Twice

She ignored him, hoping he would go away and let her think. After a moment he walked a loop around the gallery and found a place standing outside the door, legs apart, arms folded. My bodyguard, Lydia thought, wanting to scream and throw things at him like a toddler having a tantrum.

“Why did you want to come here?” asked Jeffrey. She’d persuaded him to come with her to the gallery that displayed Julian Ross’s most recent work on their way to meet Ford McKirdy at a diner on West Fourth Street.

“I just wanted to get a sense of what she’d been painting recently. This one,” she said, pointing to the tag beside the giant canvas, “was finished about two months ago.”

“It’s intense,” he said, regarding the painting before him. “Not the work of a stable person, if you ask me.”

Lydia nodded. “But not necessarily the work of a murderer, either.” She pointed toward the cowering figure behind the cinderblock wall. “Julian Ross sees herself as a victim.”

“Maybe so, but her husband is the one spread all over the bedroom walls.”

Lydia nodded again, not quite sure how to respond to a statement like that.

“Can I help you?” asked a smooth male voice from behind them.

They turned to see a suave, tall, dark-skinned Latino with a slick of black hair that flowed to his shoulders. His lips were a warm, full pink and his liquid brown eyes spoke to Lydia of salsa dances under a full moon, scandalous assignations, and sangria. He wore a pair of black linen pants that draped elegantly from his thin hips and a white silk shirt unbuttoned to reveal a hairless chest. He extended a manicured hand to Lydia. “I am Orlando DiMarco and this is my gallery,” he said, looking straight into her eyes.

Lydia smiled and shook his hand but didn’t offer her name. He released her hand a moment later than was appropriate and glided past her. He removed the information tag from the wall beside the painting and replaced it with one that read SOLD.

“Unfortunately, this piece was sold this morning.”

“Bad news travels fast,” said Jeffrey.

Orlando gave Jeffrey a cool smile. “But there are many more interesting pieces in the back I can show you, if you like.”

He was handsome and sexual in a very effeminate way, not as though he were gay but in the way of European men. As if he were more in touch with his emotions and less afraid to show them than an American man. She could sense that he was highly temperamental. It was something in the shape of his eyes, the warmth of his hand, and the sway of his hips that communicated to Lydia that he would be an earth-shattering lover.

“Are they recent?” Lydia asked.

“Yes, of course. One of them she turned in just a few days ago. Of course, it may be her last for a while. So, it’s particularly valuable,” he said matter-of-factly. “Follow me.”

She turned around to tell Dax they were going in the back, but he was already right behind her.

The room behind the gallery space was bigger than Lydia had expected. There were hundreds of shrouded canvases leaning against the walls like ghosts. The lighting was dim and the air cooler than it had been in front, she imagined to preserve the artwork. A light and not unpleasant scent of paint and linseed oil permeated the room. In the back she saw a large black lacquer desk with a computer, a credit card machine, and stacks of files. She also noticed a framed picture, a close-up of Julian Ross smiling radiantly, her cheeks flushed from the sun, a wisp of dark hair blown in front of her eye. She looked happy, in love. Lydia glanced over at Orlando DiMarco as he climbed up on a chair to remove a shroud from the largest canvas in the room, and wondered.

“You carry Julian Ross’s work exclusively?” she asked, as he struggled with the far corner of the sheet. Jeffrey moved in to help him, but Orlando waved him away.

“Well, mostly,” he said. “Though recently I have started to feature other artists. There has always been enough demand for Julian’s work, but she hasn’t been as prolific in recent years.”

“Why is that, do you think?”

“She was happy,” he said almost sadly, and the shroud dropped to the floor.

A monster stared out at them, trapped in Julian Ross’s canvas. It was a face divided in half. On the right, the canvas was dominated by the features of a handsome young man, his mouth drawn into a twisted sneer. He had a shock of blue-black hair and one clear green eye, in which there was the reflection of a beautiful woman. The figure posed in the reflection of his eye, naked, her arms bent lifting her hair off her neck, her breasts pushed forward. On the left, it was the same face but age had warped the features, the hair had grown long and gray, twisted into shabby dreads, his teeth brown and sharp. His mouth was drawn into the same sneer, but a trickle of blood trailed from the corner of his mouth. In his eye, the reflection of the same woman, mutilated, her body opened and innards escaping, hung from the black branches of a great oak tree. The detail of the face and the images dancing in his eyes was exquisite, every line, every shadow, every muscle defined by the deft hand of a gifted, accomplished artist. It was remarkable.

All four of them stood there looking.

“What did she say about it?” Lydia asked finally.

“Nothing. She had it sent by messenger. I called her and she never returned my call,” he said, and sounded bitter.

“Who is it?”

“Look closely.”

She examined the detailed facial features of the man and at the woman reflected in the green pools of his eyes.

“It’s her,” said Lydia. “It’s Julian Ross.”

“The woman?” asked Jeffrey, looking more closely at the reflection in the monster’s eyes.

“Both,” answered Lydia. She walked over to the desk and picked up the picture she had seen there. Orlando looked uncomfortable but didn’t protest. She held the picture up for Jeffrey and the features were undeniably similar to the man in the painting.

“What did she call it?”

“He Has Come for Me,” he said, shaking his head. “I think it’s her most disturbing work. Though I can’t say why. There’s just something so fearful about it.”

“How well do you know her?” Lydia asked.

Orlando reached out and took the photo gently from Lydia’s hand. “Who are you?” he asked, suspicion creeping into his voice. “You’re not here to buy art.”

“No,” said Jeffrey, holding out his private investigator’s identification. “Eleanor Ross has asked us to find out what happened to Julian’s husband. I’m Jeffrey Mark and this is Lydia Strong. This is our associate Dax Chicago.”

Orlando nodded, as if he weren’t surprised. Most people would have been at least annoyed, but he looked suddenly tired. Lydia saw him retreat into himself. He got that glazed-over look that people get when their thoughts have turned inward. He walked back over to his desk, placed the frame back in its place, and sat in the chair behind his desk.

“We have worked together for over twenty years. We were… we are friends,” he said, still looking at the photograph, and Lydia saw so much more than feelings of friendship there in his face.

“So you knew her when her first husband was murdered,” said Lydia.

He nodded. “She was acquitted,” he said, a little defensively. “She’s innocent… of that and of this. I’m sure of it.”

“How can you be so certain?”

He sat forward and looked directly at Lydia. She walked closer to him, while Dax and Jeffrey hung back a bit. Lydia sat down across from Orlando, returned his gaze. He sounded positive, as though there were not a doubt in his mind. But Lydia had to wonder, wouldn’t even the most loyal friend have his suspicions after the second murder?

“Because I know her,” he said, sitting back.

“So then, any thoughts on who would be motivated to murder Julian Ross’s husbands?” she asked, keeping her voice light and even. Here she saw his eyes shift, as if he were remembering something. Whatever it was, he didn’t share it.

“Someone who was stalking her, someone who wanted to hurt her, an enemy?” Lydia pressed. “Was there