Identity Crisis (3 page)

“Actually, the women in his paintings were often composites of several different lovers.”

The corners of his mouth slowly curled into a smile. “Then he should have taken each of their best features, not their worst.”

She stifled a smile, not being a huge Picasso fan either. “You’re obviously not an art lover, so what are you doing here, Mr. Ryder?”

“I’m interested in hearing more about this Chagall guy.”

She gave him her best
Yeah, right
look.

Gaze narrowing, he studied her intently, as if appraising a Monet on auction at Sotheby’s. “Considering your father’s past, it’s rather ironic you own a gallery. Was he a partner?”

Her eyes widened. “Are you suggesting I followed in his footsteps?” She lowered her voice, even though the chattering was deafening.

He arched a curious brow and stepped toward her, seriously invading her personal space, yet she didn’t shy away from him or his accusation. He leaned in toward her, mere inches from her face. “Did you?”

“No,” she snapped. “I just found out about … his previous life today.”

He looked skeptical. “At least twenty percent of relocated witnesses continue their lives of crime. We can’t keep an eye on them forever.”

“I guarantee you he was part of the eighty percent.”

“Maybe his partner tore apart his place searching for unsold forgeries and ripping backs of furniture looking for money stashed from their lucrative scam. He had to have been looking for something behind those canvases. Why else slice them? Whatever he thought might be behind them was obviously worth a helluva lot more than the paintings themselves.”

She wanted to pull out her pepper spray and blast this guy right between the eyes again. At this close a range, she wouldn’t miss. “And there wasn’t another canvas behind any of them, or the front canvas would have been stripped away.”

“His partner would have taken the entire painting and stripped it later.”

“There wasn’t one painting missing from his collection.” Even though she’d only looked in a few rooms.

“Besides the one you took.” He quirked a curious brow. “Why exactly did you choose that painting?”

She glared at him. “What the — ”

“Forgot to mention,” Lawrence said walking up, “I have an interested buyer for your
Trapeze Artist
. Gave him your card.”

“That’s wonderful, Lawrence. Thanks so much.”

Her gallery could desperately use a sale like
Trapeze Artist
. With the sucky economy over the past year, she’d struggled to stay afloat. This painting was a middle market piece worth just over a half million.

Lawrence looked at Ethan. “If you haven’t already, you should check out Olivia’s Chagall collection sometime. It’s really quite splendid.”

Ethan flashed her a smug grin. “Have to do that.”

While Lawrence continued praising her collection, the thought of Ethan snooping around her gallery kicked her body into panic mode. What if Ethan was right, and her dad had resumed his life of crime, using her gallery as a front? Over the past few years he’d seemed to let down his guard. Like attending several of her gallery’s showings. After successfully hiding his entire past from her, concealing the fact he was once again selling forgeries might not have been difficult.

What if
Trapeze Artist
was a forgery?

Dozens of fakes were brought into her gallery annually. She’d been studying Chagall since she was eight, and her gut instinct told her when something wasn’t right, even before she requested the painting’s paperwork. The color could be off or it didn’t have the playful feeling of an original Chagall.

Trapeze Artist
felt right, didn’t it?

She was selling it on consignment for an established client who’d had it authenticated locally. But according to the newspaper article, her dad had swapped out lesser known middle market paintings that wouldn’t attract attention with fakes. What if her dad had replaced it with a fake after she’d contracted it, and he’d sold the real one? He’d given the fake painting the provenance, knowing the authentic one could likely be sold without papers documenting its history of ownership. Maybe he’d fabricated a provenance for the original
Trapeze Artist
. He’d had the codes for the security alarms in her condo and gallery.

Lawrence finished boasting about her Chagall collection and gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder. “Good luck with the sale.” He waved at someone across the room and strolled off.

“I have to go,” she told Ethan, who followed her into the nearly empty hallway. She spun around. “Stop following me.”

Ethan’s expression and stance relaxed slightly, as if he momentarily slipped out of marshal mode. “Hey, I was out of line implying your gallery is anything but legit. I’m sorry. It’s the cop in me.”

She glared at him. “While I was growing up, every birthday my dad took me out for my favorite dinner, spaghetti and meatballs. Each Christmas, until I was eight, he brought me to the mall to see Santa. He always remembered to slip a quarter under my pillow when I’d lost a tooth. Not the type of man who would destroy his daughter’s life by selling forgeries in her gallery.” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself as much as Ethan. Regardless, his gaze seemed to soften ever so slightly.

He shrugged. “Maybe. Besides, taking money from a bunch of snooty rich people responsible for jacking up the prices of art to begin with so they can flaunt their wealth isn’t really a major crime. However — ”

“Not a major crime? What about the artists’ integrity? Every time a forgery is sold — which my dad hadn’t done in twenty-four years — it not only depreciates the value of the original painting, but the quality. Many forgeries out there aren’t nearly as well painted as the originals. Pretty soon, people see enough crappy fakes and they’re thinking, ‘Hey that Rembrandt wasn’t such a great artist.’ It diminishes people’s view of the real artist and alters history.”

“Like I was saying, if it’s just a bunch of rich people getting screwed, it’s not as major a crime. However, using stolen art and forgeries to fund terrorism or arms and drug trafficking is major. A multi-billion dollar enterprise annually to be exact. Largely operated by international organized crime syndicates. Like the one your father worked for.”

She let out an angry huff of air, flexing her fingers, wanting to wrap them around this guy’s neck. “No way in hell,” she said through gritted teeth, “was my dad involved in funding terrorism or arms and drug trafficking. He was a peaceful man. I guarantee you won’t find me nearly as peaceful if you continue harassing me.” She gave his shoulder a shove, pushing past him. “Stop following me.”

If Ethan insisted on an investigation, once someone caught the slightest wind of it, her and her partner Rachel’s reputations would be ruined. Even when the paintings turned out to be authentic, the doubt would be planted in people’s minds, and scandal would be attached to her gallery’s name forever.

She needed Ethan Ryder to stay away from her gallery, and out of her life.

• • •

Ethan watched Olivia bolt down the hallway, her dark, wavy hair bouncing against her back, an air of confidence in her stride. He’d never met someone so passionate about her career. Well, at least not someone with a legitimate one. And his gut told him she was legit, even though she was hiding something. He’d mastered the skill of reading people, and he could see fear in her eyes. Good thing he’d just finished his latest assignment, protecting a witness waiting to testify. Not that any assignment was ever really finished. When he was assigned a witness, they were his responsibility for life, or until they opted out of the program. After twenty-four years, Andrew Donovan’s case appeared to once again be active.

Had her dad continued his life of crime? If he had been selling forgeries, Ethan doubted the money had funded terrorism or drugs when Donovan appeared to have lived a quiet, unassuming suburban lifestyle.

Ethan had never dealt with a witness involved in forgery or theft. Outside of protecting innocent victims of circumstance, his criminal witnesses were mainly snitches who’d put away dealers or gangbangers. It came down to using the little fish to bait the bigger ones.

Busting an art forgery ring was outside the scope of Ethan’s job description. Except in this case, WITSEC — marshal talk for the Witness Security Program — had been responsible for putting Olivia’s dad back on the street and giving him a clean slate. If it turned out he’d been selling forgeries and Ethan didn’t follow his instincts and stop a possible forgery ring, it wouldn’t be good. He was already on the U.S. Marshals’ shit list. He had to find out if her dad had indeed been a little fish.

He wasn’t about to lose his job over another screw-up.

Olivia walked into her gallery — a brick building on Sutter Street, just off of Union Square. She’d never get to sleep without taking a look at
Trapeze Artist
, along with whatever was inside the envelopes from her dad’s safe. Even though the last envelope she’d opened had been like opening Pandora’s Box.

She’d closed the gallery for the funeral and her talk. Rachel was vacationing in Rome, returning the following day. Being high season in Europe, she’d been unable to change her airline ticket to get home in time for the funeral, so Olivia had told her to stay until her vacation was over.

Besides Chagall, their gallery specialized in Matisse and Picasso — Rachel’s area of expertise — along with several local artists. When Olivia was young, she and her dad used to visit remote galleries throughout California. She’d fallen in love with Chagall’s colorful artwork, especially his whimsical, fantasy-like portrayal of the circus. The more interested she’d become in Chagall, the more her dad had discouraged her. Made sense. The newspaper article stated he’d sold several Chagall forgeries.

Olivia marched over to
Trapeze Artist
hanging on the white wall. Done in vibrant reds and blues, the painting portrayed a young girl swinging through the air, no net below. The scent of cotton candy and popcorn filled Olivia’s head, along with gasps of awe from the circus audience. Her gut told her the Chagall was real. And that her dad hadn’t resumed his life of crime. He’d been too cautious to have done anything to put their lives in danger.

Olivia walked over to her desk, her heels echoing against the wood floor and through the gallery. She scooped a handful of Gummy Bears out of the jar on her maple desk and popped several in her mouth. A lone framed Chagall postcard sat on her desk, whereas family photos filled Rachel’s. Olivia hoped to have her children’s pictures sitting on her desk one day. Rachel was the first friend Olivia had really clicked with. Growing up, she’d been into hanging Chagall posters on her bedroom walls rather than ones of Kirk Cameron or New Kids on the Block. Rather than
Teen
, she’d subscribed to
Art Digest
.

Olivia sat at her desk, removing her dad’s envelopes from her briefcase. Taking a deep breath, she opened one and pulled out a stack of financial papers. She thumbed through statements for retirement accounts, a life insurance policy, several mutual funds and stocks. There was no bank account in the Caymans proving he’d been funneling large sums of money from the sale of forgeries to an offshore account. The envelope also contained the provenances for the artwork at his house, but none for any possible forgeries or paintings currently in her gallery. More evidence of her dad’s innocence.

Take that, Ethan Ryder.

There was no evidence against the mob. She wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing.

The other envelope contained personal documents, including their real birth certificates. His parents were Katherine Flannery and Roger Donovan. Allegedly, her dad’s parents had died in a car accident when he was in high school, and her mom’s dad had run off when she was two, her mother dying shortly after. Undoubtedly lies, same as the rest of Olivia’s past. Her family was possibly still alive and living in Five Lakes, Wisconsin.

She picked up a small yellowed envelope with a return post office box in Washington D.C., the postmark dated twenty-four years ago. While removing a letter, a thick gold band with alternating diamonds and rubies set in the center of flowers fell out onto the desk.

Her mom’s wedding ring?

Olivia slipped it on her ring finger, envisioning her dad slipping it on her mom’s finger during their wedding ceremony. A warm feeling washed over her as she admired what was likely the only personal possession she had of her mom’s. A tad big for her finger, she removed it, fearing she’d lose it.

She opened the letter, written on purple floral stationary. The folds were nearly worn through, testament to the fact it had been read often.

Livvy. So her name really was Olivia. Her dad had apparently been able to correspond with his parents through the U.S. Marshals and he’d chosen not to. He’d chosen for her not to be able to write to them. Granted, if he hadn’t, she’d have insisted on meeting them. It made her furious that he’d chosen a life of crime without considering the consequences.

From her grandmother’s kind words, she appeared to have forgiven her son. What if Olivia wasn’t capable of such forgiveness? How would she learn to live with the anger eating her up inside?

Olivia’s eyes shot open. She laid still in bed, soaked in sweat, her green silk nightgown clinging to her. Her gaze darted around her bedroom, scanning the Chagall lithographs on the red walls and the maple furnishings, dimly lit by the streetlights filtering in around the edges of the curtains.

Must have been a nightmare.

Located in a large Victorian house, her condo was cozy with oak floors and wood beam ceilings, yet suddenly it felt eerily quiet and empty. Then the wood floor in the living room creaked, as if under someone’s step. She lay frozen, her heart racing. Had she forgotten to set the security alarm? No. She’d checked it several times. Especially after the break-in at her dad’s. A creak echoed down the hallway, and a shadow cast against the hallway wall.