Donovans 02 - Jade Island

Feds just made up charges out of thin air?”
    “I don’t know what they’re doing. I do know that at least two pieces of Wen’s jade collection have been taken from the vault and similar, less valuable pieces have been left in their place.”
    Three, if she counted the jade shroud. Assuming that there had been a substitution at all.
    She didn’t know. The only way to find out would be to get inside the vault and have a look around. That would be hard to do when the Tangs didn’t trust her and the Feds would arrest her if she crossed the border into Canada.
    “Are you certain about the substitutions?” Kyle asked.
    “Yes,” Lianne said bleakly. “Turn left after the next light. My apartment is in the same building as the Jade Trader.”
    “Just two pieces have been substituted?” he persisted.
    “There could be others. I don’t know. I didn’t even know about those two until yesterday. That’s why I was so late meeting you for dinner. I kept waiting for Daniel to leave so I could do a fast check of a few other drawers in the vault. But he didn’t leave.”
    “Daniel?”
    “Johnny’s youngest son. Wen is teaching him about jade. I think Daniel must have been the one who put Wen up to filing charges.”
    Kyle filed that fact as he dodged a bicyclist, pulled around a stopped bus, and decided against pushing the stoplight. It was already red.
    The tan Ford stuck with him through all the urban maneuvers.
    “So Daniel believes you stole from Wen?” Kyle asked.
    Lianne remembered the hatred and contempt in Daniel’s eyes. “Yes.”
    “Why?”
    “He knew about the Neolithic blade. It was Wen’s.”
    Kyle’s glance snapped away from the rearview mirror, where the Ford grew like a tumor on the BMW’s bumper. “The one at the auction?”
    Lianne nodded.
    “The one I bought?” he demanded.
    “Yes. That’s why I wanted to buy it. I was nearly certain it was Wen’s. Now I am certain. I’ve seen the drawer in the vault where the blade was kept. Another blade was in its place.”
    “An inferior one,” Kyle said.
    It was a statement, not a question. Any blade he had ever seen would have been inferior to the one he now owned.
    But he wouldn’t own it for long. By law, stolen goods were returned to the owner upon discovery. The buyer, however innocent, lost out.
    “It will be interesting to see if that blade turns up on the list of stolen jades,” he muttered.
    “I can’t imagine it not turning up.”
    Kyle accelerated quickly away from the light. The Ford caught up again halfway down the block.
    “What about the other piece of jade?” he asked. “You mentioned two that you were sure of.”
    “A recumbent camel from the Tang dynasty. The one that was substituted lacks the very subtle toe pads on the undersides of the feet. But Wen’s hands and eyes are too bad for him to notice the substitution.”
    “How much were the replacement pieces worth, the blade and the camel?”
    “It would depend on the collector. At a guess, I’d say perhaps one-third to one-half what Wen’s original jades were.”
    “A thousand each for the substitutes, maybe more?”
    “Probably a lot more. I can’t be certain. I didn’t examine them for sale.”
    “The Feds didn’t mention substitution, did they?”
    “They dropped some hints. I ignored them.”
    “So a million in jade is missing and a third to a half million in jade has been substituted?”
    Though Kyle’s voice was carefully neutral, Lianne sensed his skepticism. Why would a thief bother to spend money leaving decent substitutes? “I don’t know about the rest of the missing pieces,” she said, “whatever they are. I only know about two.”
    “The camel and the blade?”
    “Yes.”
    “We’d damn well better find out about the rest, hadn’t we?”
    The word we went through her like a shot of neat whiskey, making her light-headed. Until that moment, she hadn’t admitted to herself how much she didn’t want to be alone in this tangle of family, lies, jail, and jade.
    “Why?” she whispered.
    “Because until we find out, we won’t have the faintest idea what’s going on with the Tang jades.”
    “No, not that. Why are you helping me when you don’t really trust me?”
    “Good question. I’ll let you know when I have a good answer.”
    It was less than Lianne wanted and more than she had any right to expect. It was much more than she should take from a man who had nothing in common with her but jade and great sex, a man she