Page 70 of Girl, Sought

‘Eleven.’

‘Eleven? In themorning?’

Luca planted the boxes on the table. ‘In the morning.’

‘Jeez. I never…’ Ella put aside her excuses, because there were more pressing matters right now. Guilt tweaked at her, because Luca had put up with her obsessive, erratic behavior and hadn’t even raised his voice in return. So first on the agenda was groveling to the man in front of her. ‘Hawkins, about last night at Carpenter’s. I didn’t-‘

‘Save the Hallmark moment, Ell. We’ve got bigger problems to worry about.’

The apology she’d been rehearsing last night crawled back up her throat. Part of her wanted to lance that particular boil before it festered any deeper, but the intensity radiating off him said this wasn't the time for emotional housekeeping.

‘What problems do we have? Apart from the obvious.’

Luca tapped the boxes. ‘See these bad boys? This is the information foreveryclient the Curated Value Group have had in the past five years.’

‘Seriously? You got them already?’

‘Yup. I called Vanessa last night, the moment that warrant hit our inbox. She was kind enough to set me up on a date with her receptionist who met me at their offices. An hour later, I came out with this. The receptionist assured me these are the master copies of all the legal paperwork they’ve had since the business started.’

‘A date, huh?’ Ella knew he was being facetious, but she was pathetically irked by the joke.

‘Ell, please, be serious here.’

‘Right. How many clients are we talking?’

Luca grabbed his laptop, which he’d balanced on top of the boxes, and flipped it open. ‘Over five-hundred of the bastards, but I managed to narrow them down pretty quickly.’

‘Narrow them down? By what?’

He spun his screen around to show her a spreadsheet that looked like a rainbow had vomited on it. Names, dates, addresses, monetary values. ‘Some collectors died, some moved out of state, some were never local to begin with. By the time I’d narrowed it down to people whocouldbe potential victims, I was at 120.’

‘Jesus, Hawkins. This is…’

‘Bad choice of words, Ell, and I’m nowhere near finished yet. Because after that, I called up HQ and got us access to FALCON. God bless the IT nerds there that work all night.’

Ella’s head was beginning to spin. FALCON was the Financial Analysis and Ledger Correlation Network, a database used by the FBI, CIA and Homeland Security to monitor anomalies in tax data. It was basically VICAP for financial crimes.

‘And don't tell me - you found something in the tax records?’

‘Yeah. Any sizable charitable donation gets registered in FALCON, and every single collector I checked - apart from three - had donated high-value items to museums, galleries, religious institutions, you name it.’

The revelation hit Ella like a shot of pure adrenaline. ‘And those three were…’

Luca pulled out three stacks of paper from the top box and threw them down one by one. ‘Eleanor. Alfred. Joseph. The only collectors I’ve found so far thathaven’tdonated any of their collectibles, ever.’

‘Holy…’

'Yup. Alfred's and Joseph's collections were both appraised years ago, so they both had plenty of time to donate. Eleanor is tough to say because she only had her collection appraised recently before the tax year was out.'

She scanned the names and felt her blood pressure redline. ‘Our collectors wouldn’t let go of their items for any price.’

‘Nope.’ Luca picked up one of the stacks of paper. ‘And seriously, you should see how much Joseph Carpenter’s collection is worth. Ten million in total. He even owned a crucifix worth five million alone.’

‘That’s probably what our killer stole.’

‘Doubt we’ll find it on eBay any time soon.’

‘So our killer isn't just targeting collectors at random. He's targeting the true believers. The ones who collect for passion, not profit.’

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