Take Me Two Times Page 19

  “I’m actually going to miss that painting,” she said. It had hung in the living room of Liam’s London home.

  He brightened. “Then you’ll let me hang on to it?”

  “No stolen goods,” Avy said in severe tones.

  “Such a stickler for law and order, darling. Not that I don’t adore you, but your morals get rather onerous at times.”

  “Yeah?” She shrugged. “Well, it’s just the cross you have to bear. You’ll get used to it, given twenty or thirty years.”

  Liam looked perturbed. “Then may I gamble our fortunes away?”

  “No.”

  “Become an arsonist, an alcoholic, or an addict?”

  “No.”

  “You won’t let a man have any fun, will you?”

  “There’s always kinky sex.”

  “So there is,” Liam mused, brightening.

  “But it has to be with me.”

  “How wretched.” He cast a furtive look over his shoulder and slipped his hand inside her coat and up her skirt.

  “Liam!”

  “I’m doomed, am I?” His wayward fingers slid under her thong. “A prisoner to the marital flesh, ending my days in abject misery . . .”

  “Stop that!” She squirmed and sidestepped, trying to catch her breath. Her body had gone from freezing to electrified in a matter of seconds.

  “ . . . just begging for a little slice of . . .” His eyebrows waggled and he whispered a dirty word into her ear. Heat blazed between her legs and she caught at his wrist, trying to pull his hand away.

  Liam just chuckled and maneuvered her down a side street and into a dark doorway. He stood in front of her, his coat open, so nobody could see what he was doing.

  Avy gasped and clutched at his shoulders, no longer willing or able to stop what he was doing to her.

  His diabolical grin widened as her head fell back and a tiny whimper left her lips. She exploded against his hand as he rubbed it between her thighs. Her knees trembled and she fell forward against him.

  “I don’t suppose you’d let me keep my Bacchus now, would you, darling?” he murmured into her ear.

  “You,” Avy said raggedly, “are the devil.”

  He seemed unfazed by this opinion. “Yes, occasionally. I’m a Renaissance man, after all, and temptation is just one of the many services I offer.”

  Caravaggio’s fleshy, sly, exuberant Bacchus did seem more at home here in Italy than he did in the respectable areas of London. He sprawled decadently across a sofa not monitored by the security cameras when Liam and Avy made their exit from the Ca’ d’Oro.

  It had been frighteningly simple, really. Liam had walked in with the unframed Caravaggio rolled tightly and attached inside his London Fog coat by small loops of black Velcro.

  Once inside the building, they played tourists. They duly admired Andrea Mantegna’s St. Sebastian and Carpaccio’s Annunciation and Death of the Virgin on the first floor. They strolled through the portego gallery, which faced the Grand Canal, and admired the sculpture.

  On the second floor they wandered through the exhibits of tapestries and ceramics, viewed a couple of paintings by Guardi, and double-checked the positions of all security cameras.

  Liam disabled the only relevant camera, pulled the rolled painting out of his coat, and gently spread it out. Avy stood casually in the doorway, making sure they weren’t disturbed.

  Liam eased the Bacchus onto the sofa with a small sigh of regret. “Cheerio, old boy,” he said. “Carry on with the hedonism, eh?” Then he walked away.

  That had been hours ago. Now it was time to replace the Tintoretto Venus. They slipped through the shadows in a black sliver of a gondola, not encountering anyone at this hour. Most of Venice was sleeping at four a.m., which was too late for any drunks and too early for even the most industrious workers.

  Avy didn’t much like trusting a gondolier with their destination, but Liam assured her that this particular one was a jolly fine fellow and accustomed to dark doings. She wasn’t to get her knickers into a twist.

  The jolly fine fellow knew how to handle a gondola, at least, which was more than they did. He also knew the back waterways of Venice like his own palm.

  They pulled up to a dilapidated old lady of a house that had once been quite lovely. But this poor villa was in her dotage. Her facade showed cracks and peeling paint, her arches looked dingy and gray even by moonlight, and some of her architectural details reminded Avy of old gums and false teeth.

  She knew it was hideously expensive to live in Venice, and she couldn’t imagine what it took financially to keep up these stately old homes. “Liam,” she whispered. “You took that Tintoretto from people who couldn’t afford to lose it.”

  “Yes and no,” he said. “The old codger certainly enjoyed spending the insurance settlement he got, and as far as I know not a penny of it went into the upkeep of this place.”

  “Maybe he has an aging parent to take care of, or children to put through college.”

  “Your faith in humanity is touching, my love. But he spent it on whores and the casino we passed earlier today.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Ah.” Liam smiled in the dark. “How do you get your information, Avy? We each have our ways, do we not?”

  The jolly good fellow guided their gondola around to the back of the home, and Liam leaped out with a flash of white teeth. Then, ever the gentleman thief, he extended his hand to Avy.

  They crept around the side of the house and came to a halt.

  Then Liam produced two masks from an inside pocket of his coat. She wasn’t surprised that they were genuine Venetian Carnevale masks—this was just up Liam’s warped alley. His was the traditional Il Dottore mask, the medieval plague doctor. The mask featured a long beak and painted black round eyeglasses.

  Avy quietly snorted with laughter until she saw her own mask, which Liam handed to her with a smirk. It was the Burrattino, or puppet mask. “Oh, I’m your little marionette, am I?” she said wrathfully. “Insignificant until you pull my strings?”

  “Avy, love, it’s just a joke. Now put it on like a good little cat burglar and let’s get on with things.”

  They each made a bizarre appearance, dressed in formfitting black with the Carnevale masks over their faces. Liam led the way toward the back entrance of the house and produced a key.

  “How in the hell did you get a key, for God’s sake?” Avy whispered.

  He shrugged. “Little boys should be more careful of where they leave their schoolbags.”

  “That’s low,” Avy said. “That’s really low, Liam.”

  He rolled his eyes, turned the key, and eased the door open. He listened for a moment and then stepped inside, gesturing her to follow.

  She had a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach, and if Avy had a rule it was, Listen to your gut. She grabbed his arm and shook her head. “Something’s not right.”

  That put Liam on alert, but he just held up a finger. He cocked his head in the ridiculous mask and listened some more. Then he took two more steps inside.

  “Liam, I’m warning you. Get out now. Leave the painting right there if you must, but something’s off. I’m not going in.”

  “You don’t make much of a puppet!” he hissed at her, but she was already crouched low, heading back for the gondola.

  “We can always try again tomorrow night,” she tossed back at him.

  He shook his head. “We’ve a schedule to keep to, darling. And besides, we’re going to enjoy the real Carnevale while we’re here. Thousands of people will be out over the next few nights—too many eyes for what we have in mind.”

  “Don’t. Go. In,” Avy tried one last time, but Liam’s body language remained stubbornly committed. “Fine. I’ll do my best to bail you out of Italian jail, then.” She slipped back into the gondola with their jolly fine fellow, and Liam, damn him, ignored her advice and crept inside the house. Within three minutes, lights blazed in a room on the middle floor of the palaz
zo.

  Avy’s heart leaped into her throat. Liam was in serious trouble, and she might be the only person who could get him out of it. Cursing under her breath, she palmed her SIG and climbed back out of the gondola, stopping only to make a promise in fluent Italian to the man still in it. “If you leave us here, I will hunt you down like a dog and shoot you, capisce?”

  chapter 25

  The bitch was now in Venice. The man didn’t know what she and the thief were up to, but he seriously doubted it was a vacation.

  He had a way to pay her back for all the headaches she’d caused him. He sent an anonymous tip to someone he felt sure would be interested in the whereabouts of Sir Liam James.

  Avy Hunt was about to regret very much that she’d ever messed with the man’s family.

  Frankly, with all the cleanup he was having to do on the original plot, he would quite enjoy killing her, too. Yes, it would give him great pleasure. But . . . he wanted to come up with a creative death, something that would resonate. Bullets were so boring, so uninspired, so common and pedestrian.

  As he savored an excellent, full-bodied cabernet at the Delano on South Beach, he turned the issue over in his mind. A couple of drunk models stumbled in, giggling, and made eyes at him to see if he’d buy them drinks. They were beautiful, but a bit too skinny for his taste. Still . . .

  They hovered over the cocktail menu, shamelessly flaunting cleavage and bare skin and thick, fake nails painted in eye-popping colors. Finally they turned to him and asked what he recommended, with naughty giggles. He’d bet a hundred dollars that they each knew exactly what they wanted.

  But then, so did he. “I think,” he said, lighting a cigarette, “that you would simply adore the Ménage à Trois.”

  They laughed uproariously, the little harlots.

  “No, really. It’s a California white. The 2007 is quite good.” He signaled the bartender to hook them up and smiled ferally. Now all he had to do was score a little blow . . . in more ways than one.

  In the small hours of the morning, after a sweaty, raunchy romp, the perfect idea came to him.

  The Borgia mask he’d begun with had a bloodthirsty history . . . and had been crafted as a tool of revenge. Why not reenact that history? Why not continue its pattern of revenge? He admired the neatness of the concept and its ties to his original plan. Not all of his efforts would go to waste.

  While the secrets of the mysterious Borgia family poison had died along with them, plenty of other toxic substances existed. Angeline had the original mask, which suited him fine—ARTemis or the cops would never look beyond her or, without evidence, believe a word she said—but he could easily get his hands on the copy. In the meantime, he’d do a test run.

  He woke up the skanks sprawled naked in his bed and kicked them unceremoniously out. They could find their own way home.

  chapter 26

  Miguel was brilliant: He hadn’t let Gwen down. He’d been swamped with other information requests, but had tracked Esteban Velasquez’s location by the next morning, and had promised Gwen the results of the jeweler search soon.

  Twenty-four hours later, a simple bribe was all it took for the clerk of the Manatee Motel in south Miami to walk Gwen to Esteban Velasquez’s room. The clerk made no secret that he liked her body and the long blond hair of the wig she wore.

  Gwen made it clear that she, in turn, liked his complete lack of morals and receptiveness to cash.

  The room was simple and frankly scuzzy. It smelled of stale cigarettes and cheap industrial cleaning solution, neither of which quite covered a lurking mildew odor. A queen-size bed was covered in a cheap rainbow-hued spread, and the rest of the furniture was laminated faux-wood grain over particleboard.

  Velasquez had tossed a small duffel into the room’s only armchair, and it contained inexpensive clothing from Wal-Mart with the tags still attached, as if he’d bought some necessities in a hurry.

  “We ain’t seen him in a day and a half,” said the clerk. It looked as if Esteban had stepped out for a meal or a vending machine soda and simply not returned.

  “Like I said,” the clerk continued, shaking his head, “the guy’s truck’s still there, but when the maids knocked on the door they got no answer. One of ’em said something to me just this mornin’ about the TV still bein’ on after twenty-four hours. I says, ‘Well, then turn the darn thing off! Ain’t like anybody’s watchin’ it.’”

  “Do you mind if I take a quick look around?” Gwen asked. “I won’t touch anything. I’m just worried about him. He hasn’t called me like he said he would.”

  The clerk shrugged and winked. “I figure I’m not s’posed to let you in at all, but it helps pass the time.”

  Not to mention that he was a hundred dollars richer. Gwen rounded the bed and checked the drawer in the nightstand, but found nothing but a Bible.

  The new clothes were half pulled out of the duffel, and there were no papers or anything of interest under them.

  “You didn’t see him get into a car with anyone, did you?”

  “Nope.”

  Gwen pulled open the dresser drawers, but they were completely empty. She headed toward the vanity area outside the bathroom. A toothbrush lay to the right side of the sink with a miniature tube of Colgate next to it. An electric razor was plugged in on the left side.

  She poked her head into the bathroom. A minibottle of shampoo had been half emptied. Nothing else of interest was in the room.

  The closet was completely empty except for a pair of brand-new gym shoes. Gwen turned slowly around, surveying everything a second time. She spotted the wastebasket under the vanity and went over to nudge it out from under there with her toe. There was nothing inside.

  As she shoved it back, a flash of white caught her eye. She discreetly toed forward a small, crumpled scrap of paper from behind the little can, but she didn’t dare pick it up in front of the clerk.

  “You done?” he asked, pulling a toothpick out of his mouth. “Because if the guy comes back, I don’t wanna be in his room.”

  Gwen nodded. “I’m done. There’s nothing here.”

  He nodded, yawned, and turned toward the door.

  In a flash she’d palmed the scrap of paper. Gwen followed him out and said thanks. If he saw Mr. Velasquez, would he tell him to be sure to give his cousin a call?

  The clerk smirked at her around the toothpick. “Sure, I’ll tell him. But, babe, you ain’t no cousin. You got about as much resemblance to that guy as my ass does to a lawn mower.”

  Gwen dimpled and touched the hair of her blond wig. “What gave it away?” she asked.

  “Lemme guess: He owes you money.” The clerk was eyeing her tits in a contemplative way.

  “Good guess.”

  “Well, don’t spend no more looking for him. You could have traded me something else for the key to his room, cutie pie.”

  Disgusted, Gwen winked anyway and did a classic hair flip accompanied by a strategic jiggle of assets. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.”

  Once she was back in the Prius, she unfolded the balled-up paper and peered at it. In pencil, someone had scrawled, Costumeria Barzini. Isola di San Servolo, 30104 Venice.

  Venice? Gwen supposed it made sense. The mask she was tracking was, after all, Venetian. And this was a costume shop. There were probably dozens that catered to locals and tourists alike during Carnevale.

  She was headed back to ARTemis when Miguel called.

  “Hello?”

  “Miguel the magician, mi vida.”

  “What have you got for me, oh magician?”

  “I think I have your jeweler. Tracked him down through that Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths organization. An old guy. He’s got the right kind of welder and he’s a repoussé expert. In fact, that’s pretty much all he does. He’s in Padua, near Venice in Italy.” He read her the name and address.

  Gwen snatched a pen from her bag and copied the information onto her thigh for lack of a piece of paper. “You’re the best, Miguel.�
��

  “Si, it’s true.”

  Gwen laughed and recapped the pen, dropping it into her open purse. “I owe you my firstborn.” Her stomach dropped as she said it. She didn’t have a cramp on the horizon. . . . Dear God.

  He shuddered audibly. “Coño. I’d rather have a BMW.”

  “Very shallow of you.”

  “Yes, but smart. I don’t have to send a BMW to college.”

  “Bye, Miguel. Looks like I’ll be booking a flight to Venice.” Gwen hung up. What a chore . . . having to go to that beautiful city for work. It looked as if she were about to fly back to Italy. But this time, she’d make sure to bypass Rome and crazy Sid Thresher.

  “Ice, ice, baby,” Sheila said, brandishing a package at Gwen when she walked into the office the next morning. Sheila wore sequins today, and nobody wore sequins like she wore sequins. Cobalt blue ones formed a body of water on her yellow shirt. Coppery brown ones created the hull of a ship. White ones billowed out in sails across a baby blue sky, which in turn bulged over Sheila’s ample bosom. Her reading glasses were bright yellow.

  Gwen eyed the package with misgiving. “Who’s it from?”

  “Your lover boy.”

  Sid. Her heart sank. “What’s in it?”

  “I haven’t opened it yet—the UPS guy just came a second ago—but I have high hopes. Can’t wait . . .”

  “Yeah, me, either,” Gwen said without enthusiasm. “Go ahead.”

  “You thought I was waiting for permission, doll face? Get real.” Sheila cackled and dug into her top drawer for a letter opener. She slit the tape on the package and pulled out a red velvet box along with a note that reeked of men’s cologne.

  Both she and Gwen gagged.

  “Holy Mother of God,” Sheila gasped. “What’s that, essence of rhino ’nads?”

  She flipped open the long velvet box and gasped again. Inside was the gaudiest diamond necklace Gwen had ever seen. It was fit for the empress of all hookers and madams. It looked a lot like a rhinestone dog collar with a bow suspended from a two-inch-long squiggle in the center. The squiggle and the bow were both mounted with diamonds, and gauging by the proportions, the bow was meant to nestle right in the lucky wearer’s cleavage.