If I Didn't Know Better (The Callaways #9)(62)

"That's terrible."

"He's going to be all right. He can live a normal life; he's just not sure he can pass the extreme physical tests for his unit. Plus, his daughter needs a father. Her mother recently passed away."

"That sounds very sad and complicated. Are you sure you want to get in the middle of that?"

It was a good question. Unfortunately, it had come a little late. "I'm already involved, but Jeremy isn't the reason I'm reevaluating my career plans."

"Are you sure about that?"

"Yes. He's a great guy and I like him, but we aren't making serious plans. We both have things to figure out. It's fine. You're going to have to trust me to run my own life."

"I know. You're not the first of my six children to tell me that, but you are my baby, and I've always felt a little more protective of you. You gave us such a scare when you were little. I've always worried more about you."

"I'm the picture of good health now, and I'm actually having a great time here, so don't worry, okay?"

"All right. I'll let you go. Love you, Mia, take care of yourself."

"I will. Love you, too."

She ended the call and set down her phone. She didn't usually keep things from her family, and she felt a little guilty about not telling her mother about the vandalism in the studio, but there was nothing her mother could do about it. Plus, she would have wanted Mia to come home, and she wasn't ready to leave.

She could handle things here. Whoever had broken in had had plenty of time to take what they wanted. There was no reason to think they'd come back.

She needed to move on with her plans, clean up the house, set up the paintings for the exhibit, and even though she'd lost some pieces, she still had others she could use, including the ones upstairs.

As she thought about her aunt's paintings, she decided to take a closer look. She got up from the table and went upstairs. She pulled the paintings out of the closet one by one and stood them up around the bed so she could see what she was looking at. As she reached for the last painting, the ragged edge of the frame cut her finger. She winced and sucked the blood off her finger as she glanced down at the frame.

It was pulling apart at the corner. When she tried to pull the two edges into place, she just made things worse, and the corner of the painting came loose from the frame.

Carrying it over to the bed, she set it down so she could take a better look at it. This particular painting didn't really look like the others. It wasn't a scene or a portrait. It was just a mass of brushstrokes in bold colors. It didn't look like something her aunt would have painted.

As she tried to tuck the edge of the canvas under the frame, her eye caught on the frayed edges of something underneath.

Frowning, she pulled the corner of the canvas up, stunned to see what appeared to be another painting underneath.

Her pulse began to race and after a few seconds of trying to gently remove the broken frame, she just gave it a ruthless pull until it came away from the canvas. Then it was easy to pull up the top picture to reveal the hidden painting.

Her breath caught in her chest. This painting was not the work of an amateur. The exquisite brushstrokes, the attention to detail and light, the subject matter—Moulin Rouge and Paris nightlife in the nineteenth century—reminded her of the French painter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. He was one of the most talented painters in the Post-Impressionism period.

Her pulse jumped and blood raced through her veins as she studied the painting, turning it one way, then the other, knowing without a doubt that she was holding art in her hands that was very old and probably very valuable. She'd studied the works of the masters for years. If this painting wasn't by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, then it had to have been done by someone who had studied under him.

Or—it could be a forgery, a copy. She didn't remember this particular scene. She knew it was different than the painting entitled At the Moulin Rouge by Toulouse-Lautrec, but there were quite a few similarities.

She sat down on the bed, her legs feeling suddenly weak. She'd been hoping to find a treasure in her aunt's house, but what if the treasure had been stolen? If the painting had not been hidden away, her mind wouldn't go to that possibility. She would have thought that her aunt bought it somewhere or that it was a copy, not worth anything more than the pleasure it gave from studying it.

But someone had carefully put another really terrible piece of art in front of it. If the frame hadn't broken, she never would have discovered it.

And the painting had been hidden away in her aunt's closet, where she kept her personal paintings, which led her to believe that it hadn't been left behind by one of the visiting artists, although she couldn't be sure.

In truth, she didn't really know what her aunt had painted and what she'd gotten from others.

Her stomach began to churn. She felt a little sick. Her aunt couldn't have been an art thief, could she?

Her gaze drifted to the other paintings she'd pulled from the closet. What if there were other masterpieces hidden by what appeared to be amateur art?

Another thought occurred to her…

Had the paintings she'd found slashed in the yard been ripped apart to see if they held this treasure?

Her heart was beating so fast, she felt dizzy. She needed to talk to Jeremy. She needed him to calmly tell her that her imagination was running away from her. But he wasn't home. He had things to do this morning. Still, she had to reach out.