Page 4 of Mimosa

Their relationship was much better than it had been. Hippy hadn’t trusted Cosmo at all when he first came to the pub and brought with him a fed for a boyfriend. Since then, however, they were getting very close and could be found together most days. Hippy was even trying to get Cosmo into the blues scene, with which he surrounded himself.

“Excuse me,” Mims said to Hippy. “I have a serious boyfriend.”

Everyone at the table rolled their eyes.

“Hey!”

“Sure, you do, babe,” Haze said, coming to his defense. “Even if he does keep putting you off.”

Mims stuck his tongue out at his friend before Murphy cleared his throat to regain their attention.

“Anyway, boyfriends or none, this is under wraps like Taran. He’s not coming yet, he still has to wriggle himself into position to be the member of the BBC that comes here.”

“Member of the BBC?” Haze asked. “What the hell, Murphy?”

“Yeah, Paps,” Mims said. He was the only one that called him Paps, and Murphy pretended to hate it, but Mims knew he liked it just fine.

Taran stood to speak to them. “It’s true, he’s inside the BBC. I told you all that we had someone inside, and we actually have two. They were placed undercover into the BBC by Internal Affairs Division of Denver PD. When our two agencies collided, we decided to try to work together. No one is truly thrilled about that prospect, but already we’ve shared information that is valuable.”

“But…how can you be sure he’s actually not really in the BBC?” The dark and delicious Goldie asked. His big arms showed with the muscle shirt he wore and Abs nodded in his agreement with Goldie.

“Yeah, Taran? Maybe he’s trying to see what the feds know, and then he’s going back and telling the others.”

“Believe me, the information he’s given is truly worth the risk.”

“Maybe for you,” Tally said. “What about the boys here?”

Taran eased, “I knew you’d worry. I’ll bring him as soon as it’s safe to meet you all.”

“Not here,” Murphy said. “We’ll meet somewhere else.”

“Fine. I can actually arrange that sooner. How about we get on to other business?”

Cosmo reacted before the others could pounce on Taran for that question. “I think that would be great. We do have other business, after all, like the Maxfield Parrish painting. Taran has an idea of where it ended up.”

Murphy sat and gestured to Taran. “Let us in on it.”

“Okay, well, the previous owner didn’t want the painting back, since he’d had to repair it. He’s a snob that way, but he did sell it in perfect shape, which with the small repair, it is.

“From what we’ve been able to gather, it was a deal done through the mail. There is a small publication that art enthusiasts subscribe that sellers can post their wares. Art thieves,” he said, as he smiled to Mims, “have internet skills, so a lot of sellers post in the magazine and then use landlines and snail mail to do their deals.”

“Well, that’s not really fair,” Mims whined.

“Not fair to the thieves, no. In transit is when a lot of art pieces are stolen. It’s so much easier than to break into the homes and galleries that have great security.”

“So, if he simply posted the painting for sale, how do you know who bought it?” Cosmo asked.

“We have the phone records,” Taran said simply. “All of the landline calls from the time the publication became available to subscribers and in galleries and sales channels. There are surprisingly few calls on his landline. Five. We’ve done reversenumber searches and found all the names. The rest, I’ll leave to you, the experts.”

“Give me the list, I’ll start now,” Mims offered.

Taran’s eyes widened. “I left it in the car.”

“I’ll get it,” Cosmo offered then left the room.

“Sorry, everyone. I was…”

“Excited to come and see your boo,” Goldie told him, laughing.

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