Читать книгу Green's Way - Juli Bunting - Страница 6

It only took Samantha eight minutes to drive from her townhouse to the mansion on Tavistock Road, but the two places were more than worlds apart. She parked her car in the vast circular driveway in front of the house and was greeted at the door by a man who introduced himself as Charles Austin, the Brownfield’s attorney.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Austin.” Sam knew it was customary for people of great wealth to be represented by an attorney in these matters.

“Please come in, Ms. Green, and I will show you where the pieces were hanging.” He gestured her inside and shut the massive front door. “Please follow me.” Samantha followed Austin to a large sitting room toward the back of the house overlooking the pool and a lake beyond. She was careful as she walked in her pumps not to slip on the marble floors. The image of her sprawled on the floor of this marbled mausoleum made her smile. Austin stopped in front of a fireplace, which Sam immediately recognized as the place where one of the paintings had hung.

She set down her briefcase, opened it, and took out a file with the copies of the pictures Heartland had sent her. In order for Heartland to insure artwork like this, they insisted on pictures of the art where it was placed in the house. Samantha raked through the pictures until she found what she was looking for. There it was—a truly exquisite piece. It was a forest landscape by Ivan Shishkin, a well known Russian painter. This piece alone was valued at close to two million dollars. Just the photograph of the piece was stunning. Samantha could imagine how gorgeous the real thing would be. She put the photo down and pulled on a pair of latex gloves.

“So, Mr. Austin. There was absolutely no one in the house when these paintings went missing?” Samantha wondered about staff in a house this size. She walked over to the fireplace and ran her gloved hand over the area where the painting had been.

“No, Ms. Green. The Brownfields have several employees in the house during the day, but everyone had gone home before the Brownfields left for the symphony that night.”

“And everyone would be?” Samantha had a list of the employees in her briefcase, but asked in case something had been missed. She turned to look at Austin, who seemed irritated at the question.

“Well, I know there’s Mrs. Martinez, who works as Mrs. Brownfield’s assistant. She takes care of the day to day functioning of the house. She’ll be here shortly. She can give you a complete list of anyone who might have been working in the house that day or, for that matter, this past month. She hires everyone and oversees everything that has to do with the house.”

“Well, maybe, if it’s okay, I’ll have a look around until she gets here.” Samantha started to walk into another room and noticed Austin followed her in.

“There are no missing paintings from this room,” he said rather abruptly. “Come out by the pool, why don’t you? It’s a beautiful day.” She followed Austin to a table out by the pool where he pulled out a chair obviously expecting her to sit down. She complied and pulled a legal sized yellow notebook from her briefcase and a pen from her jacket pocket.

“I will send Mrs. Martinez out, Ms. Green.” Austin was beginning to really get under Sam’s skin.

“Thank you.” At that, Austin turned and walked back into the house. A few seconds later, Sam was startled by a voice behind her.

“I hope it won’t bother you if I vacuum along this side of the pool?” Samantha turned and saw a tan, shirtless, and very muscular blonde Adonis crouching a few feet away with a large hose in his hand.

“Oh not at all. I hope I’m not in your way.” Samantha watched as he stood up, wiped his hands on the thighs of his jeans, and flashed a magnificent smile.

“You are most definitely NOT in my way.” Samantha wondered if this handsome pool guy was on the list of employees she was expecting. “My name is Samantha Green. I work for the Brownfield’s insurance company.” He shook Samantha’s hand and then looked rather anxiously toward the back of the house.

“Well nice to meet you, Samantha Green.” And as soon as he had appeared, the blonde Adonis walked away and disappeared into the pool house. Damn. She hadn’t even gotten his name.

“Ms. Green?” Samantha turned around to see a strikingly attractive middle-aged Latina woman in a tailored navy blue suit and yellow blouse holding out her hand. “My name is Lupe Martinez. I am the Brownfield’s personal assistant here at the house. I understand you have some questions for me about the burglary.”

Samantha found Mrs. Martinez eager to help. She seemed genuinely distressed at the loss of the paintings.

“They are very valuable and beautiful paintings. The photos you have don’t begin to do them justice.” Samantha liked Mrs. Martinez immediately and knew she could probably get whatever information she needed from this woman who seemed very dedicated to the Brownfields. Of course Sam had yet to meet the Brownfields and wondered when they would be available for her to interview. After their brief conversation, Mrs. Martinez took Sam on a tour of the mansion and showed her all the spots where paintings had been taken. The police had finished dusting for fingerprints and looking for other evidence, so Sam was free to snoop a little at each site. She didn’t see anything that indicated anything unusual. It merely looked as if the paintings had been removed for cleaning or re-hanging.

When she finished at the Brownfield mansion, she headed to the police station where she met with the burglary investigator from the case. He was more helpful than most cops she dealt with, but he was also unusual in that he was assigned to high-end fine art theft. Most cops saw her more as a pain in the ass than as an asset, but this detective seemed to welcome her involvement. In most of her other cases where the cops looked down at her, she just turned on the charm and played the dumb insurance investigator so the smarty pants cop could guide her along and feel superior.

But this cop in Orlando was very helpful. His name was Detective Marco Reyes and he gave her a complete list of all the workers near the mansion that day. It was a copy of the list Mrs. Martinez had given her earlier, and she put it in her briefcase. Detective Reyes showed her the crime scene investigator’s report and, according to it, absolutely no fingerprints were found at the scene near the places where the paintings were taken. Sam asked about it.

“Isn’t it unusual not to find ANY fingerprints near those paintings? I mean, didn’t you expect to at least find the cleaning crew’s fingerprints?” Sam thought it was very curious.

“Yes ma’am. Obviously the perps used gloves and not only used gloves, but completely wiped down any areas they touched. We found very few fingerprints anywhere we dusted in the entire house. And we dusted desks and nightstands, anything in close proximity to the paintings. These perps are pros for sure.” Detective Reyes looked at Sam like he wanted to say something more but glanced at the detective sitting at a nearby desk and seemed to think better of it.

“Yeah, we will probably never know who took those paintings and I doubt we’ll ever recover them.” Sam looked at the nearby detective who had just spoken. He was in general burglary detail and did some of the initial crime scene investigation.

“Why do you say that, Detective? Don’t you think the paintings are here in Orlando?” Sam wondered why the detective was so skeptical.

“Well, no, actually, I don’t. My guess is those paintings are long gone from Orlando.” And with that, he dismissed Sam by picking up the desk phone and dialing.

*****

Now back at her townhouse, Sam turned on the TV, took out her laptop, and poured a glass of wine. She took out her case file and began with the list of employees who were present the day of the burglary. She noticed that the lists were identical with the exception of one instance. On Mrs. Martinez’ list, there was a notation, handwritten, that said the following:

“Workman from Residence Resonance.”

“Good grief, that’s a mouthful.” But more than the weird alliteration the company had chosen for their name, Sam was struck by the fact that this workman did not show up anywhere on the list given to her by the police department. That’s weird, she thought as she took a sip of her wine. She was about to spread some cheese on a cracker when her phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number, but knew the 407 area code meant it was an Orlando number.

“Hello, this is Samantha.”

“Hello Ms. Green. This is Detective Reyes. We met this afternoon regarding the Brownfield case?” Samantha pictured the short, stocky investigator who was so helpful earlier in the day.

“Yes, hello detective. What can I do for you?”

“I have some information I think you might be interested in that was not in our report.” The young detective was talking rather fast with a bit more pronounced Spanish accent than she had remembered. “But I’d like it if you kept the fact that I’m giving it to you confidential.”

“Of course, Detective Reyes. How do you want to do this? Is there somewhere we should meet?”

“There’s a sports bar on North Alafaya called Friendly Confines. I’m not sure where you’re staying, but this place is in Waterford Lakes and I know none of my fellow officers are likely to show up there.”

“Well, sure, Detective. I’m on Cardinal Meadow Trail, not far from the Brownfield’s, and I have a GPS in my car so I’m sure…”

“Oh, then it won’t take you long to get to this place. How about we meet in, say, forty-five minutes?”

“Sure, Detective. See you then.” Samantha hung up the phone and immediately Googled Friendly Confines in Waterford Park. He was right, she thought. It wouldn’t take her long at all to get there. She wondered what information he had for her and why on earth he didn’t want anyone in the police department to know he was giving it to her.