Chapter 45 Linc
LINC
Standing before my father, Jules draws herself up.
“Someone has been commissioning high-quality forgeries, having them authenticated by our own experts, insuring them for massive amounts, then claiming tax deductions for ‘donating’ them or sending them to auction while keeping the originals in private storage.”
My father’s head inclines in a direction that shows mild surprise. “How long has this been going on?”
Jules looks at me as if for approval. “Based on the patterns we found, at least a year. Someone with executive access has been taking advantage of desperate sellers and increasing values for insurance purposes.”
Eyes boring into my father, I add, “It’s fraud. Executive fraud.”
“Indeed,” he says as if this is a novelty.
Jules continues, “But that’s not where it ends. These pieces have then been sold at auction.”
My father leads, “And you think—?”
Unable to restrain myself as he holds it together as if not at all shaken by this information, I turn to Frank Andresen, the man who loved my mother, broke her heart, and wants me to become him. “Are you involved?”
The accusation hits like a slap as his head snaps in my direction. “What?”
“From the outside, it looks like—”
“Like I’m part of the fraud,” he finishes with a derisive snort.
Jules and I have shifted closer together. My father’s eyes slide up and down, in between, as if trying to figure out how to play his hand … or as if he sees something he hasn’t in a long, long time. My lifetime, in fact.
I say, “I just want the truth.”
“That’s a serious accusation, son.”
“It’s not an accusation,” Jules says quickly.
I start, “I’m trying to understand—”
“No, you’re right to question it.” Then I watch, as if in slow motion, my father turn the tables. “I have a question too. How do I know you two aren’t involved and brought this to me to deflect responsibility?”
The three of us are in a standoff, as silence as thick as ice fills the air.
“We both know quite well that I did not want to be here this summer,” I say like a gavel dropping.
I don’t let myself look to see if Jules flinched.
“Then you have a motive to get the most out of your time at Meridian.”
This time, I do look at the stunning woman with bright eyes and stop-traffic, forget-your-own-name beauty. “I already did.”
Jules looks at me briefly, storing my comment about her, us, for later. She stands strong. “Sir, I am not running a fraud scheme. I’m risking my job right now.”
“Fair point. As for me, I am most certainly not stealing from my own company.” He looks toward the door as it opens again. “Ah, Maxine, how timely.”
Jules seems to shrink as every muscle in my body coils with rage.
“Frank, you wanted to see me?” She stops when she spots Jules and me. “Oh. This is unexpected.”
“Maxine,” my father says with a density behind it I can’t place. “We were just discussing—”
“Personnel matters? These two have been quite the pair of firecrackers this summer.”
A growl rises in my throat.
“Actually, it’s about an audit they ran,” Dad says.
My jaw slowly lowers. It’s then that I see that my years of learning at his side have paid off.
His angle takes shape, suddenly makes sense.
He’s known about the scheme all along and let Jules and me figure it out.
But why? I wonder if he was aware of Drecken’s thugs.
If so, he could’ve intervened before now.
The man deals in art, but is an artist himself in the way he crafts business ventures. He’s about to let Maxine hang herself.
I’m. In. Awe.
“Speaking of fire, your services are no longer needed, Maxine,” he says.
My mistake. He went straight for the jugular.
She stammers.
“If that wasn’t clear. You’re fired.”
“What—why?”
“Before I have security take you into custody, do take this opportunity to defend yourself. I’d like to hear why a promising COO, a person who could’ve been the next chief executive, deceived me.” My father’s voice is cool while Maxine tries not to melt under pressure.
She stammers, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you do. You sent thugs after an employee and my son. You’ve been working on the side with yours.
Robbing from the company that has only treated you well, not to mention the headache it’s going to be to correct all the intentional errors you made.
Did you really want to make an entire industry’s worth of enemies? ”
Changing tack, she snorts with derision, stalking toward my father like he’s prey—that might be her greatest mistake yet.
It’s the seasoned hunters you have to watch out for.
“I knew you were getting old, Frank. Saw the writing on the wall. Needed to make my stake before you handed over the crown of this castle to someone who’d waste it.
” She pitches a scathing glance at me and cackles like I’m a big joke.
My father lets the room fall silent before striking. “Are you admitting to wrongdoing?”
“I’m admitting to being smarter than everyone else on this floor, where I belong. Including you, Frank.”
His face darkens. “Maxine—”
She tuts. “Oh, don’t look so shocked. You’ve been too focused on your presidential legacy fantasies to notice what’s been happening right under your nose. Did you really think I’d just quietly step aside when you decided to hand the company over to your son?”
The words hang in the air like the moments between a grenade’s pin being pulled and the explosion.
“The beauty of the scheme was its simplicity. Commission forgeries of minor pieces, get them authenticated through our own people, insure them, then have my son destroy them and collect the insurance. Clean, efficient, profitable.”
“But the Marchand diptych was from my collection.”
My father’s voice is frigid. “Did you really think you could steal from my family’s legacy?”
“I was your legacy,” Maxine shoots back. “Twenty years of building this company, and you were going to hand it to a boy who doesn’t even want it. I earned more than a gold watch and a pat on the back.”
“Who was your partner?” my father asks.
“Veronica and Misha?” Jules asks, referring to her assistants.
She caws a laugh. “No, they were just pawns. Useful to keep an eye on you. Remind you of your place. No, my partner was part of the family, though you’d know about that.”
Jules lets out a soft gasp at the same time I make the connection.
“Aiken the Demo King,” I say, referring to his viral channel that makes the perfect cover.
Jules explains to my father, who would think it’s far too pedestrian to be worth a second of his attention. “‘Aiken the Demo King’ destroys priceless artifacts and costly items, making ‘new art.’ But in this case, insurance pays out, and according to them, everyone wins.”
Maxine smirks. “Well, everyone except the people who thought they were buying authentic pieces.”
My father digests this information like a sand worm.
Maxine scoffs. “I wasn’t expecting you two to interfere.”
My dad says, “I put them on a special assignment.”
The pieces are falling into place with devastating clarity. She orchestrated everything—the fraud, the threats, and maybe even the fire lit by Jules’s father’s debtors.
My father ordered me not to seek the letters because he knew I would disobey.
Jules points her finger at Maxine. “You changed the Echo & Answer signature from Clement Marchand to D. Kinnard. You wanted to hide that they were a diptych.”
So far, I’ve been following Jules’s line of thinking, but she’s lost me now.
Maxine’s nostrils flare. “Marchand only created matched pairs. If anyone knew one painting was by Marchand, they’d search for the companion piece. Separated, attributed to different artists, I could insure them as two unrelated works and double the payout.”
Like the narcissistic villain she is, this woman cannot help but brag about her questionable and diabolical logic.
Now I fully understand what Jules is getting at.
“The real Fairfax Collection documentation would have listed both paintings together under Marchand’s name, which is why you couldn’t let anyone find the start of the list of the gifts to the Todd family, included in the lost love letters.
That would have led us to the end of the list—the Marchand paintings donated to them posthumously in Lincoln’s memory. ”
My father snorts as if impressed by the unraveling of the scheme. “Let me see if I understand. You discovered a record of part of the Lincoln diptych in our archives. You realized it was worth more separated than together.”
“The insurance possibilities were plain. Almost too good to pass up after the restructuring,” Maxine says coldly. “Two paintings by different artists, different time periods, insured separately were worth triple what they’d be as a matched set.”
Jules adds, “But you needed to hide the provenance. If anyone traced the Fairfax Collection back to Lincoln’s original gifts, they’d find documentation of a Marchand diptych, not two separate paintings.”
Maxine huffs. “I was playing a long game. Your mother’s obsession with those letters was the catalyst. I thought when she died, the search would die with her. But then you started looking.”
“The letters don’t just prove Lincoln loved Mary, they prove what pieces Lincoln originally gave to her family, which leads to the full collection. And the paintings, together, tell the complete story.” My father folds his hands.
“You’re finished, Maxine,” I say, surprised by how steady my voice sounds. “We have everything we need to destroy you.”
Her smile turns predatory. “Do you? Because from where I’m sitting, you’re the one who’s been requesting access to forged documents for months. Your little treasure hunt for those love letters made you the perfect patsy.”
I go still. My innocent search for the Lincoln letters has created a paper trail that makes me look complicit. Maybe that’s why Dad urged me to leave the letters alone. Either way, he counted on Jules and me finding the discrepancies. On us exposing Maxine.
Then Jules steps forward, eyebrow arched. “There is one problem with your theory, Ms. Drecken. We have the letters. You have the painting—or did you and Aiken already destroy it? He won the winning bid at the auction. Looks suspicious.”
“I covered my tracks. You won’t pin anything on me.” Her tone is cold, but uncertainty flickers across her face.
“Lincoln kept meticulous records,” Jules continues. “Including records of which documents he gave to which collectors. The letters reference his inventory. Your forgeries are about to be exposed.”
It’s brilliant and Maxine’s confident smirk wavers.
“You’ll never prove anything,” she says, but she sounds less sure.
“Won’t I?” Jules pulls out her phone. “Should I call the FBI now, or would you prefer to explain to them how you’ve been systematically defrauding insurance companies and auction houses, not to mention attempted murder?”
The room goes so quiet I can hear the traffic below.
Then Maxine clicks her tongue. “This isn’t over,” she says, but she’s already backing toward the door.
“Yes,” my father says quietly, “it is.”
After she leaves, the three of us exchange baffled looks as if to ask, Did that really happen?
My father says, “I’m afraid so. But I have you two to thank.”
“So you knew all along? You planted me on the inside, ‘undercover boss’ style, without my even knowing it?” Wrinkles line my forehead and then a sharp bark of laughter escapes when he doesn’t deny it.
My father spins his pointer finger in the general vicinity of the room. “The best part is all of that was caught on the security cams. I use Checkpoint Secure.”
Of course he does.
“Did you really find the letters?” he asks with a surprising amount of eagerness in his voice.
“Sure did.”
Jules turns to my father and says, “Sir, your wife really loved you. Your son, too. Now I understand why.”
Then she excuses herself, leaving Dad and me alone. He comes out from behind his desk and, for the first time in my adult memory, he hugs me and says, “Go after her.”
I grip him more tightly, not realizing how much I’ve needed this hug.
“I’d like to see those letters when you get a chance.”
“Absolutely.” I start toward the door.
“Oh, one more thing. Jules really is an expert forger. But I have it on good authority that she truly cares about you.”
“What do you mean?”
“She may not have an authentic college diploma.”
My brow forms a trench. “Huh?”
He claps me on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll let the two of you work out the secrets you keep. But don’t hold on to them for too long.”
With that, his phone rings and he takes the call.