Page 69 of Forging Caine

The second was Sofia with her youngest son, Nico. Che cazzo, no.

Jason had not cracked a smile or a grimace, nor given any hint of emotion since he’d arrived. “There’s a substantial reward for information leading to the recovery of this painting. I trust you don’t need the money, but all the same, we don’t want it to go missing.”

Samantha leaned against the worktable, as though her legs were about to surrender. She’d lost so many people in her life. There was no way I’d risk doing that to her, nor to my own family.

“I’ll let you get to work.” Jason zipped the backpack and walked over to my desk, peering around the setup. “I expect you’re feeling inspired and want to get to work. I’ll be downstairs and will check in every thirty minutes.”

I wrapped an arm around Samantha. “Don’t worry, bella.”

Jason waved us over to the desk, where he’d grabbed a pencil and paper. He wrote, ‘The earpiece microphone is good, but it shouldn’t pick up things you say when I’m downstairs. Watch your volume anyway.’

One of the fifty knots crowding my stomach loosened. Hewason our side. That was something.

Finger pressed to his mouth, Jason headed to the stairs.

Once he was gone, Samantha snatched my hand and dragged me out to the patio. She kept her voice down. “We need to call Elliot.”

“Are you mad?” I flung my hand toward the worktable. “That’s exactly what this threat is about. We can’t call them.”

“The FBI can protect them.”

I could barely form words. Was she serious? “The way they protected Jimmy?”

Her hands landed on her face, and for once, I let her leave them there.

“And even if they could… If Fiori can’t get to Sofia and Cassandra, who next? Lorenzo? My parents? Lucy? My cousins? Mario?” I was already too deep in this, and I hadn’t even touched the painting. “Samantha, there are no charges pending against Fiori. These are just random photographs. You wouldn’t even be able to arrange for any protection.”

“Then we tell them to get out of town.”

“For how long?”

She dragged the hands down to her cheeks, determination glistening in her eyes. “Until Fiori’s behind bars.”

I grasped her hands and held them against my chest. “Bella, how long have they been after him already? Elliot just said yesterday the case is not progressing fast enough.”

“Fuck.” She tried pulling her hands back, but I held them steady. “We have to do this, don’t we?”

“If we believe Fiori was behind the attempt on Zio Giovanni’s life two—”

“Elliot confirmed he was.”

I sucked in a breath. Marone, how far did this go? “If we also believe he was behind Jimmy’s death, there is no reason to think those photos are an empty threat. I need to go back in there and do exactly what he’s asking. And as much as I hate to say this—you need to keep it quiet.”

Chapter 22

Samantha

Abstractimpressionism.Primarycolorsred and blue. Ground of white. Thin streaks of yellow and gold, almost like marbling. My gaze followed the paint strokes and the splatters, absorbing the flow and the abrupt halts in the painting. Fifty inches by eighty-four. Big piece. Stretched canvas, no frame. Stretcher had two gallery tags and a stain near the bottom left.

The box Elliot had given me was full of photos and documentation of paintings and other artwork from the pawnshop’s hard drive. Most of them were long gone by the time the FBI shut the place down, and they weren’t sure how many had been bought and sold legally.

The working theory was that the pawnshop was involved with the smuggling ring Elliot’s team was investigating. Antonio and I had found a stash at Parker’s girlfriend’s that was headedtothere, another at an auction which had comefromthere, and the FBI had also found several other stolen pieces in their inventory.

I closed my eyes and placed a finger on the bottom left of the photo I was reviewing. Tracing my memory of one yellow thread, around a blob of blue, into an explosion of red. I re-opened my eyes with my finger in the right spot.

This painting was committed to memory. I moved it to the pile on my right and pulled one from the stack in front of me.

I sat on the floor in Antonio’s library—now my office—with my crop circle all around me. My office. Antonio couldn’t even get in without my say-so.

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