Chapter 3
Auralia
The subject line read: Consultation Request – Confidential.
I stared at it for eleven seconds before clicking. I counted.
The sender was someone called Maksim Besharov, a name that meant absolutely nothing to me—no prior correspondence, no industry gossip, no memory of encountering it at auctions or in trade publications.
The email itself was brief, courteous, and intriguing in the way that made my pattern-recognition brain light up with curiosity and my anxiety brain light up with warning sirens.
Ms. Hart,
Your reputation for authentication work precedes you. I have a sensitive matter requiring expertise in provenance research, and I believe you may be uniquely qualified to assist. I would prefer to discuss the details in person rather than through correspondence.
I'm prepared to offer three times your standard consultation fee for an initial meeting, with potential for ongoing engagement depending on scope.
I understand this request may seem unusual. You're welcome to research me before responding—I expect nothing less from someone of your thoroughness.
If you're amenable, I suggest the Vasiliev Gallery in Chelsea. Tomorrow at 2pm, if your schedule permits.
With respect,
Maksim Besharov
I read it four times, looking for red flags. The careful phrasing. The acknowledgment that I'd want to verify him. The offer of three times my fee, which was either a sign of desperation or a sign of money so abundant that normal rates seemed insulting.
The Vasiliev Gallery. I knew it vaguely—high-end contemporary, the kind of place where prices weren't listed because if you had to ask, you couldn't afford it.
Ghost watched me from his bed, his elegant whippet face expressing mild concern. Or maybe I was projecting.
"I need to research him," I told the dog. "Obviously."
Obviously.
Forty-five minutes later, I'd fallen so deep into the research rabbit hole that my tea had gone cold and Ghost had given up watching me in favor of sleep. What I'd found was frustratingly sparse—the kind of minimal digital footprint that could mean either genuine privacy or deliberate concealment.
Maksim Besharov. NYU graduate, double major in computer science and psychology.
An unusual combination that suggested someone interested in both systems and the people who built them.
Listed as a "consultant" for Besharov Holdings, which appeared to be a legitimate investment firm with offices in Manhattan and—I noted with a flicker of unease that sat heavy in my stomach—Moscow.
The firm's website was professionally designed and nearly content-free. Mission statement about "strategic investments" and "long-term partnerships." No staff photos. No detailed portfolio. The kind of corporate presence that existed primarily to prove existence.
No social media presence whatsoever. No LinkedIn, no Twitter, no Instagram, nothing. In the current age, that required active effort. Most people left digital trails without trying. Maksim Besharov had apparently spent considerable energy leaving none.
I found exactly one photograph, buried in a society page archive from a charity gala five years ago.
The image quality was poor—clearly taken by someone's phone from across the room—and he was half-turned from the camera, caught in motion, as if he'd sensed it coming and deliberately avoided it.
Dark hair. Sharp profile. The suggestion of height.
It told me nothing except that he existed and attended the kind of events where people raised money for causes while drinking expensive champagne.
I should say no.
The thought arrived with the certainty of all my carefully constructed rules.
I didn't take jobs from people I couldn't verify.
I didn't meet strangers in unfamiliar places.
I didn't deviate from the routines that kept me functional, the protocols that prevented meltdowns, the structures that held my life together.
Maksim Besharov was a deviation. A variable I couldn't control.
But.
Three times my usual fee would cover Ghost's vet bills for the year.
His last checkup had revealed early signs of arthritis, common in former racing greyhounds, and the specialist had recommended supplements and possible physical therapy that my current budget couldn't accommodate.
I'd been putting it off, hoping, pretending the problem would solve itself.
Three times my usual fee would also cover six months of art supplies. The good paints I kept eyeing in the catalog, the ones that cost more per tube than some people spent on groceries. The canvas I'd been rationing because the kind I needed wasn't cheap.
The money mattered. The money always mattered, no matter how much I pretended it didn't.
I read the email again, slower this time, trying to identify what was nagging at me beyond the obvious concerns.
I understand this request may seem unusual. You're welcome to research me before responding—I expect nothing less from someone of your thoroughness.
There. That was it.
He'd anticipated my reaction before I had it. Given me permission to be cautious without making it feel like a concession. Created space for my process without demanding I justify it.
If you're amenable . Not when you're ready. Not pressure, not assumption. Just . . . an offer, held open. It was sweet.
I was being ridiculous. The email was professional, nothing more. Plenty of people were capable of courteous communication.
Ghost stretched on his bed, his long legs extending in that greyhound way that always made me smile despite myself. He yawned, showing impressive teeth, and fixed me with a look that seemed to say: You've already decided. Stop pretending you haven't .
He was right. He was always right, my ridiculous elegant dog.
I opened a reply window.
Mr. Besharov,
Thank you for your inquiry. I've reviewed your proposal and I'm willing to meet to discuss further details.
The Vasiliev Gallery, tomorrow at 2pm, works for my schedule.
I should mention that I prefer to assess projects before committing to them. Any meeting would be preliminary consultation only, with no obligation on either side.
Regards,
Auralia Hart
I sent it before I could second-guess myself.
Then I sat very still in my studio, watching the morning light shift across my worktable, and tried to convince myself I wasn't making a terrible mistake.
T he Vasiliev Gallery occupied the ground floor of a converted warehouse in Chelsea, and it was exactly as hostile as I'd anticipated—brickwork painted aggressive white, concrete floors polished to a mirror shine that reflected the overhead lights directly into your retinas, the kind of space designed to make art look expensive and people feel inadequate.
I stood on the sidewalk outside, unable to make myself go in.
Four minutes. I stood there for four full minutes, counting my breaths the way Lis had taught me, running through my preparation like a pre-flight checklist. Meeting with Maksim Besharov at 2pm. Hear his proposal. Make no commitments. In and out in thirty minutes maximum.
Thirty minutes was optimistic. I knew that even as I thought it. The fluorescent lighting visible through the glass doors was already making my eyes ache, and I hadn't even stepped inside yet.
I focused on my breathing. Kept it even. The rhythm helped, gave my brain something to count instead of catastrophize.
My clothes felt like armor today, which was the point.
Black trousers with a crease sharp enough to cut paper.
Black silk blouse, expensive enough that people noticed but understated enough that they wouldn't comment.
A structured blazer with shoulders that made me feel less small, less vulnerable, less like someone who could be dismissed with a glance.
My hair was pulled back so tight my scalp ached. No loose strands. Nothing that could fall into my face or distract me with movement in my peripheral vision.
No jewelry except my grandmother's ring—a thin gold band with a tiny sapphire that had been worth almost nothing even when it was new.
I twisted it compulsively as I stood there, turning it around and around my finger, feeling the familiar groove it had worn into my skin over thirteen years of anxious fidgeting.
Grandmother would have told me to stop procrastinating.
I pushed through the glass doors.
Inside, the gallery was exactly as awful as I'd anticipated. Worse, somehow, because anticipating something terrible never actually prepared you for the reality of experiencing it.
The light hit me first. Not natural daylight, which I could have managed, but that frequency of artificial brightness that galleries favored—supposedly to show art at its best, but really just an assault on anyone with sensory sensitivities.
The white walls amplified everything, bouncing light back and forth until there was no shadow anywhere, no relief, no place for my eyes to rest.
The quiet came next. Not silence—there was a low hum from the climate control system, the distant murmur of someone speaking in another room—but that pressurized quiet that made every sound feel amplified. My footsteps echoed on the polished concrete like judgments. My breathing seemed too loud.
The smell was neutral, which should have been fine but somehow made it worse. Nothing to anchor myself to. Nothing familiar. Just the vague chemical absence of carefully filtered air.
A woman at the reception desk looked up with the smile of someone assessing net worth. Her eyes tracked over my blazer, my shoes, my understated jewelry, performing calculations I couldn't follow but could certainly feel.
I opened my mouth to speak and nothing came out.
This happened sometimes. The words got stuck somewhere between my brain and my throat, tangled in the overwhelming input of a new environment. I knew what I wanted to say— I have an appointment with Maksim Besharov —but the sentence refused to form.