Mismatch - By Nana Malone Page 0,3
were forgeries.”
“That's why you brought me in.” They'd worked together on enough cases in the past to understand how the other operated. Vince was a classic white hat kind of guy. Good and evil, black and white, home team versus visitors. He never wavered. Which is why Eli liked working with him. It made things far less complicated.
“I wish I had more to go on. This guy's got skills not to mention he's got the funds behind him to get what he needs to produce these fakes. He can age his canvases and use the right paints. Any expert authenticator could tell you that much.” Vince's dark brows drew down over his forehead. “But you, you’re able to tell by brush stoke technique and usually just by looking. It’s spooky.”
Eli cracked his neck as he massaged his nape. He'd been crammed inside this car for most of the day doing surveillance. He also didn’t want to clue Vince in to the nature of his forgery knowledge. He was in no kind of mood for show and tell. “Yeah, random lucky knowledge. You see enough forgeries, and you start to piece it together.” Never mind that he’d once thought himself an artist. But that was a long time ago. He’d made a choice and left that behind.
“Strange being you, isn't it? Your whole life is about spotting fakes.”
“Well, when you put it like that, I sound nice and cynical.”
Vince's dark brows shot up. “Aren’t you?”
Eli chose not to answer. He checked his watch and handed Vince the file back. If he didn’t hurry, he'd miss his brother’s show. Samson might not mind, but Eli would. His twin brother, in a club, with alcohol and all kinds of illicit drugs—now that was a recipe for disaster. Not that Eli could stop Samson from using if he chose to, but Eli felt like if he could act as a deterrent and buffer the cravings he could help keep Sam on the path to recovery. Plus he’d made a promise to Samson to help get his career back on track, and there was no way he was letting his brother down. He owed Sam too much. He’d invited several managers and agents to the show tonight, so hopefully one of them bit.
“I’ll check you later, Vince, I have a thing. I'll give you a call after I take another look at the original fakes we found this weekend. Maybe I missed something.” The fuck he did. He was meticulous about finding fakes, but it never hurt to look with fresh eyes.
“Where you off to?”
And there it was—the bulldog thing that took Vince from a good agent to a great agent. He had a way of sniffing out evasion.
“I told you, I have a thing.” Eli started the engine. “Besides, I don’t really want to be here when Ferrari guy realizes the Degas is gone. I don’t think he made me, but you never know.”
Vince grinned at him. “And I asked where you’re off to? How come you never invite me along to your secret parties? You off to meet a girl?”
Ahh, if Vince Del Monaco had an Achilles heel it was women. He loved women. Any kind of woman. Big, thin, beautiful, homely—it didn’t matter. As long as Eli had known Vince, he'd always had some woman in his life. He seemed to have no discernable type, except that they all had sizable racks.
“I play a good wingman.”
Eli rolled his eyes. “My brother has a thing. I promised I'd be there.”
Deep lines etched on Vince’s dark brow. “Your brother? I didn’t know you had a brother.”
Eli almost chuckled. What Vince meant was that the file the Feds kept on him didn't show he had a brother. And that's the way Eli liked it. No need to draw any kind of attention to his past, or worse yet, Samson's. He’d taken many steps to keep their past private. The least of all being changing Samson’s name. In Eli’s line of work it would be career suicide to have an ex-forger for a brother. “Guess it never came up.”
And he preferred it that way. After their parents’ divorce, his father had taken Samson and his mother had taken Eli. His mother had changed their last name to her maiden name, Marks, and had tried to get by with seeing Samson every other weekend. Not getting custody of the both of them had killed her, and it had killed Samson, too. Even though Eli tried to act