7

Back at headquarters, I sent out an email alert about Gladys’s missing Dali to my art-crime contact list—basically anyone the thief might try to sell the work to—art galleries, dealers, auction houses, law enforcement contacts, and even criminals.

Next, I ran cursory background checks on Gladys’s children and housekeeper. The housekeeper’s credit history was spotty, but she didn’t have any liens against her. She’d been at the same address for the past twenty years—the same length of time she’d been with Gladys. She’d also had a couple of side jobs through the years. Never married and had a lead foot if her speeding tickets were any indication.

Gladys’s daughter, Tasha, didn’t have any red marks against her. She’d gone to the top private schools, joined a sorority in her college years, married as soon as she graduated at twenty-two. Taught piano lessons from her home. Her husband, Lucas, was a different story. He’d had a DUI at nineteen and spent a weekend in jail. He’d gone through more than twenty employers by the time he graduated with a masters in business, and another three before he landed in the CFO job at his current bank. He was questioned in connection with a possession charge during a raid at a local bar, but it didn’t look as if anything came of it. Six years ago, a woman had filed a paternity suit against him. I did a deeper search but couldn’t find any information on the outcome.

Could mean someone paid her off. Or that it was still unresolved. If Lucas was getting himself into trouble sowing his wild oats, it could be motivation to secretly sell one of mother-in-law-dearest’s expensive paintings.

Gladys’s son, Pete, had a clean criminal record and a good credit history. So whatever real estate albatross Randy had been referring to earlier hadn’t affected his daily transactions. At least not yet. Pete hadn’t missed a single payment on his mortgage, utilities, or credit card.

Stretching out the kinks in my neck, I decided to wait on pumping Pete for the name of the exterminator he’d hired to catch Gladys’s squirrel. Despite Ted’s appearance at the drop-in center, it seemed like a stretch to suppose he knew why Nana wanted to see me and had followed her. Besides, he couldn’t have switched the paintings without an accomplice. An accomplice that I had a bad feeling had to be someone Gladys trusted too much.

My cell phone rang, and a fuzzy image of my mugger appeared on the screen.

“This your guy?” Matt Speers, my friend on the St. Louis PD, asked.

“Yes, where’d you get the pic?”

“Pulled the image off the security footage of the coffee shop across the street from your art expert. According to the time stamp, he was already in the shop before you went into the building across the road.”

“So he wasn’t following me. That’s good. Saves me worrying about one more thing.”

“Yeah, figured you’d be happy about that. We didn’t manage to ID him. The barista said he wasn’t a regular, but that it’s not the first time someone’s been mugged coming out of the artist’s place.”

“No? Did you look up the report on the other mugging?”

“No report was filed. According to the clerk, the victim said the joke was on his mugger, because he’d just found out the painting was a forgery.”

“Really? Sounds a little too coincidental, wouldn’t you say?”

“How well do you know that expert you were visiting? You think she could be pulling a scam? Telling people their genuine paintings are fakes, then alerting a mugger to take them off their hands.”

I shook my head, not that Matt could see me. I didn’t want to believe it. Zoe, my good friend, not to mention the head of security at Forest Park Art Museum, had highly recommended Nicki. “I watched the readout for the paint elements come up on the screen. My painting was definitely a forgery.”

“You sure she didn’t scan it over a nearby palette on the sly when your attention was diverted?”

“Wow, you’re devious. I’m glad you’re on our side.”

He chuckled. “I’ve seen it all.”

“Okay, I think I’ll get a second opinion to be on the safe side.” Zoe was in the middle of planning her wedding, and as her maid of honor—somewhat delinquent though I was—I could vouch for how distracted she’d been lately. And I certainly hadn’t been watching for any sleight of hand on Nicki’s part. I tidied my desk and then snatched up my bag so I could go down to evidence to retrieve the Degas one more time.

Tanner rounded the corner of my cubicle as I turned from my desk and caught me before I ran into him. “Whoa, you get a lead already?”

“Lead?”

“You know . . . another day, another Dali.” He turned his cell phone screen my way. “Got your email alert.”

“Cute. No lead. I was heading out to get a second opinion on the Degas. My friend with the St. Louis PD thinks the expert I took it to might’ve lied about its authenticity.”

Tanner’s cheek muscle twitched, a sure sign he didn’t like what he was hearing.

“What? You know something I should?”

“Nah, I hoped to pull you in on a surveillance run. But if you need—”

“It’s fine. This can wait until Monday. How can I help?”

“How’s a sunset cruise sound to you?”

“Ooh, sounds like my kind of surveillance.”

“Perfect. I figured having a ‘date’ to photograph would give me a good excuse to get my targets on film without raising suspicions.”

I glanced down at my standard FBI-wear—charcoal-gray slacks and blazer, white blouse. “I guess I should get changed.”

“Good plan. If I pick you up at your apartment in an hour, that give you enough time?”

I rolled my eyes.

He backed away, hands raised in surrender. “Hey, what do I know? I thought sometimes women want to do their nails or—”

“Is something wrong with my nails?” I needled, studying my splayed fingers. Okay, they could use a little TLC. Nail polish wasn’t really my thing.

Tanner shook his head. “I’ll see you in an hour.”

Back at my apartment, I slid into a classic black cocktail dress, sheer pantyhose, and black pumps—because if Tanner was noticing fingernails, I sure didn’t want him seeing my toes. I added a swipe of gloss to my lips and a touch of glittery shadow to my eyelids and glanced at the digital clock next to my bed. Still had fifteen minutes to figure out what to do with my hair. I undid my ponytail and experimented with a couple of updos, trying to decide which Tanner would prefer.

I dropped my hair like a hot potato. What was I doing? It wasn’t as if this was a real date. I snatched up my favorite hair product, spritzed it on, and scrunched my long, blond waves into the kind of rumpled disarray men seemed to find appealing, if magazine ads were anything to go by.

My thoughts drifted to the one and only river cruise I’d ever been on. I’d been sixteen, the boy seventeen, and it had all seemed so astronomically romantic—the music, the gentle sway of the boat, the breathtaking colors splashing across the water and sky as the sun slipped below the horizon.

Laughter filtered through my apartment wall. Laughter that sounded a lot like Aunt Martha’s. I glanced out my back window and spotted her powder-blue car in the parking lot. How had I missed it? Sometimes I wondered why she begged me to take over her apartment lease. She seemed to spend more time here than at my parents’. Chances were she was visiting friends other than me, but just in case, I grabbed my wrap, stuffed my Glock and wallet into a nicer purse, and snuck out my kitchen door that opened onto a metal staircase on the side of the building.

Tanner pulled up just as I reached the bottom stair. His appreciative whistle filled the air.

I rolled my eyes.

He shifted into park and reached for his door handle, but I waved him off and let myself in the passenger side. No point risking hanging around a second longer than necessary. Aunt Martha wasn’t like Mom, trying to marry me off to every guy who asked me out. But who knew what she might say to Mom if she saw me like this?

“Uh . . .”

Wow, rendering Tanner speechless was a first. Because I looked so hot and he wasn’t used to seeing me this way? I hid a smile. Wait . . . what was with the funny expression?

I twisted to check the sides and back of my dress. “Did I forget to take the price tag off? What?”

“Um”—Tanner glanced at his watch, and a look of pain flickered over his face—“nothing. Really.” He rammed his truck into reverse and squealed out of the driveway. “You look amazing.”

Ri-i-i-ght. That was totally convincing.

“We’ve got to get on the boat before six in case my target’s contact doesn’t stick around for dinner.”

I laughed. “What’s he going to do to get away? Jump overboard?”

Tanner’s hand jerked the stick shift, grinding the gears. I’d never seen him so flustered over a stakeout. He was practically squirming in his seat.

At the next intersection, he suddenly turned into Forest Park. “Why are you going this way? We’ll miss the boat for sure.”

As if he’d simultaneously turned a corner in settling whatever had him so antsy, he stopped squirming and that familiar bantering gleam returned to his eye. “I’m pretty sure they’ll hold our boat until we arrive.”

“Don’t count on it.”

He pulled up alongside the Boathouse restaurant in the middle of Forest Park.

“Why are you stopping here?” The Boathouse offered casual indoor and patio dining overlooking Post-Dispatch Lake, as well as . . . paddleboat rentals. “No way. I’m not dressed for this. You said you were taking me on a sunset cruise!”

“It is.” He pointed to a sign advertising sunset cruises, complete with a deluxe picnic supper and rental of a two-person paddleboat to chug around the rivers in Forest Park. An instant later he materialized outside my truck door in his cream-colored chinos and navy blue windbreaker, a DSLR camera slung over his shoulder.

“You’re serious?” I said as he opened my door.

“C’mon, it’ll be fun.”

“Fun? Look at me. I can’t go in a paddleboat like this.”

Grinning wickedly, he looked his fill. “I’m sorry. Back at headquarters, when you asked about changing, I assumed you meant into something more casual. Then it was too late to do anything about it. But trust me, it’ll be fine.” He caught my hand and helped me out. “I’ll be the envy of every guy in the place.”

I grabbed my wrap from the seat. “Fine, but I’m not paddling.”

Laughter rumbled through his chest. “Wouldn’t dream of making you.” Tanner led me through the gate and gave his name to the man in charge of the boats. The outside patio was packed with dinner patrons.

I clutched his arm and leaned in close as I pretended to pick a stone from my shoe. I lowered my voice. “Your target here yet?” I asked, ignoring the appealing woodsy scent that wafted from his warm skin.

“One of them.” He half turned his head, and his lips brushed my cheek.

I jerked back, and Tanner gave me a sardonic look before adding, “Nine o’clock.”

I focused on making a casual visual sweep of the area, not reacting as my gaze noted the well-dressed Russian with neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper hair, mustache, and beard.

“Don’t think you won’t pay for this wardrobe malfunction,” I said under my breath to Tanner, then turned to smile at the boatman who’d just secured a picnic basket aboard our paddleboat.

“Never doubted it for a second.”

The boatman handed us each a life jacket. “Your boat is ready.”

Tanner nodded, then patted my hand still clutching his arm. “Shall we?”

Tanner stepped into the boat first, then extended his hand to help me.

“Wait!” I toed off my shoes and, turning away from him, discreetly shimmied off my pantyhose.

“Uh . . . what are you doing?”

“Do you have any idea how much these things cost?” I carefully stuffed them into my clutch, but one look at my toes convinced me to slip the shoes back on. “Guaranteed those babies would’ve run the second I sat down, and they were my last decent pair.”

He erupted in a fresh bout of laughter. But as I stepped over the side of the boat, his gaze snagged on my bare legs and his laughter abruptly stopped.

I tugged my wrap tighter around my shoulders against a sudden shiver that didn’t have much to do with the breeze dancing off the water.

“You going to be warm enough?” Tanner asked, steering the boat away from the dock.

“I’m good.” If I ignored the unnerving feeling that I’d just stepped into Édouard Manet’s Boating painting. The only thing missing was a boater hat for Tanner. I lifted the camera from around his neck and aimed it his way. “I don’t see how you plan to pretend to take pictures of me and get your target in your sights when I’m sitting right beside you.”

He steered left, bringing the boat behind a small island.

“Wait,” I whispered and pretended to focus on him when I was really zooming in on his target at the patio table. I snapped half a dozen pictures as Tanner grinned crazily. “Got it.” I lowered the camera to my lap and brought the pictures back up on the viewing screen for him to see.

“Wow, talk about handsome, huh?” Tanner said, and I did a double take of the target, who reminded me of Alan Rickman as the bad guy in Die Hard. “Not him, silly,” Tanner said, jostling my shoulder. “Me.”

“Hah,” I said. “Just paddle.”

In truth, Tanner had the warmest brown eyes and a killer dimple that made most girls go weak in the knees.

Good thing I wasn’t most girls.

“Robert Downey Jr?”

“Huh?”

“My lookalike. You know, from”—he deepened his voice—“The Avengers.”

I smacked my hand to my forehead. “Of course! Anyone with two eyes could see it—you wish.”

He shrugged good-naturedly, speeding the boat to the next island. “Target’s contact is due in ten minutes, so that’ll give us enough time to set up our picnic in the gazebo on the island. I figured from there, I can take pictures of you from all kinds of angles.”

I shook my head. “You better not let my mother hear you talking like that.”

He laughed.

Yeah, who was I kidding? Mom would totally miss the “for work” part and be so thrilled to hear I was out on a date that she wouldn’t care what kind of pictures he was taking.

Tanner moored the boat to the island and climbed out. “Hand me the basket first, then I’ll help you out.”

My stomach grumbled as I handed him the basket and the delicious aroma of fried chicken swirled past. I scrambled out before Tanner had time to lower the basket. His hand swallowed mine, and he tugged me toward the gazebo.

“I hope we’re going to get a chance to eat this supper,” I said. “I’m starving.”

Tanner pulled a blanket from the basket and, spreading it on the floor of the gazebo, squinted toward the Boathouse. “We can start eating. No sign of the target’s contact yet.”

I sank onto the blanket, my legs tucked under me as ladylike as I could manage in a cocktail dress, and helped Tanner pull out the food containers. In addition to fried chicken, there was potato salad, coleslaw, a fancy quinoa dish, warm rolls, and . . . “Mmm, brownies.”

“Ordered those just for you.”

“This sure beats the last surveillance we did.”

“I don’t know. What’s not to like about a hot, stuffy car, bologna sandwiches, and cold coffee?”

“Hmm.” I savored a bite of brownie. “At least I didn’t have to wear a dress.”

“You don’t like wearing dresses?”

I shrugged.

“They look good on you.”

“Is that a compliment?” I fanned my face as if I were going to faint.

Tanner rolled his eyes. “Thank you is the correct response, Jones.”

He sprang up and started snapping pictures of me. “Stand by the tree over there and fling your hair around.”

“Fling my hair around?”

“You know. Act like we’re being silly imitating a professional photo shoot.”

I glanced toward the Boathouse. Tanner’s target stood and extended a hand to a hefty man in a pinstriped business suit. I sashayed to a better position for Tanner to focus on them while appearing to photograph me. “Who’s the target?” I asked.

“A player in a case I’m working on,” he said in his usual evasive way.

I flipped my hair off my shoulder and flung back my head like a prima donna model. “What would you think if you asked me about a case I was working on, and I gave you that kind of cagey answer?”

He stopped snapping pictures and shot me a confused look. Not surprising since he’d been my field-training agent. It’d probably never occurred to him that one day I might stop discussing my cases with him. “I’m sorry.” He resumed snapping. “It’s been so ingrained in me to not discuss cases outside the office that I answer like that without thinking.”

“So who is he?”

“A player in a case I’m working on,” he repeated, amusement in his voice this time.

I stuck out my tongue at him.

“No, I’m sorry. It really is a sensitive case.” He circled around me, taking photos from every angle, probably to check out the rest of the patrons in the area, some of whom were no doubt his target’s bodyguards. “Okay, I think I have plenty of shots. We can finish the picnic now.”

We tucked into the chicken and salads as Tanner regaled me with outrageous stories about some of the stakeouts he’d been on. I was having so much fun that, when my cell phone rang, I ignored it.

“Aren’t you going to answer that?” Tanner asked.

“It can go to voice mail.”

“What if it’s important?”

Clearly, the idea of ignoring a phone call was a foreign concept to Tanner.

I retrieved my phone from my purse and glanced at the name on the screen. “Hey, Nate, what’s up?”

Tanner’s expression soured.

I grinned and winked at him before turning away and lowering the phone’s volume so he wouldn’t overhear.

“Randy wants to meet us in an hour to introduce us to the forger he found. Will that work for you?”

“One sec.” I covered the phone and turned to Tanner. “Are we just about done here?”

Tanner squinted in the direction of his target. “Might look suspicious if we leave before sunset.”

“I kind of need to use the bathroom anyway.”

Tanner started tossing dishes into the basket. “I can take you home. Wouldn’t want your mother to accuse me of messing up your social life.”

I gave him an exasperated look. Ever since the blustery February day Tanner found Nate peering in my kitchen window and mistook him for a stalker, just the mention of Nate’s name seemed to get under Tanner’s skin.

“I can be ready in about forty-five minutes,” I said to Nate and clicked off.

“Big date?” Tanner stuffed the blanket into the basket.

I shrugged. “You know what they say about all work and no play . . .” After all, I couldn’t tell him I was going undercover with Nate. He’d have a conniption. Not to mention that if he figured out I’d already fooled him with my Sara Thompson imitation, he might assume Nate and I had had a good laugh over it, and nothing could be further from the truth. Then again, considering he was way less forthcoming about his own cases, I shouldn’t feel guilty about keeping one from him.

“I don’t know.” He put the basket in the boat then offered me a hand. “I thought this was fun. Didn’t you?” He jostled the boat and I lost my balance.

“Ahh!” Cold water soaked my foot as the mucky bottom ate my shoe.

Tanner’s gaze shot to the restaurant’s patio patrons looking our way. “Shh.” He hauled me back on shore.

“My shoe!”

He fished my pump out of the muck as I wrung the water from the hem of my dress. “I’m sorry.” He rinsed the shoe clean, then knelt at my feet and slipped it back on my foot.

I couldn’t help but giggle at the fairytale ending to our date.

A few minutes later, we neared the shore in the paddleboat and I glanced toward his target, still sitting on the patio. “Are you sure you’re okay to leave?”

He tossed the rope to the boatman on the dock, then hopped out and reached for my hand. “Your wish is my command.” He gallantly brought my hand to his lips as he drew me out of the boat.

My heart skipped a beat. “You’re an idiot,” I said, trying to tug my hand away.

He pressed his palm to his chest. “You wound me.”

“Don’t tempt me.” I bit down on a grin. “Let me slip into the restroom. Might counter anyone’s suspicions about why we came in before the sunset.”

Clapping heels rushed up behind me, and a “Serena!” squeal practically ruptured my eardrum.

Oh no. I glanced at Tanner, whose gaze jumped to his target. Could we have been any more conspicuous?