The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro

Author:B. A. Shapiro
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fiction, Azizex666, General
ISBN: 9781443418058
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2012-10-23T04:00:00+00:00

Twenty-seven

Above the fold, on the front page of the Boston Globe, is a photograph taken from the Gardner Museum archives of After the Bath, the one that had hung in the Short Gallery for almost a hundred years, the one stolen in the heist. Only Aiden and I know that this isn’t the painting recovered on a dock in San Francisco. Only I know it wasn’t painted by Edgar Degas.

STOLEN GARDNER MASTERPIECE FOUND? asks the large-font headline. It’s the lead story on almost every news site on the Internet. The Today show, too.

Aiden and I comb every source we can find, reading snippets out loud to each other. But the bottom line is that nothing additional has been released since yesterday’s announcement. No mention of Patel or an arrest. The authorities are keeping whatever they know very close.

“Do you think they’re doing that thing where they withhold evidence that only the killer could know?” I ask Aiden.

Aiden rolls his eyes. “Claire, there is no killer. And there very well could be no evidence. Which is probably why they aren’t sharing it.”

“You know what I mean.”

He stands and massages my neck, another thing he’s really good at. “Unfortunately, I know exactly what you mean.”

I lean back into his expert hands and groan. I’m in my paint clothes, and Pink Medium has been cooking for over an hour. I drop my head forward so he can get at the sore muscles above my shoulder blades.

“Are you scared?” I ask.

His fingers keep working, but he doesn’t answer.

His silence jolts me, and I turn to look at him. “Could we go to jail?”

“Don’t be a child, Claire,” he snaps.

I take a step away from him. He’s never raised his voice to me before.

“Sorry,” he says, drawing me back. “Sorry. As you might have guessed, I’m a little stressed.”

My eyes scour his.

He sighs. “Anything’s possible, and this is not an insignificant crime. But no, I don’t think we’ll go to jail. Or at least you won’t.”

I hold onto him. I don’t think I could bear to lose another man due to a situation for which I’m partially to blame.

“Don’t worry so much,” he says. “I’m checking into a number of options. Things to keep us safe.”

While this is hopeful, there’s evasiveness in his voice that makes me uneasy. “What kinds of things?”

Aiden gently untangles himself. “I have to get going,” he says. “Should be at the gallery most of the day. I’ll call you if I learn anything.”

When he leaves, I go right back to work. The zone is the only safe place for me now.

TWO DAYS LATER, it’s confirmed that a man named Ashok Patel, an Indian national from Bangalore, has been arrested for transportation of stolen goods. It’s also reported that the canvas was on its stretchers, not rolled up as Patel had been instructed. Nor was he carrying it with him. Instead, it was concealed inside a large container of blue jeans destined for a New Delhi department store.

Over the next few

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