Page 31 of Canvas of Lies
“He always felt you were part of the family. You’re right, I should’ve told you about the painting as soon as it happened. It was a family matter.”
“Yes, you should have.”
“And I definitely should’ve roped you into my nefarious plans earlier on.”
“Well, I probably could have saved us both some time and stress.”
I saw the flash of guilt in his expression, but he covered it by kissing my forehead. “I really am sorry about that. I’ll make it up to you.”
“Damn right you will, and I have a few ideas on how,” I replied, smirking at him. “But first, you’re going to feed me. I’ve worked up quite an appetite.”
“Far be it from me to deny you anything. Let’s eat.”
Chapter Eleven
Nico
Althoughithurt—agreatdeal—to abandon my carefully laid plans, I reminded myself that flexibility had always been a priority in this venture.
And, if I were completely honest, the prospect of having Kat at my side moving forward was a comfort. I’d been on my own since my father died, but now she was here with me, a partner instead of the pawn she’d called herself.
Her brilliant mind would be an asset.
I threw together a haphazard brunch, laid the spread across the coffee table, and we sat down on the sofa to eat before getting into a more serious discussion about what the hell to do from there.
Kat, dressed in only one of my t-shirts and a pair of my boxers, wiped a drop of syrup from her lip with a paper towel.
“So,” she said, tucking her feet under her as she turned toward me. “Tell me what happened, from the beginning. How did my father get his hands on the painting in the first place?”
I leaned back against the cushions. “I didn’t know my dad was sick, not until the day before he died—even then, I had no idea the illness was that serious. I talked to him on the phone and he insisted it was just a bad cold.”
“Unsurprising. I don’t remember him ever taking a day off.”
He had, but only rarely. It’d been a bone of contention between us, especially after I finished college and was able to view the situation from the outside. We’d argued about it—he insisted he had no need of vacations, but I knew he missed France, missed his family. Only once, for my sixteenth birthday, had we made the trip back to visit my mother’s grave.
It was the only gift I asked for that year.
“As it turns out, it was a lot worse than that. Some woman called me the next day, your dad’s assistant or secretary, I think, to tell me he died that morning. I couldn’t believe it. He was only in his fifties.”
If anything happens to me, anything strange . . .
My father’s words from that night had hit me the second I hung up the phone. Now, I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from spilling it all to Kat. If she knew what was at stake, she’d throw herself headlong into danger before I could blink.
Her fingers curled around mine in a silent show of support. That period of my life had been bleak, to say the least. With a single phone call, everything changed. The only member ofmy family who lived on the same side of the Atlantic was gone. Looking back, I wished I’d realized how great a loss it was to Kat, too, but I’d been too tangled in my grief—and then my rage—to consider how she would feel about my father’s death.
I forced myself to shove down the emotions those memories drew to the surface. “By the time I got to the cottage, the painting had been swapped out for some generic piece of crap like you’d find at a doctor’s office. As you might imagine, I had some choice words for your father, but his security guards forcibly removed me from the premises.”
“So he’s had it for what, two years now?”
“Yes.”
“Why now? What changed?”
“A while back, I was sitting in a cafe when the news came on. There’s an exhibit in Rochester coming up, featuring Hugo Clément’s work. The guy started talking about the number of unsigned paintings Clément left behind, then mentioned the discovery of a piece belonging to your father. I guess he claimed he hadn’t known who the artist was before then.”
“It’s a Clément?” she whispered.
“Yes,” I said, smiling at her awed expression. She’d always loved that painting, which had inspired years of fascination with other Impressionists. Not telling her the truth when I learned it had been nearly impossible.
