“Please tell. I could use a laugh.”
“If you’d died today, every painting here probably would have gone way up in value.”
I drained my glass in one big gulp. “The sad thing is you’re probably right. Only I wouldn’t have been here to enjoy spending money frivolously for the first time in my life.”
She grabbed me another full glass. “Then I think we should toast to a long life, to huge success, big bucks and to the guardian angel who kept you from dying before you’ve had the chance to really live.”
I looked at her. “Is that a crack at how boring my life is?”
She gave me innocent eyes. “I have no idea what you mean. Me, making a crack about your wildly exciting and romance-filled life?”
“I’m focused on my career right now. I’ll find a man when the time is right.”
“Sure you will.” She nodded as if to humour me. “OK, so let’s drink to the life of an eccentric twenty-something artist who hasn’t dated anybody in as long as I’ve ever known her. One who creates gorgeous paintings of romance and love and desperate, aching need even though she chooses not to partake in such unsavoury endeavours herself. Until the time is right, of course.”
“‘Eccentric’,” I repeated. “Sounds way better than pathetic, doesn’t it? I’ll definitely drink to being eccentric.”
“You would.” Anna rolled her eyes and laughed. “Cheers, Sophie.”
Anna left the gallery early, but I stayed till the bitter end. Three paintings sold, although they were some of the cheaper ones. Still, a minor victory and one that would pay the majority of my rent for the next three months.
I’d had too much wine and tottered unsteadily on my heels as I made my way to the street to hail a cab. That was when somebody grabbed me from behind.
A scream tore from my throat but was muffled by a foul-smelling cloth clamped down over my mouth. My attacker held me thereprone until my head went cloudy from whatever chemical was on the cloth and I fell head first into darkness.
“Wake up.”
It was a command not a request. And when I ignored it since I was only semi-conscious, I felt the stinging pain as a slap resounded across my face. My eyes shot open and I gasped for breath.
I found myself seated in a hard chair and my hands bound behind me. The room was dark but there was a light shining in my face – a flashlight, I thought.
“What’s going on?” My mouth felt dry and the words rasped out.
“That’s a very good question,” a man said. I couldn’t see him clearly apart from a shadowy outline. “And something we’re trying to figure out as well.”
I pulled against my restraints but the rope bit into my wrists. “Who are you?”
“We’re the ones asking the questions.”
Panic gripped my chest. I’d been kidnapped. It was the sort of thing that happened all the time, but I never thought it would happen to me. Which was probably why I’d felt confident leaving the gallery after midnight by myself – something I’d done dozens of times before.
“Sophie Shaw,” he said. “Born December 17, 1983. Raised in Albany and moved to Manhattan to attend the New York Academy of Art. Never married, no dependants. Both parents deceased. Is that right?”
My mouth moved but no sound came out. How did they know me? What did they want?
He smacked me again and my head rang from the pain.
“Is that right?” he asked again.
“Y-yes, that’s right.”
“Dammit, Harris,” another voice said sharply. “There’s no fucking need to abuse her, is there?”
“Just let me do my job.” I heard paper shifting together. “Date of death is listed as September 15, 2009.”
I stopped breathing for a moment. That was today’s date.
“What?” I managed. “Please, I don’t know what you’re looking for, I just want to go home.”
