Chapter 3
The museum closed the family galleries the next morning.
Luciano ordered an inventory review before anything else could be moved.
Marcus called it an overreaction.
Bernadette called it humiliation.
The museum staff called it overdue.
Claire produced a list of forty-three items with questionable ownership records.
Some belonged to Luciano.
Others came from homes belonging to older Venturi relatives.
A few had been donated legitimately.
Several had no paperwork at all.
Then Claire showed him something more serious.
Three valuable railway artifacts listed in the museum database were not physically present.
A brass conductor’s chronometer.
A Pennsylvania Railroad presentation lantern.
A nineteenth-century route ledger.
All three had been photographed during earlier exhibitions.
Now their storage boxes contained reproductions.
Luciano looked at Claire.
“How long?”
“I know the lantern was real fourteen months ago.”
“Who had storage access?”
Claire pulled the log.
Marcus.
Bernadette.
Two conservators.
The museum director.
Luciano himself.
Marcus laughed when Luciano confronted him.
“So now I’m stealing antiques?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Bernadette stood beside her husband.
“If you accuse him publicly, Felix will hear about it at school.”
Luciano’s expression hardened.
“You slapped Theo in front of eighty relatives.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
Bernadette opened her mouth.
Nothing came.
The foundation’s attorney advised Luciano not to touch the collection until outside specialists completed an inventory.
That meant cancelling two holiday events and temporarily closing portions of the museum.
The lost revenue would be significant.
So would the embarrassment.
Luciano approved it anyway.
Marcus followed him into the corridor.
“You really want auditors crawling through family property?”
“It’s museum property.”
Marcus smiled coldly.
“You sound like a lawyer now.”
“I sound like someone who wants to know where three artifacts went.”
Marcus stepped closer.
“And if you find out?”
Luciano looked at him.
“That depends on what I find.”
Marcus’s confidence slipped for the first time.
Only slightly.
But Luciano saw it.
That evening Luciano received a call from the foundation’s longtime accountant.
“There’s something you should see before the auditors do.”
“What?”
“A series of reimbursements Marcus submitted over the last two years.”
“How much?”
“That isn’t the strange part.”
May you like
The accountant paused.
“Some of them are tied to objects that are now missing.”
