The Gauguin Connection Read online

  “Nothing. Again you give me nothing.” I glared at the three computers on my dining room table, neatly arranged in a semi-circle. It was late Sunday afternoon and I had spent my entire weekend at my dining room table, on an uncomfortable chair, going through the shipping data Manny had sent me. Of course the scathing email delivering the data was rife with sarcasm. He had ended his email with an order to not lose focus with my quixotic look into the ships. I made a point of counting how many times he referred to me wasting my time with this. It was eight times.

  Neither he nor the Chief had been impressed with my report. A report that was heavily edited to not reveal or even hint at Colin’s involvement. The thought of Colin triggered a strange emotion in me and it took me a few seconds to identify it. Disappointment. I did not often experience that emotion since I had very few expectations of other people. My training had given me the exceptional skill to predict people’s behaviour and reactions, which protected me from disappointment.

  The fact that Colin caused this intrigued me. Against all my expectations, the thief did not break into my apartment again. I realised that I had actually been looking forward to the challenge of sparring with him again. That specific realisation irked me and I returned my attention to the notepad. I supported a paperless office environment, but I did my best thinking when I put pencil to paper. Not until I looked, really looked, at the notepad, did I realise how many notes I had scribbled over the course of the weekend.

  On the top page were the three sentences the Russian murderer had shouted. In neat blocks I had rearranged the words in six different ways. My first attempt was to translate it to Russian, a language I loved for its melodious richness. Of the six attempts, the first made the most sense, yet it made no sense at all. I traced the Russian lettering with my index finger, but nothing revealing was forthcoming.

  The top page was the least of the riddles I was currently facing. I lifted a couple of sheets and stopped at the third page to look at it more intently. On it were all the role players in this mystery that Manny had brought to our doors. They were all there, the murdered girl who still had no identity, the Gauguin painting, the Russian murderer, the stolen Eurocorps weapons, the suspected EDA and Eurocorps insiders, the ships and the unknown Russian connection. I had written all these in a circle around the page and had drawn blocks around each item, separating them.

  Now I was at a loss. I had made such negligible progress in forty-eight hours. What else could I enter into the search parameters to give me more results? Results that could solve this mystery.

  “It’s all that bloody thief’s fault.” I would love to blame Colin for my unproductive weekend. He was the one who had sent me on this ship witch-hunt. Yet, I was the one who followed that trail. Now I was stuck. And annoyed with myself. My mind felt bruised from forcing it to look for different approaches. I couldn’t even believe that I was contemplating it, but I realised that I might need Colin’s help.

  “If he ever sets foot in my place again, I will tell him how much I despise him.”

  “I really hope you are not talking about me, Jenny.”

  I shrieked. Sadly, no other word would be apt to describe my undignified reaction. I closed my eyes for a second to regain control. When I opened them to glare at Colin, I allowed all the annoyance burning in my stomach to seep into my voice. “How did you get in?”

  The art re-appropriator was lounging in my reading chair. How did he get in and walk past me without me noticing? His denim clad legs were stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. This high comfort position was not lost on me. He felt confident and safe. It annoyed me even more. While I was studying him, he simply sighed and tilted his head to the side with an amused smile. “Superglue? Really, Jenny, you should’ve known that was not going to keep me out.”

  “Genevieve. My name is Genevieve. And I didn’t have anything else to seal the windows with.” I stopped abruptly when I realised I was justifying myself. “Why did you not just ring the doorbell?”

  His only response was one lifted eyebrow and a sideways glance. “Moving on. Why are you so frustrated?”

  “Because you are in my apartment. Again. Without an invitation. Again.” I got up and walked to the kitchen. Almost imperceptible footsteps alerted me to Colin following me.

  He groaned. “That’s not quite what I meant by moving on.”

  I spun around, ready to give him a mindful, but didn’t get the chance.

  “Let’s not hash through our last arguments again, Jenny.” He winced at my fierce look. “Genevieve. I’ve had a few days to think this over and have made a decision. I’m totally committed to working with you and finding out who the bastards are that killed my … these artists. Wait. Before you argue again. I know that one of your main arguments is that you can’t trust me. So, as a show of my trust in you, I will give you this.”

  He reached into his designer charcoal jacket. Out came a folded piece of paper that he held out to me. I looked at the white paper as if it was a snake ready to strike. “What is that?”

  “My trust in you.” He shook it towards me. “Please take it before I change my mind. I’ve never given anyone this.”

  I took a moment to move past my distrust of this man and read him. The piece of paper in his hand quivered very lightly, indicating a surge of neurotransmitters and hormones. Most likely adrenalin, causing the uncontrollable quivering of his hands. Why was he stressed, nervous? There was also no trace of any deception to be read on his face. Combined, all of these unmanipulatable cues led me to only one conclusion. He was being truthful about never having trusted anyone with whatever was on that piece of paper. This made the accomplished criminal infinitely nervous.

  Without a word, I reached out to take the piece of paper. I realised that with this gesture I had just sealed an agreement with a criminal. I accepted his trust and in return had given some of mine. I took the paper and wondered how this piece of pulped, pressed wood was going to change my life.

  “Open it.”

  I looked up from the piece of paper in my hand and regarded Colin.

  “Oh, stop reading me. Just open it or I’m taking it back.” He pulled his arms closer to his body and his eyes narrowed. He was exhibiting signs of discomfort with his decision to trust me and my hesitation to see what was on the paper. It gave me no pleasure to cause him such discomfort, but it went a long way to soothe my mind. I unfolded the sheet of paper. On it were written, in strong masculine handwriting, five addresses, one of them in Strasbourg.

  “What are these?”

  He swallowed and then looked me straight in the eye. “My homes. All of them.”

  “Your homes,” I repeated while trying to find the significance of this gesture. “Oh. Wow. Oh.”

  “It’s not so many homes. Most of them are rather rustic.”

  “I doubt that. But that is not why I am surprised.” I refolded the piece of paper and unconsciously pressed it against my heart. “You’re willing to trust me, a complete stranger, with your freedom?”

  “That is how much I want to catch these bastards.”

  “I’m working with…”

  “… the EDA. Yes, I know that. I have a theory that you’re working with Millard. Aha, you blinked. So, you are working with him. Good. He’s an irritating arsehole, but he’s good.”

  “You know Manny?”

  “Let’s just say that our paths have crossed a few times.”

  “Translated, that means that either he arrested you or almost arrested you.” The piece of paper was still clutched to my chest. I closed my fist around it and then held it between us. “I don’t understand your trust.”

  “You need something that will assure you that I’m not playing games and I gave it to you.”

  “But why me?” Not many things confounded me, but Colin’s absolute trust had my mind reeling. People just didn’t trust me. They felt uncomfortable around me and were even scared of me. Very few liked me. But trust?

  “Bec
ause I know you will never use this,” he nodded at my fist, “against me. Not unless I betray your trust.”

  I thought about this. “That’s correct. Would you like some coffee?”

  Colin blinked his surprise and then awarded me with a smile that reached deep into his eyes. “I would like that very much.”

  We stood in companionable silence for the time it took the coffee machine to drip out two cups of coffee. By offering him a cup of coffee, I had agreed to co-operating with a criminal. I did not know when exactly I was going to regret this decision, but I knew it was going to be soon. I handed Colin one of the cups. “Milk? Sugar?”

  “Black is fine.” He followed me to the dining room table. “So, what have you found so far?”

  I hesitated for a moment. Was I really going to trust a criminal with my findings when I didn’t even trust Manny with them? Colin’s pointed look at the paper that was still in my hand made up my mind. I opened the piece of paper again, looked at the five addresses for a full minute and handed him back the page.

  “Now what?” His eyes narrowed with anger.

  “Calm down, Colin. I memorised your addresses.” I tapped with my index finger on my temple. “Once it’s in here, it stays. I don’t want the responsibility of it on paper in my home.”

  “Oh. Okay.” The folded piece of paper disappeared into his jacket pocket.

  “Let’s sit down.” I pointed to the chair next to mine and cringed slightly when he moved closer to look at the computer screens. I leaned away from him. “What is your interest in this case?”

  “To stop the senseless murders of artists.”

  I pushed my chair away from him, crossed my arms and glared at him. “Your main motivation for being involved in this is not to stop murders.”

  “What do you know?” He mirrored my body language by also crossing his arms.

  “Every time you talk about it, I see remorse. You are feeling guilty about something. What?”

  He bit down hard and swallowed a few times before he answered. “I feel responsible.”

  “How?”

  “It was only after the seventh time that I became suspicious.” He smiled sadly. “As you know, I exposed forgeries whenever I found one. It was seven times too late when I realised that soon after my reports… ”

  “… an artist was murdered,” I finished softly. Guilt and regret were deeply etched on his face. It had no rational basis. “You could not have known.”

  “Maybe not in the beginning. But once I had noticed the murders, I should’ve immediately made the connection and stopped.”

  “Did you stop?”

  “I did. Too late.”

  “Have there been more murders since you stopped pointing out forgeries?”

  Colin frowned and blinked a few times. “Yes.”

  “Well, there you have it.”

  “Are you always this rational?”

  “Yes.”

  I followed his thought process by watching the different expressions moving over his face. The last was relief. “Thank you.”

  “No thanks needed. It’s simple logic.” I pointed at the computer screens. “Let me show you what I have so far.”

  I moved a bit closer to the computers, which put me closer to him. From the corner of my eye I saw him take a sip of his coffee and he moved to place the cup on the table. I stopped him with a quick hand and a voice that came out too stern. “Please use the coaster.”

  Colin’s hand stopped mid-air. With a slight smile he took the coaster I offered and placed his cup on it with care. “Why three computers?”

  “It helps.” Not even Phillip knew that it helped me to have as many things visually in front of me as possible. My auditory memory had never been my strength. It was my visual memory, my visualisation of patterns that awarded me the reputation I had acquired. I was not about to explain this to Colin. The next fifteen minutes I did, however, explain to him exactly what I had found in the last few days. I told him about the mysteriously recovered artwork and the non-existent private investigators.

  “Then I started checking through all the shipping info,” I said.

  “You have details on shipping?” Colin sounded excited and leaned closer. Again I leaned away.

  “Manny sent me the shipping info for the last five years. It’s an incredible amount of data. It lists all the types of ships, the companies that own these ships, even the manifests for each voyage.”

  “From your earlier frustration, I assume you didn’t find anything?”

  “Of course I did.” The audacity to suggest otherwise drew my eyebrows together. “Just not as much as I hoped.”

  “Okay,” he said slowly as if careful to offend me. Again. “What did you find?”

  “When I entered the forty-seven miraculously discovered artworks, three of those were registered on the shipping manifests.”

  Colin’s eyes widened. “Which ones?”

  “A Degas pastel, a Gustav Klimt painting and an Amedeo Modigliani sculpture.”

  “Valuable stuff.”

  “But that’s not the most interesting.” My voice changed pitch as I became excited again with my meagre discoveries. “The Degas was shipped on a general cargo ship from St Petersburg to Rotterdam on 17 August 2009. The ship was called Derbent and belonged to a Russian shipping company. The final destination for the Degas was to be in France. “

  Colin started shifting in his chair. “Yes?”

  “Don’t get bored. The details here are important,” I said. “The same Degas was mysteriously found by a private investigator in May of 2009. A newspaper article stated that the owner, monsieur Villines, was delighted when his private investigator tracked the Degas down in France. The journalist wrote that monsieur Villines had had tears in his eyes when he said that for months he sat with it in his villa in the south of France, overwhelmed by having it back. The article continued by saying that even though the owner was delighted at the artwork’s recovery, his dire financial situation caused by the international financial crisis called for him to sell it at an auction. The auction was held in late November.”

  “Wait.” Colin held up both hands and closed his eyes. I assumed he was going through the facts he had just heard. I saw the exact moment all the pieces fell into place. “How was it possible for this monsieur Villines to have his Degas returned in May when it was shipped to him three months later?”

  “A very good question. One that I don’t have an answer to. I found the same with the Klimt and Modigliani. The discovery dates and shipping dates don’t make sense.” I glanced at my notepad, thinking of the other connections. That was when Colin noticed my notepad. I didn’t even have a chance to stop him from taking it, he snatched it so quickly. Thief.

  “What have we here? Your notes?”

  “I will tell you everything that’s written down. Please give it back to me.” I reached for it, but he pulled it farther away from me without taking his eyes off my notes. He turned the pages and slowly perused each page, squinting every so often.

  “You might have to interpret some of it. Wait. What’s this?” He placed the notepad on the table, still holding it in his possession. He pointed at the first page with my attempts to make sense of the Russian murderer’s last words.

  “Manny’s going to kill me.” I closed my eyes and sighed. “If you ever tell anyone else this, I will give Manny all five of those addresses and a very detailed description of everything I know about you.”

  “Understood.”

  He listened intently as I explained the girl’s murder and rantings of the Russian before he killed himself. Colin stared at the page for a long time. “You speak Russian. A woman of many talents.”

  My eyes widened. “You studied the page and that’s all you have to say?”

  “Well, it’s the only thing that makes sense.” He shrugged at the notepad. “The daffodils and the all powerful red is muddled nonsense.”

  “What if it isn’t? What if it’s key to understanding all
of this?” I tapped on the notepad.

  “Maybe.” He didn’t sound convinced. He turned the page, found nothing of interest and turned to the third page. The page with all the different pieces of this puzzle listed in a circle. His eyes widened. “Explain, please. Especially the stolen Eurocorps weapons.”

  I gave him the short version of how the events led to the discovery of the missing Eurocorps weapons and its tenuous connection to the EDA. “And they still don’t know the exact number of weapons stolen.”

  Colin whistled softly. “This is even worse than I’d thought.”

  “I’ve told you all that I know. Tell me what exactly it is that you had suspected this was.”

  “I didn’t quite manage to make sense of the deaths, except that they were somehow connected. I was also convinced that the EDA was involved. I never suspected Eurocorps. I thought this was simply an official of the EDA with his finger in an art fraud pie.”

  “I don’t understand what you are saying. Please use normal English.”

  “But I was.” He tilted his head. “You’re not very good with euphemisms, are you?”

  “No.” For the sake of speeding up our conversation, I admitted this weakness. I didn’t like doing it.

  “Okay. Normal English.” There was no verbal or non-verbal censure. He simply accepted this particular oddity of mine, the same way he did not show any judgement of my episode during our first meeting. “I thought that some EDA official, someone quite high up, was involved in art fraud. I thought that he was using his power, influence and connections to ship the pieces. Somehow he-”

  “How do you know it’s a man?” I interrupted him.

  “Gross assumption. It could be a woman, but I doubt it. This is mostly a man’s game.”

  “A game?”

  “A gentlemen’s game. Art crimes are almost exclusively non-violent. It is rather about outwitting the system, the fraud detection systems, the investigators, the security in the homes, galleries and museums where the pieces are. It’s about beating the authentication processes. And, of course, the money. But, it’s not about violence. That is why the deaths of some, let’s just call them friends, caught my attention. We all have an incredible love for the arts. Some have an equally strong love for money, but very few, if any, are in it for violence. The power comes from the outwitting.”

  “Interesting.” I was completely fascinated. I had never spoken to a criminal before. To have a first hand insight into the workings of their minds captivated my interest. “But look at this page. You say this alleged EDA official was shipping the art. There is no line drawn between the shipping and the dead artists. I haven’t found any connection.”

  “But you have lines between the girl and the weapons, the girl and the dead artists, and the forgeries and the ships.” He stopped suddenly. “Tell me about the forgeries and the ships. How are they connected?”

  “I searched the shipping database for any links to the mysteriously discovered artworks and got three connections I told you about. The Degas, Klimt and Modigliani.”

  “What other connections did you search for?”

  “I entered all the art listed on Interpol’s website, but didn’t get any other hits. That was when you overheard me.”

  “You were angry with me.” There was a smile in his voice.

  “You started this whole shipping search disaster. It feels to me like I have wasted this whole weekend searching through the shipping database for nothing.”

  “Not nothing. You got three art connections.”

  “Yes,” I almost shouted. “Only three. It’s nothing to be proud of. I need more search parameters. I need more connections.”

  Colin leaned back in his chair and rested his head against the high back. He closed his eyes and for a moment I thought he might be falling asleep. His eyes flew open. “What about the girl? Have you entered her name?”

  “We don’t know her name yet.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Sometimes the police are so embarrassingly incompetent. I’ll bet you a thousand pounds that I’ll have her name by tomorrow.”

  “I don’t bet and I have no use for pounds. In case you haven’t noticed, you’re in France. We use euros.”

  “Pounds, euros, it’s all the same to me,” he said dismissively. One of his homes was in England, so I supposed it really was all the same to him. I saw his mind working, most likely on a strategy to ascertain the murdered girl’s identity. “What about the Russian who killed her?”

  “I don’t even want to know how you know this.” The fact that he knew so much about the investigation and my involvement was jarring. “Manny told me that they had identified the Russian as a tourist who had entered Europe, but he never gave me the guy’s name. It will be here somewhere. Just a moment.”

  I turned to the EDA computer and started searching through the case file to see if the Russian’s name was there.

  “Is that an EDA computer?”

  “Yes,” I answered absently.

  “With full access?”

  “Not full, but enough for now.” I located the page with information on the Russian and perused through it. Then a thought struck me and I turned sharply to Colin. “You are at no time to work on, switch on, open or even touch this computer. Have I made myself clear?”

  “As a bell.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You made yourself clear.”

  I turned back to the computer, knowing that I had made myself clear, but that Colin most likely was not going to heed the limits. My attention was drawn away from this concern to the second paragraph on the page. “Here. It says that he had three different identities on him, but after liaising with Russia, they got his real identity.”

  “Russia liaised? That’s a surprise.”

  “Russia is not all bad.”

  Colin made a rude sound. “Not in my experience. If they liaised, it was only to create the image of goodwill and co-operation.”

  “Do you want to argue about this or hear the murderer’s name?” I was hard pushed to not start a political debate. I had a soft spot for Russia. It was a country rich with history and culture. True, it had a tumultuous past and present, but the people at heart were wonderfully generous. It was the elite few who were corrupt to the core.

  “Who was he?”

  “Nikolay Chulkov. He also travelled under two other identities.”

  “Put his name in the shipping search.”

  I did that and waited. Nothing. I sighed despondently.

  “What about his other identities. Try them.”

  The next identity didn’t give any result, but the third, Sergey Kruchenykh, was going to help us draw another line between the boxes on my notepad page.

  “I can’t believe it worked.” I felt like I had just won a Nobel prize and smiled brilliantly at Colin. “We have another connection.”

  He was also smiling. “Follow that link.”

  “Okay, here it is. He was working on the ship, Trojka, in October 2007. The ship left the port of St Petersburg and stopped in Gdansk, Poland before it continued on.”

  “On how many ships did he work?”

  “He was only on that one voyage.”

  “Isn’t that a bit strange?”

  “I certainly think so. Why would anyone work on a ship only once?”

  “Maybe he suffered from sea sickness and had to give up his new career.” Colin smiled and I assumed he was being witty.

  “Maybe,” I replied seriously. “But I think it is unlikely.”

  Colin sobered. “Of course. Draw a line.”

  “What? Oh. Yes.” I paged back until I found all the items listed and drew a line between the ‘Russian murderer’ box and the ‘ships’ box. “What’s next?”

  I accessed the personnel records on the EDA computer and ran the names of the permanent staff against the manifests. The people who cooperated with the EDA were not listed and it would be nigh on impossible to find those thousands of names. With Colin’s help we go
t as many names as possible from Eurocorps’ website and did the same. With no results. I grunted in frustration and slumped in my chair.

  Colin stared at the notepad in front of me for a while and then tapped on one of the boxes with a long finger. “What about the non-existing private investigators?”

  “Let’s see.” I entered each of the eight private investigator’s names, but none of them resulted in anything. “If there is a connection between the Russian murderer and the ships, then there must be some kind of connection between the ships and the girl.”

  “We need to know who she is,” Colin stated quietly. “What do you know about her?”

  “She was most likely an artist, a painter. The coroner put her in her early twenties, middle class, and she was in good health when she was murdered.”

  “We need to know who she is,” he repeated. “Once we have her identity, I’m convinced it will lead us to the ships and the Russians.”

  “What is your problem with the Russians?” I couldn’t tolerate his hateful tone any more.

  “Don’t get me started. They are a bunch of ruthless criminals.”

  “I have an idiom for this!” I felt enormously proud of myself. “You are the pot calling the kettle black.”

  Colin surprised me by laughing. “Brilliant. Of course, I would not consider myself as ruthless.”

  “But you would consider yourself a criminal?”

  “I admit to nothing.” There was still a smile in his voice, but he was serious.

  “Since we are talking about your crimes.”

  “We are not.”

  “I have a few questions for you,” I continued without acknowledging his denial. “How did you know those artworks were forgeries?”

  “Aw, Jenny. If I tell you that, I might as well hand a written statement in at the police station.” He sighed. A moment passed while I just stared at him. He sighed again. “There are certain methods used when forging an artwork. Sometimes it was a hint of a method I know about that made me suspicious. Sometimes it was the signature of a forger that I knew. Forgers are sometimes better artists than the artists themselves. It takes incredible skill to copy a piece of art so that it not only resembles it in appearance but also in age and chemical composition. Forgers often are required to have an extensive knowledge of art as well as geography, history and chemistry.”

  “And you know all this?”

  Colin took a deep, deciding breath. “Yes. I’m considered to be one of the best.”

  I considered his tone of voice and studied his face to see if he was being truthful or sarcastic. I settled on the former. “Do you forge artworks?”

  “I think I have trusted you with enough incriminating details for one day, Jenny.” His use of this version of my name was an obvious ploy to vex me enough to discontinue any further questioning. It almost worked.

  “I will respect it for today. But only because I realise the risk you are taking by trusting me. Not because you are disrespecting me by not calling me by my true name.”

  “You just seem much more a Jenny to me than a Genevieve.” He leaned back in his chair. “A Genevieve is all stuck up and artificial. Jenny is soft, gentle and very real.”

  “You think of me as soft?” I didn’t even bother to hide my shock.

  “Of course. Doesn’t everyone else?”

  Nobody had ever shown enough interest in me to attribute such adjectives to me. Maybe Jenny was not such a bad name after all. The corners of my mouth pulled down at that silly thought. “I don’t know nor do I care what others think about me. Shall we continue searching for more connections tonight?”

  He smiled at my quick change of topic. “No. I think we’ve done quite well.”

  “There is one more thing I’ll do.” I opened the file with the shipping companies. “I want to see if there is any connection between the ship carrying the Degas and the ship Nikolay Chulkov worked on. Maybe I’ll even find more ships.”

  “You’re going to make another list?” The smile pulling at the corners of his eyes didn’t indicate any malice in his question.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sure all your lists will come in handy soon. Already it’s helped.” He got up from his chair. “While you’re doing that, I’m going to find out who our girl is.”

  “How do you plan to do that? Oh wait, don’t tell me. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  Colin smiled. “Don’t worry. There won’t be too many criminal activities involved.”

  “I told you, I don’t want to know.” I also stood up and looked at him earnestly. “It’s really difficult for me to work with you.”

  “With me?”

  “Not you as a person. That’s quite easy.” Much to my surprise. I had never worked well with anyone before and I had just spent five hours without once feeling the panic from human closeness eating at me. “It’s working with a criminal that goes against everything that I believe in.”

  “Then maybe it’s time to change what you believe in.”

  I made a noncommittal sound. I hated change but knew it was essential to my own growth and development. Change made me feel terrifyingly unsafe. But it was also change that had brought me bit by bit out of the very small world I used to live in. I was the first to acknowledge that my world was still miniscule compared to Colin’s.

  For me though, it was a proud achievement to have proved everyone wrong. Everyone being my parents. They had been convinced that I was going to be some computer scientist that never left the basement. Someone who never had contact with the outside world. I had proven them wrong. My world was much larger than a basement and I was in contact with the world, even if the contact was feeble at times. But maybe it was time to widen my horizons a bit.

  “Well, okay,” Colin said when I didn’t respond any further. “I’ll see you tomorrow then. Hopefully with the girl’s identity.”

  “I suppose I shouldn’t bother suggesting that you use the front door.”

  “You’re welcome to suggest it.”

  “But you’ll still use your own means of entering and exiting.”

  The man was a menace. His smile brought warmth to his eyes. I couldn’t deny that he was a fascinating and attractive man, but he was still a criminal. And that was a chasm between us that would prevent me from even considering a friendship with him. This tentative working arrangement was as far as I was going to enlarge my world. I followed him to my home office and narrowed my eyes at the sight that met me. I was furious.

  “There’s a footprint on my windowsill.”

  He looked surprised. “I’m not superman. I didn’t fly in here, Jenny.”

  “If you’re going to continue breaking in, you’re going to have to start cleaning up after yourself.”

  “I thought that I did quite a good job cleaning up the superglue remnants.” He gave me another dazzling smile. “Just keep the windows locked, not glued. I’ll find my way in.”

  He hoisted himself effortlessly onto my windowsill and disappeared into the night before I could object any further. I immediately fetched my cleaning products and once the windowsill was yet again spotless, I placed a brilliant white towel on the marble windowsill. At least a towel was easier to clean.

  A quick glance at the clock and I decided to get a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow was Monday. I could look into the owners of the shipping companies at the office before the meeting with Manny. That was really not something I was looking forward to. The EDA deputy chief was an intolerant boar. At least Phillip would be there to play his usual role as a buffer and translator. I switched off the lights around the dining room and wondered how I was going to convince Phillip to not tell Manny about Colin and his involvement. I didn’t even know if I was going to tell Phillip that Colin now knew everything. I cringed to think what his reaction would be.

 

  Chapter SEVEN