Page 36 of Girl, Sought

Eleanor's dolls had been her substitute family. Each porcelain face was a substitute for the void her dead husband had left behind. Alfred's insects were his attempt to impose order on a chaotic universe, to pin down meaning like he pinned down beetles. Take away the collection and what was left? Just another empty vessel, like Eleanor without her dolls or Alfred without his insects. They'd all built themselves around these precious things, defined their worth by what they owned instead of what they were.

He understood that need. That hunger to possess something meaningful. But physical objects were just symbols. The real collection was the collectors themselves.

And the collection in this house spoke of deeper needs. Of a man trying to possess pieces of divinity itself.

The collection room waited in the basement behind a door that required both key and keypad entry. But he had those codes too. Amazing what people would write down on official forms if someone asked the right way.

His heart rate picked up as he typed in the combination. Like the moment before opening a perfectly wrapped gift.

The lock disengaged. He stepped inside.

Moonlight caught gold leaf and ancient wood, illuminating treasures that would make museum curators weep. This place was a veritable magpie's hoard, worth an accumulated ten million dollars. If this collector had any sense, he would have sold up and retired the moment his collection passed the seven-figure mark.

But that was the thing about these people. The value of their collections was their whole being. To them, it was some kind of game. Stockpile these expensive items, and the value upon death is what your life was worth. And that was what he was so desperate to understand.

He settled into the shadows to wait, surrounded by treasures that would soon lose their owner. In an hour, someone who'd spent his life collecting pieces of the divine was about to have a very personal encounter with his maker.

Some people filled their lives with beautiful things. He preferred collecting the people who collected beautiful things. It was all about value in the end - not the kind you could calculate on a spreadsheet, but the kind that transformed the mundane into something extraordinary.

So he slipped on the next mask and waited.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Numbers didn't lie, but the internet sure as hell could. Ella stared at her laptop screen and fought the urge to put her fist through it. The Curated Value Group existed in that shadowy space between legitimate business and digital ghost - no website, no social media presence, not a single human name or photo to prove real people ran this show. Just a P.O. box address and a phone number that kept going straight to voicemail.

Ella dug deeper; scraped trade publications, collector forums, digital back alleys where deals got made. The CVG left traces there, faint as they were - a booth at an antiques show in Baltimore three years back, a classified ad in some niche magazine for wealthy hoarders. One article mentioned the firm's involvement with the now-defunct St. Andrews Museum of Medical History. Apparently, the museum's entire macabre collection was slated to be cataloged and auctioned by Blackburn's company, but the deal crumbled years ago due to thorny legal battles over provenance and ownership rights.

‘Got anything?’ Luca asked from across the desk.

Ella rubbed her temples. ‘Not much. State registration shows they're legit - incorporated five years ago under Vanessa Blackburn's name. Former antiques dealer turned professional appraiser.There's a brief mention of her involvement with the St. Andrews debacle, but no details on what went wrong.Beyond that? Radio silence. Even the business address is registered in Maryland.’

‘How does a company handling millions in rare collectibles stay this far under the radar?’

‘Same way high-end art dealers do. When your clients are dropping serious cash on obsessions they'd rather keep quiet, discretion becomes your brand.’

Ella's mind snagged on the museum article again. What kind of 'legal issues' could derail the auction of a medical history collection? And why would a company like CVG get involved in the first place?

She grabbed her phone and tried the number again. She switched it to loudspeaker.

One ring. Two rings.

‘Come on. Someone answer.’

‘Maybe they’re finished for the holidays,’ said Luca.

‘It’s only the first week of December.’

‘Not everyone has our work ethic.’

Then, the dial tone stopped for a second before resuming with a different cadence.

More ringing. Luca raised an eyebrow. She flashed him a wait-for-it hand.

Click. A live human. Female. ‘Curated Value Group, how may I direct your call?’

Finally. Ella flipped her badge at the phone like the woman could see it. ‘Special Agent Dark, FBI. I need to speak with Vanessa Blackburn.’

Crisp rustling of paper. ‘Do you have an appointment?’

---