Chapter 9 - The first buyer
One prospective buyer was Helena Frost, a collector from Boston.
She had been offered my landscape painting for:
$780,000.
Its estimated value:
Around $900,000.
A quick private sale.
Helena’s adviser asked:
“Why is the owner selling?”
Cross & Vale replied:
“Post-marital redesign and consolidation.”
Plausible.
No one told Helena property was stolen because nothing had been removed yet.
She expressed interest.
No deposit.
No contract.
Then the silver service.
A dealer offered:
$120,000.
Amanda wrote:
Take anything above 105. Need liquidity immediately after Italy.
Liquidity.
Why?
That shifted motive.
I assumed greed.
But Amanda had money.
Her own career in luxury marketing.
Investments.
Not enough to explain risking prison for $2 million.
Then her bank records, obtained later through legal process.
Debt.
More than I knew.
A failed boutique-hotel investment.
Personal guarantees.
A private bridge loan.
Total obligations approaching:
$1.9 million.
Due dates clustered over the next three months.
She had hidden it from me.
May you like
The wedding was not creating theft opportunity from nothing.
It was creating the deadline.
