St Kilda Consulting 04 - Blue Smoke and Murder

verifies fake paintings and everything is sweet—except Crawford will have my balls if I don’t generate enough auction excitement to support a minimum of eight million dollars per Dunstan. Ten is what Crawford really wants. That will make the kind of waves that nobody can question, not even the IRS.
    Worthington was, in his own way, as eager as Crawford to make a huge splash. It would bring his new auction house to the attention of the big players in the art world in a dazzling way. But that would be hard to pull off with a dozen dubious Dunstans coming out of the woodwork at the last moment.
    Crawford didn’t have the money to soak up twelve new paintings at four million each, much less at ten. And if the new paintings went for less, they would devalue the ones Crawford already owned.
    “Don’t worry about anything except keeping a lid on Lee andcalling me if someone contacts you about the paintings,” Worthington said. “Do you understand?”
    Betty sighed. “I don’t understand anything, but I’ll do what you say.”
    Worthington hung up and dialed Crawford’s cell phone number from memory.
    Answer, you bastard. Time is running out.

65
    SAN DIEGO
SEPTEMBER 16
4:15 P.M.
    D ad?” Lane asked, sticking his head out of the bedroom doorway. “Where are you?”
    “In our office,” Faroe called out, “burping the eating machine.”
    “I didn’t know if you wanted all this on the St. Kilda network, so I thought I’d give you what I have so far.”
    Computer under his arm, Lane walked into his parents’ office. He took the locked gun cabinet and the wall of electronics for granted, but he always loved seeing the array of computers. Working for St. Kilda Consulting meant not only that his parents had great equipment but that he got to use it sometimes.
    His idea of heaven.
    The baby tucked against Faroe’s shoulder gave a belch that Lane would have been proud of.
    “Is that a round-two burp?” Lane asked.
    Faroe blinked. “A what?”
    “You know. You’re full and then you give a big belch and you’re ready for—”
    “Round two,” Faroe said, shaking his head. “Gotcha.”
    Grace looked up from her computer and held out her arms forlittle Annalise. “I have a new search running on the Moorcroft case.”
    “Anything?” Faroe asked.
    “I’ll know in a few hours. Or days. Depends on how many levels I have to go through to strike gold.”
    “We’ve got to hire some more researchers,” Faroe said.
    “Steele said he’s vetting them as fast as he can.”
    “He’s worse than the government when it comes to background checks.”
    “Good thing, too,” Grace said dryly. “St. Kilda is a lot more demanding than good old Uncle Sam.”
    “Steele has me,” Lane said, smiling and opening his computer. “Look at this. I don’t understand half the language, but there are a lot of zeros to the left of the decimal.”
    “Drag a chair over,” Faroe said, settling into his own office chair, “and show me what your swarm found.”
    “This is only preliminary,” Lane said. “We haven’t had much—”
    “Gimme,” Faroe cut in. “No researcher ever has enough time.”
    Lane sat and scooted a rolling office chair across the Spanish tile floor. Faroe stuck out a long leg and cushioned the impact of his son’s landing.
    “I’m not sure where to begin,” Lane said.
    “At the bottom line,” Faroe said.
    “Which one,” Lane said under his breath.
    “You always say that.”
    “You always give me a reason.” Lane frowned at the computer. “Okay, most recent hits first. I shunted all the general Western art stuff into a separate file if—”
    “Bottom line,” Faroe said ruthlessly.
    “Right. Recent Dunstan hits. Governor of Nevada, one of the state senators, a congressional representative, and a rich dude called Talbert ‘Tal’ Crawford congratulated themselves at a press conference calledbecause Crawford is making a big contribution to something called the Museum of the West. He’s donating his entire collection of Western art, including whatever he buys at the Vegas auction on Sunday.”
    Faroe watched his son with steady eyes that were more green than hazel, intelligent, and fierce in their intensity. “Generous man.”
    “Yeah. It’s his first big charitable contribution, too, and he has megabucks. Has had it for years. Oil, mostly.”
    “Interesting.”
    “I thought so,” Lane said. “You always say to look for the pattern, then look where it isn’t