Faking It d-2 Read online

  Clea stared at him coldly. “Ronald. You’re not helping me.”

  “There was a lot on the Goodnights,” Ronald offered. “They changed the family name in 1948 from Giordano. They moved here in the sixties.”

  “I need dirt, Ronald,” Clea said.

  “One of them went to prison for art forgery,” Ronald said helpfully. “That’s when they changed their name.”

  “In 1948,” Clea said. “Do you have anything from this century?”

  “Not really,” Ronald said. “They haven’t done anything since Gwen’s husband Anthony died. I told you, the gallery’s on its last legs. There’s nothing there.”

  Clea resisted the urge to slap him. It wasn’t his fault there was nothing there. Also, she was beginning to suspect that Ronald liked being abused. “Well, thank you for trying, Ronald.”

  Ronald leaned forward. “I’ll do anything for you, Clea, but really, can’t we forget this whole thing, go back to Miami -”

  “No,” Clea said. “My art collection is here, Ronald.” My future husband and his money are here, Ronald.

  “Did you find the rest of the Scarlet Hodge paintings?”

  “No,” Clea said, feeling bitter just thinking about it. “But I found two people who had sold them. Somebody else is collecting them.”

  “Why?” Ronald said.

  Clea blinked at him. It was a damn good question. The only person who wanted them was Mason, but he didn’t fit the descriptions of the buyers, tall men with dark hair and very different wives… Clea sat up slowly. “Davy Dempsey.”

  “Why would he want paintings?” Ronald said. “He has no interest in art.”

  “He’s living at that gallery,” Clea said. “You said Gwen Goodnight had been an actress, right? It was the two of them. He’s running some con at that gallery.”

  “He’s gone straight,” Ronald said.

  “Oh, sure, like you did.” Clea bit her lip, and Ronald breathed faster. “No. He’s up to something with Gwen Goodnight. I bet they’re scamming Mason. They’re going to use those paintings to get him to propose to her. Then Gwen will pay off Davy.”

  “That’s not Davy’s kind of con,” Ronald said.

  “Davy is capable of anything,” Clea said.

  “No,” Ronald said, and Clea looked at him, surprised. “I’m sorry, but that’s not his con.”

  “Well then, why does he want the paintings?” Clea said.

  “I don’t know,” Ronald said.

  “Find out,” Clea said and picked up her menu, feeling much better now that they were making progress.

  “No,” Ronald said.

  Clea frowned. “It was interesting the first time you said it, Ronald. Now it’s just annoying.”

  “I’m not hired help, Clea,” Ronald said. “I’m your lover. I deserve some respect.”

  Clea thought about it. On the one hand, life would be simpler if she let him storm off into the sunset. On the other, he was useful. And he was going to pay for lunch.

  “You’re right, Ronald,” she said, smiling at him ruefully. “You’re absolutely right.” She leaned toward him, bathing him in her smile and her cleavage. “But you will find out what Davy’s up to, won’t you? For me?” She breathed in deeply.

  Ronald breathed deeply, too. “Of course.”

  “Oh, good,” Clea said and went back to the menu.

  THAT AFTERNOON, Davy borrowed one of Simon’s shirts for the flea market, trying to look prosperous but not rich, somebody Colby would buy as honest.

  “It has to be my shirt?” Simon said.

  “Tilda doesn’t have anything that fits me,” Davy said. “Boy, one night without Louise, and you’re a mess.”

  “Four nights,” Simon said. “Does that strike you as odd?”

  “That a woman would avoid you for four nights? No.”

  “I checked her out through the Bureau,” Simon said.

  “You what?”

  “I was curious. I did it informally.”

  “Oh, good,” Davy said. “You know damn well Tilda’s up to something, and you alert the FBI.”

  “They were already alerted,” Simon said. “Someone’s up here looking into them.”

  “Fuck,” Davy said.

  “It’s part of something larger,” Simon said. “Some rich old man who died after a warehouse burned down. His grandson is insisting it’s arson. But the Goodnights are definitely on the list.”

  “Keep an eye on that list,” Davy said. “If they start to look like they’re going for anybody here, let me know.”

  “Certainly,” Simon said. “I don’t have anything else to do.”

  Downstairs in the gallery, Tilda was also annoyed.

  “I don’t get to come?” she said when Davy got the car keys from Jeff. “I leave work early and you’re doing this without Betty and Veronica?” She stopped. “Oh, good, I sound like an Archie comic.”

  “Stay close to the phone,” Davy said. “If I need you, I’ll call. Oh, and you,” he said to Nadine, who was trying to get a sock away from Steve. “You stay here, too. We may need you.”

  “For what?” Nadine said, looking up. “I get to play?”

  “This is not play, my child,” Davy said. “This is art.”

  “Uh-huh,” Nadine said and went back to retrieving her sock.

  Colby was on the edge of the market when Davy finally found him, directed there by an exasperated woman in a pink My Little Pony T-shirt who was trying to sell “real old handmade reproductions” of advertising signs. He looked like he was trying not to fit in, his polo shirt neatly pressed and tucked into Dockers that failed to disguise his paunch. He was at the age when his hairline was gathering strength to recede, and he smirked under its creeping edges, smug in the knowledge that he was better than everybody else there.

  Take him for everything he’s got, Davy’s inner con whispered.

  Davy strolled over and began to leaf through the prints that Colby had displayed in a V-shaped easel.

  “Those are all original artwork,” Colby said, which was such a blatant lie that even Davy was taken aback.

  “I’m really more interested in paintings,” Davy said.

  “Got those, too,” Colby said, sweeping his hand behind him to show a selection of framed artwork, very few of which were actual paintings.

  “Something colorful,” Davy said, and Colby offered him a still life of throbbing purple grapes and a portrait of a clown that looked as though it had been painted in orange Kool-Aid.

  “You know what my wife likes?” Davy said. “Dancers. And wouldn’t you know it, I can’t ever find a dancer painting.”

  “Don’t have one,” Colby said with real regret.

  Oh, hell. “Got anything close? People dancing in the air. Flying?”

  “Got just the thing,” Colby said. “It’s got no frame, though.” He began to dig under the table, and Davy thought, There is no chance that this-

  And then Colby was holding up the Scarlet, this one a checkerboard sky with two people with smeared heads who were sure as hell not dancing, not with that body language. Scarlet got more interesting with every painting.

  “It’s a little weird,” Colby said. “But it’s colorful.”

  “It’s smudged,” Davy said. “Their heads are all messed up. I don’t know. How much do you want for it?”

  “Well, this is an original artwork,” Colby said. “So it’s five hundred dollars.”

  Davy shook his head. “It’s messed up.”

  “It’s original,” Colby said.

  “Let me think about it,” Davy said and walked away before Colby could come down on the price. He crossed over to the next lane where he could see Colby between the booths while he punched in Tilda’s number on his cell phone. Colby was not a happy art dealer.

  “It’s me,” he said when Tilda answered. “He’s got it. Get Nadine and get ready.”

  “Okay,” Tilda said. “Andrew said he’d watch the gallery. Anything we should know?”

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