The Accusation Beneath the Red Glass

Chapter 06 - The Price of a Reputation

Detective Lena Ortiz arrived before the guests were allowed to leave.

She had the quiet manner of someone who did not need to raise her voice to control a room. After viewing Noah’s video and inspecting the conservation room, she separated Victoria, Marcus and the security staff for interviews.

Eleanor expected to be treated as a suspect. Instead, Ortiz asked her to describe the original panel from memory.

Eleanor drew it on the back of a catering invoice.

Every lead line curved with confidence. She marked the air bubble, the copper swallow and a pale crescent near the base that no published photograph showed. Samuel watched the sketch take shape and finally understood the depth of what Henry Crowell had stolen.

Victoria’s interview lasted nine minutes.

She emerged furious.

To the remaining board members, she claimed the museum was being sabotaged by old resentments. She reminded them of the grants she had secured, the donors she had courted and the jobs that depended on her leadership. Then she made the threat beneath the argument clear: if her name fell, the institution might fall with it.

Daniel did not answer immediately. Several board members looked frightened.

Reputation had always been Victoria’s sharpest tool. She knew respectable people often preferred a polished lie to an ugly truth.

Then Samuel asked a question.

“How much was the Scarlet Wing insured for?”

Victoria said the figure was confidential.

Daniel already knew it. “Two point eight million dollars.”

Ortiz returned in time to hear him.

The insurance policy had been increased six weeks earlier, shortly after Victoria announced the fragment’s miraculous recovery from a private European collection. The seller’s identity had never been disclosed. The acquisition had been paid through a foundation account controlled by Victoria and Marcus.

If the fake had been destroyed during the gala, the museum could have claimed the insurance money while the real fragment disappeared into a private collection.

Eleanor looked at the false panel and understood why Victoria had held it so close to her face.

The accusation had not been improvised.

Victoria had needed someone with access, little social power and a reason to handle glass. Eleanor was meant to become the explanation for a broken fake.