ve had a few very strongly worded reprimands from above to only be positive about tourism.” Zork rolled his eyes. “It’s hard to like the people who cause all kinds of destruction to a place we’re trying to protect.”

  Luka raised one hand. “In context, these are the exceptions. Most tourists respect the historic value of our cities and do very little damage.”

  “It’s the over-tourism that really is the problem.” Zork pushed his chair back until he was riding on the back two legs. “You’ve seen how small Rovinj is. The whole city has less than fifteen thousand residents. The city area isn’t even ninety square kilometres. It’s a small place. Then a cruise ship docks here with two or three thousand people flooding the streets. We have the same in Split, Pula and Dubrovnik. This many people not only stress the infrastructure, but also law enforcement. They are soft targets for pickpockets, which means more police energy being diverted to petty crimes.”

  “Where’s Colin?” Nikki’s question pulled my attention back to her. She was staring at the Becić with her head tilted.

  “He’s outside on his phone.” I hoped he was successful in gaining more information about Florian Brasseur. He’d also mentioned that he was going to ask around about the Seuso Treasure.

  Nikki stretched her arms above her head and yawned. After another long stretch, she lowered her arms, not once taking her eyes off the painting. “I think I might have something, but I want to know what he thinks.”

  Someone’s phone started ringing, drawing my eyes to the men. Pink answered the call with a smile. “Hey, Rox.” He got up and wa
lked towards us as he lowered his phone and tapped the screen. “Hey, buddy.”

  Nikki jumped up and pushed in next to Pink, staring at the phone screen. “Good morning, Eric. Did you have good dreams?”

  “I dreamed Pink was driving a brontosaur.”

  Nikki giggled. “Riding a Brontosaurus?” She elbowed Pink. “That’s a good dream, sweetie. Did you eat your breakfast?”

  “Yes, Mommy. Where’s Daddy?”

  “He’s sleeping, love.” Nikki’s smile was genuine. We’d all been relieved when Martin had returned from the hospital after only an hour and a half. The doctors had done a quick and very thorough examination of all his injuries. The worst were three ribs that were cracked and fortunately not broken. His shoulder would take some time to heal, but there was no internal damage.

  “He worked really hard yesterday,” Pink added. “And then he fell into his bed like a Gigantosaurus, and he’s snoring like a ten-ton dinosaur like this.” Pink made exaggerated snoring noises that sounded disturbingly inaccurate.

  Eric’s giggles brought warmth to my heart. I left Nikki and Pink to their fun-filled conversation with Eric and turned my attention back to my tablet. I’d read through all the information I could find on the personal and professional lives of Vladimir Becić and Josip Račić, but hadn’t learned anything that brought pertinent insights into this case.

  Oskar Herman was a new artist to me. I’d never seen his work before today. I clicked on the link Colin had sent and navigated to the images. The first few paintings showed bold brush strokes and strong colours. I liked it.

  I clicked back to read about the artist. There wasn’t a lot of information on his personal life, but his studies in Munich and his connection to the other three came up in four of the sites I visited.

  “I love you, buddy.” There was no mistaking the tenderness in Pink’s tone.

  “Love you, Pink. And Mommy. And Dohgee. And Francie. And Colin. And Big Vin.” Eric continued to list everyone he knew, including the kids in his daycare group. Nikki showed incredible patience by letting him finish before they ended the call.