I punch him a few times and my hand feels good colliding with his face.
After a few more, my fingers start to throb but I keep at it.
Olive’s voice starts to come in more clearly but I still don’t really process what she’s saying.
“Get off him!” she screams into my ear just as she hits me with something hard.
My head starts to spin and my body gets wobbly.
I try to move off Owen but instead I just melt onto the floor.
“You were going to kill him.” I hear her say when my eyes open and I manage to focus on her face. “You both were going to kill each other.”
My head is throbbing and I’m lying on the bed.
She keeps going over what happened as if I wasn’t there or as if it’s going to make me feel better.
Owen is lying on the couch with his hand over his face.
Like most physical altercations, our fight has resolved nothing but it did allow us to blow off some steam.
We both got a bunch of good punches in.
My throbbing face and right hand are a testament to that.
With us on our backs, Olive takes charge.
“This isn’t going to work unless we all cooperate,” she says, standing in the middle of the floor. “We all need each other.”
“I am not starting any new life with that asshole,” Owen mumbles.
My chest tightens.
He doesn’t need me as much as I need him, but my only consolation is that neither of them know this.
If I can get this painting then I won’t have to work for the FBI anymore gathering evidence on him and I won’t have to worry about paying off any debts that the mob thinks I owe them.
Of course, I can do this on my own and disappear but I want Olive to come with me. And the only way she’ll do that is if she can bring Owen along.
I know all of this and I have gone over it a million times already. I keep looking for a way out but nothing presents itself.
“I’m ready to talk about this whenever you are, Olive,” I say, forcing myself to my feet.
My body throbs and aches but I don’t dare let out a sound.
My announcement catches Owen’s attention.
Now he looks like the uncooperative one.
Now he looks like the asshole that I know that he is.
“What’s the plan?” Olive asks.
I walk over to the dining room table and pick up my scribbled notes.
I’m about to open my mouth when I remember the promise that Owen still owes me.
“I can’t get into any of these details without him committing to do this job with us,” I say as calmly as possible.
22
Nicholas
When we begin again…
I address my words to Olive.
She’s the one who is in the middle.
She’s the mediator who can make this happen. I turn to face her and wait.
It’s her turn now. She walks over to Owen who sits up on the couch with an angry yet defeated look on his face.
He crosses his arms and legs, withdrawing himself as much as possible from everything around him.
I want to give them some space but there’s nowhere to go. I take a few steps away and then disappear into the bathroom. With the light on and the fan running, I can’t hear what they’re saying.
But when I come out, there’s the beginning of a smile at the corners of Olive’s mouth. I let out a small sigh of relief.
Without insisting on an apology or an explanation, I accept his nod as a sign that he’s in.
“The couple who own the painting are in their late sixties. They live in a five-bedroom, five-thousand square foot home in Martha’s Vineyard. They have a number of paintings in their collection,” I say.
“How did they get into that?” Olive asks.
“I’m not sure. The husband worked in a hedge fund and the wife was in the upper echelons of a big pharmaceutical company. They both retired with millions.”
“Have you done anything like this before?” Owen asks.
His words are jagged and rude but I choose to ignore the tone.
“No, I’ve never taken a painting before,” I say calmly.
“What makes you think you can do it then?” He pushes me.
“Owen, please,” Olive interjects. “I want to hear the plan.”
“Even though Mr. and Mrs. Linchfield are rich, they did not buy these paintings from reputable art dealers or galleries.”
Olive stares at me with a look of surprise.
“The paintings are stolen and they bought them from their contacts in the black market,” I continue.
“Is that who is paying you?” Olive asks. “The people they stole the painting from?”
I swallow hard.
That’s exactly what Art says Olive did and it would be too much of a coincidence if this story went the same way.
“No.” I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”
The story is not all true but it’s true enough to get Olive on my side.
They wait for me to continue.
I try to think of the best way to organize and present the details that Art gave me.
“The painting we want is called Dark Blue Mirror by Alexandra Blur,” I continue. “It’s basically a large canvas that’s all dark blue.”
I pull up the painting on my phone and show it to them. Its website lists it to be estimated at seven-hundred thousand dollars.
“Wait a second,” Owen says. “Seven hundred for this? Just some blue paint the whole way around and that’s it?”
I tilt my head to one side.
“That’s the art world, Owen,” Olive says.
“But that doesn’t make any sense!”
“Well, that’s how it is.” She shrugs. “I don’t know what to tell you.”
“So, can I paint this and get that much money?” he asks, incensed.
“No.” She laughs.
“Why the hell not?”
“Because…you’re not an artist. You’re not saying anything.”
“There are people starving in the world, working hundreds of hours just to put food on the table and someone is spending this kind of money on this shit?”
I hate to admit it but he does have a point.
I don’t know much about the modern art world but the prices there for the quality of the work are outrageous.
It doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the painting but rather the painter and the valuation for the investors.
“It’s just like the housing market,” Olive says. “Ten years ago houses cost two hundred grand and now they’re six. The market deems it so, so that’s what happens.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that,” Owen says. “But they’re still fucking houses, Olive. They’re not a huge canvas painted one color. There’s some value in that you can live in them.”
He waits for her to say something else but she just throws up her hands.
“Am I wrong?” Owen asks. “I mean, really, am I wrong?”
Again, she doesn’t say anything.
“Nicholas?” Owen asks, extending me an olive branch, the first one since I’ve known him.
“It’s fucking ridiculous,” I agree.