Forger of Light

by Nupur Tustin

  Bulger had been allowed to commit the most vicious crimes in return for supplying the FBI with information against Anguilo. Problem was none of the information he’d given them had been worth what Blake would’ve referred to as a “squirt of piss.”

  John Connolly, Bulger’s FBI handler, had been prosecuted. John Morris, the weak FBI agent who’d overseen their relationship, had admitted to turning a blind eye to it. Several of their colleagues on the Anguilo-takedown team had been tainted.

  But not Julia Hood.

  The former fed flushed a deep angry crimson. “Hugh Norton was the only person with a motive for killing Laurie,” she snapped. “The poison used was cyanide.”

  “Maybe the General thought she was onto something and decided to eliminate her,” Blake suggested.

  “Professional hitmen don’t kill for the heck of it, Blake,” Celine found herself saying. “Every kill is a job and needs to be worth it—financially—for them to undertake.”

  “He’s been trying to kill you,” Blake countered.

  “And I’m sure he was paid to do it.”

  Celine was aware of Julia’s eyes on her, agape.

  “Is that your guardian angel speaking or logic?” Blake asked pointedly. The implication being that if it was logic, she—as the only civilian in the room—wasn’t allowed to have it.

  That was how she interpreted it, at any rate.

  “A bit of both,” she shot back. “I can lead the General to the loot that slipped out of his hands. I’m not worth killing—unless someone wants me dead and is willing to pay for it.”

  “That someone being . . .?” Blake prompted, his gray eyes flashing a challenge at her.

  Celine took a deep breath, aware of her rising anger. She’d never crossed swords with the special agent—not like this. And she didn’t like it. Not one bit. Her psychic senses tended to shut down when people grew confrontational with her.

  And with her growing fatigue, it was even harder to keep her senses from clouding over.

  The shrill ringing of the phone filled the room—a fortunate interruption.

  “I can get that,” Julia offered, but Celine was on her feet and by the sleek blue instrument the Boston Plaza Hotel furnished its guests before her friend could hoist herself out of the chaise lounge.

  “No, let me,” she said as she picked up the receiver. She glowered at Blake, green eyes blazing. “I’m done with this conversation.”

  Chapter Forty-Four

  It took an effort of will to step into the study, but Sofia steeled herself to do it.

  Clutching the after-dinner cup of espresso and dessert plate that Aria—Sofia might have had to accept Dom as her dad, but Aria would never be “Mom”—had pressed upon her, she reluctantly followed the hulking six-four frame that loomed before her toward the thick plank of butcher-block oak that served as a desk.

  Resistance was futile. No one had ever defied Dom Wozniak—not with any success at any rate.

  Her heart muscles clenched tightly and her chest constricted as though it were in the grip of an icy vise. Why had she been summoned here? Into this room that had always been out of bounds to the rest of the family. Where even Aria was not allowed.

  What did Dom want with her?

  “We need to talk,” he’d informed her—in a voice so quiet it had sounded all the more menacing—while Aria bustled in and out of the kitchen, bearing platters of roast chicken, fingerling potatoes, and the salads and wines that would accompany their meal.

  That was all he’d said. Until dessert was served, when he’d fastened his dark eyes upon her, flicked his glance to his study door and back again to her face.

  The time had come.

  “Sit.” Dom indicated the leather chair placed across from where he sat—legs spread wide—like a potentate ready to receive an emissary from a troublesome enemy.

  Sofia set her cup and plate on the desk—Dom had never bothered with coasters—and lowered herself gracefully into the leather chair. Light splashed from the green desk lamp—the only source of it in the room—into a middling-sized pool that encompassed her own chair and the area of carpet between it and Dom’s.

  It was like being snared in a harsh spotlight. Dom’s eyes—dark and inscrutable—studied her face minutely. The scrutiny made Sofia nervous. Why had she been summoned here? But with her hands decorously placed in her lap, she squared her shoulders and met his gaze without flinching.

  “Find anything of interest?” he eventually asked.

  “For the shop you mean?” Were they going to be talking business after all? Sofia allowed herself to relax.

  Dom stared at her.

  “In Tony Reynolds’ apartment.”

  The clarification uttered in Dom’s low rumble caused her nerves to explode as though a bomb had gone off under her chair.

  “You were there today, weren’t you?”

  My God! Her hands fell away from her lap. How in the world had he found out about that?

  Denial would be futile, she knew. Dom never confronted you without marshaling all his facts.

  But she wasn’t a child anymore. Sofia pressed her lips together. She wasn’t going to be browbeaten into a defense.

  “What if I was?” she replied tightlipped. “What of it?”

  He gently stroked his gray beard. Under the thick, scratchy mustache, his lips twitched. The small gesture of amusement—the calm before a storm—made her flinch as though she’d been struck. Her hands felt cold and clammy.

  “What did you take?”

  “I d-didn’t,” she stammered, startled by the question. What was he getting at? Sofia struggled to understand. “I took nothing.”

  “A key is missing. Tony’s warehouse key.”

  Her eyes widened. Of course, he’d have a warehouse. How dumb of her not to consider it. Or to remember that an artist like Tony needed a space far larger than the tiny studio in his apartment to mold the large-scale pieces he sculpted.

  Back when they’d been engaged, he’d mentioned the warehouse. But she’d never been all that interested in his work. Never asked where the warehouse was. Never asked to visit it.

  “Missing?” she repeated.

  “Stolen from the scene of a crime.”

  She was only half-listening, barely registering the fact that Dom had learned of her whereabouts through official channels.

  If Tony’s warehouse key was missing, Sofia suspected she knew who’d wanted it and why. But that would mean . . .

  She felt sick to the core of her stomach.

  “His warehouse must’ve had something worth stealing,” she said, cursing herself for not thinking of it.

  “Only if we take the word of a forger at face value, my dear.”

  “But it wasn’t just his word,” she muttered.

  And it was likely gone now. They’d never find it.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  “Celine? It’s Jonah.”

  “I know.” Celine clutched the receiver to her ear. She’d have recognized the journalist’s whiny, nasal tenor anywhere. “How’s your mother? Everything okay, I hope.”

  “Oh, yes. She wandered off”—Jonah’s mother had Alzheimer’s—“Fortunately, she didn’t get too far before the attendants realized she was gone. They brought her back, a little dazed, somewhat confused, but otherwise more or less in one piece. But you don’t want to hear about my mother.”

  “No?” Celine smiled.

  Jonah was calling for information. Not to chat about his mother’s wellbeing. In a way, she understood his eagerness. It probably took every cent of his journalist’s salary and more to pay for his mother’s bills at the care facility where she was housed. Celine couldn’t even begin to imagine how Jonah afforded it.

  The inexplicable anger that had arisen earlier began to subside. Probably a side-effect of her extreme weariness, she thought, dismissing any residual sense of guilt she felt about the emotion.

  “Well, you know what I mean.” Jonah was unabashed. “I want to know w
hat the scoop is.”

  “Well, so far all we’ve been able to ascertain is that Reynolds had information on one of the stolen Rembrandts.”

  He emitted a low whistle, but listened quietly while she talked.

  “So chances are it’s in his warehouse, which Soldi will be searching tomorrow, right?”

  “That is right,” Celine confirmed. “I certainly hope the painting’s there. But if it’s not, I have no idea where we’ll look.” A telltale flutter in her stomach told her Soldi would have disappointing news for them the next day.

  It seemed almost too good to be true that the lost Rembrandt should be so easily found. And with Reynolds’ key missing, it was almost inevitable that when it came to searching the warehouse his killer would’ve beaten them to the punch.

  “If it’s not,” Jonah said, bringing her thoughts back, “we might want to consider that Reynolds entrusted the painting or information about it to someone he trusted.”

  “Such as whom?” Celine pressed the receiver closer to her ear. Jonah’s idea was a good one. But from the little she’d learned of Reynolds, he was a lone wolf who trusted no one.

  “I don’t know. A friend. Someone like you, perhaps.”

  “Me!” She was astounded. “Why would he entrust anything to me? We were barely nodding acquaintances, if that.”

  But as she voiced the question, Reynolds’ words to her when they’d first met began ringing in her ear.

  You’re psychic, aren’t you? You’re psychic, aren’t you? You’re psychic, aren’t you?

  Over and over again. It was maddening.

  She jammed the receiver closer to her ear, plugging her other ear with her left forefinger. She was having a hard time hearing Jonah over the din.

  “Well, you’re clearly a person of integrity,” the journalist was saying. “And you helped recover the Gardner’s Vermeer. Everyone knows that.”

  Thanks to you, she thought. She’d never wanted her role in the recovery to be so publicly disclosed.

  And as for integrity, Jonah’s article at the time had implied that the rest of the Gardner art was stashed away somewhere in the Mechelen. The subsequent FBI raid had been both unpleasant and humiliating.

  The news that the Mechelen had none of the Gardner art never seemed to have been broadcast quite as widely as the rumor that she was privy to its location and reluctant to give up the details.

  “What?” she asked, realizing he was asking her something.

  “Could Reynolds have passed along some information to you when he visited the Mechelen?” Jonah repeated himself.

  “No,” she began to say.

  “It’s something we should consider, you know.”

  Celine shook her head, beginning to lose patience again. “Jonah, there was nothing he gave me except for his plans for the installations I’d commissioned for the grounds. And a few miniature pieces—replicas of what he’d planned.”

  Reynolds’ chant was still buzzing in her ears. It was accompanied by a phrase that didn’t make any sense. Don’t trust the mailman.

  Her senses overwrought and overwhelmed, Celine struggled to tune the sculptor’s voice out, focusing on Jonah instead.

  She could barely hear what Jonah was saying. Something about plans and replicas. He was probably repeating what she’d just told him. But his next words came through loud and clear.

  “Could he have slipped something else to you, unnoticed, as it were?”

  “Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  The Dutch Room was empty. Celine wasn’t sure how she’d made it back to the historic building of the Gardner Museum. But here she was, at the doorway, peering in. She stepped inside, the icy atmosphere of the gallery making her shudder.

  It was cold enough to raise goose bumps on her bare arms. Vaguely aware of the flimsy, sleeveless nightdress she had on, she huddled her arms around herself. The rash of goose pimples on her chilled skin felt rough against her palms.

  Her gaze alighted on the empty frame of Rembrandt’s seascape, Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee, hanging just across the doorway on the south wall. Celine moved farther in.

  Was this the painting Reynolds had discovered?

  Or was it the double portrait he had information about? Her glance moved a few feet to the left to the empty frame of A Lady and Gentleman in Black.

  You’re missing something, Belle had informed her through her guardian angel. But Celine didn’t understand. What was she missing?

  “You’re looking in the wrong direction.”

  Celine heard the deep voice before she felt a warm, masculine presence next to her.

  She recognized him before she turned to meet his gaze.

  Tony Reynolds.

  The gash on his neck was healing. His clothes looked less disheveled and bloodied.

  He’s getting used to his circumstances, Sister Mary Catherine told her. He’s coming to terms with what happened.

  “Looking in the wrong direction?” Celine asked the dead sculptor. They were conversing normally, she realized. Not communicating telepathically the way she usually did with the dead.

  “You’re looking at the south wall.” Tony placed his warm, strong hands on her shoulders and firmly swiveled her around. “Look at the north wall, instead.”

  “But the self-portrait wasn’t taken,” she argued.

  “Look down, not up.” He propelled her toward the Flemish oak cabinet placed between Rembrandt’s self-portrait and another portrait by Albrecht Dürer.

  “Look down, Celine.”

  She felt her head being pushed firmly down.

  “No, stop!”

  Darkness engulfed her like a fog.

  Wake up, Celine. It was Reynolds’ voice, so faint, so far.

  Wake up. Louder now. Wake up.

  Her eyes opened and she gazed straight up. The ceiling above her supine form was pristine and white, its ornate crown molding very familiar. Beneath her, the mattress felt soft.

  She was back in her hotel bed.

  It took a second to realize the covers had blown off her, leaving her cold and shivering in the air-conditioned room.

  What had Reynolds been trying to do back there? Kill her? She pushed herself up, slowly surveying the room.

  Celine?

  At the sound of his voice, her head turned sharply to the left.

  Reynolds was in the white cane armchair with its powder blue cushion by her bed.

  What are you doing here? She pulled the covers back up, aware of the sheer nature of her chemise. The action, once she’d performed it, seemed ridiculous. The man was dead, after all.

  He fixed his eyes on her, oblivious to her concerns. Now do you understand?

  Understand what?

  What you need to see? You’ve been looking in the wrong direction.

  And the right direction would be . . . the cabinet?

  He smiled. Now you’re getting it. Then the smile faded, and a puzzled expression settled over Reynolds’ features.

  But why do you still trust the mailman?

  The mailman?

  You can’t trust him, Celine. Beware the mailman.

  But . . .?

  He was gone. Darkness engulfed her again.

  Morning sun poured through the lacy curtains at her window. Instinctively Celine’s glance cut to the armchair by her bed.

  It was empty.

  She sat up, rubbing her eyes. Had Reynolds really been here? Or had that been another dream?

  Beware the mailman. She recalled the warning Reynolds had issued before his form dissipated. But what mailman was he warning her against?

  He’s referring to the mailman who accosted him in Paso Robles, Sister Mary Catherine told her. As you get closer to the truth, beware who you share it with.

  The nun’s words were accompanied by two quick flashes of insight. Something had gone down at the Mechelen. Celine’s heart twisted—a painful clenching of her muscles that was followed by a rush
of apprehension flooding her being.

  Oh, God! Annabelle. They’d been betrayed.

  Her hand reached for the phone, then stopped.

  The oak cabinet in the Dutch Room. What had Reynolds been trying to tell her? Who was she not supposed to trust?

  Blake? She’d been about to call him, but . . .

  The FBI agent had grown wary of her insights. And he’d outright dismissed their suspicions about Hugh Norton . . . Why?

  The strident ringing of the phone curtailed the trend of her thoughts.

  “Hello?”

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  “Celine?”

  Annabelle’s voice sounded tremulous, quavering as though she were on the verge of tears.

  Celine was instantly alarmed.

  “Annabelle? I was about to call you.” She swung her legs off the bed and stood up. “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes . . . no.”

  Celine heard a gulping sound followed by a loud sniffle.

  “Are you okay?” She opened the door of her room and peered out into the living room. Julia’s door was closed; the former fed was still asleep. “You’re not still at the hospital, are you?”

  Another gulp. “Oh no. They discharged me yesterday. I was hoping you’d have time to call . . .”

  Celine knew her failure to call wasn’t the cause of Annabelle’s agitation. But Annabelle seemed so distressed, she felt a twinge of regret for not making more of an effort to stay in touch.

  Leaving the door ajar, she turned back into her room. “I’m so sorry, I—”

  “That’s not why I’m upset, Celine.” Annabelle’s voice sounded firmer. She’d obviously regained control of her emotions. “I know you and Julia must’ve been busy. It’s just . . . We had a break-in last night—at least, I think we did.”

  “Another break-in?” They’d had one four months back when the Mechelen’s handyman-slash-guard, Bob Massie, had foolishly given a couple of the General’s men access to Celine’s cottage.