Priceless (32 page)

“Who? Which rich guy? Are they the kind of people Katie should be around?”

“What does it matter to you? If I don’t take her with me, what then? You don’t want her to interrupt your romantic trip to France. Would you have me drop her off with social services for a couple of weeks instead?”

Serena slammed the phone down.

Conversations with her ex-husband were never an unmitigated joy, but his last question, “Are they the kind of people Katie should be around?” had unnerved her. Of course they weren’t the kind of people Katie should be around. They were the kind of people who turned up at your house in the middle of the night and offered you the choice of a life of crime or a bullet in the back of the head.

Yasha Suscenko was very pleased that Serena had seen sense. He was a great deal more professional than Julian had been when it came to ensuring that the link between Serena and his painting was invisible. She had to buy her own ticket to Pisa, from where she and Katie would take a train to Empoli. Then and only then would they meet one of Yasha’s Italian associates who would drive them to the villa where the original painting awaited, alongside
the reclaimed canvas that Serena would transform into its exact likeness.

As she watched the Italian countryside roll past while Katie slept on her knee, Serena considered that perhaps this was some kind of dream. It was unreal. Who traveled to Italy to paint a fake? She would get to Empoli and find no one waiting for her. But there was someone on the platform. Serena knew at once that this had to be Yasha’s associate. The man held his cigarette pinched between thumb and forefinger in the manner of every small-time crook in every gangster movie she’d ever seen. She caught his eye. He gave a flick of his head that she took to mean “Follow me.”

“Are we going in a car with that man, Mummy?” Katie asked.

“Yes. I think so.”

“Then why doesn’t he help us with our bags?”

Serena forced herself to smile.

“Perhaps that’s not what they do over here,” she said.

The car matched the gangster image—a sleek black Lexus that was distinctly out of place among the battered old Fiat Pandas that made up the rest of the parking lot.

“Is it far?” Serena asked. The driver didn’t respond. She tried again, in Italian.

“No,”
grunted the driver.

“Good,” said Katie. “I’m hungry.”

But the driver was wrong. He was taking them a very long way from Empoli. Serena was working hard to keep the anxiety at bay now. They had been driving for half an hour, the last ten minutes of that half hour on a track that looked as though it hadn’t been used in weeks. The farther they went, the narrower it became, as the surrounding forest seemed determined to take back the land.

But finally there it was. The road widened up again,
and in front of them was the warm red and yellow brick of a traditional farmhouse.

From the outside it was picture-postcard perfect. On the inside, where animals had once slept, there was now a state-of-the-art kitchen, complete with the kind of oven that even Gordon Ramsay would be pleased with. The oven was one of the things that Serena had explained she would need—though not for cooking lasagne.

Katie immediately set about choosing her bedroom. There was a small room at the top of the house with bunk beds. Katie proclaimed it hers and installed her toy rabbit on the top bunk. Meanwhile, Serena couldn’t help but give a little snort of delight and amusement when she was alone for a moment in what was to be her room—far bigger and grander than the room she and Tom had shared on their honeymoon in Tuscany.

This was the strangest situation Serena had ever found herself in. She wasn’t sure what she had expected when the Russian had summoned her to Italy. A hotel room, bare and cheap. She’d expected to have to share the space with her daughter. But here they were in an enormous farmhouse with an infinity pool to themselves.

“It’s brilliant,” Katie shouted as she stripped to her undershirt and panties and jumped in. “Come on, Mummy.”

“All right.” Serena joined her daughter in the water.

To an observer, it looked idyllic. And on the surface it was. The house on the hill was the stuff of middle-class holiday dreams: a mother and daughter—gray from an English winter—splashing around in a pool under the Tuscan sun. But when she’d put her daughter to bed for the night, Serena’s face reflected an altogether different reality. She sat on the step, smoking her first cigarette in years, and stared blindly into the trees that surrounded this gilded prison. The only sound was the curious bark
of a deer. Miles away from anywhere, with no lights in view to reassure her that help was within reach if she needed it, Serena felt a hot tear run down her cheek.

What would the morning bring?

CHAPTER 45

Y
asha spent the night on the road with Leonid. Their brief time in Moscow had been far from pleasant. They were met at Domodedovo airport by more of Belanov’s men, including one of his pet bankers, and were driven straight to Vasilyev’s veritable fortress on Rublevka Avenue. There were no niceties. No welcoming tea or vodka. Belanov’s party was simply led down into the basement where the painting was kept pending sale.

The portrait, just fifteen inches high, was revealed to Yasha and his new colleagues without ceremony. It lay, unframed, on Vasilyev’s desk, with a half-finished cup of coffee perilously close by. The only sign that the painting was valuable at all was the number of men who packed into the remarkably small office, with their guns on show.

“Mr. Suscenko.” Vasilyev motioned for Yasha to step forward. “Your opinion, please.”

Yasha’s first instinct was that this was the real thing. He had explained to Belanov that it would take a barrage of scientific tests to be 100 percent sure of the painting’s age and provenance, but with a simple black light that would highlight any recent touch-ups, and a well-trained
eye, Yasha felt he could give Belanov an assurance that was 99 percent accurate.

The room was silent as the main lights were extinguished and Yasha ran the black light over the canvas. You could have cut the tension in the air. After all, who wants to be in a dark room with fifteen armed gangsters? The whole party seemed to sigh in relief when Yasha requested that the main lights go back on again. Then he nodded toward Leonid and the nervous rat-faced banker who had joined them at the airport.

“It’s what he said it was,” Yasha confirmed.

The banker stepped forward with a case containing thirty million sterling. Vasilyev handed Yasha the painting.

“I can buy something nice and new now,” Vasilyev said.

Moron
, thought Yasha as he nodded at the joke. Belanov had just gotten himself a bargain. Thirty million dollars for a painting that should have been priceless. Quickly he fitted the painting into the special case he’d had especially made for the occasion. He offered Vasilyev his hand. The rich man merely looked at him.

Then it was time to get out of the house with Leonid and Basil, another of Belanov’s favorite goons, close behind. The challenge ahead was to get the painting from Moscow to Portofino, where Yasha would deliver it to Belanov’s yacht, without falling foul of border controls. The first leg of the journey would take them from Moscow to a private airport in Slovenia. Leonid, Basil, and Yasha would be driving into Italy from there.

There was time for Yasha to visit just one of his old haunts before the private jet was due to fly—his brother’s nightclub, Diamond Life. Leonid and Basil waited in the car with the painting while Yasha went up to the door. It
was shut. A sign stating that the club would be closed until further notice fluttered from the door. There was little point leaving a message for his brother there. Yasha just wanted to know that Belanov hadn’t been bluffing. Here was the proof. God only knew where Pavel was being kept this time.

When Yasha got back into the car, Leonid was going through the pockets of Basil, who was unconscious, soon to be dead, in the passenger seat.

“What happened?” Yasha asked.

“Heroin,” said Leonid matter-of-factly. “Too pure for his black heart.” Leonid gazed forlornly at the syringe sticking out of his former colleague’s forearm. The syringe that he had prepared himself.

“Thanks,” said Yasha.

“We’ll leave him by the back of the club,” said Leonid, driving around so that he could simply roll the corpse out of the door. “There are always druggies here. I’ll tell Belanov he overdosed.”

Yasha nodded. He knew that even someone so vile as Basil had a mother to mourn him, but he consoled himself with the thought that this guy had probably been part of the squad who’d gotten hold of his brother. He looked away as Leonid arranged Basil’s lifeless limbs in the gutter.

“So the mission is going ahead as planned,” said Leonid as he got back into the car.

“Yes. Yes it is.”

“Good.” Leonid nodded, then he turned to Yasha with a wicked smile that Yasha found oddly comforting.

CHAPTER 46

Y
asha and Leonid’s car—an SUV with blacked-out windows—pulled into the driveway as Serena and Katie were having breakfast on the terrace. Serena, who had been awaiting this moment with dread, immediately began clearing the plates and sent Katie inside.

“What for?” Katie asked.

“Because I want you to.”

“Why?”

“You left Bunny upstairs,” said Serena, grasping for an excuse. “I’m sure he must be lonely.”

“I’ll bring him down,” said Katie, nodding.

Katie wouldn’t be long, but her search for the fluffy rabbit would give Serena just enough time to have a moment alone with their visitor. Or visitors. The sight of the enormous, anonymous car was worrying, and sure enough, Yasha wasn’t alone. Serena felt panic surge through her body, followed by a fresh wave of fear when Yasha reached into the passenger seat of the car and pulled out a big black case. What did that hold? A shotgun?

“Hey!” He waved to Serena and smiled cheerily, as though they were old friends. She gave an unenthusiastic wave back to let him know from the start that she was there because she had to be. She wasn’t doing him any favors. Leonid waved too, before he settled himself on the hood of the car and rolled a cigarette.

“What do you think?” Yasha asked her. “How are the working conditions? Will you be able to paint here? Is the oven good enough? Is it big enough?”

“The whole place is incredible,” Serena said honestly.

“I like the swimming pool,” said Katie. She was back downstairs already, having dressed Bunny in a pair of her own underpants.

“He doesn’t have a pair of swimming trunks,” she explained.

Yasha beamed at her and ruffled her hair. He withdrew his hand quickly, however, when Serena glared at him. They weren’t a happy family on holiday.

“Katie,” said Serena. “Why don’t you give Bunny a tour of the garden? But no swimming until I’m there to watch you.”

Katie pulled a face. “No swimming? In that case,” she said, “we’re going to watch
High School Musical.”

For once Serena didn’t argue. Whatever it took to get Katie out of the way.

“Well,” said Yasha, suddenly businesslike. “I suppose we should get started right away. You’ll need what’s in here.”

He tapped the case and they went inside, upstairs to the room that would be Serena’s studio. Once the door was safely closed (and locked) behind them, Yasha clicked the case open. It contained an accordion. Yasha lifted the accordion out and played a few melancholy bars.

“Russian folk tune,” he said. “It’s the only thing I can play. I learned especially for this trip.”

“Why?”

“So that when a customs officer wants to know why I’m carrying an accordion to Italy, I can explain to him that it’s because I love to play.”

Next Yasha reached into his jacket pocket and brought out a knife. “But, of course, I don’t love my accordion anywhere near as much as I love my art.” He began to slit open the velvet lining of the music case. Serena held her breath for what seemed like an age as Yasha made
a neat incision all the way around. She had guessed what was beneath it, and the idea of a knife in such close proximity to a priceless work of art made her feel quite queasy. At last he finished. Almost gingerly he picked up the edges of the velvet and peeled it back. And there was the pearl in the oyster.