Carla Neggers (7 page)

Sean shook his head. “Just passing through. You haven’t seen Lindsey, have you?”

“Not since yesterday.”

“Yesterday?”

“Yeah.” Philip lifted a bottle of wine from a rack and checked the cork, obviously looking for something to do. “She stopped by the garage—the field station. I was in back with the tanks. By the time I realized she was there, she was on her way again.”

“Did you speak to her?” Sean asked.

“Not a word. I don’t think she saw me.”

“You were alone?”

“Yes. Sean—geez, man—”

“What time was this?”

“Two o’clock or so. After lunch.” He gave a half nervous, half sarcastic laugh. “I wouldn’t want to get into real trouble with you. I’m sweating.”

Sean eased off the stool, attempting to look less as if Philip were a terror suspect. His months of inaction—healing, thinking, tending sheep—had taken a toll, and now he was overreacting to absolutely nothing. “Where were Eamon and Brent yesterday?” he asked casually.

“I don’t really know. Off diving, I expect. You don’t think anything’s happened to Lindsey, do you?”

“I’ve no reason to think so.”

It was a careful answer, and Philip seemed to recognize it as such. He returned the wine bottle to the rack and grabbed a wet rag out of the small, stainless-steel sink but didn’t seem to know what to do with it. He finally slopped it onto the edge of the sink and scrubbed at some possibly imaginary stain. The color in his face was all the confirmation Sean needed that the lad was taken with Lindsey. She was at least a decade older, but that wouldn’t stop an eighteen-year-old’s fantasies.

Not much did, Sean thought. At the moment he had no desire for alcohol. He stood by the fire, burning hot with no one to enjoy it. Above the marble mantel was a mirror that had hung there for as long as he could remember. Interesting to see what Kitty had kept of John O’Byrne’s and what she’d dumped.

She bustled into the room, saw him, stopped abruptly. She wore a long sweater that came almost to her knees. It was a soft wool, as blue as her eyes. “Hello, Sean.” Tight, brisk. “I didn’t realize you were here.”

“I’m admiring your fire.”

She moved deeper into the room. “You’ve never been even half as funny as you think you are. What do you want?”

He realized he wasn’t exactly sure and said, “I’m looking for Lindsey Hargreaves.”

“I see. Well, did you find her?”

“No. I talked to Philip. He hasn’t seen her today.”

“Good,” Kitty said under her breath.

Sean watched her as she tidied books that didn’t need tidying. She worried about her son. Philip didn’t seem to grasp that the clock was ticking and he needed to get on with his life. His diving friends and their live-for-the-moment ways weren’t necessarily the best influence, but they didn’t seem bad sorts.

Then again, Sean thought, what did he know about the divers, or about Kitty and her teenage son? Since he’d arrived in Declan’s Cross in June, having barely survived his smugglers’ attempt to kill him, he’d kept to himself.

“David Hargreaves is arriving tonight,” Kitty said. “Lindsey’s father.”

“Here at the hotel?”

She nodded. “He’s staying in the cottage.”

The O’Byrne cottage was through the gardens, a separate accommodation with its own kitchen and two bedrooms. Sean grabbed the poker and gave the fire a quick stir. “Lindsey’s not staying with him?”

“Apparently not. She’s supposed to be staying at your cottage. The views are gorgeous up there.”

Sean returned the poker to the rack. He noticed Kitty’s cheeks flame. She would be familiar with his cottage’s views just from living in Declan’s Cross, but he knew she wasn’t thinking about looking out at the cliffs and sea from the lane. She was thinking about waking up in his bed six years ago. His father had died. His mother had moved into the village. He and Kitty had had the place to themselves.

It had been his second chance with her. He wouldn’t get a third.

“It was a long time ago, Kitty,” he said.

She frowned as if she were mystified. “I must have missed something because I have no idea what you mean.” She moved off to adjust drapes, her back to him as she continued. “You’ve met my new guests. Finian Bracken’s friends.”

“They’re FBI agents, you know.”

She glanced back at him. “Are they now?”

Clearly she did know.

“They’re here just for the night,” she added. “They’ve been staying at Fin Bracken’s cottage near Kenmare. The one he and Sally fixed up.”

Sean nodded but made no comment. Half the women in Ireland had fallen in love with Finian Bracken after the tragic deaths of his family. They’d wanted to take away his pain and give him a new life. Then he’d gone and become a priest, and now he was in New England, thanks to Sean and, in part, to Kitty herself. On a visit to Declan’s Cross in late March, Fin had talked Sean into stopping at the hotel for a drink. They’d found Kitty deep in conversation with an American priest, Joseph Callaghan, a quiet, thoughtful man in his early sixties. Father Callaghan had chosen Declan’s Cross not just because of the raves about its newly opened hotel but because he served a parish in Rock Point, Maine, not far from the Heron’s Cove offices of Sharpe Fine Art Recovery. He’d heard about the decade-old unsolved theft. That had tipped the scales in favor of a two-night stay in Declan’s Cross.

Over too much of Bracken Distillers’ finest, Father Callaghan had explained how he’d fallen in love with his ancestral homeland and dreamed of taking a sabbatical in Ireland. Sean hadn’t realized what a chord the old priest’s words had struck with Fin Bracken, but next thing, Fin had done whatever ecclesiastic string-pulling he’d needed to do and in June was off to Maine to replace Father Callaghan for the year.

Sean supposed the good Father Callaghan was somewhere in Ireland. He was due to return to Rock Point next June.

Not always easy to go back, was it?

Shaking off his ruminating, Sean noticed Kitty was frowning at him again. Ordinarily he wasn’t the type to ruminate. He said, “I went out to Fin’s cottage once, a year after Sally and the girls died.” He recalled that Fin had been dead drunk. Pasty, shaking. Not at peace with God then, for certain. Sean was of no mind to mention the incident. “It’s a small place, but it’s done up just right. Sally’s influence, I imagine.”

Kitty sighed heavily. “I expect so.”

It wasn’t a time he liked to revisit. He changed the subject. “Where are your FBI agents now?”

“Upstairs, I think. They had lunch here. When I saw the Sharpe name, I assumed they might be here about the theft—some new development, perhaps—but they’re seeing about this marine biologist friend of theirs who’s renting your cottage. Fin’s doing, I’ve gathered.”

“He was worried about Julianne, I think.”

“We emailed this morning, but you know how circumspect he can be,” Kitty said. “Father Callaghan never mentioned the Sharpes and FBI agents when he was here.”

Sean shrugged. “Why would he?”

“Always so practical,” she said with a bit of a sniff. “I suppose you’re right, though. The theft’s not as well-known as it was ten years ago, but it’s still a curiosity for some. It’ll never be solved.” Her eyes darkened on Sean. “I expect you know that better than most.”

“Because I’m a detective, or because I’m Paddy Murphy’s nephew?”

He thought he’d kept any harshness or sarcasm out of his tone, but Kitty nonetheless looked taken aback, as if she didn’t know if she should slap him or run from him. “Neither. Both. I don’t know. It makes no difference. Excuse me,” she said, crisp. “I’ve work to do.”

“I won’t keep you, then.”

She took a breath, but her eyes were fixed on the bar where Sean had chatted with her son. Her expression softened. “This lot Philip’s diving with—they’re all right, Sean?”

“I’m just a farmer these days, Kitty.”

“Even your sheep don’t believe that,” she said with a scoff, then moved on behind the bar. She was still clearly worried about her son, but Sean knew she would never admit as much to him, or ask him to intervene.

He lingered just long enough to notice the light shining on her black hair. He could see her on a long, lazy morning six years ago, sleeping as the sun rose. Her black hair had gleamed then, too. She’d looked comfortable again in her own skin, excited about what was next for her. She’d told him she’d remembered all the reasons why she had fallen for him the first time and had forgotten all the reasons why they had gone their separate ways.

Sean exited through the bar lounge, welcoming the cool air and wind.

Kitty was a smart woman. She wouldn’t forget again.

* * *

Sean stopped just past the bookshop, far enough from the O’Byrne House Hotel and its maddening owner that he could think straight again. He paid little attention to the familiar surroundings as he debated whether to call Fin Bracken about his FBI friends. He finally decided against it. It had never been easy to get information out of Fin and less so now that he was a priest. Instead he phoned Eamon Carrick’s brother, Ronan, a garda in Dublin and a member of the underwater diving unit that served the entire Republic of Ireland.

Ronan picked up almost immediately. “Sean Murphy. What a surprise. How are the sheep, my friend?”

“Bleating even as we speak.”

“Bleeding? Dear God. What have you done to them?”

“
Bleating.
Baaing. You know.” Sean had no idea if Ronan were serious or joking. “Never mind. It was just something to say.”

“Small talk from Sean Murphy. There’s something. Are you in Declan’s Cross?”

“As ever. Have you any idea why Wendell Sharpe’s granddaughter is here?”

“In Ireland?”

“In Declan’s Cross. You already knew she was in Ireland?”

“Word reached me.”

“Eamon?”

“Not Eamon. If it doesn’t come in water, he’s not interested. Someone I know in the art squad mentioned it. Wendell Sharpe’s semi-retired now, did you know? And Emma Sharpe is with the FBI. Any reason for the FBI to be interested in Declan’s Cross?”

Sean didn’t respond at once. He looked in the bookshop window and saw a small boy sitting on the floor in front of a shelf of books. He’d done the same as a boy, always interested in biographies and comics. Superheroes. Finally he told Ronan, “No reason. There’s nothing new on the art theft at the O’Byrne house, is there?”

“You’d know before I would,” Ronan said.

Probably true, if more because he lived in Declan’s Cross than because of his garda position. “You haven’t by chance run across an accident report on Lindsey Hargreaves?”

“The woman who wants to start this field station down there? I haven’t seen anything, no. I’ll have a look if you’d like.”

“I’d owe you one, thanks.”

“What’s going on, Sean?”

He told his friend what he knew.

Ronan listened without interruption, then said, “I’ll let you know if I find anything. When can we expect you back in Dublin?”

“For a pint? Soon, my friend. Thanks for your help.”

If Lindsey Hargreaves had driven off a road, Ronan Carrick would know it within the hour. He was famously dogged, as well as quick-witted and good-humored. Sean had relied on him many times during tricky investigations. They’d joined the gardai at the same time, fifteen years ago. Ronan was a few years older, redheaded, in good shape and the happily married father of three.

Sean turned from the bookshop and started up the hill toward his farm. He wasn’t always good at dodging disaster, but he’d managed to the one time he’d set his mind to propose to a woman. That had been four years ago. She’d said yes but then decided she wanted to try her hand in New York. Last he heard she was a makeup artist in the theater district.

He couldn’t see his lovely ex-fiancée spraying a sheep’s hoof to prevent a highly contagious fungal disease. Strangely enough, he could see Kitty doing it, if only because it had to be done.

Thinking about Kitty O’Byrne was the road to ruin.

Sean picked up his pace, glad he felt no pain—at least none caused by his smugglers.

7

EMMA STOOD IN
front of the marble fireplace in the reading room at the top of the curving stairs. She could hear the wind and a passing shower, the light fading with November’s early dusk. By all accounts, it had been an even wetter, chillier night a decade ago when a thief had slipped into this very room. Later in the evening—no one could pinpoint the exact time but it had been after midnight, at least.

“A fire would be nice,” Colin said from the doorway.

She turned. She didn’t know how long he’d been standing there, or how long she’d been staring at the fireplace, lost in her thoughts. “It would be. I’m sure Kitty would arrange for one if we wanted to stay up here for a bit. There aren’t many guests.”

“Quiet time of year in Ireland. I like it.”

He crossed to the fireplace, making no sound on the thick Persian carpet. The shadows accentuated the hard lines of his face, but Emma knew it wasn’t always possible to read him. He was adept at burying his real emotions. In his undercover work, his life often depended on his ability to convince people he wasn’t feeling what he was feeling.

He stood next to her and glanced around the room. “No alarm system in this place ten years ago?”

Emma smiled. Colin—his pragmatism—helped keep her from disappearing into her thoughts. “No, no alarm system. John O’Byrne was lucky to keep the lights on.”

“Where was he that night?”

“He was on vacation in Portugal, staying with friends. A local farmer was looking after the place. He was asleep in the kitchen. The thief was in and out before anyone knew it.”

“Local farmer as in—”

“Padraig Murphy. Paddy Murphy. Sean Murphy’s uncle.”

“Ah.”

“He says he slept through the whole thing.”

“You talked to him?”

“No. I saw him out in the fields but never talked to him. My grandfather did.”

Emma glanced around the room, focusing on it as it was today. Modern, gracious, with Kitty’s distinctive touch. Her taste in bright, contemporary art and furnishings was very different from her uncle’s shabby, traditional decor.

“Does Wendell know you’re here?” Colin asked.

She nodded. “I called him this afternoon and left a voice mail. I told him I want to talk to him about our thief.”

“Your thief.”

She spun from the fireplace. “On my first night in Dublin four years ago, Granddad took me to a pub, and over pint of Guinness, he told me that his best advice in art crimes work—in life, too—is to distinguish between what I know and what I believe.”

Colin studied her, his eyes taking on the stormy-gray of the darkening Irish sky. “I want both, Emma. What you know about this thief and what you believe.”

She sat on a chair angled in front of the fireplace. “I don’t know if Julianne’s presence in Declan’s Cross has anything to do with the theft here.”

“But you believe it does.”

“I’m at least concerned.”

Colin sat on a soft-cushioned love seat directly in front of the fireplace. “I’d feel better if she at least had a phone up at that damn cottage.”

“It kills you that she’s there by herself,” Emma said with a smile, despite her own misgivings about Julianne’s presence in Declan’s Cross. “Ireland’s pretty safe.”

“This farmer’s uncle is a suspect, isn’t he?”

“Not for being the thief,” Emma said.

“For helping him.”

She didn’t respond.

Colin stretched out his long legs and tapped the arm of the love seat with his fingers. Restless energy, Emma thought. Not nervous energy.

“Julianne doesn’t think before she acts,” he said, as if that explained everything.

“Her quick thinking saved Andy’s life a few weeks ago.”

“Yes, it did.”

Emma didn’t push him further. She couldn’t get him to discuss the attack on his younger brother beyond the basic facts. Digging into the emotional impact of what had happened that day—and the prior weeks—wasn’t for him.

He shifted in his seat. “Julianne would string me up if she could hear me right now. The Maroney pride. She has it in spades.”

“You don’t think she’d appreciate your concern?”

He didn’t hesitate. “No. I don’t blame her for not wanting me around. Andy’s done some stupid things in his life, like the rest of us, but getting involved with Julianne...” He broke off and sat up straight, as if he were about to jump up from the love seat. “He knew how it would end.”

“Maybe it was inevitable,” Emma said. “They’ve known each other forever. Did you and Andy talk about it?”

Colin looked at her with a grin. “You’re kidding, right?”

She sighed. “What about Mike and Kevin?”

“Andy didn’t ask any of us for our advice or opinion. Not his style. He and Julianne thought they could separate themselves from Rock Point, pretend they were a couple of strangers who met over fried clams.”

“That could be fun at first.”

“Then reality catches up with you. It always does. You have to look it square in the eye. Be who you are. Accept it.”

Emma wondered if they were still talking about Julianne and Andy. “Colin...”

His gaze settled on her, but he pulled away and sprang to his feet. “Julianne’s smart and ambitious. Driven. Speaks her mind. Andy’s smart, but he’s not as ambitious as she is, or at least in the way she is.”

“He’s also not ready to settle down.” Emma looked up at Colin. “Are any of you Donovans ready to settle down?”

His smile caught her by surprise. “It’d help if we fell for easy women.”

“Considering how easy Donovan men are.”

“Are you saying my brothers and I are difficult?”

“Challenging. I’d say you’re all challenging.” She stood next to him in front of the fireplace. “Did you ever think Andy and Julianne’s relationship would last?”

“I wasn’t around much when things got hot and heavy between them.”

“That doesn’t answer the question, Special Agent Donovan.”

He glanced at her. “You’d do fine as a field agent, you know.”

“Maybe we’re on edge because we’ve been on vacation too long.”

“I think it’s more than that, Emma.”

She nodded. “So do I.”

He studied an atmospheric watercolor painting above the fireplace. It was of an Irish sunset, all splashes of rich color against a backdrop of a churning sea and rugged hills.

Emma eased next to him, aware of how tense and preoccupied he was. “This wasn’t here ten years ago,” she said. “It’s Aoife O’Byrne’s work.”

“It’s quite a painting,” Colin said.

“She was inspired by her uncle’s art collection. The most valuable paintings he owned were here, in this room.”

“The thief knew?”

“That’s our assessment, yes. We think he was after specific works and he knew exactly where to find them.”

Colin turned to her. “Tell me what happened.”

Emma moved to a tall window overlooking the hotel gardens, its pebbled walkways illuminated against the early night. What a place to relax, she thought. Read a book. Think. Nap. Enjoy the surroundings. She knew Colin was watching her, perhaps again trying to figure out what she’d been like before she’d headed to Quantico. The Sisters of the Joyful Heart...Sharpe Fine Art Recovery. So different from the world he knew. She could picture him in Rock Point, lobstering, working in the marine patrol. It was his life with the FBI that was tougher for her to envision. His deep-cover work with international arms traffickers. Killers.

“Emma,” he said quietly, joining her at the window.

She continued to stare out at the darkening gardens. “Two of the paintings stolen that night were by Jack Butler Yeats. The third was unsigned.”

“Worth a lot?”

“The Yeats paintings, yes. Not hundreds of millions but in the millions. It’s often easier and ultimately more profitable for thieves to get rid of pieces that aren’t as well-known. Yeats’ work has become extremely popular. He’s considered one of the greatest Irish painters of all time.”

“Related to William Butler Yeats?”

“His younger brother. Their father, John, was also a painter. John O’Byrne bought the Jack Yeats paintings at an auction in Dublin, before Yeats’ popularity went into the stratosphere. They’re earlier works—pre-1940. Landscapes of scenes in the west of Ireland.”

“What about the third painting—the one that was unsigned?”

“It’s an oil landscape of a local scene.”

“Where?”

“The painting depicts three remarkable stone Celtic crosses at the tip of Shepherd Head.”

Colin was silent a moment. “Have any of the missing paintings turned up?”

Emma shook her head. “Not a one.”

She noticed the shower had passed and some of the clouds were breaking up. There’d be more rain later on, but she’d seen weather reports. Tomorrow was supposed to be beautiful. If they heard from Lindsey Hargreaves tonight, they all could relax and enjoy the day.

“What about the cross that was stolen?” Colin asked.

“It was on the mantel downstairs. It’s a small silver wall cross inscribed with a beautiful Celtic motif. It’s a mini version of the largest of the crosses on Shepherd Head but much older.”

“How old is old around here?”

“Granddad guesses the wall cross that was stolen might be as early as fifteenth century. He can’t know for certain since he hasn’t seen it and it was never appraised. John O’Byrne said he found it when he put in the gardens here about fifty years ago. He told Granddad he was devastated by its loss.”

Colin turned from the window. “Where were his nieces that night—Kitty and Aoife?”

“Kitty was staying with a friend here in Declan’s Cross, as I recall from the file. Aoife had been living in Ardmore but she’d moved to Dublin by then and was home, but alone. They’ve both done well financially. Their uncle was a widower with no children. He struggled with money at the end.”

“The cross and the stolen paintings were uninsured?”

“Right. John O’Byrne didn’t arrange the theft to collect insurance money.”

“That doesn’t let him off the hook. He could have worked out a deal with the thief to split the profits of a private sale to a rich collector.”

“There’s no evidence of any financial gain,” Emma said.

“What we know, what we believe and the resulting unanswered questions.” Colin moved back from the window to the round table in the middle of the room. He fingered a thick book on romantic Irish country homes, then met her gaze again. “Do you think the thief is from Declan’s Cross?”

“We don’t know enough. That’s what I think.”

“Did someone from here help him? Our sheep farmers? Paddy and the nephew? Someone else?” He stood straight. “The nieces?”

“None of the evidence—”

“I’m not talking about evidence. I’m talking about instincts.” His gray eyes steadied on her. “Your gut, Emma. What does it say?”

It was how Colin thought, Emma realized. He was pragmatic, unsentimental. He had investigated a wide range of crimes as a Maine marine patrol officer and then as an FBI agent, even before turning to undercover work. Her focus was the complex but particular world of art theft. “My gut says we’re missing something.”

“Then or now?”

“Both,” she said without hesitation. “But I don’t trust my gut as much as you trust yours.”

“You think there’s some rock you haven’t turned over. It’s out there, waiting for you.”

“That’s one way of putting it, yes.”

“I know that feeling.” He gestured to another painting, an oil depicting a row of bright-colored cottages. “How much of the artwork here now came with the house?”

“We’d have to ask Kitty. Her taste is different from her uncle’s. Most of the art on display is likely her doing—contemporary Irish painters and sculptors, including her sister. Aoife is an internationally recognized artist herself now.”

“Did her uncle support her artistic efforts in her early days?”

“I don’t know.”

Emma glanced again at Aoife O’Byrne’s moody painting, with its striking colors and intriguing use of light. Aoife had an ability—a vision—that blended drama, open, deep emotion, reality and fantasy into a unique style that was all her own. Emma felt her throat tighten, her reaction to the painting catching her off guard.

“Who called the police?” Colin asked.

She cleared her throat and looked away from the painting. “Paddy Murphy called the gardai in the morning when he saw that the French doors were wide open. He knew it wasn’t the wind, but no one realized the paintings and cross were missing until John O’Byrne returned from Portugal a few days later.”

“Ouch.”

“Yes. Ouch.”

“He cooperated with the police?”

“As far as I know. Granddad didn’t get involved until six months later, after two Dutch paintings were stolen from a small museum in Amsterdam. They’re landscapes but otherwise very different from the works stolen here.”

“But you’re sure it was the same thief.”

“That’s right.”

“And the subsequent thefts—you’re sure?”

Emma nodded. “Yes.”

“How do you know?”

She touched the cover of the book on romantic Irish houses, debating what to tell him. She looked up, saw that Colin was watching her, his eyes narrowed. He already knew the answer, she realized.

She stood back from the table. “We know because he tells us.”

“‘Us’ being—who? You, your grandfather, your brother, your folks? All of you?”

“Granddad,” Emma said, leaving it at that.

“Not going to tell me how he lets you know, are you?”

She gave a tight shake of her head. “I can’t go into detail, Colin.”

“Understood.” He eased next to her, his upper arm brushing hers. “Is this thief matching wits with your grandfather?”

“Possibly.”

“Someone from his past?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. It wouldn’t narrow things down very much. Granddad’s worked in art crimes for sixty years. That leaves a wide, deep pool of possibilities. The thefts are all brazen but so far not violent.”

“The ones you know about,” Colin said.

Emma acknowledged his statement with a nod. “Fair point. Not everyone reports an art crime, and he might not tell us—Granddad—about every theft.”

“He could escalate to violence at any time, if he hasn’t already. And you’re convinced it’s a man.”