Chapter 3 - He Was Already Waiting
Roman was at the studio before I arrived.
That should have made me feel safer.
It did not.
Two black SUVs idled at the curb outside. A man with close-cropped gray hair stood near the entrance talking to Nina. The front door lock had been forced, splintering the old wood around the plate.
Inside, my workbench looked as if someone had searched it with surgical patience.
Nothing smashed.
Nothing stolen that I could see.
But drawers had been opened and closed. Acid-free folders moved. My reference photographs were out of order. The canvas I was cleaning had been lifted from its supports and placed back upside down.
Roman stood in the middle of the room with his hands in his coat pockets.
His coat.
Apparently the reunion had been brief.
I stopped three feet from him.
“How did you know?”
“Nina called the gallery.”
Nina looked guilty.
“I panicked.”
“You called him?”
“I called the number on the card you left by the phone.”
I stared at her.
Roman said, “Be angry later.”
I turned on him.
“Do not manage me.”
“Then ask the useful question.”
I hated that he was right.
“What were they looking for?”
Roman nodded once.
“That is useful.”
The gray-haired man entered.
“Dominic Bell. Security.”
His handshake was firm.
Not an underboss, apparently.
That surprised me, though I had no idea why.
Dominic showed me photographs of the forced lock.
“No random theft,” he said. “They bypassed the front register, left laptops, left cash. Your station only.”
I looked at Roman.
“You brought this to me.”
His expression did not change.
“Possibly.”
“Possibly?”
“The painting may have.”
“I worked on that painting for three weeks.”
“Did anything unusual happen?”
“No.”
“Think.”
I wanted to snap at him.
Instead, I did what restorers do.
I reconstructed.
The painting had arrived in a sealed climate crate. I removed backing boards. Documented labels. Cleaned the frame. Consolidated flaking pigment. Replaced two oxidized hanging wires.
Then I remembered.
“The lower frame rail.”
Roman waited.
“There was a cavity.”
Dominic looked at him.
“What kind?”
“Old insect damage, I thought. A narrow channel in the wood behind the decorative molding.”
“Did you remove anything?” Roman asked.
“No.”
“Did you photograph it?”
“Yes.”
My stomach dropped.
The photographs were stored on an external drive.
At my bench.
I pulled open the second drawer.
The drive was gone.
“That,” I said, “they took.”
Roman’s face became very still.
“Only copy?”
“No.”
His eyes snapped to mine.
“I back up everything.”
“Where?”
I hesitated.
“Cloud account.”
Dominic muttered something that sounded like gratitude toward whichever deity protected obsessive freelancers.
Roman did not smile.
“Show me.”
I opened my laptop.
The image appeared after two password prompts.
Close-up of the frame rail.
The narrow cavity looked darker than surrounding wood.
I zoomed in.
Something pale sat inside.
Not insect debris.
Paper.
Roman leaned closer.
His shoulder nearly touched mine.
I could feel his body heat through my sweater.
“What is that?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Can you recover it without damaging the frame?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“The painting is still at the gallery.”
“No.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“It was moved thirty minutes ago.”
“By whom?”
“Someone using a valid transfer order.”
Dominic’s mouth tightened.
Roman continued.
“The order was forged.”
The room suddenly felt smaller.
“Where did it go?”
“We don’t know yet.”
I stared at the photograph.
Someone had broken into my studio for an image of a hidden cavity inside a three-million-dollar painting.
Someone else had stolen the painting itself.
“Roman.”
“Yes?”
“I am changing my mind.”
He waited.
“I’ll help.”
“No.”
I blinked.
“You spent yesterday trying to hire me.”
“Yesterday you were useful. Today you are a target.”
Anger burned through the fear.
“You do not get to decide that I stop asking questions because someone threatened me.”
“I get to decide whether I put you closer to the men who did it.”
“You already did.”
Silence.
Nina wisely moved toward the back room.
Dominic studied the ceiling.
Roman looked at me for a long time.
Then he said, “You come with me.”
“Where?”
“My house.”
I laughed once.
“No.”
“It has security.”
“So does prison.”
“Gemma.”
“No.”
A sharp knock hit the studio door.
Everyone froze.
Dominic moved first.
He opened it two inches, then wider.
A bicycle messenger stood outside holding a padded envelope.
“For Gemma Reed.”
My name was handwritten across the front.
No return address.
Dominic took it before I could.
He opened it carefully.
Inside was a photograph.
Me.
Leaving the Costa Gallery the night before wrapped in Roman’s coat.
On the back, four words had been written in black ink.
GIVE BACK WHAT YOU FOUND.
I stared at it.
Roman’s voice changed.
Not louder.
Colder.
“You’re coming with me.”
This time, I did not argue.
Before we left the studio, I insisted on cleaning up the one thing everyone else had ignored: the canvas someone had placed back upside down. The painting was not valuable, just a small commissioned portrait of a retired teacher’s mother, but the woman had trusted me with it. Fear did not cancel that responsibility.
Roman watched while I reset the supports and covered the surface with archival tissue.
“You are doing that now?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Someone threatened you.”
“And Mrs. Feldman paid a deposit.”
He stared at me as if I had become more confusing than the break-in.
“Your priorities are strange.”
“They are mine.”
Roman looked at the little portrait. “Will it be safe here?”
“No.”
He nodded toward Dominic. “Move it with the rest.”
I turned sharply. “No. Ask.”
Roman stopped. It was the first time I saw him catch himself in the act of deciding for someone else. His jaw tightened, not at me but at the correction.
Then he tried again. “May Dominic move it to secure storage until the lock is replaced?”
I considered him for one second longer than necessary.
“Yes.”
May you like
Nina, standing behind him, mouthed something that looked suspiciously like trained him already. I pretended not to see.
That tiny exchange should not have mattered. There were threats on my life, a missing painting, and an armed man offering me sanctuary. But it did. Roman Costa was used to obedience. I was used to people deciding that exhausted women would eventually stop objecting. The fact that he could hear a boundary and adjust, even reluctantly, was the first truly dangerous thing about him.
