Liar's Key (8 page)

Isabel took the hint as Claudia threaded her way through heavy traffic. Once they were on the interstate, heading north to Maine, though, Isabel shifted in her seat. “Agent Wheelock isn't a problem for you, is he, Claudia?”

“Isabel—”

“I was only half-serious about you two earlier. Does he know your mother stored some of her collection in Heron's Cove?”

“Yes, but I don't care one way or the other. I have nothing to hide.”

“Of course not. I didn't mean to imply otherwise. Anyway, I'm glad you won't be in Maine on your own.”

“Me, too, but not because of him. I haven't been to Maine in a long time.”

“Not since Victoria...” Isabel's voice trailed off, and she sniffled, staring out the side window. “I'm going to cry when we get there.”

Claudia felt tears rising in her eyes. “We can cry together.”

8

Southern Maine coast

The gray-shingled Sharpe house in picturesque Heron's Cove didn't look much different from the outside than it had before renovations. Fresh paint, new pots on either side of the door filled with green plants. Emma remembered her grandmother's weathered pots with their plethora of flowers, a reflection of her the-more-the-merrier gardening philosophy. It had been her philosophy about company, too. Emma felt a pang of grief as she headed up the short walkway. Was it possible her grandmother had been gone for more than fifteen years?

The front door was unlocked. Emma rang the bell and went in. She imagined her grandfather setting up his fledgling art-recovery business in the front room sixty years ago. So much had changed since then. Sometimes—too often, maybe—the work forced Lucas to put aside his personal wants and needs, but if he resented his younger sister's decisions about her own life, he'd never said.

Emma went down the hall toward the kitchen. Although she'd witnessed the transformation of the small Victorian into state-of-the-art offices since last fall, the changes still could take her breath away. The space was open, bright and well-equipped for taking Sharpe Fine Art Recovery into its next decades. The hall was decorated with framed photographs of the rocky Maine coast, but Emma noticed a black-and-white photograph of her grandfather at his first desk, an old oak rolltop that unsentimental Lucas had stored in the attic. He'd have gotten rid of it altogether if Emma had let him.

She smiled, remembering their many “discussions” over renovations. Her only stake in the house was emotional, but her brother hadn't shut her out of decisions, even if technically he could have.

The few staff had gone home for the day, and she found Lucas making tea in the kitchen. He was dressed casually, in a dark polo shirt and khakis. Emma was struck by how much her brother and grandfather resembled each other with their rangy builds, green eyes and tawny coloring. She was fairer, slender but not tall, but she did have the Sharpe green eyes.

“This isn't a casual visit,” Lucas said, plugging in the electric kettle. “I can tell by your expression.”

“Where's Granddad?”

“Out for a walk. He's been gone about an hour. I'm not ready to call the marine patrol.”

Emma pulled out a chair at the table. Like everything else in the kitchen, it was new, an oak-top with a base painted a sea-turquoise. Out the windows there were views of the tidal river behind the house. “How's he taking to being back in Maine?”

Lucas shrugged. “Seems fine. Same as ever.”

“Not that you'd notice if he dipped into melancholy or nostalgia on his first visit home to Maine in years. You two are so much alike—cut-to-the-chase, focused on the work and rarely if ever introspective.”

“Emma, I didn't expect such compliments from you.”

She laughed. “You deserve each and every one.”

Since he was now in his eighties, last year Wendell Sharpe had decided to retire and shut down his Dublin office. He was working on the odd project from his home in Dublin, still occasionally talking about returning to Heron's Cove to live. Although the two floors and attic of his former home had been given up to office space, renovations had included a small apartment—really, a guest suite with kitchen privileges—should he return to Maine, whether for a visit or to stay. It'd taken all but a crowbar to pry him loose from Dublin, his birthplace, onto a flight to Boston last week.

Emma sat at the table. “I'd like to talk to you about the open house.”

Lucas pulled one of their grandmother's old china teapots off a shelf. “Granddad warned me having an open house would cause problems. Mum and Dad were for it. You've graciously kept your opinions to yourself. It's too late now.” He set the teapot on the counter. “Please don't tell me that we have a wanted felon on the guest list.”

“I haven't seen the guest list, so I wouldn't know.”

“Ha.”

She watched him prepare tea. The kitchen had a clean, bright feel with its white cabinets and butcher-block countertops, a contrast to the old kitchen with its worn counters and scarred cupboards.

Lucas set a plate of digestives in the middle of the table. “One of Granddad's favorites,” he said, returning to the counter.

“Mine, too,” Emma said.

He grinned. “Figures.”

As similar as he and their grandfather were, Emma recognized that Lucas was more businesslike, less prone to operating on gut instinct and not keeping proper files. When he retired, he wouldn't need to spend days doing a brain dump with his successor, as their grandfather had done with him in Dublin last fall. Anything needed to carry on the business would be in the Sharpe Fine Art Recovery files, backed up, sorted and official.

Matt Yankowski often told Emma he'd like to do a Vulcan mind meld with Wendell Sharpe. Not a bad idea, she thought. She'd like to do one with Gordy Wheelock right now. He hadn't returned her call and text, but Sam Padgett was pushing forward to learn more about what had happened at Gordy's hotel last night. Emma wouldn't want to try to get anything past Sam. If Gordy had indeed tripped over his own feet, so be it. But Sam was on it.

“I talked to Mum and Dad on my way up here,” Emma said as Lucas placed the teapot and mismatched cups and saucers on the table. “They were at a tea party in London on Sunday celebrating the opening of an antiquities show at the Victoria and Albert Museum.”

“They told you they ran into Oliver York, Gordon Wheelock and Claudia Deverell,” Lucas said, sitting across from her.

Emma nodded, not surprised he already knew. “Still no love lost between you and Claudia?”

“Still.” His tone suggested the reasons were none of his younger sister's business. “Her father and brother arrived in town a little while ago. I suspect that's where Granddad is. He ran into them in London last week and made sure they'd be here on Saturday.”

“I understand Granddad was in London last week for Alessandro Pearson's funeral,” Emma said.

“That's right. He visited Mum and Dad at the same time. You met Alessandro, didn't you?”

“I did but only once. I tagged along when he and Granddad had whiskey together after Alessandro gave a guest lecture at Trinity College. That was when I worked with Granddad in Dublin.”

“Before the FBI, then,” Lucas said, his tone matter-of-fact.

“They talked about whiskey and the weather. Not a word about antiquities.”

“It can be hard not to talk business sometimes, can't it?” Lucas reached across the table and poured Emma's tea, then poured his own. “I met Alessandro in London last year—it was a few weeks after you'd moved to Boston. April, I think. Nice old fellow. He'd obviously lost a step or two but he was sharp as a tack. Sorry he's gone. Anyway, what does this party on Sunday have to do with the FBI?”

“Possibly nothing. Are you okay with the Deverells being here on Saturday?”

“Henry and Adrian have said they'll stop in. We haven't heard from Claudia.”

“Interesting that she was at the party on Sunday, too,” Emma said.

“Makes sense given her background in antiquities. I find Oliver York's presence more intriguing.” Lucas settled back with his tea, studying his only sister. “Is Oliver the reason for this visit?”

“Granddad invited him to the open house back in February.”

“That was a spur-of-the-moment thing. Oliver hasn't said whether or not he'll be here on Saturday. If he is, he is.”

Pragmatic Lucas, Emma thought.

“We invited a long list of people,” he added. “We never expected everyone to show up. Maine in May is great but it's not high season. No one will have trouble finding a place to stay but it won't be the best beach and boating weather.” He reached for a digestive. “What's up with Special Agent Wheelock? We invited him, of course, but I didn't expect him to respond, never mind say he'd be here.”

“When did that happen?”

“Last week by email. He and Oliver York are your friends, Emma, not mine.”

They weren't friends, but she didn't raise an objection. She gazed out the window in the back door. More pleasure boats were in the water at the marina next door. Finally, she shifted her attention back to her brother. “What do you know about rumors about stolen mosaics?”

Lucas broke his digestive in half and dipped it into his tea. “Mum and Dad mentioned the rumors when I talked to them earlier,” he said finally. “Granddad did, too.”

“When did he mention the rumors?”

“I don't remember. A few days ago.”

“Before or after the Claridge's party?” Emma asked.

“Before. He stressed they're only rumors. We don't know anything for a fact.”

We.
Emma helped herself to a digestive. “Do you have any information on the mosaics in question?”

“Early Byzantine Christian. No description.” Lucas's voice was crisp, businesslike. “I took the rumors with a grain of salt, Emma.”

Emma ate her digestive without dipping it into her tea, a habit she had refused to pick up from her grandfather or her older brother. Suddenly all she wanted was to sit on the back porch, look out at the boats and have tea and digestives. She'd meant to be on her mini break by now, but Gordy's arrival in her office that morning had changed everything.

“Can you let me know if you hear anything else about these mosaics—even it's just more rumors?”

“Of course,” Lucas said. “Is Gordy Wheelock on these rumors? Wasn't he working an antiquities case when he retired?”

Emma finished her cookie and lifted her teacup. It was decorated with morning glories and had been one of her grandmother's favorites.

Lucas leaned back. “All right, Emma. I can translate your silence. You can't discuss Gordy Wheelock and an ongoing investigation, except on your terms. Mum says he's put on weight but otherwise seems fine. Does he know Oliver York is your serial art thief? Gordy chased him almost as long as Granddad did.”

“Lucas...”

Her brother grinned. “I had to try.”

Emma drank the rest of her tea. She thought of Colin's texts from Ireland and pictured him at Bracken Distillers with Sean Murphy. It was a good image, two strong men conferring about a cheeky English art thief with a tortured past.

Could Wendell Sharpe know something about Gordy and Oliver that wasn't in the Sharpe or FBI files, that he hadn't told her, Lucas, or anyone else?

“I miss the carpenters,” Lucas said, reaching for another digestive with an obvious lack of enthusiasm. “They always brought doughnuts. A digestive is not a doughnut.”

“I love digestives.”

“Does Colin know this about you?”

“He does, and now he's become a fan, too. Well,
fan
might be too strong.”

“Where is he?” Lucas asked mildly.

Emma grabbed another cookie and bit into it, welcoming the familiar bland flavor. When she'd worked with her grandfather in Dublin, between her time at the convent and joining the FBI, they'd enjoyed many tea-and-digestive breaks together on his terrace.

Lucas poured himself more tea. “Sorry if Colin's whereabouts is an awkward subject for you,” he said, setting the pot back on the table.

“Colin's been in and out of Washington so much lately, it's hard even for me to keep track of him.”

“I see,” Lucas said, his tone enough to convey he could read into her safe answer.

Emma directed the subject back to the matter at hand. “Did Granddad see Oliver when he was in London for Alessandro's funeral?”

“I don't know. I didn't ask. Oliver isn't our problem these days.” Lucas smiled, if faintly. “He sent you sheepskins, not Granddad or me.”

She groaned. “Don't remind me.”

“Beware English thieves bearing gifts,” Lucas said with a laugh. “I bet they're top-quality sheepskins, though.”

“Oliver says they're from sheep on his farm in the Cotswolds.” Emma kept her tone neutral. “I think he was telling the truth this time.”

“Have you seen him since he had you and Colin out to his farm in February—with the FBI's approval, or so I assume?”

“It was with approval and no, I haven't seen him since then. We didn't stay with him at the farm.”

Instead, Emma thought, she and Colin had stayed at an inn in a nearby Cotswold village. They'd taken a short break after a particularly nasty case that had involved Oliver, at least on the periphery. It had also included an attempt on her life. Although nothing was said, she suspected Colin had been taking a few days to rest and be with her before going undercover again.

“Thanks for tea, Lucas,” she said, getting to her feet. “Let me know if Gordy or Oliver gets in touch, okay?”

“Will do.” Her brother rose, grabbing the teapot and taking it to the counter. “Mum and Dad said they still plan to make it home for your wedding.”

“That would be nice,” Emma said.

“Granddad says he wants to stay here through the wedding. It's only a few weeks away.”

“I'd love for him to be there, but if he's homesick for Dublin—”

“Dublin's not going anywhere.” Lucas turned to her, some of his earlier intensity easing. “I can keep him busy with work here. He's not as young as he thinks he is, but he's not just any man in his eighties, either.”

No doubt about that, Emma thought. She knew—and she suspected Lucas did, too—that Dublin was home for Wendell Sharpe now, and that aside from brain dumps, walkabouts in the Irish hills and giving up his office, he'd never fully retire.

Lucas walked out with her onto the back porch. “The new offices are working out well,” he said. “We have more space than we need. That was the idea. Room to grow.”

“I'm sure it helps to be out of temporary quarters. You're happy? You like the work?”