Cross roads, p.10
Cross Roads, page 10
He’d never used the accolade to describe anyone’s artistic talent before. Although she’d enjoyed the novelty, his verbal admiration of her work wasn’t what had touched her the most.
What she could recall to this day with vivid clarity was the flood of tears filling his eyes as he looked at her painting. Having one’s art spark a deep, emotional connection with its viewer was the ultimate narcotic.
Lena slanted a glance at Rohan while he assessed her painting in progress. Surprised by the nervous jitters setting up shop in her stomach.
She busied herself by stepping out of her tight shoes and stoking a flame in the fireplace. When several nerve-stretching seconds clicked by without a word from her guest, she peered at him over her shoulder. He observed the Nativity with a stillness that unnerved her.
She forced the myriad of questions dancing a jig on her tongue backstage.
Fire engulfed the logs, warming her face. She stared at the changing hues—vermillion, burnt sienna, ochre, and dandelion with shocks of ultramarine and brilliant white. Mesmerized by how they swayed together to create the whole. Flames licking the air, gulping down oxygen like starved travelers plowing through a tray of Oreo Thins.
Procrastination complete, she rose and joined him before the canvas.
“I’ve viewed many paintings attached to your name while conducting my background check,” he said in a quiet voice. “All beautiful pieces of art. But none of them prepared me for the real thing.”
A wave of relief washed away her anxiety. “As you have observed, there are many real things in my loft.”
“Something about witnessing the transformation from this,” he pointed at the blank canvas erected a few feet away, making Lena’s gut twist, “to this,” he air-traced a finger over her pencil sketch of the angel, “to this,” his fingers hovered over the painted Christ child, “has given me a new awareness and a new level of appreciation for your talent.”
Lena peered at the empty canvas, at the whiteness of her failure, and had never felt like more of a fraud—a forger—in her life.
“It’s getting late,” she said in a thick voice, “and I’d like to get an early start tomorrow.”
“Did I say something to upset you?”
“You praised my work. Why would that be upsetting?”
“Good question.” His too-observant gaze landed on the blank canvas, and Lena’s muscles locked as if a glacial storm blew through the cabin.
“Thanks for the ride.” She marched to the door, opened it, and waited for him to take her not-so-subtle cue.
He gave both canvases another long, considering look before stalking across the room, pausing beside her. He took in her features with a thoroughness that left her breathless.
“Don’t forget to set the alarm.”
Lena closed the door behind him, sank against the hard surface.
Like lights twinkling across an arid desert, the blank canvas drew her attention again and would not release its taunting grip.
19
“I love you too, baby,” Phin crooned into his phone from the back of the van. “What are you wearing tonight?”
Rohan clamped his teeth together. It was bad enough navigating the new love period of Phin’s—and Zeke’s—cooing at home, but having it blare in Bose surround in such tight quarters was more than he could stand.
Not taking his eyes off the employee entrance of the manufacturing building, Rohan put the ignition in ACC mode and cranked up the radio until he drowned out the conversation in the backseat.
Cruz chuckled from the passenger side. “That’s one way of shutting him up.”
“Maddy, I gotta go,” Phin said, raising his voice. “The guys are being jealous assholes.” A short silence. “I’m not sure how long we’ll be. We’re waiting for the thief to get off work.” Another short silence. “Don’t worry, I’ll be home in time for us to . . .”
Phin’s voice dropped, and Rohan was thankful his brother spared them the details of his carnal acrobats. Which, of course, led his lizard brain to thoughts of Lena.
What was she doing right then? Putting the finishing touches on the Catawnee? Or had the Caravaggio distracted her again. After viewing her work last night, he would never think of her as a mere painter. She was a talented artist who should have a gallery dedicated to her own artworks. Why didn’t she? Why did she continue copying other artists’ paintings?
“Almost three o’clock,” Cruz said. “Balor’s shift should stream out any minute.”
Facial recognition had identified Lena’s burglar as twenty-six-year-old Bobby Balor. A McDowell Tech graduate, working as a first-shift machine operator.
“Here they come,” Phin said, his voice all-business again.
At 3:02 p.m., employees rushed from a back door like a mass of pissed-off yellow jackets bursting out of their underground hive.
Cruz held up his phone with Bobby’s DL photo blown up on his screen.
Rohan didn’t need it. The guy’s features were etched in his mind. “There.” He followed a shaggy-haired, narrow-bodied man fast-walking his way to a black truck, scanning the parking lot as he took a long draw on his cigarette.
Definitely not the mastermind type.
“Skittish,” Cruz observed.
“Stealing a million-dollar painting will do that to a fella.”
“I’m surprised he hasn’t disappeared,” Phin said.
“Maybe he figured running would throw a spotlight on his back and decided to carry on for a few weeks or months before enjoying his spoils.”
“That plan works only if he didn’t get made,” Cruz said.
“He probably wouldn’t have if our boy,” Phin slapped Rohan on the shoulder, “hadn’t gone hacking.”
Rohan started the van and followed Bobby out of the parking lot. The thief made a brief stop at the ABC liquor store before pulling into a driveway of an eleven-hundred-square-foot ranch where he roomed with two other guys.
“No other cars in the drive,” Cruz said. “We going in?”
Rohan killed the engine and scanned the neighborhood from their position a few doors down. He didn’t like going into a situation without working through different scenarios. Especially in broad daylight. But the clock was ticking, and he didn’t know how long Bobby would stay put.
Nodding, he stuffed his glasses in a protective pocket in his vest and made eye contact with Phin in the rearview mirror. “If anything feels off, get the hell out of there.”
“Ten-four.”
Phin grabbed a clipboard, straightened his Armani tie, and strode down the sidewalk while Rohan and Cruz headed for the back of Balor’s house.
Once they reached their destination, Cruz paused at the corner and listened for Phin’s knock on the front door. He nodded to Rohan, who stood on the crumbling cobblestone patio near the rear door.
Once Phin mentioned the stolen painting, Bobby would no doubt bolt. Right into their web.
Drawing his Sig Sauer from his appendix holster, Rohan motioned for Cruz to take up a position opposite him. Their gazes met, and Rohan started a mental countdown.
Five . . . four . . . three . . . two—
The pounding of Bobby’s feet through the house preceded the screen door flying open. Rohan caught it, using it to funnel Bobby toward Cruz, who tripped the thief and sent him sprawling.
His brother had about thirty pounds and five inches on the guy, so it took only a matter of seconds to secure his wrists.
“What the fuck’s going on?” Bobby yelled.
“You got this?” Rohan asked, pulling a set of black nitrile gloves from his front pocket and putting them on.
Cruz nodded. “He’s not going anywhere.”
Rohan entered the residence on soft feet. He stepped into a mudroom, which led into a galley-style kitchen. A noise in the outer room drew his attention.
He eased his head around the doorjamb to find Phin striding toward him from the opposite side of the house.
“Clear,” Phin said. “No basement.”
The tension gripping Rohan’s shoulders eased. “Clear.”
Rohan holstered his nine-millimeter and helped Cruz drag Balor back inside. They dropped him in one of the wooden kitchen chairs, securing his hands to the back.
“Robert ‘Bobby’ Balor,” Rohan recited from memory. “Twenty-six-year-old machine operator with Sonoco. Last-born son of Rhonda and Brian Balor. Mom’s a director with a local nonprofit and dad’s a freelance landscape architect.” He cocked his head, considering their prisoner. “You have a taste for high-octane activities and poor investment choices.”
“Am I supposed to be impressed with how well you memorized my Wikipedia page?”
Phin snorted. “Lowlifes like you don’t have Wiki pages unless it’s to recite your rap sheet.”
“Fuck you.”
Phin smiled. “You can do better than that.”
“Where’s the painting, Bobby?” Rohan asked.
The thief stilled. “I don’t know what y’all are talking about?”
“Why’d you run, then?” Phin asked.
Bobby’s gaze dropped to his lap.
“Give us the painting you stole two days ago and we’ll walk away. No questions asked.”
After a brief silence, the thief lifted his head. Sweat pebbled on his upper lip. “You got the wrong guy. I was watching football all day with my friends.”
From his back pocket, Rohan withdrew the print out of Bobby leaving a convenience store and held it up to him. “This truck matches the one I saw leaving the scene of the crime.”
Bobby squinted at the picture. “How can you tell? Picture’s pretty grainy.”
“Amateur move to stop at a store in the middle of a heist, Bobby.”
The thief stared back.
Rohan nodded at Cruz and Phin, and his brothers split off to search the house.
“Keep your fucking hands off my stuff!”
“Tell us where the painting is and we’ll leave your cache of cocaine alone.”
His eyes widened.
Rohan hunkered down on his haunches, out of kicking distance. “I know everything about you, Bobby, except this one little piece of the puzzle.” He flattened his voice. “I like puzzles. I’ll find the painting with or without your help.”
Bobby swallowed. “Who are you?”
“I can be your friend, or your adversary. You decide.” He leaned forward a few inches. “I recommend the former.”
The thief shot to his feet, chair and all, and rammed his shoulder into Rohan’s face.
Cartilage cracked, and Rohan’s vision blurred. He lost his balance, but twisted at the last second and grasped the bottom half of the fleeing man’s pant leg. He clutched the material, jerked hard. The thief crashed to the floor. Wood splintered.
Before Rohan could get his legs underneath him, Bobby kicked out of his grasp and scrambled away, leaving the destroyed chair behind as he threw open the screen door once again. This time, his mad flight met with no resistance.
The door banged shut.
“Dammit!” Rohan blinked hard to clear his vision and staggered to his feet. Blood streamed from his nose and his face felt like a sledgehammer had hit it.
Cruz and Phin stormed into the kitchen. When they moved to help him up, he ordered, “I’m fine. Get the bastard.”
Grabbing a dirty hand towel off the counter, Rohan pressed it to his bleeding nose while he stalked through the house. In the main bathroom, he rummaged through drawers and doors until he found a few cotton balls up he could stuff up his nostrils.
In one of the bedrooms, a laptop sat open on a rumpled bed as if Bobby had been using it when the doorbell rang. A godawful odor emanated from the bed that even his cotton barriers couldn’t ward off.
He carried the laptop to the kitchen counter. Since the computer hadn’t gone to sleep, he didn’t need Bobby’s password and was already scanning emails by the time Cruz and Phin hauled the thief back inside.
The bastard cackled when he saw Rohan’s face.
Cruz shoved Balor into a seat. “Shut up. You don’t look any better.”
“Good luck, Rocky,” Bobby sneered at Rohan. “You won’t find anything on there. Everything’s gone.”
“Thanks for the tip.” Rohan redirected his attention to uncovering deleted files. So many computer users operated under the misbelief that when you deleted a thing, it was gone. Forever.
But a good hacker could recover just about anything.
It so happened Rohan was one of the best.
Five minutes later, he looked at Bobby. “Tell me about Mr. Byrne.”
20
“We’ve lost our light,” Lena said, setting down her paintbrush.
Sadie did the same, but her weapon of choice was a charcoal stick. The girl stretched her fingers wide, then shook out her wrist.
“Is your hand bothering you?”
“No,” came the quick response.
Lena used a rag to wipe the paint from her fingers. “I’ll show you some exercises you can do to help preserve your back and arm.”
“I’ve never drawn this long before.”
“If you’re serious about improving your craft, you’ll be putting in many more hours than the two we worked today.” She moved toward Sadie’s workspace. “Think of your body as a work tool.” She thought a moment. “Does your dad use a chainsaw?”
The girl nodded. “A few weeks ago, he had to cut up a tree that fell across the road.”
“Did he sharpen the chain cutters before he used it?”
Another nod.
“Did he clean it afterward?”
“Yeah, there was a lot of sawdust gunked up inside.”
“Why do you suppose he went through all that extra effort?”
Her brows knit together. “So the chainsaw would work?”
“Work safely. Sawdust can catch fire and a dull blade can increase the chances of kickback.” Lena demonstrated an imaginary saw jerking back toward the user’s head. “Kickback can be deadly for sawyers.” She lifted her paint-stained hand. “It’s the same with your drawing arm. If you don’t care for it properly, you will, over time, destroy it—and your career.”
Sadie opened and closed her hand several times. “Okay.”
She handed the girl a new rag. “Clean off the worst of it, then tidy up your supplies.”
“A cluttered workspace creates a cluttered mind,” Sadie quoted.
Lena smiled. “Who said that?”
“Nana Lynette. She used to be in the military.”
“You seem very close with the family.” Lena began putting her own art supplies away. “Calling Lynette Nana and Liv aunt.”
“We’ve all sort of adopted each other. I call the guys uncle, too.”
A small piece of Lena’s heart clutched with envy. For nearly a decade, she’d called Neil Dad, but it had always felt like more of a label than a connection.
Once they had finished cleaning up, Lena nodded toward Sadie’s easel. “Do you mind if I take a peek?”
The girl glanced at Lena’s painting in progress. “I’m not good yet.”
“No artist ever is in the beginning. Practice, heart, and perseverance will get you where you want to be.”
“What about talent?”
“If you’ve got a speck of it, PHP will take care of the rest.”
Relieved, Sadie nodded her assent.
Lena moved to stand before Sadie’s sketch, and her breath caught. Not because she looked at the renderings of the next daVinci, but because she stared at a familiar figure.
Her.
The charcoal-rendered Lena wore a pensive expression. The tip of her paintbrush pushed against the center of her bottom lip as she contemplated the construction of an angel’s left wing.
Staring at herself, at her work, through the eyes of another, left Lena feeling unsteady, as if she perched on the top rail of a fence during gale force winds. Then something snagged her attention.
Charcoal Lena’s eyes were . . . wrong. They seemed to be directed at a blurred rectangle in the distance. A rectangle with three legs.
A rubber mallet slammed against her ribcage.
Sadie hadn’t captured her scrutinizing her brush strokes on the Nativity, but staring at the bloody blank canvas that plagued her every waking hour.
Why had she brought it with her?
Some would call the affliction masochism.
Lena called it hopeful idiocy.
All the roiling emotions inside her must have showed on her face, for Sadie rushed out, “I’m sorry. I should have asked.” She made to rip the sheet from the sketch pad.
“Wait.” Lena put a hand on the girl’s arm. “This is incredible, Sadie. You . . . surprised me, is all.”
She pushed her own fears back into their box and focused on her young student. “You have an eye for detail, an extremely valuable trait in an artist. Have you taken any classes?”
The girl shook her head. “I just like to draw.”
“People?”
“People, animals, plants, buildings. Everything, really.”
So much about this girl reminded Lena of herself at her age.
“Do you have a sketchbook?”
“Sort of. I use a bullet journal I got for Christmas.”
“I’d love to see your sketches.”
“Okay.” Sadie cast her an uncertain look. “Tomorrow?”
“And the day after, and the day after.” She smiled. “Let’s wash our hands, then I’ll walk you home before I fetch my car from the Annex.”
“I can show you a shortcut.”
“Won’t your mom wonder where you are?”
“Not until six.” She skipped-ran to the bathroom.
Lena used the kitchen sink to clean her own hands, then located two flashlights. Expecting to follow the vehicle track for much of the way, she hesitated when Sadie immediately set out for the woods.
