Carla’s Prince

“A tea set that valuable…is it vintage?” she asked and Cristoff raised an eyebrow over the other.

“Yes, actually. From early 19th century China. One of the last things to come from the Qing Dynasty.”

Carla forced out a laugh.

“Then you are gravely mistaken, sir. There is no way a tea set from the last imperial Chinese dynasty would be worth five grand. Fifty grand or more but definitely not five,” she said as she slowly walked towards them.

“Let me get this straight, we are talking about a tea set, right? Like, a kettle that pours tea into cups?” Thomas interjected still looking and sounding a little confused.

“Forgive him. He doesn’t really know or understand much about how the world works,” Carla said, smiling.

“Yeah, I got that much.” Cristoff smiled.

“Good, you two have met and you clearly know more about this kettle and cups than I do,” Thomas said

She was smiling as she made her way to where they were. She took a seat and reached for her notepad and pen in her purse.

“So, apart from a priceless tea set, what else went missing?” she asked.

Cristoff took a long deep breath and shook his head.

“There’s the tea set and a few months ago I started noticing I had less cash in my money clip than I thought. At first, I thought it was just a mistake. Maybe I didn’t pay attention on how much I put in there in the first place, but when I mysteriously lost two watches earlier this month, I just knew that something was off.”

“Did you try retracing your steps maybe?” Carla asked.

Cristoff nodded.

“Actually, that’s how I know that I was robbed. Because I have been in town for the last few weeks. The only other place I went to was just one weekend and I am sure I didn’t lose anything there.”

Carla raised an eyebrow over the other.

“How can you be so sure?” she asked.

“Yeah, the people we least suspect are usually the ones who fail us the most,” Thomas said and Cristoff looked at him shaking his head.

“I could not be more confident in myself when I say that I know these people better than you could ever imagine.”

Carla shrugged and nodded.

“All right. What else should I note down?” she asked.

“Well, I already reported this to the police but I had a party at my place some time ago and one of my guests, an art dealer, pointed out that a piece she had brokered looked like a cheap imitation and I didn’t think anything about it at the time but when I had the piece appraised, I found out she was right.”

“Someone switched out a painting?” Thomas asked. “That takes a lot of guts. Maybe someone who was extremely comfortable being at your place,” he added.

“I guess the first order of business is to go through your security cameras, check as far back as they go…” Carla started but her voice trailed off when she saw Cristoff shaking his head.

“I have perimeter cameras but nothing in the house,” he said.

“You have a piece of Chinese history in your house and you chose to live without a security system?” Carla asked, surprised.

“It’s a privacy issue and until recently, I had no issues not having cameras inside the house,” Cristoff said.

Carla took a long deep breath. This was not going to be an easy case. All she could do was hope that someone had been sloppy enough to leave a trail but without anything to go by, she was just not sure how this was going to be. She might have been happy that she was not going to be working on yet another ridiculous marriage on the rocks story but now that she was handling some unknown issue with no clear ending in sight, she was not so sure if this was better than another cheating spouse.

“Miss Gibson?” Cristoff said making Carla snap back to reality. She had been staring down at her notepad scribbling a bunch of nothing all that time.

“I’m sorry. Did you say something?” she asked.

“I was asking if it would be possible to know what your plan was?” Cristoff asked.

She rubbed her temple and nodded.

“Sure. I will need some time to get everything all laid out but right now the number one thing is to make sure you get cameras inside your house. Discreetly of course in case the perpetrator thinks of doing this again.”

“Yeah, maybe you could catch the wolf in the hen house red handed,” Thomas said and Cristoff nodded.

“As long as I catch the damn wolf before he takes all my hens,” Cristoff added.