sofa, Hannah went to take another look at August Koon’s work. Her condo faced west and the late afternoon sun, filtered through the gauzy sheers over the open patio doors, set the space aglow. Warm as the day had been, nights in L.A. remained cool until late June or early July, when the ocean finally had a chance to warm up. The temperature now was dropping fast. A soft breeze wafted the sheers. The low, steady hum of traffic on Sunset Boulevard was underscored by the distant wail of a police siren.
Setting her glass on the coffee table, she zipped open the leather portfolio and pulled out the painting. She examined it front to back, inside and out. If it weren’t for a wire hanger on the frame and the artist’s signature at the bottom right, there’d be no telling right from left, up from down on this “masterpiece.” The canvas was a thickly painted mass of blues, greens and violets.
Flipping the picture over, Hannah examined the reverse side. Heavy kraft paper was stapled to the wooden frame. She shook her head and went to the kitchen for a sharp knife. No way would she not check under the paper. Lifting out half of the staples, she rolled the paper back, taking care not to crease it. The back of the canvas was grimy, but the paint-splattered pine stretchers and staples holding the canvas in place seemed relatively new. Nothing remotely untoward here.
After stapling the paper back in place, she propped the painting on the sofa. Then, she had another thought. She pulled the portfolio toward her and examined it closely. Rebecca had provided it, so if the case concealed something illegal, then Nora’s friend was implicated. Hard to believe, but who knew? She wouldn’t be the first person driven to crime out of desperation.
The case was padded and reinforced to reduce the risk of crushing. And maybe conceal contraband? Hannah took her Swiss Army knife from her messenger bag and used it to make a small slit in the lining. All she found inside was high-density foam wrapped around sturdy cardboard.
Setting the case aside, she took up her water glass again and settled into her favorite rocker to study the painting. Why would anyone want to own a piece like this? And pay a quarter million dollars for it, plus commission and shipping? It wasn’t so much that it was ugly. Compared to other “high concept” art pieces she’d seen in the past, hideous things that left her head shaking, this one was okay. The longer she looked at it, in fact, the more she found herself picking out images, reading emotions into the dusky, gladelike colors. Maybe that was the idea.
Since this was the first time she’d ever acted as an art courier, Hannah had raised with Rebecca the legal ramifications of importing and exporting paintings.
“It’s not a problem with modern work like this, as long as the paperwork’s in order,” Rebecca had said. “August Koon’s work is hardly a national treasure.”
She’d handed over an envelope. When Hannah had opened it, she’d found the bill of sale and an authentification certificate signed by Koon, as well as an import permit from Mexican Customs and her Los Angeles/Puerto Vallarta return air ticket—AlaskaAir, 10:10 a.m. Tuesday morning, first class as promised. Rebecca said the airline had been given a heads-up that Hannah would be hand-carrying a painting and had affixed an amendment to her file noting that the portfolio was to be safely stowed alongside her in the first-class cabin.
Hannah examined the Mexican import permit that had apparently been arranged by Moises Gladding. It all looked very official. She suspected money may have changed hands under a table somewhere but, although she studied the paperwork closely for irregularities, everything seemed in order. No matter how much she might fret about dealing with Gladding, sometimes a cigar was just a cigar and a courier job was just that. All she had to do was carry the painting to LAX, board the plane, tuck the portfolio into its closet, then sit back with a glass of champagne and enjoy the two-hour flight. She’d be met in Puerto Vallarta, she’d deliver the picture, and then her work would be done. Easy money.
She rewrapped the painting in the soft cloth Rebecca had provided and slipped it back into the leather portfolio. In her bedroom, she propped it behind her bureau, then kicked off her sandals and pulled her T-shirt over her head. She was just heading to the bathroom to turn on the shower when the bleep of her cell phone stopped her in her tracks. It was in her messenger bag in the living room. She ran back into the other room, plucked it up and glanced at the screen. Her stomach did a backflip. The number was familiar enough that she recognized it, but not such a habit that she’d assigned it a permanent place in her phone list. That would be too much like asking for trouble.
She opened the phone. “Hi, there.”
“Hey, stranger.” John Russo’s voice reminded her of bittersweet chocolate—deep, dark, rich but never cloying. It was like everything else about him, a balance of weirdly Zen calm and edgy tension that made him intriguing, unpredictable and just a little bit scary. He was unremarkable in appearance, not overly large or menacing, but the bad guys he encountered in his line of work would underestimate him at their peril. Russo was one of the best homicide detectives in the city. It would be easy enough, she imagined, for a suspect to be lulled by his easygoing demeanor, only to be stung by that laser intelligence and pit bull tenacity.
Hannah counted herself among the good guys, but Russo kept her feeling a little off balance, too. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do about that. The two of them had been tap-dancing around each other for a couple of months now. If the irregular hours they both kept made it tough for them to find time to see one another, Russo had made it clear he wasn’t about to let a few scheduling problems get in his way. The guy was determined, she’d give him that. And a damn good kisser, Hannah had discovered. Her stomach cart-wheeled as she recalled their one and only real date. It was about ten days ago, dinner followed by a walk on the beach. Yes, a cliché right out of the classifieds, maybe, but it had worked. Unfortunately, it had come to a breathless but abrupt end when he’d been called out to a murder scene in West Hollywood. He wasn’t supposed to be on call that night, but as luck would have it, a gang war had erupted in Compton and all of Russo’s colleagues had been out picking up the pieces of carnage there when the dead sheet call came in.
“You’re a tough lady to get hold of,” Russo said now.
“I wouldn’t want to seem easy.” Hannah winced. Damn, was she flirting? She hated flirting. “Anyway, I called your office. You have a new partner.”
“Yeah, she’s a newbie. She’ll be riding with me for the next couple of months. I’m her T.O.” Her training officer. “Name’s Lindsay. She just transferred in from the Twin Towers.”
The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, in addition to policing vast swaths of Southern California, also ran the detention facilities that housed men and women arrested anywhere in the county. It was impossible to climb through LASD ranks without sooner or later doing a stint as a corrections officer in one of the jails. Hannah herself had worked in the Twin Towers correctional unit for a year after graduating from police academy, and she’d hated every minute of it. The relationship between jailed and jailer was made up of equal parts suspicion, contempt and gamesmanship, bored inmates having little else to occupy them besides looking for ways to end-run the guards. The day her transfer to a patrol beat had come through, Hannah had danced a jig right there in the control tower.
“I’ll bet she’s glad to be out of there. I assume she’s been on the street already?” Hannah asked. You didn’t make detective in the Sheriff’s Department until you’d put in your time on patrol.
“Yeah, she worked the Valley and Compton. She only just told me you’d called. When exactly was that?”
“Thursday or Friday, I think.” Actually, Hannah knew precisely when she’d called, but there was no mileage in looking too eager. “She said you were out of town.”
“Yeah, I had to go up to
