Harbor Island. Carla Neggers
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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 octogenarian art detective. Maybe our murdered Hollywood producer figured it out.”
“And wanted to make a movie?” Emma asked.
“It’s possible. Did she sound scared on the phone?”
Emma shook her head. “Breathless. Excited. Definitely not scared.”
“Okay. Keep me informed. Watch your backs.” Yank shifted his gaze from her to take in his entire team. “I want this Sharpe thief.”
* * *
Emma stayed behind in the conference room as the rest of the team filed out once the monitor went blank and Yank left them. Colin ducked out, saying nothing. He didn’t have his own desk yet. He would go down to her office or park himself at one of the cluster of desks in the open workroom. Yank had designed the space so that his agents could work quietly, alone, behind closed doors or in small or big groups.
“Yank was at your grandfather’s place in Dublin, wasn’t he?”
The question came from Sam Padgett. He hadn’t gone anywhere. Emma nodded. “I recognized the fireplace. How did you know?”
“I recognized the fireplace, too. It’s pictured on the Sharpe Fine Art Recovery website. I did my homework.” He walked over to the large casement window that looked out on to the harbor. The sky had turned overcast. “I should have taken a picture of the sun while it was out.”
“Making a joke, Sam?”
“Nope. Serious. Might not see the sun again until April.”
“Winter days can be bright and sunny in Boston. Those are often the frigid-cold days, too.”
“Something to look forward to. I like you, Emma. You’re smart, and you’re good at what you do, but it bothers me that you didn’t tell us you’d been a nun.”
Not what she’d expected, given the circumstances. “Yank knew.” She kept her tone even, without any defensiveness. “It wasn’t a secret. It’s just not something I talk about that often. Do I know everything about your past?”
Padgett turned from the window. He seemed almost to smile. “I wasn’t a monk for three years in my early twenties, that’s for damn sure.”
“What were you?” Emma asked him.
The almost-smile broadened into a genuine one. “Trouble.” He returned to the table and pointed at the small stone cross. “Where did Rachel Bristol get her cross?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could it be one of the ones this thief sent to your grandfather?”
“Possibly. I haven’t talked to him yet. I don’t know if any are missing.”
“He didn’t turn them over to law enforcement?”
“No.”
“Interesting guy, your granddad. Has he told us all he knows about this thief?”
“I can’t say for sure,” Emma said, noticing beach sand on her boots. Her stomach lurched, but she tried not to show any emotion or discomfort as she continued. “It’s been ten years. There’s a lot of information. Blind alleys he’s gone down, people he’s talked to and leads he’s followed that haven’t worked out. He doesn’t write everything down. It’s hard to know what he’s forgotten, what he’s deliberately left out that he thinks doesn’t matter.”
Padgett grimaced. “An honest answer, I guess. Have you told us all you know?”
“Yes.”
He pulled out a chair and sat down, nodded again to the stone. “What’s the significance of the bell? Besides it leading Declan to Ireland. Does it have any special powers?”
“Declan and his followers were at sea, returning to Ireland, when they realized they had left the bell behind on their stop in Wales. They prayed for its return, and it appeared on a large boulder that they followed to Ardmore.”
“Right.”
Emma ignored Padgett’s skeptical tone. “The bell is gone now, but a boulder on the harbor beach is said to be the one that carried the bell to Ireland.”
“More than fifteen hundred years ago.”
“It’s called Saint Declan’s Stone. On Declan’s feast day in July, the faithful crawl under it with the hope it will bring them good health, or restore them to good health. Saint Declan was a healer credited with many miracles.”
Padgett ran one finger over the small cross-inscribed stone in the center of the table. “Think our thief is hoping for a miracle?”
“It’s one theory. We have very little to go on, unfortunately. Even the artwork he’s stolen over the past ten years doesn’t tell us much. We can speculate but not much more than that.”
“Well, our long-departed Irish saint and his little bell must have meaning for our thief or he wouldn’t copy them onto a rock every damn time he makes off with a work of art.”
“I’m glad you said our thief.”
Sam’s dark eyes hardened. “Yeah. I don’t like that he sent Yank this cross. I don’t like that he could have followed any one of us here. He’s out there taunting us. And if he—or she—killed that woman this morning, then we’ve got a violent perpetrator on our hands. This scumbag’s in Boston, Emma. Mark my words.”
“He could be in Maine by now.”
“Heron’s Cove?” Padgett got to his feet. “Home of the Sharpes. I haven’t been up there yet. I hear it’s pretty.”
“It is. Not that pretty matters to a rugged guy like you.”
“Making a joke, Emma?”
She managed a smile. “Nope. Serious.”
He gave a short laugh and again looked out the windows toward the harbor. “Did the shooter know you were on the way this morning? Who would have discovered Rachel Bristol’s body if you hadn’t?”
“Her ex-husband or stepdaughter, I imagine.”
“The cops said that Travis and Maisie didn’t know Rachel had gone onto the island. She didn’t have her own car in Boston. She had to have hired a car, taken a cab or the subway or walked.” Padgett shifted back to Emma. “Was Rachel Bristol killed to keep her from talking to you? That’s the question of the hour, isn’t it, Emma?”
“Right behind who shot her.”
He shrugged. “That’s a given. You okay? I’ve been in the situation you were in this morning a few times.”
“I’m okay, Sam. Thanks for asking.”
“Once the adrenaline wears off, you think—hell, I could have been shot dead myself out there.” He grinned as he started toward the door. “But I’m not an ex-nun.” He paused in the doorway and looked back at her. “Were you thinking as a federal agent this morning, or a Sharpe?”
“I’m a federal agent at all times.”
“I know that. Do you? Deep down? Or does part of you think you still work for your family?”
He left without waiting for the answer. Emma knew the entire team would be sifting through her files on the Declan’s Cross thief. Her grandfather hadn’t investigated that first theft in the small Irish village until six months later, after two Dutch landscapes