The Good Thief

“We don’t have a lot of time,” she hurried on as the waiter sauntered away. “I appreciate your stepping in at the last moment.”

“When your father calls, I come. I owe him a great deal.”

“He said he found you serving in Kosovo, in the French Foreign Legion.”

He nodded. “The Legion taught me a lot, but it’s a rough crew. Working for your father’s security business is more to my taste. And it let me return to Italy.”

“What we’re doing today should be an easy job. I don’t know if Dad told you what I do as a side venture, when I’m not selling for and promoting NSI business.”

Marko Savin angled the free chair at their table and propped one booted foot on it. He wore a black leather jacket with black jeans. “He says you buy back stolen goods for their rightful owners.”

“Correct. Today I’m purchasing a painting for a million and a half American dollars.” While thinking again how wonderfully deep blue his eyes were, she nodded to the bulky white cotton satchel at her feet. It held a four-foot-long tube which, in turn, held a quality reproduction of the painting. “I’ll trade the tube in this satchel for the tube that has the original. There’s a minor difference in their labels that only I would notice.” On at least four occasions this little bit of confused identification between the original and the copy had worked to good effect for her. A way for her “steal” the painting back if the deal went bad. It might not be needed, but again, better to be prepared for all eventualities than sorry for assuming all would go well.

She explained the history of the Nazi theft of the painting.

Savin frowned. “I don’t get it. You’re paying off a thief, an ex-Nazi, for a painting he stole. Owners shouldn’t have to buy back their own stuff.”

“The owners just want their painting back.”

“Seems to me that’s a job for the authorities. They catch the bad guys, retrieve the art, return it, and punish the crooks.”

“I’m hired when owners discover that the authorities aren’t going to be able to retrieve something the owners very much want returned.”

“Isn’t that sort of interfering with a criminal investigation—for money?”

His questions were starting to annoy her. “When the authorities can’t deliver, people hire me. They’re willing to pay a substantial retrieval fee. The fee is, of course, gratifying, but the real satisfaction—the reason I take the risks—is because I get to see the joy on my client’s faces when I return what they loved and thought they had lost forever. I can assure you that I only work for legitimate owners or their representatives.”

“You said the guy is a Nazi! Pretty much scum.”

She glared at him. “The seller isn’t a Nazi. His grandfather was. But, yeah, I’d deal with a Nazi. I deal with whoever has what owners want returned. And that’s why you’re here. Sometimes things can go sour. So, you in or no?”

Savin stared right back, then shrugged. “Sure.”

“Okay. Here’s the action,” she continued. “You and I go to the meet, you on the bike, me in my rental car. We arrive a minute apart—you first—and we make no connection. They aren’t to know I have muscle behind me. I’ve made my reputation—I am the best and intend to stay that way—by never coming armed and making certain that buyers and sellers get what they expect. I presume you’re carrying.”

He patted his chest where under the leather jacket she assumed he had a gun. She’d already figured out from the bulge on the calf of the leg propped on the chair that he carried a knife.

“That’s fine,” she continued. “But there’s to be no use of weapons unless it looks like someone is going to kill me. Okay?”

“Got it.”

“What I do, and my reputation, depends on being clever, not violent, but I will get the painting back, and I will not get killed doing it.”

He smiled. It made his blue eyes twinkle.

From the white satchel she pulled out a map of the Capodimonte Park grounds. She explained where he would park and where Gottschalk was supposed to meet her—on an access road about a hundred and fifty yards away.

“If I need help, I’ll jab my fist into the air. Or,” she slid a small black box to Savin across the table and as he reached for it, his finger brushed the back of her hand. She felt a quick spurt of warmth to her face, her body’s response to a profound sense of pleasure at his touch.

Stunned, she drew in a slow breath, then, “If I press this,” she touched the center of a silver moon pendant, “the green light on your box will go red.” The slim moon disk contained a built-in transponder, activated by a three-second touch.

“Don’t come in unless I signal, okay? Any questions?”

He shook his head, then said, “I like your earrings. They’re exactly the color of your eyes.”

For a moment she couldn’t find words, surprised at the sudden shift of topic and tone. Her earrings, a gift from K-bar and her mom when she graduated from the Academy, were half-inch, oval studs set in silver. “They’re gray star sapphires. From India.”

“Very beautiful.”

She felt herself warming, knew that her face was reddening. How embarrassing.

She checked her watch. “It’s time to go.” She lay ample euros on the table, grabbed the satchel and, keeping her eyes off of Marko Savin, headed for the street.

Chapter 2

Lindsey drove the rented red Fiat uphill from the center of Naples through heavy traffic. The city spread across hills that allowed those spectacular vistas of Vesuvius rising in all its imposing splendor, an ancient sentinel watching over the bay, its peak shrouded in clouds. Everything was going well, even on schedule.

She kept Marko Savin in sight all the way to Capodimonte Park. With Tito, she stayed focused on the deal, but thoughts of the surprising rush of pleasure she’d felt at Marko Savin’s touch kept intruding.

K-bar had said Savin wasn’t married. She couldn’t resist wondering what his “type” might be. She had always wanted to share her passions and joys and hardships with a special companion. So far, however, the only man she’d ever had a serious relationship with wanted her to quit taking the risks involved in her art buybacks. And he hadn’t even known about the sometimes extremely dangerous courier jobs she did, in secret, for the U.S. government as an Oracle agent.

She knew other Athena women who had sacrificed their lives of high risk for family, but that would never be Lindsey. Retrieving art, sometimes masterpieces, stolen and precious to their owners, gave her life meaning. Most of her assignments as a courier were important, some critical to U.S. security, and that also gave her life substance. This was who she was.

Saying no to the possibility of love and a family of her own had been the hardest thing she’d ever done. Sometimes, alone at night, she would get the blues and think she’d made a mistake, but, she’d inherited her mother’s cheerfulness, and in the morning she’d look forward to the day’s action.

No one in this life gets everything.

She pulled over and waited, carefully watching for one minute. Maybe she could risk some fun and adventure with this man. No ties. She would very much like that—if he showed any interest. He had seemed to. Why else comment on her earrings and her eyes with a look that said he couldn’t stop mentally undressing her?

When the sixty seconds had passed, she drove through the entry and through extensive grounds with spacious lawns, now brown with winter, passing groves of leafless trees and a number of old buildings, including the palace that was now a museum, all of them tied together by looping access roads.

Heinie Gottschalk was waiting at the prearranged spot, seated in the back of a black Alfa Romeo sedan, parked as directed and accompanied only by his driver. She’d agreed that Heinie could bring one man with him and had said, “Sure, he can be armed.” Her main line of defense against treachery by Heinie, or any seller, didn’t rest on strong-arm measures. She could be counted on by both sides to be an honest broker, no violence, no treachery and total discretion.

She parked the Fiat in front of the Alfa Romeo and turned off the motor. A hundred and fifty yards away, Marko sat on his bike, apparently studying a map or newspaper.

Carrying the white satchel with its slightly protruding tube, she strode to the Alfa. The driver stepped out and opened the rear door behind the driver’s seat. Lindsey slid inside, sharing the seat with Heinie. He was perhaps twenty-five with neat shoulder-length blond hair and a flashy pinstripe suit. The diamond stud in his ear had to be at least a carat and a half.

Heinie spoke English, in which he was fluent. “So, we’re ready to trade?”

“Let me see the painting,” she countered. As he reached for it, she slipped her hand into her jacket pocket and palmed the tiny GPS transponder, the size of a dime. She had to slip it into the tube with the genuine painting and quickly because in the end, he might refuse to leave her alone with Cleopatra.

He handed her the tube she had supplied to him. “I need to have a few moments in private to inspect it,” she said.

“Why the fuck would you need to inspect it? You think I try to cheat you? I know your reputation and I deal in good faith.”

“Others have tried to cheat. Before we part, you will be able to verify that the wire transfer has been made. Right now I verify the painting’s authenticity. It’s all part of keeping everyone honest.”

“What’s in your tube there?”