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Thank you all for returning for another chapter of my story! I have so appreciated all of the love and support in the form of favorites, follows, reviews, and even a couple of private messages that I've gotten. Please, keep it coming!

Also, I've had a couple of people ask me how far along I am in catching up on the show… I'm all caught up! Someone else had a suggestion that I wanted some opinions on: Adrian006 said that since I'm planning to update once a week, anyway, that I pick a number and if I get that many reviews before the week is up, I post an extra chapter. I kind of like the idea, but I wanted to see what you guys thought. The number would definitely go up with each chapter, but hopefully I'll get more followers and reviewers with each chapter, too. Let me know what you think, either by PM or review!

As a reminder (though I'm sure you don't need reminding): This story only uses the characters and the premise of Hawaii Five-O. I have taken many liberties, and so some things that you read may be at odds with what you've seen on the show. I apologize, but it was the only way that I could get my story to work out in my head.

Happy reading!

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Chapter Three: Lead Us to a Solution

Steve

We had brought the husband in for questioning, but it had been a bust. After we had left the interrogation room, Danny and I had both agreed that he was telling the truth – he hadn't arranged to have his family murdered, or even to have himself robbed. He hadn't even known that the Hollis Clayton original had been sold; he swore up and down that it had been hanging in his gallery even up until the night before the robbery. And, Chin had researched his financials and found nothing out of the ordinary.

"So, either it was a forgery, or the contact that you spoke with was misinformed," I told Allie the next morning, careful to keep any smugness out of my voice and expression.

She didn't seem bothered by it, but perhaps she was simply gifted at concealing her emotions. It certainly would have paid off in her former jobs. "It's possible, but I doubt it."

"Yeah?" I challenged. "And why's that?"

"Because the source that I contacted is in Russia right now. He spoke with the buyer and saw the piece himself. He's… uniquely talented at recognizing forgeries, and he swore to me that it wasn't a forgery."

"So, you think our guy's was a forgery?" Danny asked her.

"That would be my guess." She nodded and sighed, spreading her hands on the table. "I don't know of any good art forgers on the island. Haven't been here long enough. But I could reach out to some contacts?" She looked at me, waiting for an order. For some reason, that ticked me off even more, even though it was the most respectful thing for her to do.

"Do it," I told her with a nod. At least it would get her out of the room – give me a chance to cool down.

She nodded and moved for her office, closing the door behind her. Within seconds, she was on her cell phone.

"Okay, so we wait for that?" Chin said slowly, and the look on his face told me that I hadn't done a good enough job of concealing my emotions. "Or is there something we can work on in the meantime?"

"We don't have any other leads," I sighed and ran a hand over my hair. "Why don't we all run out to the shrimp truck for lunch and we can bring Allie some back. Hopefully by then, she'll have a name for us."

The rest of the team agreed and we left the office. Of course, as soon as we were in the car, Danny had to bring it up.

"Does it really irk you this much that Allie has contacts that you don't have?"

I rolled my eyes. "Come on. What are you talking about?"

He laughed sarcastically. "What am I talking about? I'm talking about that hostile look that you gave our newest team member when she shot down your idea and then suggested that she get in touch with someone that could give us a lead."

"Of course I want a lead. If she can give us that, then great."

"You just wish it wasn't coming from her." As usual, he was pretty spot-on. "How is she ever supposed to prove herself capable if you just get irritated every time that she tries?"

"I'm not having this conversation."

"Right, because that's not proving my point at all." He sighed. "Look, all I'm saying is that it's not easy to be the new cop. Especially on such an elite task force. And it's even harder when your boss doesn't like you."

"I never said I didn't like her!" I sounded defensive, even to me.

"What's that thing that people say?" His voice dripped with sarcasm. "Actions speak louder than words? You've been giving her the stink eye every single time that she talks. Maybe act a little more supportive, you know?"

I parked in the lot next to the shrimp truck and raised my hands in surrender. "Okay, fine. Fine. I will try to be more supportive. You happy?"

His smug smile was back in a millisecond. "I'll be happier when she solves the case all by herself and shows you up."

"Out of the car," I growled, and he laughed as he followed me to the truck.

Back at the office, Allie was typing on the big screen and pulled up the displays as soon as she saw us. "Hey, you're just in time. I may have a lead."

Danny shot me a grin, but I purposefully ignored him. "What do you have?"

She pointed to the screen, where a picture was pulled up. "This is Jason Stark. He's a well-known art forger. And, according to my sources, he's in Hawaii."

"If he's so well-known as a forger, then how is he not in jail?"

"Because he's very good," she answered me, and the hint of a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "And he's only well-known among like-minded people. Anyway, I set up a meet with him in an hour."

"What?" I asked her, and I didn't even bother trying to hide my annoyance. "You didn't consult with me first?"

She didn't back down, which I both hated and respected. "No. I don't have your number and you were out to lunch. My contact offered to set up a meet and I had to decide then. I made a call."

"So, we set her up with a wire and see what this guy knows, right?" Danny asked.

It was the most logical call. I just wished that it hadn't been necessary. "Yes. We'll set you up with a wire. And we'll be waiting nearby, just in case."

She laughed as she shrugged. "If that's what you want to do, but don't feel like you need to completely gear up. Stark is a forger and totally not dangerous."

"Better to be safe," I said. "Kono, set her up with a wire. And make sure we all have her number and she has ours."

I wasn't going to be kept out of the loop again.

Allie

"Jason." I smiled at the young man sitting at the table on the patio. The restaurant wasn't crowded, as the lunch rush had likely ended about half an hour ago. He had picked the patio at Uncle Edward's request.

"You must be-"

I cut him off before he could finish. "Allie Rhodes."

His hazel eyes widened in understanding and he nodded as he shook my hand. "It's nice to meet you. Edward said that you had some questions."

"A few." I sat down across from him and took it all in, from his unruly, curly black hair to his Hawaiian flowered shirt. He looked like a tourist. "First time to Hawaii?"

He nodded. "I've been here for about a month, but yes. It's my first time here. I kind of like it."

The waitress came just then to take our order and I got myself a can of sparkling water and an order of grilled chicken. Jason would be paying and I hadn't had lunch, so it seemed fair.

"Edward told me that you had decided to become a cop." Jason smiled at me, secrets dancing in his eyes. Much like I'm sure they were in mine. "I was surprised."

He would be, given my background. "Well, I'm just one of the good guys." A wink and a nod let him know that yes, I was wearing a wire but no, I didn't want him to get arrested.

"Good to know. So, what can I do for you?"

"Do you know a man named Dan Coulter?"

The waitress returned with our drinks and we thanked her. He made sure she was gone before he spoke again. "The name sounds familiar. Who is he?"

"A private art collector."

"Ah." I saw the moment that realization sparked in his eyes. "I have heard the name before." Leaning closer, he lowered his voice to a whisper. "Is all of this on the DL?"

I had gotten permission from Steve to grant him full immunity, provided that he wasn't responsible for the robbery or murder, so I nodded. "Full immunity."

"Wow." He laughed in surprise. "Not often that you get that offer from the law."

"No," I agreed with him. "It's not. So, how do you know Dan Coulter?"

Resting his arms on the table, he began his tale in a low voice. "A month and a half ago, I got a call. A friend of a friend of a friend kind of thing. A guy I know knew of a guy that needed a forger. Specifically, a forger specializing in paintings. As you obviously know already, that's my specialty."

"I've heard rumors." I did my best to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but his smile told me that he caught it.

"Anyway, at first, I didn't want to take the job. For one thing, it required me to travel to Hawaii, and I typically like for people to come to me."

"Did you ask why they couldn't come to you?"

"Of course I did. The guy that wanted the job done said that the painting couldn't be moved. He wouldn't go into any further detail, so I just figured that he was nervous about traveling with it by air. Understandable, really. You don't want to taint an original with non-private air travel, and that can get expensive."

"Any other reason that you didn't want the job?" I asked and reached for my water.

He shrugged. "I just didn't really need it. I'd just pulled a job about a month before that had set me up pretty well for the rest of the year."

That was understandable. A lot of forgers did that because they were afraid that they would get burnt out from all of the work and start making mistakes. And with the amount that a good forger could get paid per job, they really only needed to work a few per year.

"So, what made you decide to take the job?" I asked him, just as the waitress returned with our meals. Once we had assured her that we had everything we needed, she left.

"He offered me five hundred thousand dollars."

I choked on the piece of chicken I'd been swallowing. Once I could finally breathe again, I asked, "What?"

"I know," he assured me. "I couldn't really believe it, either. But he wired the first half of it to me beforehand and it cleared no problem. Guy even bought my first class plane ticket to Hawaii and set me up in a nice suite at the Hilton. I don't know his name or anything, though. He was careful to never let me learn too much and I didn't ask questions. I only heard the name Dan Coulter in passing."

"Hard to turn down," I said. "Okay, so you decided to take the job. What happened then?"

"I packed and came out to Hawaii. He said that I needed to get started right away. I got all set up in my hotel room, supplies were brought to me, and then the painting came in a few days later."

"What painting?" I was practically holding my breath, waiting for the answer.

"Yeah, get this." He leaned closer, even though there was no one nearby. "It was a Hollis Clayton original from 1943."

Bingo. "Hollis Clayton. He was a native of Hawaii, wasn't he?" I knew the answer, but it never hurt to let the informant feel like he was more knowledgeable than you.

"Yeah. Came from a poor family here on the island. His paintings began to sell pretty well in the late thirties and early forties, and after Pearl Harbor, he was one of the most sought-after artists in the world for a short period of time. But, he typically only produced three to four paintings a year up until his death in '52."

"So, an original from him is worth…"

Jason swallowed a bite of his fish. "Easily worth millions of dollars. Especially because his earliest paintings were stolen by the Japanese and burned. I think that's why he became so popular in the first place. The earliest of his paintings that are still intact are-"

I finished for him as the wheels began to turn in my head. "Let me guess. The ones from 1943."

He nodded. "The war didn't end until '45, but Clayton got smart and began to hide his works in '43, just in case the Japanese ever raided again."

"So those first three paintings from his earliest years would be worth much more."

"Like I said, millions of dollars. Easily twenty to thirty million."

I raised an eyebrow at him. "For just that one painting?"

"Hey, I don't make the price tags. But, yeah."

We were getting off track, so I made a mental note to come back to that later. "Okay, so you forged the painting. How long did that take?"

"Well, I'm sure that you're somewhat aware of all of the things that one has to do in order to forge a painting that's over seventy years old."

"You have to age it, for one," I answered, absentmindedly pushing the broccoli around on my plate. "That takes time."

"And equipment."

"You baked it."

He nodded. "Not in anyone's house, though. I asked for a very specific type of oven and he provided it in a warehouse on Sand Island. I don't think it's still there, though."

"Do you remember the type of oven?"

He scoffed at me, offended. "Of course I do."

I smiled at him. "I didn't mean any offense."

"I know you didn't. It was a Whirlpool Smooth Surface Freestanding 5-Element 5.4 cubic feet Self-Cleaning Electric Range. EasyCare Stainless Steel, if that matters."

I nodded and hoped that the team had gotten all of that. They could use it to look up sales of that particular oven. Maybe they'd get lucky and the guy had paid for it with a credit card. "How long did the whole process take?"

"Maybe about a week and a half. But…" He sighed, his face full of disappointment. "There was one color that I couldn't get quite right. In the bottom left corner. Paints were different back then and no matter how much I mixed, it never looked quite right to me. But the guy that hired me said that it didn't matter. He said no one would be able to tell the difference."

Because Dan Coulter collected art as a hobby. It wasn't his whole life. Whoever had switched out the paintings knew that and had used it to his advantage. No telling how much he had sold the painting for, and Dan Coulter was none the wiser.

But why the robbery?

"Did he say anything else about his plans?" I asked him. "What he was going to do with the painting? Who he was selling it to? Anything?"

"No, and I didn't ask. I usually don't."

"I understand," I sighed, and popped the last of my chicken into my mouth. And I did understand; it just would have been a lot more helpful it he had. "I guess that's it… unless you can draw me a sketch of this guy?"

He laughed outright. "I'm an art forger, sweetheart. I can sketch anyone you want. But let me get back to my hotel room, okay? I want to do it right."

Of course he would. I smiled at him. "No problem. Let me write down my e-mail for you and you can send it in to me."

He handed over a small notebook and a pen, and I carefully wrote out my name, phone number, and e-mail address. When he took it back, he said, "I'll head back to the hotel right away and draw you up a sketch. You're lucky you caught me today, you know. I'm headed away from the island tomorrow morning."

"I'm glad that luck was on my side, then." I finished my sparkling water and stood. "You've got lunch, right? I mean, you did just get paid five hundred thousand dollars."

With a laugh, he nodded and waved me away. "Go, go. I'll get this. And good luck with your investigation."

"Safe flight," I returned and headed away. The team was probably already headed back to headquarters, and I had agreed to meet them there once I was done talking to Jason. It was a short drive, and we were all standing together in the main area within ten minutes.

"Chin and Kono, you two begin working on finding all sales of that particular oven on the island. Danny, you and I are going to begin going over that inventory list that the insurance company sent over. I want to compare it to the one that Dan Coulter gave us, because something isn't adding up."

Exactly what I was thinking, I thought, and called out to Steve as he began to head to his office. "Hey, boss. What do you want me to do?" Surely, I could be most helpful working with him and Danny.

"You're waiting for an e-mail from Jason," he told me, and then went into his office with Danny close behind.

"Oh, of course," I muttered angrily as I ambled into my own office. "I'll just sit here and make myself useful by waiting for a freaking e-mail."

But that's not all I did. I also did some research on Hollis Clayton, and found that everything Jason had told me had been true. He'd only sold his paintings locally, and the Japanese had stolen a lot of art when small teams came in to raid as Pearl Harbor was bombed. That made the '43 paintings worth a lot of money.

Which meant that something was off about the insurance policy. The policy stated that his entire collection was worth thirty million, but thirty million could have easily been the price of that one painting. With all of the other art that he also owned, the price should have been more like forty or fifty million.

Something was off, and I started by looking into the insurance agent that handled Dan Coulter's account.

His name was Antoine Staggler, and he didn't have a criminal record, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. He did have a degree in art history, though, which was why the insurance company had put him in charge of all art-related policies. He ran the department, which meant that there was no one looking over his shoulder to make sure that he priced things correctly. It wasn't that hard to forge the report stating how much each art piece was worth. No one would question him.

When my phone pinged with an e-mail, I opened it up immediately.

Hope this sketch helped. Enjoyed our lunch today. Aloha.

-J

I clicked on the file attached to the e-mail, and my heart was pounding as it loaded. When it finished, my breath caught in my throat. It was almost an exact replica of the photo of Antoine on the insurance company's website.

So, it really had been a case of insurance fraud, just not the typical kind.

I ran out of my office and into Steve's, practically shoving the phone into his face in my excitement. "It was insurance fraud, but not on Dan Coulter's end. This is the sketch that Jason Stark just sent over."

"That's Dan's insurance agent," Steve said, eyes widening in recognition.

I nodded. "He changed the report that he was required to have on file that stated how much the pieces were worth. My guess is that there are actually two copies of the report and the real one is worth much more than just thirty million."

"So, he planned to sell the original painting for its full thirty million, and then siphon off of the insurance money when it was paid out?" Danny asked.

"We may have him on forging the painting," Steve agreed, "but where's the proof that he's planning to take money from the insurance payout?"

"All we have to do is look at his files," I explained. "There will be two reports, one for the thirty million that matches Dan Coulter's report, and one that's closer to forty or fifty million."

"I'll call the governor and see if we can get a rush warrant for those files," Steve said.

Danny scoffed. "Since when do you wait around for a warrant?"

With a shrug and a small smile, Steve stood. "You're right; I don't. Let's go. Grab Chin and Kono."