1 Chapter 1

A ball bounced off the brick walls in front of her. Prison guards and inmates walked by her cell. She continued to toss the ball and it kept coming back.  She couldn't believe he was gone. A guard had told her he was killed the day before. Shot in the street after an undercover op gone bad.

The news brought back many memories. The most memorable was how they met during a charity dinner in her home when she was seventeen.

"I didn't know you had a daughter," the now ghost-like voice said, and she was suddenly transported ten years into the past.

Men and women walked around a circular room, admiring their host's art collection, talking indistinctly. Taking sips from their champaign glasses.

Seventeen-year-old Lexus walked down the stairs. She wore a gold dress with diamonds sewn into it. Two men in suits followed her closely. She didn't speak to anyone, but went straight to a specific wall.

"Her name is Lexus," she heard her father say. Hearing her name dropped in front of guests was unusual since she was a well kept secret. Only her father's employees knew about her.

"Like the car?" the ghost said. Lexus never turned her eyes away from the wall she was staring at.

"As you can see from my daughter's dress, Mister Halden, I have expensive taste. And I extend that taste to the people in my life. My daughter gets nothing but the best, from her name, to what she wears," her father answered.

"She's beautiful," Halden said.

"Yes. Much like her mother," her father replied.

Lexus listened to the footsteps of each guest as Halden broke away from her father. She felt like tearing up. It wasn't often he spoke of her mother. She knew very little about the woman.

Halden took his time in approaching Lexus, pretending to look at all the paintings on display. The painting he stopped at had striking similarities to Lexus. But a quick glance told him it wasn't Lexus in the painting. She was there looking at it. Her hair fashioned just like the figure in the painting. The sound of Halden's footsteps reached her ear.

"If you're trying to get a job here, you're doing it wrong," she said.

"And what am I doing wrong?" Halden asked her.

"Oh, where to start. Flirting with the art curator, talking to a perspective employer's underaged daughter, changing the seating arrangement..." she answered, catching him off guard. But he recovered quickly.

"I didn't-"

"I heard him tell you about me... the way you get to Vincent Adler is to tell him who the woman is in this painting. Sure, he'll hire you if he likes you. But there's a secret to this painting. You figure out that secret, and the job is yours without even having to interview."

"I take it you know the secret."

She shook her head. "Only part of it. The woman in the painting is my mother. The rest of the secret is kept so quiet that only one person knows the answer. And you were just talking to him."

Halden turned his eyes upon the painting Lexus was talking about. The woman on the wall looked familiar to him. He hid his recognition which wasn't missed by Lexus.

"You look just like her," Halden said.

"So I've heard," Lexus replied. "She died when I was one. At least, that's what I was told... If you wish to continue speaking with me, you'll have to do so through my father. I'm not actually allowed to speak with anyone he hasn't approved."

"Oh, but he has approved me," he lied.

But she saw right through it. "Nice try, but everyone he's approved to speak with me has the same look after their interview." She directed his eyes to the body guards behind her. They looked different from the other guests. "And if you had asked to date me..." She turned his attention to a gentleman being escorted out of the building... "That would happen and you'd lose your job..."

Her father noticed them talking.

"Then I guess it's a good thing I'm not here for that," Halden said sounding relieved.

"You know, I should congratulate you. You've had more time with me than anyone. My father usually keeps a better eye on me. May I ask why you are here, Mister Halden?"

"You can call me Nick... and you've done a lot of talking for somebody who isn't allowed to speak with anyone."

"I've broken every rule my father ever made concerning me, Nick. And he knows it.  Which is why those two follow me everywhere I go," she referred to the bodyguards again.

"How many have you broken in a day?"

She laughed. "That's funny. How many rules I broke in a day? Try how many I've broken in the last minute." This intrigued Nick.

"What'd you do?"

"Being down here is at the very top of the list. Then there's talking to someone my father hasn't approved. Looking at this painting is as close to the top as I've gotten in a long time. All it does for me is create questions I'll never know the answers to. That's three right there. I'll save the rest for if you get the job. We'd be allowed to talk without my security detail."

His curiosity of Lexus gave him almost as much incentive to pass the interview as the possibility of seeing Adler's curator and assistant again.

The sound of a throat clearing from across the room made Lexus stop talking.

"I should go. Thank you, for not being afraid to speak with me. I don't get that luxury very often," she said, shaking Nick's hand. She pat his arm, and walked toward the stairs.

Nick looked down at his hand. There was a note left behind. Nothing was on the note but a QR code for him to decipher. He palmed the note, put his hands in his pockets, and watched as Lexus left his view.

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"You met his daughter?!" a short, balding man exclaimed. "This is great! I didn't even know he had a daughter!"

"Yeah, Moz. She passed me a note, but I don't understand it. We've never used or seen codes like this," Neal said. "Think your code breaker can crack it?"

"He can try, but I doubt he's seen one like this before," Mozzie said. "We'll make a copy so we can try and crack it ourselves."

"She said there was a secret to a painting. Other than Lexus looking exactly like the woman in it, I didn't see anything special. She said that if I can figure out the painting's secret, I'm guaranteed the job without an interview."

"I'll try to figure out the secret while you prepare for your interview when he calls. Before I go, tell me what she told you about the painting."

"It's her mother... Got a bad feeling I know what the secret is, Mozz. And his daughter wants to know what it is, too."

"She doesn't know?" Mozzie asked.

"She doesn't know. And Adler doesn't want her to."

"Which means she can't be present when you meet with him, or he'll reschedule," Mozzie finished.

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Lexus sat on the couch in her father's office. She pretended to ignore the lecture he was giving her while he paced the floor.

"You chose a time when I couldn't do anything about your defiance, Lexus. You know you're not allowed to speak with anyone who doesn't work for me, or be in the gallery. I gave you strict instructions to stay in your room... What did you tell him?"

"Nothing."

"What did you tell him about the painting?"

"He knows what I know, which might as well be nothing as if you don't already know. You did have microphones sewn into every article of clothing I have," she spat. Lexus stood up from the couch and crossed her arms. She looked down at the floor, pretending to be ashamed of her actions. "Everyone who sees it says I look just like her. Is she really my mother?"

Instead of answering her, Adler told the bodyguards to take her away.

From her bedroom window, Lexus watched as Nick entered the house. This meeting would determine her future.