“Mrs. Bari, I’ve got to ask. Are you and Jimmy an item?”
She snorted. “We’ve been lovers for five decades.”
Okay. Didn’t really need to know that.
But I couldn’t help thinking…was there a Mr. Bari?
She read my mind. “Mr. Bari died cleaning his rifle.”
I nodded sympathetically.
“Take this back up to Jimmy.” She gestured to the painting on the floor. “I’m going out the other way.”
“Huh?” I said intelligently.
She gathered up her tools and sighed. “As part of the cleaning crew.”
Ah! Clever.
“Nobody notices little old ladies,” she said patiently. “People don’t see past the gray hair and wrinkles. See you at the wedding.”
I nodded my thanks. Then I picked up the fake Kugel and ran.
Jimmy was waiting for me in the “three boobies” room, holding open a green garbage bag. “Put it in here. I’ll meet you on the other side.”
I nodded and deposited the fake painting. Then I peeked into the hallway. Still empty.
In less than a minute, I was back in the great hall.
Things were calming down now. I saw Pete struggling with Nico to get Pauly into the bag. Joey and the cameraman had cornered the cat.
Lainy was still yakking with fans. The security guard was getting her autograph.
The gallery manager was wiping sweat from his brow. But he looked pretty happy.
Stoner was sitting against a wall with a dreamy smile on his face. In other words, being Stoner.
My eyes searched the room. Jimmy shuffled out from behind the…not sure where he came from. But he made the signal.
I backed away from the group to the shadows again.
Jimmy limped by with his walker. He passed me the green garbage bag, then continued on his way to the elevator.
I checked for staff. The manager, security guard and ticket taker were all over with Lainy, getting their pictures taken as planned. The coast was clear.
I signaled to Tiff. She turned and said something to her gang.
A few moments later, I walked nonchalantly down the stairs and out the front door, in the middle of a crowd of chattering girls. As soon as we parted, Tiff and the others started singing.
“Who…who…who let the cat in?”
All along the lane, they sang at the top of their lungs.
I grinned. Good ol’ Tiff. Another distraction.
I snuck around the side of the building and peeked in the bag.
Happily, it was the right bag. Meaning, not the bag of stinky dog poo we had collected earlier. That was my backup plan for ensuring Jimmy could do the switch with no audience. Open a bag of doggy poo, and wait until people got out of the place. Then he could do the switch. Nothing clears a room faster than a bad smell. Who cared if they thought it was caused by a little old man who couldn’t make it to the bathroom in time?
I smiled, remembering the bad smell in the west gallery. It had done the trick!
This bag smelled fine. I wiggled the plastic down the sides of the frame so I could double-check that it was the right painting. The lady with the three boobies. Phew! What a relief.
I took a second to breathe deep. We’d done it! We’d just pulled off the coolest switch in the history of The Hammer. Even better, I had fulfilled the terms of Great-Uncle Seb’s will.
I turned around to check for Nico and smucked into a human wall.
THIRTEEN
“I’ll take that, Gina,” Joey said. He easily wrenched the painting from my hands.
I stared at the big guy, in shock.
“What the hell are you doing?” I said, pushing hair out of my eyes.
“You get Seb’s money. Seems only fair I get the picture.”
“It isn’t real,” I said, shaking my head. “I already did the switch.”
“It’s real enough to fool a buyer,” said Joey.
I stood for a moment with my mouth open. Then I shrugged. This could be good. Joey could keep the fake and I would be rid of the…evidence.
“Knock yourself out then. I don’t want it.” I straightened. It was off my hands. Yay! He could do whatever he wanted with the thing.
“Do you want a parrot too?” A breathless Nico came up beside me. Lainy followed him, with Pete in her wake.
Nico was carrying a heavy cotton sack. It wiggled a lot. He had to fight with both hands to keep it closed.
“So help me God, if you bite me one more time, you are parrot stew!” Nico shrieked at the sack.
“Pauly want a quickie,” the bag squawked.
“Gina, I can’t take it anymore. I’m starting to channel John Cleese. OUCH!”
“We have to figure out how to reward that bird. It did a stellar job today,” I reminded him. That parrot had just helped me earn a huge inheritance. And Nico didn’t know it yet, but some of the money would be his.
“The rest of you did a super job too,” I added. “I can’t thank you enough.”
“You can thank me by taking this sadistic parrot off my hands.” Nico sounded frazzled.
“It’s sad,” said Lainy. Her voice had a lilt. “Poor thing is probably just lonely.”
“Maybe he needs a lady bird,” said Joey.
“I’ll take the bird if you don’t want it, Nico,” Lainy offered. “I can use it in my road show.”
“Lainy McSwain and the Lonesome Parrot?” quipped Pete.
“No, wait. Lainy, I just got an idea,” said Nico. His face lit up with excitement. “We could run a contest to find a mate for the wretched thing. Think of the publicity. In fact, I’ve been thinking of this theme for my store, so if we shoot a promo there—”
While they were busy discussing parrot business, I walked a few steps away and called Sammy.
“Mission accomplished,” I said into the phone. “I fulfilled the terms of the will.”
“Good work, sugar. Ol’ Seb would be proud. Just a sec.”
I waited. I could hear Aunt Miriam’s voice in the background.
Sammy came back on the line. “Sorry, gotta run. I have to get Paulo to bail your Bronx cousin out of the cop shop.”
Holy cannoli. “Carmine? What did he do?”
“Apparently, he got caught passing funny fives. Imagine that.”
The Canton counterfeits? I gulped. “Where’d he pick up something like that?”
Sammy chuckled. “At a poker game. You might want to have a talk with that man of yours. He has potential. Gotta run.”
Potential?
The phone went click.
My eyes were wide as I swung around to Pete.
“You? You took those fives to the poker game?”
Pete was grinning.
“That’s why you were playing nice with Carmine and Bertoni,” I said. “I couldn’t figure it out.”
Pete’s big arms reached forward to gather me up.
“Payback is sweet. Happy wedding gift, beautiful.”
Payback, indeed. I met his eyes and smiled. “You are really going to fit into this family.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many thanks to my dear friend and colleague Alison Bruce, who loves this series and is always generous with support and encouragement.
Thanks also to Cathy Astolfo and Cheryl Freedman, who read my early drafts and provide feedback, usually in the form of laughter, thankfully.
Sincere thanks to John Thompson, for sharing his vast knowledge of security systems and patiently answering my novice questions.
And finally, I am particularly grateful to the wonderful team at Orca Books and particularly my editor, Ruth Linka, who makes every step of the publishing journey a pleasure.
Library Digest compared MELODIE CAMPBELL to Janet Evanovich. But comedy and mystery writing came to Melodie after she was a bank manager, marketing director and college instructor. Melodie has over two hundred publications, including one hundred comedy credits and forty short stories, and has won ten awards for sho
rt fiction. In 2014 Melodie won both the Derringer Award and the Arthur Ellis Award for The Goddaughter’s Revenge. She is the executive director of Crime Writers of Canada and lives outside of Toronto, Ontario.
CHECK OUT THE FIRST TWO TITLES
IN THE gina gallo SERIES
Gina Gallo is a gemologist who would like nothing better than to run her little jewelry shop. Unfortunately she’s also the “Goddaughter”. Try as she might, Gina can’t escape the family business.
The Artful Goddaughter Page 6
