Page 112 of Brazen Deceits

He drags a stool over for me. “Kneel up here. If you’re working from higher, you should have more control and be less likely to spill anything. Take this red rock and tap it apart. Once it’s grindable, we need it fine, but not as fine as cinnamon. Think you can do that?”

I nod, and we get to work, me smooshing rocks, and Walker fixing the mess I made of the clay. He turns on some music, something trance inducing I’ve never heard before, and time gets hazy as I grind red rocks, black rocks, and white rocks into fine powders.

Walker mixes different measures of powder onto the clay, working the pigment in with a handful of other ingredients scattered around the kitchen, until there are no obvious swirls left. He rolls out two sticks from each batch, every duo progressively darker, lining the sticks up two by two on a parchment-covered baking sheet.

A test batch gets burned, but after that, tray after tray of chalk cools on cookie racks, organized from lightest to darkest, and my type A color-coding heart rejoices at the uniformity of it all.

It’s not until Walker hands me a glass of wine that I realize we’re done, and that I didn’t cough once during the entire process.

“Wow. All that for one little drawing?” I ask, the wine bright and sweet on my tongue.

He pulls his stool over next to mine, surveying his chalk collection. “All that to find the three pieces of chalk that will let me do an exact replica of the Rubens.”

“When do you think you’ll do it?”

He takes a large swallow of the wine, closing his eyes. “Tomorrow, if I’m feeling well enough. Otherwise, Sunday is the last day I’ll have enough time to get into the right headspace.”

“Does it take a while? To get in the right headspace?”

Walker shrugs. “Sometimes. And sometimes it’s like drinking water—so easy I finish between breaths.”

“What about next weekend? You can’t do it then?”

“I have two finals that Saturday. And my advanced drawing piece is due the Monday after that. Then I have a final paper due Tuesday, and Wednesday, well, that’d be way too late.”

I nod, looking at the chalk. “This is really happening, isn’t it?”

“It better happen. I don’t want to be a specialist in Baroque reproductions if there isn’t money in it. If money were no object, I could build absurdist three-story installations that mimic the mirrors of a fun house, freaking out anyone who risks getting too close to the thing.”

I giggle. “Is that what you’d do? Make gigantic, tricky art?”

He presses a kiss to my cheek. “If my art weren’t tricky, then it wouldn’t be my art.”

I lean my shoulder against his, finishing the wine. A wave of exhaustion rushes over me, and my eyelids droop before I have a chance to even get off the stool.

Walker scoops up my half-awake self, carrying me to my room, stripping me out of my jeans and bra and tucking me in, then crawling in behind me.

“Thank you,” he whispers.

Before I can ask what he’s thanking me for, I’m asleep, any question I had lost in the mud of my dreams.

Chapter 48

Walker

Trance music hums through my room as I test the red chalks. One after another until I match the pigment of the Rubens, and not by looking at any of my reference photos. This must be right, and the flash in the photos distorts the colors, making them a shade brighter than the piece in the museum. I’ve got to go by memory alone to get it right.

We want this forgery to look unsuspicious for as long as possible. No matter what, once the Rubens is taken down for a cleaning or a review by the curators, it won’t pass muster. Any major tests will reveal that the materials I’m using are from post-WWII sources, with radiation levels higher than the original would have had.

This isn’t a permanent replacement. I’m making a stopgap that will keep anyone from looking for us until we’ve disappeared. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to make it the best damn fake I can.

Finding the perfect red, I do the same with the blacks, lastly choosing the correct white.

Warming up, I picture what I’m doing in my mind, the little details, the full composition, the vibe, the emotion in the strokes, all the parts I’ve been practicing for months. I hold it there in my mind’s eye, seeing myself drawing it perfectly, over and over again, until the rhythm of it takes over, the pacing, the swipe, the curl, the pressure against the paper.

I draw the collection of tigers, lions, and leopards three times on regular paper, each one the same as the last.

Clearing my drafting table, I wipe it down, placing the chalk off to the side. Lining the surface with four pages from my largest sketchbook, I create a softer workspace so I can mimic the gentle touch of the sketch—counteracting my naturally bolder hand.

---