Chapter 27 Decay
Decay
Penelope blew air onto her steaming cup and turned on her computer.
Before Lucia’s call, she had struggled to concentrate. Research and work came in bursts, not in the deep, focused stretches she’d always prided herself on. Her ability to tune out everything and lose herself in whatever project had never failed her before.
Until Lucia.
After their conversation had reestablished some of their equilibrium, Penelope dug deeper into her research regarding Belgrave Trust and Whitfield. After all, the more she knew, the better prepared she’d be for her upcoming meeting with Francesca.
Her father’s notes acted like breadcrumbs, and as she followed their trail, Penelope uncovered evidence of donor laundering and what even looked like back-channel meetings involving a Jacqueline Lewis.
Penelope had no doubt this was the same Lewis that Montgomery had mentioned, considering all the oddities surrounding her.
That had led her further down the rabbit hole, toward a suspicious recent admission tied to Belgrave: Stillness in Decay by élaine Lejeune. A piece last seen in a private estate inventory in 1956 and long presumed missing, it had recently resurfaced—donated by Belgrave.
However, it had been flagged due to several inconsistencies, though a final verdict had not yet been rendered.
Penelope logged into INTERMUSE again, searching for Lejeune’s recognized works—underrecognized in her lifetime for being a woman who refused to commercialize her art.
Several of her works had vanished during wartime transfers and estate dissolution, but there were three pieces widely recognized as authentic.
Penelope loaded the authenticated images and pushed them to her large screen, lining them up for side-by-side comparison.
She sat back, the leather chair creaking beneath her as the glow of the screen lit up the dim room, reflecting faintly in the glass of a nearby cabinet.
She clicked open the file for Stillness in Decay. The image loaded slowly—and when it did, she went still. Her heart gave a strange lurch.
An intimate, shadow-heavy oil painting of a woman seated in a high-backed chair, her face obscured by her own hand. The subdued palette contained cool grays, smoky mauves, with a muted glint of silver thread in the background drapes.
Belgrave had donated the painting six months ago. The provenance had seemed shaky to some, and rightfully so, for whoever painted this version of Stillness in Decay wasn’t Lejeune. The taste was wrong—too flat, too metallic.
To Penelope’s utter relief, it also wasn’t Lucia—the colors didn’t sing the same notes, didn’t carry that soft acidity Lucia’s work always left on her tongue.
She pulled up the provenance record again, then filtered back through pages of her father’s notes, some of the more cryptic, almost coded entries, which led her back to older pieces—donations to The Met, loans by The Met to other galleries—until all air fled her body.
Her stomach turned. A single drop of sweat rolled down her spine.
She’d had this hunch before going over her father’s notes. Something had always seemed off, like a fault line she’d kept circling, and now she feared it had finally given way.
She pulled out her phone and dialed her mother.
“Hey, sweetheart. Good to hear from you. How are you?”
“Hi, Mom. I’m OK. Listen, thanks again for sending me Dad’s notes, but—”
“Oh, don’t tell him.”
Penelope’s hand curled into a fist. She’d been about to ask just that. “He still didn’t want you to send them to me?”
“Of course not! You know how protective he is, but I know you. You’re just as stubborn, and I thought maybe, if you saw it all, you could finally move on and let it go. There’s nothing there, sweetheart.”
“Thank you. I appreciate it.” For a split second, Penelope considered asking—did you know? But what if she didn’t? She hated the idea of putting her mother in such a position. Besides, she could be wrong. Then all would have been for nothing.
“Did it help?”
“It did, yes.” Not in the way she’d hoped.
“Good, I’m glad. When will you come back for a visit?”
“Oh, uh, I don’t know. I’ll try next month?”
Her mother sighed. “How about doing it, instead of just trying. I miss you.”
“I miss you, too, Mom,” her voice caught.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, yes. Sorry. I’ve got to go. My boss is calling. Talk soon, bye.”
“Bye, sweetheart.”
Penelope hung up and bowed her head, inhaling deeply before forcing the air back out.
Her father hadn’t just turned a blind eye. She’d recognized the signatures. The deeper she looked, the more deliberate it all felt—like he’d carved out clean paths for people like Whitfield to walk without ever leaving footprints of his own, until he did.
No wonder he didn’t want Penelope to have his notes.
She had no idea what to do with this information. Didn’t she need further proof? Hard evidence? She supposed she could call him, but she doubted he’d tell her.
“The truth is more important than our feelings, Penelope. Always follow the truth.” His words, uttered almost three decades ago, rang in her head. Words she’d believed in and lived by. Words that, if followed through now, would destroy everything.
What about Valentina? Why had her father been the only one to fall? Surely, others were involved. Perhaps he’d been blackmailed, or Valentina had threatened him. Penelope wouldn’t put it past her. But it still changed nothing—nothing about where she stood now.
Yet, it changed everything.
For two years, she’d been consumed with grief and rage—getting into bed with Valentina, all in the name of justice. Or revenge.
Oh, she hadn’t been na?ve. She’d known she could never topple Valentina or her empire. But she’d wanted to hurt her.
She’d wanted access—to transactions, patterns, pressure points.
She’d mapped the cracks in Valentina’s empire like a slow fuse, even if she knew she’d never light it.
If she could trace enough transfers, gather enough forged shipments, maybe she could leak it—tip off the authorities, sabotage a key deal, bleed Valentina’s empire one slice at a time.
A death by a thousand paper cuts.
Delusional? Probably. But it had given her a purpose. A way to survive the thing that had shattered her family, even if her mother put on a brave face.
It had been a path forward, and now, it had collapsed beneath her feet.
~ ~ ~
Penelope pressed send on her last email of the day, glancing at the clock on her screen.
She fell back against her chair. She’d reread the same paragraph four times without comprehension. Another hour, and then she could head home.
Outside, the rain had picked up, now rattling in bursts against the glass, and the radiator beside her emitted a faint metallic ticking as it fought to keep the drafty office warm.
Lucia had texted her, and they’d set up the meeting with Francesca for this coming weekend. Penelope had created a folder with information and a list of questions to bring along.
At work, Montgomery turned out to be a dog with a bone, unable to let go of the humidity incident. Maybe Jules should have caused a different disturbance. But hindsight and all.
At least no one was any the wiser that the Madonna on display was a forgery.
Still, all this proved to be a welcome distraction from her discoveries about her father and allowed her to procrastinate on her next move, or so she thought until Montgomery called her to her office.
“Now, I’m not making any accusations, Dr. Blackwell. I know your call to remove the Madonna from display was based on the humidity alarm and the goal to protect our inventory, but none of this adds up.”
“Maybe it was a glitch in the system. No measurement device or electronic gadget is free of failures and errors.”
“Perhaps, but why was only the Madonna affected? You’d think if it was a system glitch, more than one piece would show such discrepancies.”
“Has tech checked things out?” Penelope asked.
“Yes, but they also have no explanation, aside from the possibility of sabotage.”
“Sabotage? For what purpose?”
“I don’t know! To remove the Madonna from display?” Montgomery said.
“What would that accomplish?”
“I have no answers either. But Ms. Lewis continues to blow up my inbox, and I’ve even spoken to the previous director, and she has no memories of ever making such offers or holding the private viewing session Ms. Lewis describes.”
“That is odd indeed.”
“Dr. Blackwell, I’m sorry that I have to be so blunt here, but I need to know if I’m going to have a problem on my hands. Because if there’s more to this than I’ve been told, I’d rather hear it from you than from the board—or a journalist.”
Penelope remained motionless. “There isn’t. I did what I thought was best for the collection, for the Meridian. If that’s not enough, feel free to file a report.”
Oh, she hated this. Lying, yes, but here, it was more than that.
She was involved. She’d helped a criminal enterprise steal a precious painting, no matter the circumstance. Nausea coiled in her stomach, and she gritted her teeth.
“Is that all, Dr. Montgomery? I have work to do.”
A shadow seemed to flicker across Montgomery’s face. “Of course. It’s nothing personal, but I have to ask. It is my job to protect the Meridian, and if this becomes a headline scandal, both our jobs will be on the line.”
“I understand, and no offense taken.” She rose and left the office, feeling almost dizzy.
Who was she becoming in all this? A fraud, a criminal, someone blinded by… Was it worth it?
Back home, Lucia called, and Penelope closed her eyes as her body sank into her couch, relaxing for the first time all day.
“Hey you.”
“Hi,” Lucia said. “I just wanted to see how you’re doing.”
Penelope smiled. “Tired. It’s a lot.”
“I bet. And tomorrow, you’re facing the dragon.”
“Way to relieve my tension, Ms. Rossi,” Penelope drawled.
“I can think of a few pleasurable ways to relieve tension.”
Penelope flushed and cleared her throat. “Right. I actually wanted to ask you something.”
“Oh?”
“What’s the story behind Francesca and Valentina? It all seems…more intertwined than Francesca made it seem.”
Lucia hummed. “Yes, but I’m afraid there’s not much I can say. We all know aspects of the tale since forever, the big betrayal, the chase after the Madonna that never led anywhere before now.” Lucia sighed. “Yet we don’t know what really happened.”
“But you all agree that there’s more behind it?”
“Oh, of course. We’ve speculated for years. Skye thinks they were lovers and Francesca cheated on Valentina, who then stole the Madonna as revenge.”
Penelope frowned. “I don’t see Francesca cheating.”
“Same.”
“What do you think?”
“They had some kind of bond, and it broke. Both likely blame each other, and what’s the real truth? Who knows. Something in between? It usually is. It doesn’t matter, though.”
“How’s that?” Penelope asked.
“It doesn’t change our current situation. Francesca isn’t going to let this go. In the end, we’ll never know for sure because no one in their right mind is going to go up to Francesca and say, ‘Hey, about Varnelli, what really happened there?’”
“There’s that, yes.” Penelope paused. “But maybe someday she’ll tell you.”
Lucia huffed. “Stranger things.”
~ ~ ~
Saturday afternoon, Penelope pulled up at Francesca’s estate. The gravel lot beside the villa was partially shaded by tall oaks, with a few cars spaced along the curved drive. Lucia’s maroon sedan was already parked near the back under a patch of shadow.
Dry leaves skittered across the stone walkway, lifted by the wind in brittle spirals.
At least she wouldn’t be the first one there, but still, Lucia could have waited for her and not let her walk in alone, especially since Penelope had told her about the potential problem with Montgomery.
She took a few steps, startling at the sound of a door falling shut.
“Hey, stranger,” Lucia said, walking around her car toward Penelope.
“Hi, uh, I thought you’d already gone inside.”
Lucia smiled. “Nah. I was waiting for you.”
Penelope’s shoulders dropped. “Thank you.”
“Of course.” Lucia stepped next to her and softly bumped into her. “Ready?”
“I suppose.” Penelope leaned into Lucia for a moment, then straightened. She tightened her grip on her purse, and together they walked up the steps.
The doorbell echoed through the villa, and Penelope shifted on her feet.
Lucia grasped her hand, giving it a quick squeeze before letting go. “We will figure this out.”
Penelope could only nod, then the door swung open, and Francesca stood in front of her.
“Come on inside. We have much to talk about.” Francesca gestured for them to enter, which they did, Lucia with the normal fluidity she always carried, while Penelope felt like she was walking the Green Mile.