The Pearl Brooch

by Logan, Katherine Lowry

  Breathing heavily, she stopped at his desk and leaned over to catch her breath. “I ran over…here. Charlotte called… She needs us…at the hospital.”

  Matt’s heart dropped to the pit of his stomach. He jumped to his feet, overturning his chair. “Why? What for? What’s wrong?”

  He mentally ran through the list of family members for possible illnesses. He hadn’t heard of any sickness or accidents in the past twenty-four hours. But if Charlotte was calling and needed them, it was a serious matter. “Where is everyone?”

  Elizabeth patted her chest as if the simple gesture would restore her normal breathing rhythm. “Amber has wee Heather in the big kitchen. Braham and Daniel have the older children in the garden.”

  “For their agronomy lesson. Right.” Matt picked up his chair. “The kids are due here in an hour for a Revolutionary War lecture.” He grabbed his phone and slid it into his pants pocket. “What about Jack and Amy?”

  Elizabeth led the way to the door. “They’re meeting with the event planner to go over last-minute details for the party this weekend. I volunteered to babysit Margaret Ann, but Amy didn’t need me.”

  Matt held the door as they stepped out into the hot, humid air. It had to be at least ninety degrees with ninety percent humidity. They hurried to Elizabeth’s white Mercedes, where Matt opened the passenger door and she slid in. “Did Charlotte give you any idea at all what was going on?”

  “No, and in the four years I’ve known her, this is the first time I’ve ever heard fear in her voice.”

  Matt hurried around to the driver’s door and climbed in. Before he started the vehicle, he said, “I should tell Braham I’m leaving.”

  “Charlotte didn’t mention him. Either she already called him, or she’ll call him once we get to the hospital. She probably didn’t want to tell him while he’s with the children.”

  “Good point.” Matt steered the car toward the exit. If everyone on the plantation was okay, then what was the emergency? “Where’s Elliott?”

  Elizabeth stopped texting and looked up at Matt. “That’s an odd question right now.”

  “Considering Elliott’s health issues, it’s really not.”

  “Well, the last I heard he was feeling fine. He took Blane to Montgomery Winery to spend the weekend helping Meredith get ready for the grand reopening.”

  “I’m not sure a four-year-old will be much help. He’ll be more of a distraction.”

  Matt turned onto the highway and the vehicle picked up speed. “Since James Cullen went to Harvard, Blane has filled the hole James Cullen left behind. If Elliott and Meredith didn’t have the four-year-old to spoil, they’d fly up to Cambridge every weekend.”

  “Why don’t they Skype?”

  “Meredith does, but Elliott wants to be able to hug his son when he sees him.”

  “Which would drive James Cullen crazy. He was ready to leave the nest,” Elizabeth said.

  Matt flipped on his blinker and passed a pickup truck hauling bales of hay. “He’ll stay in Cambridge and go to grad school, law school, or med school. He won’t be back to Lexington for several years.”

  “The family is so spread out now that James Cullen doesn’t have to be in Lexington to be part of the family,” Elizabeth said. “Look at Kevin’s brother-in-law, Shane. He’s lived in Australia for eight years, but he never misses a meeting, and is almost always at the castle or the ranch for the holidays.”

  “You’re right,” Matt said. “By the way, where are Kevin and JL? I heard they decided to come to the plantation for the weekend after all. Did Braham say anything to you?”

  “Kevin’s flying them up in his Cessna.”

  Hospital. Emergency. Kevin flying the Cessna.

  It wasn’t a stretch to connect the dots. The car swerved toward the side of the road. Elizabeth gripped the edge of the doorframe and pressed her right foot into the floorboard. “Matt!”

  He righted the car and squeezed Elizabeth’s hand. “Sorry! I think I know what’s wrong.”

  6

  Florence, Italy—Pete

  Pete Parrino finished his dinner at the Osteria Toscanella and paid the check with his Amex since he hadn’t been to the ATM to get euros yet. If he hadn’t hired a car and driver through Blacklane, a European-based chauffeur company, he wouldn’t have had cash to pay for a taxi.

  The restaurant owner told him there was an ATM near the Gelateria Della Passera two blocks down the street.

  Gabe Moretti, the general manager of Montgomery Winery in Tuscany, made the dinner reservations so they could catch up on the latest family news. At the last minute, a problem with a vendor came up that kept Gabe from leaving, so Pete had dinner alone.

  Pete’s trips to the winery were always too short to spend much time in Florence, which held special meaning for him. His grandparents emigrated from Tuscany to America shortly after World War II and opened an Italian restaurant in Little Italy. Pete’s aunts, uncles, and cousins still operated the restaurant today. He’d grown up listening to stories of Tuscany told in Italian and fell in love with the country long before he ever visited.

  He slung his computer bag over his shoulder and said goodbye to the owner of the restaurant. The summer evening was unusually cool, making it a perfect night to stroll down the cobblestone Via Toscanella and grab a gelato before returning to the winery.

  He slowed when he spotted a man with his hands cupped at the sides of his face, peering between the slats of a rolling steel security door. Because Pete was a former NYPD detective and current VP of global security for MacKlenna Corporation, his nefarious-doings antenna shot up. But the man, who was wearing a sleek, dark blue Kiton K50 suit and brown Barker ostrich shoes, didn’t look like a run-of-the-mill burglar.

  Pete sauntered up beside the man. “See anything interesting?”

  The man whipped around, his face flushed, obviously embarrassed being caught. “Mi hai spaventato.”

  “Sorry,” Pete said, although he wasn’t. He’d intentionally startled the man to watch his reaction. If he’d been scoping out the premises to break in, he wouldn’t be doing it on a public street at dusk, when he could easily be seen.

  The rolling steel door had solid panels at the top and bottom, as well as a grill over the plate glass window. The glass had stained wooden mullions dividing it into squares and rectangles.

  Inside the studio, three panels of canvas fabric hung from a curtain rod above the transom, leaving four-inch gaps between each panel so gawkers could peer inside the studio. A narrow table with a red tablecloth stood between the window and the curtain panels displaying artfully arranged sculptures and small paintings on easels. Propped against the glass was a small sign with the store’s website—www.StudioSFOrsini.com.

  Orsini was a common name in Italy, but whenever he heard it he thought of Sophia. “Looks closed to me,” Pete said. “Whose studio is this?”

  “Sophia Orsini,” the man said.

  And there it was, just like that, the old knot of pain exploded in his chest—his chronic condition that had never healed, and tended to flare up at the oddest, most unexpected times—like now.

  When Sophia’s parents ripped them apart following her graduation from high school, they sent her to Italy to live with her grandmother. He tried to follow her, but their priest had stopped him and convinced him the Orsinis had done what they believed was best for their daughter.

  “She’s seventeen,” the priest reminded him. “She’s young, and not sure what she wants to do. You’re a college student. You’ll never be able to give her what she needs. You have to let her go.”

  So he did. Because life was different back then. But one thing never changed. When his heart threatened to stop beating from the pain and bitterness of his loss, he knew another heart beat for him, because Sophia had told him that hers always would.

  “Sophia was supposed to return from her holiday yesterday,” the man said. “This is the third time I’ve been here today,” he continued. “I commissioned a
painting she promised to deliver yesterday because I’m having an event at my house tonight and planned to show it off. But I can’t reach her.”

  Somehow Pete managed to breathe through the obstruction in his chest. “Do you have her phone number?”

  “I’ve called a dozen times. She doesn’t answer. It’s not like her,” the man continued. “I have three other Orsini paintings, and they were all delivered on time.”

  The man reached between the slats and jiggled the door handle. Even if the door opened, there was no way to squeeze through the slats to get inside. While the man continued to peer in, Pete scanned the tan stucco building, spotting security cameras at both corners. The electrical wiring ran along the upper third of the studio, just as it did on the adjacent building. But the wiring to Sophia’s building looked newer than the others.

  “Is Ms. Orsini a successful artist?” Pete asked.

  The man thumbed through text messages on his phone. “I commissioned this painting over a year ago, and it was months before she could even start on it. She finished it before she left on her holiday.”

  “That busy, huh?”

  The art lover punched keys on his phone, writing a text message. “Ms. Orsini’s paintings now sell between two and three hundred thousand euros. The first painting she did for me cost twenty-five thousand. That was five years ago. Now she’s internationally renowned and exhibiting at top galleries around the world.”

  “Which increases the value of the first painting,” Pete said.

  The man raised his eyebrows. “Right, and the second, and the third. In another two years, only major art collectors will be able to afford her work.”

  “I noticed the security cameras on the corners of the building. Does she have valuable paintings inside?”

  The man gave Pete a suspicious leer.

  Pete shook off his cop look and extended his hand. “Pete Parrino. Retired NYPD detective.”

  The man shook Pete’s hand. “Ivan Bianchi. I own a family-run winery in the Sienese area of the Chianti Classico.”

  “I work for one close by in the Chianti Colli Fiorentini.”

  “Which one?”

  “Montgomery Winery.”

  “I’m familiar with them. The owners are trying to buy up all the neighboring vineyards.”

  Pete waved away the comment. “Just a rumor. Two’s plenty.”

  Ivan tapped out a cigarette from a package of Marlboro reds and flicked a lighter. “Glad to hear it.” He puffed before asking, “Are you familiar with Sophia’s work?”

  “No. I knew a Sophia Orsini many years ago in New York. The woman I knew would be late thirties, blonde, wavy hair, robin’s-egg blue eyes, five-two, and has a little bump in her right earlobe.”

  “You sound like a detective.” Ivan flicked the ash off his cigarette. “Your description fits Sophia, but I’ve never noticed anything unusual about her earlobe.”

  If you had kissed every inch of her, you would.

  “She doesn’t keep her work in the studio,” Ivan continued. “Her paintings either sell or she exhibits them. If she’s got a security system, it’s for protection.” He glanced up, squinting, and pointed when he spotted the cameras. “I’ve never noticed them before, or any inside the building.” He looked down at his wristwatch. “I’ve got an appointment. I’ll come back tomorrow.”

  Ivan turned to go, but Pete held him up with another question. “Do you know where she went?”

  Ivan shook his head. “Earlier today I asked the owner of Osteria Toscanella if he’d seen her. If anyone knows where she went, he would, but he didn’t know.”

  “Are they a couple?” The unexpected spike of jealousy after all these years surprised him. But it wasn’t any of his business. He certainly hadn’t lived a priestly life.

  “He’s a painter, too. If it’s anything more…” Ivan drew on his cigarette. “That’s their business.”

  “What’s her mobile number?” Pete asked.

  Ivan flipped open his phone folio and pulled out a business card. It was one of Sophia’s. “You can have this. I’ve got all her information in my contacts.”

  Pete committed the number to memory before slipping the card in his shirt’s chest pocket. “Have you been by her house to see if she’s home and not answering her phone?”

  Ivan pointed to the windows above the studio. “She owns the entire building. The first floor is her studio, her apartment is on the second, and the third floor is empty.”

  “Have you ever been upstairs?”

  “Once. She had a painting she wanted me to see. I was surprised. Her studio is eclectic, with student art hanging on the walls, but her apartment has the feel of plein air.”

  “I don’t speak French.”

  “Sorry. It means outside. The frescos on the walls give the apartment a garden ambience, like Monet’s garden in Giverny. If you ever want inspiration, sit there for an hour. L’ispirazione arriverà.”

  Pete’s cop radar was sending signals. He’d spent too many years investigating disappearances and murders not to be alarmed. If she didn’t return by morning, he would break into her apartment to look for clues to her whereabouts. “What does she paint?” he asked. “Modern art? Portraits? Landscapes? Lily ponds?”

  “Whatever the collector wants. The painting she just finished for me is a copy of the Mona Lisa.”

  “An exact copy, or one with an Orsini twist to give it her own interpretation, a modernistic touch?”

  “We had an argument over her interpretation. She wanted to paint the portrait using the vivid colors da Vinci would have used.”

  “Since I’m not an art aficionado, I have to ask. How would she know the original colors?”

  “She researched the copy of the Mona Lisa in the Prado Museum in Madrid. It’s believed that copy was painted by one of da Vinci’s students about the same time da Vinci painted the original. The Prado painting has had a less eventful life, and the colors are still vivid. She wanted to use those colors, and I wanted the painting to resemble the painting in the Louvre.”

  “As the client, I guess you got your way.”

  Despite Ivan’s distress, he laughed. “If you think that, you don’t know her. She can be very persuasive, especially when it comes to art.”

  Pete’s throat tightened, and even if he needed to respond he couldn’t have found his voice. Sophia’s persuasiveness had ultimately led to their downfall, but he never blamed her, only himself. He should have done what he knew to be right and said no to her, but he had loved her too much to deny her anything, even an elopement.

  Ivan looked through the slats into the studio again and tapped his finger on the glass. “The painting is on the easel in the middle of the room, drying. You can only see the back of it.”

  Pete looked through the slats, too. “Was she trying to torture you? To be this close and not see the front.” He straightened, hands on his hips, and tapped his fingers in a light tattoo. “Is there another window?”

  “A large window on the side of the building lets in the light from the north, but it’s too high to see inside from the street. The Old Masters painted only with northern light, and Sophia wants her students to paint under similar conditions. The lights in the studio are never on when someone is painting.”

  “Maybe one of her students knows where she is. Or maybe one of them can open the door for you.”

  “She doesn’t teach during the summer.” Ivan butted the cigarette against the cobblestone with his heel. “If I hear from Sophia, I’ll mention you to her.”

  Pete produced a leather business card case and handed a card to Ivan. “Here’s my contact information.” Pete watched Ivan until he disappeared around the corner onto Via dello Sprone then glanced up at the cameras again. With his experience, he could easily breach her security system. Sophia’s delayed return could be legitimate, but it didn’t sit right with him. Why wait another day?

  He walked down the side of the building along Via dei Velluti until he reached a wrought
iron gate. He pushed it open and stepped into a private courtyard with large terra-cotta pottery planted with healthy lemon trees, red and white flowers, and ferns. He stuck a finger into each pot. Someone was watering the plants in Sophia’s absence. The soil was moist, and it hadn’t rained.

  Then he saw a small business sign peeking out of the flowers—Ragazza di fiore.

  A white Fiat 500 was parked in the driveway alongside a light blue motorbike. Memories of Sophia’s white Volkswagen and red Schwinn bicycle returned to haunt him. Her parents bought the car when she turned sixteen, and, ignoring their prohibition against anyone riding with her, she often chauffeured him around.

  God, that was a long time ago.

  He made himself comfortable at a table under a pergola and booted up his laptop. It would be dark in about thirty minutes, when he intended to break into her apartment, but first he needed information about her security system. Several years ago David McBain, President of MacKlenna Corporation, had shared highly sensitive information about the software he created to allow a user to enter the dark web—a sub-world of illegal activity—and hack into someone’s server and override security systems without leaving digital footprints. Once Pete hacked into her server, the door to her studio might as well swing wide open.

  Forty-five minutes later the latch on the back door slid open with a click.

  Pete packed up his computer and entered the building to find the alarm-deactivated light was on and the LCD screen was blank. Using only a penlight, he moved through a storage room packed with shelves of paint, stacks of panels and canvases, books on painting techniques, still life objects, and a Keurig coffee pot and a basket of pods.

  In the studio, he stopped to gaze at the Mona Lisa, which was propped on an easel in the middle of the room. As he told Ivan, he wasn’t an aficionado, but he knew what he liked. Although if he was asked what he liked about the painting other than the Mona Lisa smile, he couldn’t say.

  He scanned the walls of the studio, taking it all in, and then climbed the stairs to the second floor, almost tripping over a pair of paint-splattered shoes.