Island Getaway, An Art Crime Team Mystery (26 page)

“Maybe I just wanted to see how far you’d
go.”

“Sure.” She tilted her head to look at him.
“Do you really work for the FBI?”

“Would I lie?”

“You told me you were a financial
consultant.”

Right.
Liar, liar, pants on fire
.
“Yes, I really work for the FBI.” He fished out his badge and
showed it to her.

“And did he really kill my father?” She
glanced at Curt.

“We’ll have to test his gun,” Nick said.
“But the same kind of gun that killed Gustav Sundin the other night
killed your father two months ago. I think it’ll turn out to be a
match. And Curt was visiting New York then.”

She nodded. And was silent for a moment.
“You should probably call the police. And an ambulance. Before he
dies. I don’t want him to die. I want him to live a long time and
suffer.”

“He’s not gonna die,” Nick said, but pulled
out his phone nonetheless.

“Thank you.”

“I didn’t do it just for you.” He grinned at
her as he listened to the phone ring on the other end. “I did it
for me too.”

She opened her mouth to answer, but he waved
her to silence. “Fredrik? It’s me. I got him.”

“Who?” Fredrik said.

Good question. “It’s a long story. Do me
another favor and call the Visby police. Tell them I need an
ambulance and a hearse. Their chief of police is dead. And the guy
who shot him is bleeding.”

“I think I’ll rephrase that just a bit when
I call them,” Fredrik said. “The girl?”

“She’s fine. We’ve got the treasure,
too.”

“Of course you do,” Fredrik said. “Do you
need me to come down there?”

Nick hesitated. “That might not be a bad
idea. I could have a hard time explaining this. Especially the part
about the dead chief being a murderer and a thief.”

Fredrik’s voice didn’t change. “I’ll catch
the next flight. I should be there this afternoon. Meanwhile, I’ll
just get some backup out there for you.”

“And an ambulance.”

“Anything else?”

“No,” Nick said.

“In that case, hang tight until they get
there. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

“Fuck you.”

“No thanks,” Fredrik said, “I’m sure...”

But Nick had already hung up.

“You sure this is what you want to do?” Nick asked Annika.

It was the next day, and they were in a
small speedboat Nick had borrowed from the Visby police. It was
white with a blue stripe and the police logo on the side, and at
the moment it was bobbing on the water a few hundred meters
off-shore, within sight of Visby, but out of the way of the ferry
just departing for Nynäshamn. The mid-afternoon sun was gilding the
red roofs of the town, and lending a hint of warmth to the gray
stone of the city wall and the many church ruins stretching their
mangled towers and broken gothic windows toward the blue sky.

Annika was leaning over the edge of the
boat, her hair blowing in the wind and her derriere in tiny shorts
outlined against the view, and in spite of the almost stunning
beauty of Visby, Nick had no doubt what he’d rather spend his time
looking at. She glanced at him over her shoulder and grinned at the
expression on his face. “I’m sure.”

“We could just take him back home with us.
You could get a nice spot for him somewhere in Brooklyn. That way
you could visit.”

Or, if he had to, Nick would deal with
having the remains of Carl Magnusson sitting on his fireplace
mantel in Washington. Not in a semi-transparent Tupperware
container, however. But at least that way he could be sure Annika
would be visiting frequently. Until he could figure out a way to
affix her to him permanently, so his apartment—or her
apartment—would be their apartment, and Carl Magnusson’s cremains
would be sitting on their shared fireplace mantel. Hopefully he
wouldn’t turn out to be allergic to her cat.

Annika shook her head. “This is fine.”

“We could go back to Martebo and leave him
there. Mix him with a bag of mulch or something and put him on your
grandparents’ grave.”

“No,” Annika said. “This is what I want to
do.”

She lifted the Tupperware container and
started to yank at the lid. As it was designed to do, it resisted
her attempts to get it off, and the small boat rocked wildly.

“Let me get that.” Nick clambered away from
the wheel and toward the back of the boat, making it rock even
more. When he reached Annika, he grabbed her instead of the box, to
steady them both, and because he could.

“Hey!”

She swatted at his hand grabbing her butt,
but she was laughing up at him. He smiled back. “Don’t want you to
fall out.”

She brushed the hair out of her face. “I
wasn’t going to fall out.”

“Sure.” He let go of her to take the box.
“Let me do that. From now on it’s my job to open things for you.
Like doors. And sticky jars.”

“And new worlds?”

“Those too.” He popped the lid on the
Tupperware container and handed it to her. “You do the honors.”

She took it, but bit her lip. “I don’t know
what to do.”

“Just lean out and turn the box upside
down,” Nick said. “And make sure you’re standing upwind.” Nothing
quite like getting a faceful of cremains.

“I’m not sure what to say.”

“I don’t think you have to say anything. Or
nothing particularly brilliant. We could say a prayer, if you
wanted.”

“He wasn’t religious,” Annika said, still
chewing on her lip, her eyes behind the glasses worried. “If he
were, I don’t think he’d have buried the silver in a churchyard, do
you?”

Nick hesitated for moment. “I think he
buried it there because he figured it would keep anyone else from
looking for it. Because most people have an aversion to digging up
graves. So no, I guess he wasn’t particularly religious. You could
just say rest in peace, I guess.”

“He will, don’t you think? Now that
everything is back to normal?”

Normal?

Nick wasn’t sure he’d go that far. In fact,
his own life was about as far from normal as it had ever been. But
in a very good way. He smiled. “Sure.”

“The treasure is back where it belongs. The
police know what really happened. And Curt is behind bars.” She
shook her head. “I had no idea he was a murderer. I had dinner with
him. I let him kiss me. How could I not have known?”

“How could you have let him kiss you?” Nick
retorted. “Never mind the rest of it. You can’t look at someone and
know whether or not they’re a killer. But kissing him? Why would
you do something like that?”

She glanced at him, those blue eyes big
behind the glasses. He was quickly coming to learn that there was
no real prevarication in her; that when he asked her a question,
she told him the unvarnished truth. Although those white teeth
buried in her lip clued him in that she was having a hard time
getting the words out. “I wanted to know whether the way I reacted
to you was a fluke. So I thought I’d kiss someone else and see.
Curt offered.”

“And?”

She smiled, and he stopped breathing for a
second. “It wasn’t the same.”

“I should hope not,” Nick said and dropped
his gaze to the Tupperware container in her hands. “As soon as
we’re done here, I’ll be happy to prove it to you. Again.”

Annika’s smile widened. “I’d like that.”

“Then let’s get this show on the road and
get back to the hotel.” Before the ferry passed them and the
backwash knocked her overboard as she tried to dump her ashes.

“OK.” She turned, and he could see her
swallow. “OK.”

She lifted the Tupperware container in both
hands and held it out, like an offering to the sun god. And then
she tossed the contents out and into the ocean. The sun god
returned the favor by catching the spray of coarse sand with his
rays for a moment as it hung suspended in the air, making it
sparkle before it dropped into the choppy waves. Annika stared for
a moment, eyes blinking furiously behind the glasses, before she
turned into his arms. Nick held on, burying his nose in her hair.
She smelled of roses and sunshine and ocean, and he couldn’t
believe how much she’d come to mean to him in just a few days.

He held her until the rocking of the small
craft announced that the ferry had passed. Then he let go. If he
didn’t, they’d fall in the water once the bigger waves hit.

“Hang on.” He scrambled for the wheel as the
boat rocked from side to side, with Annika stumbling behind. As he
put the small craft into motion and turned its nose toward shore
and safe harbor, Annika slipped her arms around his waist and
leaned into his back.

“I intend to,” she said into his ear. “All
the way home.”

He turned to grin at her. “I started this
trip looking for treasure. I didn’t think it’d be you I found.”

She grinned back. “I knew the first time I
saw you that you were the heroic type. I figured you were on your
way to save something. A company, or a bridge. Or the world. I
didn’t think it would be me. But you’re my hero, Nick.”

“Will you say that again in...” he glanced
at his watch, “an hour?”

“What happens in an hour?”

“I figure it’ll take me that long to get the
boat back to shore and the keys back to the police station and you
back to the hotel and into bed.”

“Make it thirty minutes and you have a
deal,” Annika said.

And Nick pulled back on the throttle and set
the boat skimming across the waves toward Visby.

# # #

Continue reading for an excerpt of A
Cutthroat Business, Savannah Martin mystery #1

Forewarned is forearmed, they say, and in
justice to — well, everyone! — I guess I must admit that I was
forewarned. It’s just that when people told me that real estate is
a cutthroat business, I didn’t think they meant it
literally
.

My name is Savannah Martin, and I sell
houses. Or I should say that I try, because I’m brand new at my
job, and truth be told, haven’t sold so much as a lean-to yet. I
should have realized, when the call came in about 101 Potsdam
Street, that it was too good to be true.

It was about 8:45 in the morning on the
first Saturday in August, and I was at work. As usual. For the past
six weeks I’d been on call pretty much 24/7 — not exactly what I’d
had in mind when I looked forward to setting my own hours — and I
haunted the office like the proverbial ghoul.

I guess I should also mention that I didn’t
actually have anything else to do. I used to work at the make-up
counter at the mall, but when I got my real estate license, I quit
my job and started living off my savings in the hope that my
dwindling bank balance would give me the incentive I needed to
succeed. So far it hadn’t worked, and if something didn’t change
soon, I’d have to crawl to Dillard’s to beg for my old job back. If
it was still available, with the way the economy was going these
days. 

But that was why, when the phone rang, I
snatched it up on the very first ring, and had to take a couple of
steadying breaths before I put the receiver to my ear. “Good
morning. Thank you for calling Walker Lamont Realty. Savannah
Martin speaking. How may I help you?”

“Savannah Martin?” a male voice
repeated.

I nodded. “Yes, sir.”

I waited for him to comment, but instead he
just continued chummily, like we were old friends, “See, Savannah,
it’s like this. I was supposed to be meeting Miz Puckett at eight,
to see 101 Potsdam Street, but I’ve sat here for 45 minutes, and I
ain’t seen hide or hair of her.”

“I haven’t seen her this morning, either,” I
answered, my heart starting to beat faster. Someone was interested
in buying 101 Potsdam? And my colleague and competitor Brenda
Puckett had dropped the ball...? “Though it isn’t like her to be
late.” Much more like her to be early, so she could feel superior
when you merely showed up on time. “Are you able to wait while I
try to call her?”

My caller said he was, and I put him on hold
before dialing Brenda’s cell phone, and when there was no answer,
her home number. There was no answer there either. I got back on
the line. “Sir? I’m sorry, I can’t get in touch with her. But if...
that is... I mean...”

My tongue tripped over itself in its
eagerness to offer help. The caller didn’t say anything, but I
could sense amusement through the line. I gritted my teeth and
tried again. “If you’d still like to see the house,
I’d
be
happy to come out and open the door for you...?”

I held my breath. The Italianate Victorian
and surrounding two acres were listed for almost a quarter million
USD, a fairly high price for Nashville, Tennessee. The commission
would pay my rent and keep me in gasoline and Ramen noodles for the
rest of the year, at least.

“You sure you can spare the time, darlin’?”
The voice was a baritone, husky and low, with a hint of velvety
roughness that made him sound like he’d just rolled out of bed.

 I assured him, with all the sincerity
I could muster, that there was nothing I’d rather do than be of
service to him. He chuckled, but didn’t comment. Even so, the
ripeness of the chuckle brought a blush to my cheeks. I ignored it,
promising him I’d be there in fifteen minutes, and then I wasted
the first thirty seconds of that time doing a (premature) victory
dance before I grabbed my purse and headed out the door. If I was
going to get from the office to Potsdam Street in the fourteen and
a half minutes left to me, I would have to get my tail in gear and
keep my foot glued to the gas pedal the whole way.

This may be a good time to explain about
Brenda Puckett, the Wicked Witch of the South, or, as she prefers
to think of herself, the Empress of Everything. She’s a short,
plump woman with big hair and a bigger ego, approximately fifteen
years older than me and at least fifty pounds heavier. And she has
disliked me from the moment she first set eyes on me. Could be
because I’m younger and thinner — though certainly no reed; it
doesn’t take
that
much to be thinner than Brenda — or could
be because my blonde hair is my own and didn’t come out of a
bottle, the way Brenda’s did. Or maybe I just wasn’t deferential
enough the first time I met her. Through no fault of my own, I
assure you. How was I supposed to guess that the dumpy, middle-aged
woman in the ill-fitting blouse, padding around the front office in
her stocking-feet, wasn’t the cleaning lady, but one of the most
successful realtors in Nashville? She sure didn’t look it. But she
wasted no time in correcting my mistake, in terms that could have
curled my hair had it not already had some curl of its own, and she
still held it against me six weeks later. The thought of being able
to put one over on her made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside as I
skidded around the corner of Potsdam Street, narrowly avoiding a
head-on collision with a souped-up green Dodge, and gunned the car
up the street.