Page 63 of Head Over Heels

"It's not a secret, though. My brother mentioned it Wednesday at dinner." I hadn't realized at the time Joe was talking about Josie's grandfather.

Josie looks at me. "I forgot you had a brother. What did he hear?"

"A brother and two sisters. We all get together for dinner at Mom and Dad's on Wednesdays—everyone but Catalina, anyway. She's the one who called the other morning—she's in Italy. You should come sometime. They want to meet you."

The elevator stops, and Josie motions for me and Tilly to exit first. "I'm not going to ask how your parents know about me. What did your brother hear?" she repeats.

I shrug my shoulders. "I told you he's a coin collector, right?" I sigh. "Apparently, your grandfather was well-known in numismatic circles. He's shown some of his private collection to some of the more exclusive members of the community. They're all very interested in finding out what will happen to his coins."

She unlocks the door and pushes it open. Tilly waltzes right in, and I follow her.

I look around in amazement. The place is like a museum. Paintings, sculptures, a wall full of books. But beyond all the pricelessstuffin here is an entire wall of glass—a window looking out over the shimmering lake. I've always had an affinity for the water.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Josie says softly. I walk toward the window. She follows me, circling her arms around my waist frombehind, and puts her chin on my shoulder. "I think I could stay here and stare out at the water all day."

I turn my head to meet her eyes. "We could, you know."

She closes her eyes, her cheek nuzzling my neck. "Florence, don't tempt me right now," she breathes into my skin. She brushes her lips against the soft skin at the nape of my neck before letting go of me.

"All right, break up the love fest." Tilly clears her throat loudly. "You can do that when you get home later." More quietly, she adds, "God knows you both need it."

"Tilly…" Josie warns.

"The safe is upstairs, right?" she interrupts, turning around and heading up the stairs.

Somehow the view of the lake is even more mesmerizing from the landing on the second floor.

"It's in the little room at the end of the corridor." Josie says, following Tilly into the last room.

I peek into the doors as I pass by them. A small room has coins mounted on the wall and drawers upon glass drawers of trays full of coins. There must be hundreds in here, maybe thousands.

I peek into the next room and it's the same with sports cards and stamps. In the last room, Tilly and Josie already have a painting taken down off the wall and the safe opened. Around them are shelves of books, many of them enclosed in glass, and piles and piles of papers.

"Absolutely not. No way," Tilly says vehemently.

Josie looks up as I come into the room. "Pretty cool, isn't it?" She glares at Tilly. "This conversation isn't over." She takes out another pile of papers and puts it on a small desk in the corner of the room. "I think I've figured out some of his rhyme and reason, at least behind the books. He'd pick up fifty or a hundred new releases every year—going back to the late forties. Then he'd sell them ten or twenty years later if they didn't pan out."

"How do you know that?" I ask curiously.

She shrugs. "He has receipts, filed by decade. He kept meticulous records."

"That's a good thing, right?" I ask. If he was good at keeping records, that should erase doubt about a lot of his valuables.

"In theory," she says. "In reality, I've found receipts and records for most of the books, stamps, and baseball cards. Some of the coins have Certificates of Authenticity, but a lot of them don't. That doesn't necessarily mean anything, but it opens up the possibility that they're stolen property."

"That doesn't mean that he's the one who stole them," Tilly says. "He could have bought them from someone else who did."

"Even if that were the case," I argue, "it would still be stolen property. There was so much looted during the war." Even Nonna's place was looted when she was a kid. I guess seventeen wasn't a kid back then, but to me—

"It's impossible to track all of that down," Josie murmurs. "My grandfather spent eight decades trying to track someone down to no avail."

"Whoever it was is gone by now." Tilly sighs. "In theory, we might be able to find the families of some of them, but that would be a lot of work."

I come up behind Josie. "You said the Auction House won't work with you?"

She leans back into me, settling against my body. "For the coins. They still don't know about that one coin, but there are a bunch of others that are raising red flags."

"What would you think about my brother coming to look at some of the collection? If he came with one or two of his buddies, they might be willing to make you an offer and buy directly from you. It might get you closer to your goal."

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