Zach took out his cell phone, put it on speaker, and hit speed dial.
“Research,” a woman’s voice said.
“This is Zach Balfour. I need a run on an art dealer called Blanchard, male, may or may not be based in east Texas. A photo would be primo. I know that you probably won’t find zilch, but you may get lucky.”
“Hey, Zach. It’s Shawna Singh. Steele told me to put you on the top of my list tonight. No guarantees about tomorrow, though.”
Zach whistled softly. “I appreciate whatever time you can spare. I do like working with the best. If I’d known you were back from maternity leave, I’d have asked for you by name.”
“Keep that in mind when you start chewing on me for not getting something from nothing. You know how useless a search based on a single name will be.”
Zach grunted.
Jill smothered a laugh. She’d never met Shawna and already liked her.
“Anything better than Blanchard for me to handle?” the researcher continued.
“Modesty Breck,” Zach said. “Normal spelling. DOB June 1922, ’23, or ’24, maybe ’25, residence on Breck ranch outside of Blessing, Arizona. Sheriff Ned Purcell, Canyon County, Arizona. Justine née Breck, DOB…”
Pulled between curiosity and a feeling of unease, Jill listened while Zach ordered up research on her family. She wanted to ask if it was really necessary to pry into the lives of the dead, but didn’t. She’d called for help, and she’d gotten it.
Now she had to live with it or walk away and go it alone.
Memories of the death threat, the trashed SUV, and the canvas rags jamming her belly pack along with her sat phone didn’t make being alone look attractive to Jill.
Nature’s violence was one thing.
Human violence was quite another.
“Then look at Ford Hillhouse, Art of the Historic West, Park City, Utah,” Zach said. He knew a lot about Western art, but he’d been out of the art loop too long to take anything for granted. “Ramsey Worthington, Fine Western Arts, Snowbird, Utah. When I get more, you’ll get more.”
Zach answered a few questions, disconnected, saw his battery wasn’t holding a charge worth a damn, and sighed. He doubted that any small Western towns sold the kind of goods he needed for his sleek sat/cell phone. He’d plug it in overnight and hope for the best.
He looked at his watch. “Two choices-sleep here or go get the paintings.”
“Nobody but my great-aunt knows that I use the homestead cabin, so the paintings should be safe there. My mail comes to a P.O. box in Blessing.”
Since St. Kilda’s researchers hadn’t mentioned the cabin, and it hadn’t burned, Zach figured the art would be good overnight.
Besides, he’d been told to guard Jill Breck, not a bunch of paintings.
“I’ll take the foldout bed,” he said, looking at the butt-sprung couch facing the TV.
“What about my car?”
“Someone from St. Kilda will handle it. Just like they’ll take care of the Chevelle I was hauling home when they called me.”
Jill opened her mouth, closed it. “Just like that? They’ll take care of my car?”
“Is that a problem?”
“I’m not used to other people taking care of things for me.”
He smiled slightly. “Get used to it. It’s what St. Kilda Consulting does best.”
16
SEPTEMBER 14
8:00 A.M.
Lee Dunstan hung up the phone with a curse and wished he could have a whiskey with his breakfast eggs.
Damn doctors. Get a few fast heartbeats and they make you give up everything worth living for.
“What’s wrong?” Betty asked.
Ken Dunstan looked at his father with concern. Lee was a stubborn old man who refused to slow down and let his son manage what was left of the family art appraisal/reprographic business. Lee wouldn’t have known an opportunity cost if it crawled up his leg. Hanging on to the Dunstan paintings for an extra quarter century had been foolish.
And then selling one to a single collector without soliciting other bids had been stupid.
“Whatever it is,” Ken said, “take it easy. It’s not worth getting a heart attack over.”
“I’m not having any damn heart attack,” Lee said, ignoring his wife. “You’ll have to wait a long time for your inheritance.”
Ken looked at the ceiling and shook his head. “Yeah, like I’m counting the days.” And like there will be anything left by then.
“You should be,” Lee retorted. “Only five days to the auction.”
Under the table, Tiffany Dunstan put her hand on her husband’s thigh, silently telling him to let his father’s sniping go.
“Now, Daddy Dunstan,” she said, “you know a few dollars will never replace you.”
“Huh,” was all Lee said.
Betty sighed, picked up the thermos beside Lee’s plate, and poured another cup of decaf for her husband. She’d be lucky if he didn’t throw the coffee into the fireplace. He hated decaf almost as much as he hated green vegetables, blood pressure meds, and getting old.
“That goddamn bitch!” Lee growled.
Nobody asked who the bitch was. In the Dunstan household, there was only one bitch that redlined Lee’s temper in nothing flat.
Justine Breck.
“She’s been dead for decades,” Betty said, handing Lee the decaf. “You’re alive. If that isn’t revenge, what is?”
“Dead, but not buried. Not deep enough.” He looked like he’d been chewing on bitterweed. “Troublemaking slut.”
With that, Lee took a drink from the cup his wife handed him-and almost spit it back. He slammed the cup down and went to the kitchen for the other pot of coffee, the one everyone else drank from.
“Don’t tell me that was her on the phone,” Ken said dryly.
Tiffany gave him a look.
“Lee, you know what the doctor said about caffeine,” Betty murmured.
“It’s my life, damn it.” Returning to the table, Lee took a swig of coffee and wished it was whiskey.
But he knew better than to start drinking when he was angry. Nothing good came of that, and a whole lot of bad.
He didn’t want to end up like his father.
“The bitch ruined my daddy,” Lee muttered.
Betty started to tune out. She’d heard enough about her father-in-law’s old lover to last several lifetimes.
“He should have killed the bitch,” Lee said.
Instead, Thomas Dunstan had killed himself.
Betty bit back a sigh. She was tired of the past getting in the way of the present. Real tired.
“So, who called?” Ken asked, wondering what had set his father off.
“Some gallery owner, wanting to know if I’d been approached about some new Dunstans.” Lee’s lip curled.
Ken didn’t ask what that had to do with the bitch. He was just glad his father had switched the channel. The past couldn’t be changed. The future could. He knew it even if his father didn’t.
Tiffany got to her feet and hugged Lee. “I’m so sorry. Why can’t galleries just accept that you and Mr. Crawford have all but two of the privately held Dunstan paintings? Why do unsavory people keep making trouble for you?”
Lee grunted and patted Tiffany’s thin shoulder. “Don’t you worry, sweetie. I know how to protect Ken’s heritage.”
Ken grimaced. If his father screwed this up the way he had everything in the past, there wouldn’t be anything left to protect.
Tiffany smiled at Lee. “I’m sure you’ll protect everything just fine.”
Betty wished she was equally sure. “I’ll be glad when this auction is over.” She pushed her scrambled eggs around on her plate. “Most people in the West are land poor. We’re art poor. It gets old.”
Nobody said anything. It was the simple truth.
Lee drank more coffee. A retired teacher’s pension, plus the occasional income from authenticating his father’s paintings, didn’t add up to the high life. But Tal Crawford was nobody’s fool. At the end of the auction, Lee would be rolling in the kind of green cows didn’t eat.
Assuming nothing went wrong.
Nothing will, Lee told himself. Tal Crawford didn’t get where he is by backing three-legged ponies.
“You want diamonds, I’ll get you diamonds,” Lee said gruffly. “After the auction.”
Betty pushed a few more yellow bits around her plate and didn’t say a word of another simple truth ringing in her head.
In the closed world of Western art, nothing was a sure thing.
17
SEPTEMBER 14
12:15 P.M.
Zach put on his truck’s parking brake, switched off the engine, and looked over at Jill. She was still asleep against the truck’s hard door, using his leather jacket wrapped around her belly bag for a pillow. Obviously she hadn’t slept real well last night with a strange man on her hotel couch a few feet away.
Or she’d still been shaken by the death threat.
Either way, Zach was in no hurry to wake her up. She looked peaceful, which she sure hadn’t last night.
He lowered the window on his side. Nothing but wind, silence, and warm sunlight. As he’d thought, no one had bothered to follow them.
Perfect.
Or not.
Time would tell.
He reached back into the bench seat of the crew cab and fished out his laptop. He hadn’t had time to check for new files before he and Jill left the hotel this morning. Might as well do it now. Jill could show him around the burned ranch house when she woke up.
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