With love,
Claire Peck Grayson, a sister in spirit
Claire had figured out that she had an authentic Rembrandt on her hands and hid it behind one of her own paintings. It would be safe, and it wouldn’t go to her husband. She’d wanted the sisters to have it. They would know what to do with it.
One hell of a thank-you gift, Colin thought, even if it had taken forty years to discover.
Mother Superior Natalie Aquinas Williams had opened up the private meditation garden for Emma and any investigators who wanted to take a moment there.
Colin imagined Emma here in her early twenties. “I’ll bet you loved watching lobstermen.”
She laughed behind him. “Don’t forget rugged marine patrol officers.”
“Not yachtsmen?”
She stood to his right now, on the very edge of the ledge. “Yachtsmen seemed more out of reach than your basic Rock Point hard-ass.”
She looked like a Heron’s Cove hard-ass right now in her leather jacket, jeans and boots, with her honey-colored hair pulled back, her jaw set and her green eyes narrowed as she focused on her job. Colin knew the events of the day had taken an emotional toll. They had on him, too, although he wouldn’t necessarily articulate it with words. Then again, Emma might not, either.
Sister Cecilia had been transported by ambulance to the hospital, then treated and released into the care of the Sisters of the Joyful Heart. She was eager to get back to work on the biography of Mother Sarah Jane Linden. As they’d waited for the ambulance to arrive, Sister Cecilia, bloody and in pain, had asked Emma if she could interview her grandfather about his friendship with Mother Linden.
Colin watched Emma stare out at the water, quiet and a dark purplish-blue in the fading light. “Gabe was looking for Sunniva when he searched the attic, but he also wanted information on the Rembrandt and any other valuable art his family had owned.
He broke into my grandfather’s Dublin office for information. He might have wanted to get closer to his mother with his little scheme, but he especially wanted to get his hands on a genuine masterpiece.”
“He stole the Dürer etching because his family once owned it and he felt entitled to it.”
“And because he liked stealing,” Emma said.
When Sister Joan discovered the Jack d’Auberville painting of Mother Linden’s statue of Saint Francis tucked away in the convent, she could have run across the painting Claire Grayson had given the sisters. Then Ainsley d’Auberville dropped off The Garden Gallery to be cleaned, and Sister Joan recognized the dead woman in the cave as the same woman in the painting in storage and started putting two-and-two together, or at least asking questions—and calling Emma Sharpe, an FBI agent, a former nun and a friend.
“Gabe was brazen,” Colin said.
Emma nodded. “Yes, he was.” She pointed at the rocky, jagged section of coast where the Sisters of the Joyful Heart lived and worked. “Imagine sneaking up here in the fog and killing a nun, then making off with a stretched canvas.”
When the police finally searched Gabe Campbell Grayson’s property, they’d discovered a small motorboat pulled up onshore that he must have used that day. Ainsley claimed she didn’t know he could operate such a boat never mind owned one.
Colin stood, wanting to put his arms around Emma but resisting. After the events of the past few days, part of her was Sister Brigid again. She had to figure that out.
Maybe so did he.
Mother Natalie joined them. She looked drawn and tired, but also peaceful—as if she’d reconnected with a deep sense of purpose that gave her strength and comfort. She turned to Emma. “Vespers starts in a few minutes. I hope you’ll join us.” She smiled. “As a friend.”
“I will,” Emma said.
The Mother Superior withdrew, and Colin cleared his throat. “I think I’ll scoot.”
Emma surprised him by reaching for his hand. “Later,” she said.
So much for Sister Brigid. He winked at her. “Damn straight, sweetheart.”
* * *
Colin drove to the d’Auberville place and pulled in behind Finian Bracken’s BMW. On his way down the winding road from the convent, he’d received a terse text message from the priest telling him to meet him there.
Moral support, Colin figured as he headed into the house, not bothering to knock. Every light in the place seemed to be on. He called a greeting but saw Bracken and Ainsley in the seating area by her artistic mishmash of a wall. She was alone, with no family or friends—just Father Bracken. She’d changed into another outfit, another long sweater and slim pants, as if that would help her exorcise Gabriel Campbell Grayson from her life.
She acknowledged Colin with a quick flick of her fingers. “I keep asking myself how many times he said he was working on a project in Rhode Island but really was in London—or who knows where—stealing art and assaulting people. The police are checking. His passport is in his legal name, Gabriel Grayson.”
Bracken didn’t interrupt her. Neither did Colin, but he wasn’t as patient a listener.
“I don’t know if I’d have recognized the room he was re-creating as the same room as in my father’s painting,” Ainsley said. “I’d have needed the artwork depicted in The Garden Gallery to make the connection, for sure. Maybe he planned to dump me before I ever moved in there. Or kill me.” She fixed her gaze on Bracken. “I don’t know how I could have been so wrong about him.”
Colin wondered if vespers had ended and if Emma was on her way. He felt bad for Ainsley d’Auberville, but she’d be fine. She was resilient, driven and positive, and she had a wide circle of family and friends willing to help her get through her ordeal.
“Gabe had to have The Garden Gallery,” she said when Bracken didn’t respond. “He wanted it because it showed his mother’s gallery and what pieces she’d brought to Maine, and it confirmed
