TOUCHING SHADOWS: Book One of The Scroll of Shadows Trilogy.

TOUCHING SHADOWS: Part 2

I’d met Geoffrey Montford three times before—once at his home when Charles Dayton and I had appraised his art collection and twice socially—but each time he’d been with his wife. She was obviously the civilizing influence. Today he was alone and, to judge by his lowering brow, feeling far from civilized. A covered painting rested on the easel by the window.

“Just what sort of business are you running, Brewer?” he snapped the moment Amos closed the door behind me. “I don’t have time to waste while you—”

“Nor do I,” I said. No one talked to Amos like that except me. “I have fifteen minutes, Mr. Montford. What can I do for you?”

Montford’s dark eyes flashed. Apparently he was the only one allowed to be abrupt.

“I have reason to believe,” he said, after a moment’s internal struggle, “someone has replaced two of my family’s paintings with reproductions since your appraisal. And although this”—he flicked a contemptuous hand toward the easel—“may well be one, my level of trust is no longer what it was. I wish to remain in the room while you work.” He shot me a challenging glance. “Is this a problem?”

Normally it wouldn’t be. But to cover those times when it could be a problem, I had learned to make one stipulation: breathing space. To the world in general I was claustrophobic. No one crowded me and expected to remain unscathed. Well, except for Charles, of course. But he’d known the truth. No one else here did. Another reason I missed him.

“I’ve told Mr. Montford your requirements,” Amos said, “and he’s happy with them.”

“Good.” I placed my briefcase on the floor by Amos’s desk. “Then let’s see what we have. Take a seat, Mr. Montford.”

“I shall stand,” Montford said, curling his lip as though the very words were sour. “Where I am.”

His tone caused cold fingers to slide down my back.

The trouble with safety is you get used to it. In the last few months I’d relaxed my guard. Now I was alone again, and nowhere was safe.

The chill increased when, as I moved away from him and toward the painting, Montford followed me as though he’d been stapled to my sleeve.

I halted. Glared at him over my shoulder. “I understand your concern, Mr. Montford,” I said as politely as I could. “But I’m hardly likely to tuck the work inside my jacket and dash off with it from under your nose.”

“I want to see what you do.”

“There’s nothing to see,” I said, aware that Amos was now at my other side. “Amos, would you—”

For the first time since the solicitor had read Charles’s abominable will, Amos touched me, his pat on my forearm firm but not unfriendly. The smile he gave Montford was pure CEO. “Most of our people,” he said, “prefer to work in private. If you’d rather have another company assess—”

“No.” The word had to force itself past Montford’s clenched lips. “No.” He lifted his hands, palms forward. Stepped back. “My apologies,” he said. “Please. Continue.”

More icy fingers traced patterns across my shoulder blades. I met Amos’s troubled gaze.

“I asked Mark for coffee,” I said, hoping he’d understand what I was saying. “Perhaps he could bring it here instead of my office. Have they fixed your intercom yet?”

Comprehension flickered in his eyes before he masked it. “Not yet. I’ll have a word with Reception. If you’ll both excuse me?”

Montford didn’t respond. I merely nodded and continued toward the easel as though I told the company CEO to arrange my morning beverage every day of the week.

When the door clicked shut, I released the breath I’d been holding. Reception would get a kick out of our head of security’s temporary demotion to tea lady. With luck a kick would be all any of us would get, but I had a bad feeling it wouldn’t be that simple.

As I lifted the sheet off the painting, I sensed Montford’s gaze boring into my head. Easy, I told myself. Take it easy.

I walked around the back of the easel to where I’d marked the painting when I’d looked at it last. Slid my finger over the microdot. And there it was. Good. Chances were it was the same work. All the same . . .  

Pretending to make a closer examination, I leaned down and, after making sure my body blocked Montford’s view, drew in a slow breath and placed one fingertip on the frame and another on the canvas.

Everything around me began the usual spin: colored paint swirling into white . . . into pink . . .  into . . . 

Red.

Bright, blood red.

One of the major ingredients in the psychic potpourri I’d inherited from my great-grandmother was the gift of psychometry—the ability to know an object’s history when I touched it. This meant, in my chosen field of art appraisal, I saw a lot of dead people. Mostly artists. Sometimes I even saw them die. But, on the whole, if I saw their deaths, it wasn’t a problem for me; the majority had been bones or ashes for hundreds of years.

The vision of death currently replaying under my fingertips was different for several reasons. I knew the event was recent because the corpse and I had enjoyed a drink together at her exhibition a month ago. I knew it was unnatural—the bloody brains being splattered around her studio were a good clue there. I also knew I was in deep trouble. Her killer wasn’t some street punk sporting a Rolex knock-off and high on meth and danger.

The spade-wielding maniac was currently wearing Savile Row and standing right behind me.

I made my fingers resume their seemingly casual progress. Kept my breathing slow. Careful. Tried to figure out why I was seeing Rheda Flynn’s murder rather than Domenikos Theotokopoulos’s creation of this masterpiece. And glimpsed a possible reason when blood arced toward me and hit the frame.

“How long did you say it’s been in your family?”

“I didn’t,” Montford said. “But since nineteen-thirty-nine. And your professional opinion?”

I only half-heard his question. The rest of the scenario still unfolding beneath my fingertips—the sheer callousness of it—almost robbed me of breath. Torn between pity and fury, I let myself flow completely back into the present. Then I straightened.

In my professional opinion I was in the room with a mentally unstable client who had already killed at least once and who was not only going to get away with it, but would also probably kill again if something wasn’t done. My choices were to let him go or push him and see what happened. A sane woman would let him go.