Page 65 of Forging Caine

“Related note: they called their boss, who also didn’t know about the onionskins. Except that they sell onionskin sheets, of course.” She was suddenly at my side, took a photo of the painting, and returned to her desk. “I’m going to send this to them. Maybe they’ll recognize it.”

I sat on the windowsill, the cool glass at my back. “If it’s not the staff, it must have come from one of their customers. I expect there’s too many of those to check with all of them.”

With a flourish, she hit one key—likely to send the photo—and looked up at me. “What next, then?”

“Look for that stamp. Maybe there’s a clue to who the letter came from?”

She nodded and popped a bubble, hunkering down in front of the laptop once more.

Stolen 13 Fell-something.

Fell-something. I pulled out my phone and did some searches for words starting with Fell. Fellah. Fellow. Felling. Fellsmere, Florida? Fellatio? No.

Unless the misaligned letters were another word, not a continuation of Fell. Stolen 13 Fell Off? Fell Away? Fell Down?

None of it made any more sense than the original.

All I had was Stolen 13 Fell.

I stood and taped the sheet to the window again.

Unless… prickles ran up and down my arms.

There were thirteen items stolen during the Gardner Museum heist. Could there be a link to Fiori and the FBI’s expectation he was bringing usThe Concert?

But the painting on the onionskins wasn’t a Vermeer and it wasn’t one of those taken during the heist. And even if it was, what did Fell mean?

“Boom!” announced Lucy.

I spun to see her hands launch into the air.

“I. Am.”

“A genius, I know.” I walked to her side and looked at her screen.

“I found completed auctions on eBay, Sotheby’s, and another little auction house where those stamps have been sold within the last couple of years. I ruled out eighty percent of them, which had already been canceled by the Postal Service before 1900. A complete tangent, but interesting: The face value may be two dollars on each of those stamps, but an unmarked one is valued at $5,000.”

I peered at the unfolded envelope next to Lucy. “That’s a bit more than was needed.”

“Maybe our mysterious author didn’t know?”

“How do you forget paying that much for a stamp and accidentally put it on an envelope?”

“Eccentric billionaire? Amnesia? Alzheimer’s?”

Two of those would explain the letter, not just the stamp. “Do you think this is a wild goose chase? Someone’s playing with us?”

She shrugged, browser windows flashing across her screen as she continued working. “Not like I’ve got anything better to do.”

I lowered my voice, in case it carried over the railing and Lorenzo wasn’t sequestered in Dom’s office. “Why are you here with him?”

“I’m going to see if I can find anything out about the buyer.” Not wanting to talk about it was a change for Lucy. Not wanting to talk abouteverythingwas a change for Lucy.

“Did something happen?”

“One mystery at a time, right?” She blew a tremendous bubble, which she let die and deflate. “I wouldn’t bother with the big sites, but this little one might yield something. How much time do we have?”

“I’m serious, Lorenzo.” Antonio’s voice and footfalls carried up the stairwell.

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