Chapter Twenty-Four
GENEVIèVE
Roux practically plastered himself to my right leg, daring Grepper to try something as I entered the villa. I ran a hand over the dark, intersecting stripes of his back, trying to keep us both calm.
Grepper closed the door behind us, cutting us off from the blizzard.
Burning logs crackled in the living room fireplace — a big, featureless slab of concrete — and though the temperature was balmy, the space was anything but warm.
All that polished concrete gave the place an industrial feel, while cool gray and black furnishings reinforced the masculine vibe.
Clearly, Hot Young Thing hadn’t had a say in decorating. Otherwise, the place would be all fluffy pillows and pastels. She was younger than me, with triple the bra size, which hinted at the type of services she provided for Grepper.
At his gesture, she scampered away like a well-trained poodle.
“May I offer you a drink?” Grepper asked as if this were a social call and not a rapidly unraveling art heist.
“No, thank you.” I stood sideways to the fire, warming my hands while glancing at a wall made entirely of glass. On a clear day, the view over the lake and mountains would be breathtaking. Even now, the sight of snow falling over pines was gorgeous.
He helped himself to a drink, then made himself comfortable on a sleek black leather recliner.
“So, my painting…” he prompted.
I shook my head. “I’m not interested in your painting. I’m interested in my painting.”
“The one I bought at auction?”
“The one concealing a second painting.”
He sipped his drink, then placed it aside. “The artwork was my purchase. Hence, it is my property.”
“I’m only interested in the front painting. The one of a chateau.”
He studied me for a moment, keeping his cards close to his chest.
“As I said, it’s mine. Do you wish to purchase it from me?”
Roux lashed his tail, reminding me time was ticking.
“It’s not worth anything,” I pointed out.
“On the contrary. I paid €95,000 for it.”
“No, you paid €95,000 for a Monet. Quite a bargain, really.”
His eyes danced, congratulating me. Not that he came out and admitted as much. He just stuck up a finger, indicating for me to wait while he stepped into the adjoining study.
Roux chuffed at me in disapproval. The painting doesn’t matter, Gen. We need to get out of here safely.
“You mean, this lovely painting?” Grepper reappeared with my father’s canvas in his hands.
Just the canvas, removed from the frame, meaning the Monet was elsewhere.
A lump filled my throat, and I nodded. “My father painted it.”
“Thomas Durand.” He touched the tiny signature in the bottom corner. “He certainly had some skill.”
I frowned at his use of the past tense. Chez Robert had only listed my father’s name and the date of the painting. How did Grepper know my father was dead?
“It can’t possibly have any value to you, but it has great sentimental value for my family,” I said.
“Perhaps, but I’ve grown fond of it.” He rolled it up and placed it aside.
“I propose a trade,” I said, making poor Roux tense all over again.
Grepper raised his thick eyebrows. “What kind of trade?”
“My father’s painting for information.”
“Such as…?”
Roux leaned against my leg, warning me. I ignored him — as well as anyone could ignore a five-hundred-pound tiger.
“Such as the fact that a band of vampires is approaching as we speak, determined to steal your Monet. And I mean now.”
Grepper reached casually for his glass. “I’m well equipped to deal with them, as your friends discovered.”
He spared us a smirk, but I closed my eyes, feeling more like a failure than ever.
“But perhaps there is something else you can offer me,” he mused, circling the rim of his glass with a finger.
Anything, I nearly blurted. But I’d learned a few lessons in the past weeks, so I held that back in favor of, “Such as?”
“Information about a mutual friend.”
My stomach dropped, and Roux’s tail slapped my leg in warning.
“Why not ask your friend directly?” I tried.
Grepper lifted one shoulder in a lazy shrug. “Unfortunately, our relationship has been strained for some years.”
This was probably how things had started for poor Claudette, I realized. An uneasy feeling, a bitter deal…
“No deal.”
Grepper looked up, surprised. “Don’t you want to know who it is?”
I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter.”
He motioned to the next room. “What if I offered you a look at the other painting?”
I gulped, tempted. “Manet painting in Monet’s Garden, by Claude Monet?”
He dipped his chin. “Quite. Though I must say, I’m surprised your godfather told you.”
I froze. “You know Gordon is my godfather?”
His lips curled. “I know many things.”
Two guesses who he wants you to spy on, Roux grumbled.
My eyes went wide. Gordon?
Feeling more unsettled than ever — as in eleven on a scale of ten — I shook my head.
“Gordon didn’t tell me. I figured it out myself.”
Grepper narrowed his eyes, and my scalp began to itch. Badly.
The warlock was trying to read my mind, wasn’t he?
I pulled an image of my father’s painting to the front of my mind and focused on one detail after another. The colors of the croquet mallets. The familiar lines of the chateau. The thick, flat strokes my father had used in a direct homage to Monet.
As suddenly as the itch started, it stopped, and Grepper murmured, “Well done, Miss Durand. Well done.”
I stared. Did he mean resisting his mind reading or identifying the hidden painting?
But what really made me reel was what Grepper slipped in next.
“Your father would be proud.”
I stared. “You knew my father?”
He nodded, savored another sip of his drink — or some memory — for a long time, then studied me quietly.
Finally, he pointed to the next room. “Would you be so kind as to fetch it for me?”
I gulped. The Monet?
Roux blocked me when I tried to step past him.
Grepper chuckled. “Very protective. You choose your friends well, Miss Durand.”
“I’m finally learning,” I muttered, slipping past Roux into the next room. Logs in the fireplace burst into flames as I entered, illuminating the space. Another of Grepper’s little tricks, no doubt.
Roux prowled in beside me, sniffing for…traps? Explosives?
“It’s on the desk,” Grepper called casually.
Roux padded over to the sliding doors that opened onto a balcony, where wisps of steam rose from a heated pool, melting snowflakes in midair.
Check if the door is open, he urged.
I shook my head and headed for the desk. If I’d wanted to run, I would already be far from here.
Roux sighed, following me back to the living room.
Grepper motioned, and I propped the framed painting up on a side table. Then I stepped back to admire it.
“Beautiful, no?” Grepper murmured.
I nodded dumbly. It was. The golden light, the dappled leaves. The simple lines of Manet’s hat and beard.
But that was just a slice of a wider scene that had played out in 1874.
I pictured a triangle with Monet at one corner, painting Manet from the side while Manet focused on Camille and Jean, who sat at the third corner of the triangle.
That was what captivated me — the view that stretched beyond the canvas and the elements I could hear, louder and clearer than ever before.
Birds chirped. Bees buzzed. Water trickled in a stream. And a little boy sighed from somewhere to the right, “off-screen.”
Maman, Maman. ?a va encore durer longtemps? little Jean complained, much as I had as a kid. How much longer will this take?
Of course, I hadn’t been sitting for a portrait done by the Father of Impressionism, as some called édouard Manet.
“Je sais que tu ressens, petit,” I murmured. I know how you feel, kid.
Encore un petit moment, mon chéri, the boy’s mother replied. Just a little longer, my dear.
I stood there, transported from this snowbound warlock’s lair to a sun-drenched scene in a different time and place.
“He found it, you know,” Grepper murmured.
I blinked, getting my bearings. Who found what?
“Your father found this painting,” Grepper said.
I whirled around. “He found it…where?”
Grepper shrugged. “He never told me the details. I only know your father hoped to match the owner with a buyer who would bring the painting back into the public sphere.”
I swayed on my feet. My father knew Grepper?
Roux snarled. He could be lying.
He could, but a sixth sense told me he wasn’t.
“So your father contacted Gordon, and Gordon contacted me.” Grepper stared into the fireplace.
It took everything I had not to shake him and scream, Then what?
But, yikes. My father, Gordon, and Grepper were buddies?
Finally, I ventured quietly, “And did he find that kind of buyer?”
I meant Grepper, of course — or his younger self.
His fingers tightened around his glass. “He thought so. Your father was on his way with a contract, but…”
I tilted my head when he trailed off.
“But?” I whispered.
“He never arrived.” Grepper looked me straight in the eyes, waiting.
My knees buckled, and I would have hit the floor if Roux hadn’t darted under my hand to steady me.
“You mean…” I started, but my voice failed me.
Grepper nodded sadly. “The brakes failed. His car went off the road. The contract never arrived.”
I bared my teeth. “More significantly, my father died.”
Grepper nodded. “Sadly, yes.” He waited a few moments, then turned up the wattage in his eyes. “I’m deeply sorry for your loss. But let us focus on the painting for now. As you said, time is short.”
The sound of car engines straining up the mountain road reached us, and the hair on the back of my neck prickled.
The vampires are here, Roux warned.
Yes, but I couldn’t stop now.
“What happened to the painting after that?” I demanded.
“No one knows but the man who took it.”
I clenched my fists, desperate to learn who that might be.
Grepper pointed to the painting, hinting. “The man who took it and kept it hidden for all these years.”
Roux growled under his breath, and I wondered why. Then it hit me.
Gordon had had my father’s painting on the wall for all these years.