LITMIR.BIZ

       4

      Sam Padgett had organized the conference room and gathered the team at the big table. He’d joined HIT in August—late compared to the other members. He was one of the hard-asses, struggling to understand the role of art and art crimes in their mission. Emma knew little about him. Mid-thirties. Single. Native Texan. Extensive field experience in Texas and the southwest. Ultrafit with short-cropped medium brown hair, brown eyes and what he knew—clearly—was a sexy smile. He liked to gripe about Boston’s high cost of living, and he got along well with Colin, also new to HIT, also a hard-ass.

      Padgett had put on a trim, dark suit with a tie before coming into the office unexpectedly on a Saturday. He’d placed the stone cross that Matt Yankowski had received a week ago on the table. He’d also set up a monitor in the middle of the table for Yank to talk to them from Ireland. Specifically, from Dublin. Even more specifically, from Wendell Sharpe’s Dublin apartment. Emma recognized the unlit fireplace in her grandfather’s living room. She said nothing, preferring to let Yank explain his whereabouts if he so chose.

      He didn’t so choose. He led off the meeting with a nod to his gathered team, agents with expertise in everything from hostage rescue to finance, cybersecurity, forensics and art crimes. Officially on duty, he wore a charcoal-colored suit, but his gray-streaked hair looked as if he’d been trying to tear it out, without success. That was unusual for Matt Yankowski, a senior agent with supreme emotional control.

      “I just got off the phone with an irate lieutenant in BPD homicide,” Yank said. “He thinks I should have invited him to coffee and explained what we were up to when I decided to set up this unit in his city. Probably would have wanted me to bring my crystal ball, too.”

      No one said anything. Colin stayed on his feet, leaning against the door as if he didn’t consider himself a true member of HIT. Everyone else was at the conference table. Only a few were missing. Emma sat on the chair Padgett had directed her to, one that gave Yank a good view of her. She’d taken a few deep breaths, centering herself, wishing color back into her cheeks.

      “The lieutenant brought me up to speed,” Yank continued. “The victim is positively identified as Rachel Bristol, forty, of Brentwood, California. Beverly Hills, basically. She was an independent movie producer, divorced eighteen months ago from Travis Bristol, fifty-three, also a producer. Travis has an apartment in Hollywood and a house here in Boston. Beacon Hill. His daughter, Maisie, thirty, is one of the hottest producers in Hollywood. The three of them planned to meet for a catered brunch at the Bristol Island Marina. The Bristols own the island. There’s talk—according to the lieutenant—of expanding the marina and developing the outer part of the island where Rachel was killed. The cottages are owned by individual families but most of them are condemned. The Bristols own the land they’re built on. They’ve bought out a few of the families, but basically the cottages are rotting while the Bristols figure out what to do with the island. Meaning Maisie. She’s the one with the money and the vision.”

      “Was that what brunch was about?” Padgett asked. “The future of the island?”

      “The detectives hadn’t gotten that far when I talked to the lieutenant,” Yank said. “It looks as if Rachel got out there early and called Emma to come meet her. BPD doesn’t have any information on where Rachel got the cross or if it has anything to do with why she was shot. It obviously has something to do with why she called Emma. I told the lieutenant to expect us to work this thing. We agreed to keep each other informed.”

      Yank’s gray eyes settled on Emma. She cleared her throat, knowing she was expected to say something. “Did the police recover Rachel’s phone?” she asked.

      Yank nodded. “It was in wet sand not far from her body. She probably dropped it when she was shot. It’s in bad shape. They’ll see what they can get off it. Someone else could have used it, but there are no other footprints near the body besides yours and hers.” His gaze bored into her. “How did this woman get your number, Emma?”

      Colin and the BPD detectives had asked her the same question. She gave Yank the same answer. “I don’t know. It was one of the things I planned to ask her. I don’t hand out my number to everyone, but it’s not top secret.”

      “Who all has it besides us?” Padgett asked.

      Emma knew it was a loaded question but answered, anyway. “My family. A few friends.”

      Yank hadn’t shifted his gaze away from her. “Declan’s Cross has been in the news recently with the murder of Lindsey Hargreaves.”

      It had been almost two weeks since Lindsey had been found dead on cliffs near the village of Declan’s Cross. Emma leaned forward, trying to relax the tensed muscles in her lower back and legs. “A few of the news accounts mentioned Declan’s Cross is the site of a celebrated unsolved theft of three landscape paintings—two of them by Jack Butler Yeats, arguably Ireland’s greatest painter.”

      “And a fifteenth-century Celtic cross like the one found on Rachel Bristol this morning,” Padgett added in a combative tone.

      “Somewhat like it,” Emma said, matter-of-fact. She didn’t want Padgett to succeed in getting under her skin. “The stolen cross is a rare silver wall cross inscribed with Celtic knots and spirals and the figure of Saint Declan, one of the Irish saints who helped Christianize Ireland in the fifth century. Some scholars believe he could even predate Saint Patrick.”

      Padgett stretched out his long legs. “How do we know it’s Declan on the cross and not some other Irish saint?”

      Emma reined in any irritation with Padgett. He was testing her, she decided. Letting her know that he was going to ask any and every question he had if he thought it would help get to the bottom of what had happened on Bristol Island that morning. “We know it’s Saint Declan because the figure is holding a small bell,” she said. “Tradition holds that the bell was given to Declan by God and led him across the Celtic Sea to Ardmore, on the south coast of Ireland, where he established a monastery.”

      “I didn’t find any photographs of the stolen cross in the files,” Padgett said.

      “We don’t have one, only a detailed description by its owner, who died five years ago, and copies made by his niece, Aoife O’Byrne, an artist.”

      Emma was aware of Yank eyeing her from Dublin, and Colin from his position by the door. No one else in the room spoke.

      Finally, Padgett scratched the side of his mouth. “Got it,” he said.

      “It’s a lot to remember.” Emma kept any sarcasm out of her voice. “The third painting stolen that night is the work of an unknown artist, an oil landscape that depicts a scene in Declan’s Cross—three nineteenth-century Celtic Revival crosses on a hill next to the ruin of a church dedicated to Saint Declan. The largest of the crosses is a copy of the stolen wall cross.”

      “No picture of the unsigned painting, either,” Padgett said. “We only have photographs of the two Yeats paintings. Jack Butler Yeats was related to William Butler Yeats?”

      “His younger brother.”

      “Good to know.”

      Emma heard a slight edge of sarcasm and even belligerence creep into her colleague’s tone. Sam Padgett hadn’t signed on to HIT to chase art thieves. She doubted he’d ever read William Butler Yeats and was certain he’d never heard of Jack Butler Yeats until the stone cross had shown up for Yank. It was a much smaller, modified version of the wall cross, minus the knots and spirals and inscribed onto a polished stone rather than carved out of silver.

      Yank settled back in his chair next to Wendell Sharpe’s fireplace. “It’s not common knowledge that the thief who hit Declan’s Cross ten years ago has been active since then, striking in eight cities around the world, or that he’s the nemesis of a renowned

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