“Hello, Frances,” said a man with a Russian accent.
A ceiling lamp flicked on, lighting their seating area.
She wondered how he knew her real name. “And you’re...?”
“An admirer...and a potential friend.”
Considering how matter-of-factly he accepted the brooch, as though it were his, this had to be the criminal working with Enzo. The mastermind Charlie and Vanderbilt Insurance wanted her to find. And to think she’d been convinced she’d blown this case.
Great. She’d found him. But who was he? Apparently a Russian who had an undercover Vegas cop on his payroll.
The man picked a box off the couch. As he leaned forward, holding it toward her, she caught a whiff of his cologne, a potent mix of burned cherries and leather.
“Please help yourself,” he said. “Chocolates from the Krupshaya confectionery factory of Saint Petersburg.”
“Are you from Saint Petersburg?”
He made a clucking sound. “Don’t be impolite, my dear. We’ve barely met and you’re already asking personal questions.” He gestured to the box. “I suggest the dark chocolates. They’re creamy and sweet, unlike the dry, bitter variety one finds in America.”
“No, thank you,” she said. She vaguely remembered someone telling her that refusing a Russian’s offer of food or drink was considered rude. “I’m allergic to chocolate.”
“Allergic to vodka, too?” He helped himself to a piece of candy.
“Uh, no.”
“Good. Would hate for you to miss out on all of life’s pleasures.” He settled back on the couch and, after popping the confection into his mouth, nodded to the other man, who moved forward, turning his smartphone so Frances could see the screen.
A video began playing of her and Enzo at the jewelry store, talking across the display case. It had been taken from the camera on her left, a good twenty feet away, yet it looked as though it had been shot from much closer.
Thoughts ricocheted through her mind. Enzo was either a terrific actor, emoting cluelessness as she lifted the brooch, or he had no idea she’d done it. Considering his current legal problems, she doubted he could pretend to be anything other than what he was—a troubled, weary man.
Which meant this Russian had somehow gotten hold of the surveillance film, but since he had the brooch again, why show this to her?
He said something in Russian to the younger man, who tapped the screen. The image froze just as she swapped the replica with the Lady Melbourne brooch.
“Nice work, Frances,” the older man said. “You’ve obviously done this before.”
“How do you know my name?”
“Your government has a marvelous facial-recognition database that contains every U.S. driver’s license photo. My associate Oleg hijacked the signal from the surveillance camera to his smartphone, selected a clear image of you and ran it through that database. It linked to your license photo and gave us your name.”
Hacking into a government database with such ease was mind-blowing. Either they had somebody on the inside or this younger guy was a computer genius. Good thing her driver’s license had a bogus street address, courtesy of Vanderbilt and the state of Nevada.
“Oleg has been monitoring that surveillance camera for several days,” he continued, looking pleased. “You see, I planted the Lady Melbourne brooch at Fortier’s because I hoped to attract a thief—make that a talented thief—who is knowledgeable about Georgian jewelry.”
This was a twist she wasn’t expecting, although she had a good idea where it was leading. “You want me to steal something for you.”
“Yes.”
“I would have thought you already had such contacts....”
“Ah, I did have an experienced jewel thief lined up. An accomplished gentleman, but he’s getting older and having health issues. Because I’ve been absent from your country for a while, I’ve unfortunately lost touch with other contacts.” He shrugged. “My excellent team has been working hard for several months.... Silly to kill a project because one person drops out. You see, we are like a pirate ship, staying on course despite turbulent seas, determined to find the buried treasure marked with an X on our map.”
“Seems risky to continue, though, if the person who dropped out is key to the plan.”
“But a key can be forged. I found you, didn’t I? As to risk...what beats in the heart of every thief is the thrill of uncertainty and peril. Without those, we lose our edge, our—” he rubbed his fingers together, as though touching a silky fabric “—finesse.”
His words resonated with her. She could still remember the rush after a successful pickpocket, a giddy high she had never gotten anywhere else in life. As an investigator, she sometimes felt that way after lifting an item, but it wasn’t the same. The risk was there, but it was nothing like the thrill of the illicit hunt.
She shifted slightly. “What do you want stolen?”
“I’m sure you’ve heard of the Helena Diamond necklace....”
“Of course,” she murmured.
The Helena Diamond was a heart-cut diamond necklace secretly commissioned by Napoleon with the help of friends during his exile on the island of Saint Helena in memory of his long-lost love, Josephine. Legend claimed that within the Helena Diamond was the pattern of two perfectly symmetrical hearts, only visible to the eyes of destined lovers.
The necklace disappeared after Napoleon’s death, supposedly confiscated by his enemy, Prince Metternich, whose family hid the diamond after the fall of the Austrian Empire. Decades later, it resurfaced in the hands of a London diamond merchant who sold it for fifteen million dollars to an unnamed American businessman.
“That necklace is worth millions,” she said.
“Twenty to be exact. It will be on display next month at the Legendary Gems exhibit at the Palazzo. We have the electronic know-how, locksmiths and muscle to grant you safe passage in and out. Your knowledge of Georgian jewelry—essential, as you will be mingling with antique-jewelry collectors and dealers—and your sleight-of-hand skills will do the rest.”
Her stomach fell to somewhere around her feet. What he was describing confirmed to her that he’d also been behind the theft of the ancient coins that she was so eager to find. And more than that, he was reeling her into his next major heist.
For most of her five years as an insurance investigator at Vanderbilt, she’d worked garden-variety thefts. Mid-range jewelry and antiquities stolen from homes and small businesses.
This past year, though, Charlie had been pushing her to tackle tougher, big-ticket-item cases. A theft of jewels worth half a million from a Las Vegas entertainer’s home safe. A briefcase of valuable coins stolen from a taxi. She’d solved both after weeks of investigative work, but tracking this mysterious Russian’s shenanigans with the Lady Melbourne brooch and the ancient Greek coins was starting to feel as arduous as Napoleon’s invasion of Russia.
This case was darker, more complex and frankly scarier than any she had handled before.
Part of her wanted to tell Charlie this job was out of her league and to get her out of it. But if Vanderbilt took issue with her backing out of this case and reported her insubordination to the court, the court could withdraw the suspension of her sentence, and she’d serve the remainder in jail.
“What do I get out of this?” she asked.
“Upon my receipt of the necklace, two hundred thousand dollars cash. And because of your fondness for the Lady Melbourne brooch, that, as well.”
No