Carla Neggers - Liar's Key

“It’s not a personal visit, but I’m not going to keep you.”

“Would you like to sit down?”

“Nah. I’ll stand. Sciatica acted up on the flight.” He walked over to her one window. The main offices, including hers, were on the second floor of a former warehouse, one of many rescued buildings of Boston’s waterfront past. “Alley view. I bet Yank has a harbor view.”

He did, but Emma made no comment.

“Security’s tight here but it’s not a fortress,” Gordy added. “The world’s changed since I broke into my first sweat at the academy.”

“You had an amazing career, Gordy.” Emma sat on her desk chair, swiveling to face him. “What brings you to Boston?”

“I’m on my way to Maine for the open house at the new Sharpe Fine Art Recovery offices on Saturday. I’m invited. That wasn’t your doing?”

“No, it wasn’t. I’m not part of the business. You know that.”

Founded sixty years ago by her grandfather, Sharpe Fine Art Recovery was relaunching itself under the leadership of her older brother, Lucas. Although still relatively small, the business had grown since Wendell Sharpe had set up his first office in his home in Heron’s Cove on the southern Maine coast. He’d been a young museum security guard, following his interests, hoping for the best. Now he was semiretired, living in Dublin since his wife’s untimely death fifteen years ago. Emma knew Lucas had never expected to take the helm so young, or on his own, but he’d taken to the work—or at least he was good at it, dedicated, tireless.

Gordy glanced back at her, a touch of the no-nonsense Agent Wheelock she’d known in his incisive look. “Any regrets about joining the FBI instead of the family business?”

“No. Gordy...”

“A touch of impatience. I like that. I don’t intimidate you anymore.”

She didn’t respond. He’d never intimidated her, but she’d always respected him. In his mind, the two often went together, and either or both could be used as leverage to get what he wanted. Answers, cooperation, his way.

She tilted back in her chair. “Let’s do this. You talk. I listen. Okay?”

He moved away from the window but didn’t sit. “Sure thing. I stopped in at a high-class tea party in London on Sunday. Champagne, chocolate, scones, loose-leaf tea. It was at Claridge’s. Damn fine hotel. I didn’t stay there—too pricey for my wallet. The party was in celebration of the opening of a show at the Victoria and Albert Museum featuring art and artifacts from the late antiquity period.” He paused. “How’d I do? Pretty good, huh?”

Emma didn’t buy his act. “As always.”

“I’ve picked up a few tidbits. Late antiquity bridges the classical era and the Middle Ages, around the time the proverbial shit hit the fan with the Roman Empire, at least in the west. It lasted from the fourth century to the end of the sixth century. That’s AD, or CE, as we say these days. But you know all this.”

“It’s a fascinating era.”

“I guess so. The party was relatively small, maybe forty people.”

“How did you know about it?”

“I still have contacts in London,” he said. “Getting the invitation to the Sharpe open house stirred me up, I guess. I’d hoped to go out on a high note and I went out on a dead end. That’s the way I looked at it. Anyway, I’m at this London tea party, and no sooner did I help myself to fancy tea than lo and behold, who do I see? Want to guess, Emma?”

“You go ahead, Gordy.”

He grinned at her. “I hope that’s my training you’re putting to use. I ran into an MI5 agent I know, a guy as knowledgeable as anyone in law enforcement and intelligence on the illegal antiquities trade and its connections to terrorism and terrorist funding.”

Emma sat straight. Gordy had her interest now. “Did you speak with this agent?” she asked.

“Sort of. He marched over to me and told me to drink my tea and then pack my bags and head home. I told him I only had one bag. He laughed.”

“Most people appreciate your sense of humor.”

“Yeah, right. More like he humored the old fart who doesn’t know enough to stay home and play golf. He wouldn’t tell me why he was sniffing around at a fancy London party—denied that’s what he was doing.” Gordy settled back on his heels and narrowed his gaze on Emma. “I thought you might know what his interest was.”

“Why would I know?”

“Because your pal Oliver York was there, too.”

And there it is. Emma remained very still. “Keep going.”

“English mythologist. A wealthy loner with a tragic past. He witnessed his parents’ murder at their London apartment when he was eight years old. The killers kidnapped him, but he escaped. They’re still at large thirty years later.” Gordy’s voice wasn’t without compassion. “Awful business.”

“Yes.”

“How long have you known York?” Gordy asked.

“Not long. Gordy—”

He held up a hand. “It’s okay. I don’t know anything that wasn’t in the papers. He got mixed up in an investigation into a private security firm this winter. You almost got killed. You already knew him by then, though, didn’t you?”

“Sort of. Keep talking.”

Gordy paused, studying her.

“Is Oliver York working with MI5, Emma?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Instinct. The MI5 guy is a real bastard. If he’s got York by the short hairs for some reason...well, it’s no wonder York is doing MI5’s bidding. But what could British intelligence have on a lonely mythologist?”

Tons, Emma thought, but she didn’t respond to Gordy’s question. Given his experience as a federal agent, he would know she couldn’t. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to. For a decade, he had chased a serial thief who’d broken into museums, businesses and private homes in a dozen different cities in Europe and the US, making off with a fortune in artwork. Wendell Sharpe, Emma’s grandfather, had also hunted for the thief, who had especially enjoyed taunting the world-renowned art detective. Last fall, while on an unrelated case, Emma had helped identify the thief as eccentric English mythologist Oliver York. Oliver had never admitted his guilt, and he would never face arrest and prosecution for any of his brazen heists—in part because of lack of evidence, but mainly because he’d agreed to help the United Kingdom’s Security Service, popularly known as MI5.

“I guess I wouldn’t answer that question, either,” Gordy said. “Oliver York’s London apartment—the same one where he witnessed his parents’ murder—is a short distance from Claridge’s. He also owns a farm in the Cotswolds. Again, though, I’m telling you something you already know, since he’s your pal.”

“Oliver isn’t my pal.”

“Is he one of your grandfather’s eccentric pals?”

“You’d have to ask him. Did you speak with Oliver at the party on Sunday?”

“No, I didn’t. He saw me and took off in the opposite direction. Coincidence, maybe.”

Emma doubted it. “What else, Gordy? I can’t get worked up about MI5 and an English mythologist showing up at a high-end London party.”

“Your parents were there.”

Now this was news, Emma thought, containing any reaction. She could see he was gauging her response as the experienced agent he was. As a member of HIT, short for High-Impact Target, she worked on investigations focusing on elusive criminals with virtually unlimited resources. But she had only a little over four years on the job. Gordy, retired just a year, had decades.

“I haven’t talked with them in a few days,” she said.

“We said a quick hello while the MI5 agent was looking daggers at me. They’re living in London now, I understand. It’s temporary?”