Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
I cling to him, and even as he slips out of me, I never want to let him go.
Chapter
Thirty-Three
AXEL
The gallery is exactly the kind of place that pretends it hides no secrets, even though it is crawling with them. It sits on a narrow street just off the Boulevard Saint-Germain with a limestone frontage and tall arched windows that glow honey gold in the morning sun. The plaque beside the door is simple and unassuming. Galerie Moreau et Fils 1924 in refined serif lettering. On the surface, it is respectable, well-established, and clean. But what it looks like on the surface means absolutely nothing here.
Jo walks beside me as we approach the building, her gloved fingers brushing mine as if by accident, but it is no accident. The contact is light. Intentional. We’re already slipping into character.
“You look like you’re about to buy the building,” she murmurs.
“I’m trying to look like a man who doesn’t enjoy being kept waiting.”
“You’re not going to be kept waiting.”
“I might be.”
She gives me that look, the one that says she enjoys sparring with me far too much. We reach the building’s entrance, and we pause, and Jo reaches up to adjust my tie. The intimacy of it is practiced, something we discussed earlier, figuring we might be on CCTV at the entrance and starting our charade straight away, and yet it feels natural. Her fingers linger at my collarbone a fraction longer than necessary.
“Remember,” she says softly, her lips almost grazing my jaw. “We’re married.”
I don’t miss a beat. “For how long?”
“I don’t think that will come up.”
“Humor me.”
She considers. “Five years.”
“Happy?”
She tilts her head, studying me as if she’s weighing the truth. “Obnoxiously so.”
I smile slowly. “Good.”
We’ve chosen our names carefully.
I’m Daniel Laurent, an American financier with discreet European interests, and she’s my wife, Elena Laurent, a London-born and educated art consultant with expensive taste and questionable ethics. We’re a couple with a lot of corrupt money that needs laundering and spending. A couple hunting for something special.
“Ready, Elena?” I ask.
“I was born ready, Daniel,” Jo replies.
I open the door and gesture for her to go in first. I stay a step behind her. There is no quaint bell above the door to chime as we enter. Instead, there is a surveillance camera watching us with an unblinking red light.
The interior of the gallery is understated but meticulous. Parquet floors polished to a mirror sheen, cream walls, quality lighting, the air faintly scented with beeswax. The pieces on display are impressive and carefully curated. There’s a minor Chagall, an early Dubuffet sketch, a modest Modigliani drawing that is real enough but not extraordinary.
This isn’t where the real inventory lives, but to anyone wandering in off the streets, it would certainly look legit, and no one would suspect this was a front for an undoubtedly successful high-end black-market art trader.
Behind a sleek walnut desk stands a man who looks like he was carved from patience and calculation. He is Henri Delacroix, the dealer who moved the stolen Gainsborough. He is in his mid-fifties with thick, immaculately brushed back silver hair. He has a narrow fox-like face, his skin sallow but smooth. He is wearing a charcoal suit, perfectly tailored, of course, paired with a silk pocket square in muted sapphire. He wears neither a tie pin nor a flashy watch, but his cufflinks are clearly expensive. On the surface, there is nothing about him to suggest he is anything but the owner of a small but successful art gallery.
But beneath the surface is where it all happens, and beneath the surface, Henri Delacroix is anything but legitimate. His eyes are the most telling thing about him. They are a very pale brown, and they are sly and watchful. I know he has clocked every detail about Jo and me as we came into the gallery. His expression tells me he is unimpressed. He doesn’t smile, not even when we approach the desk. He assesses us coldly instead.
“Bonsoir,” he says smoothly. His English, when it comes, is flawless but faintly accented. “How may I assist you?”
“Monsieur Delacroix, I am Daniel Laurent. I spoke to your assistant on the telephone on Friday and confirmed an appointment for today,” I say.
“Yes, I was expecting you. Welcome,” he says, his expression one of the least welcoming I have seen on the face of someone who wants to make a sale. Until he knows for sure we are interested in something … let’s say different … he probably doesn’t want to make a sale. That’s why the pieces he has are so overpriced. Replacing them when they are just a front for his real business is enough of a hassle that if a rich tourist who doesn’t know any better buys one of them, it makes it worth his while to allow it.