The Picasso Heist

Chapter 1

TENNIS, ANYONE?

Growing up, I remember my mother really wanting me to learn how to play the sport. She never asked if it was actually something I wanted to do, and not once did I express even the slightest interest in setting foot on a court. Still, for my twelfth birthday, she handed me a pink envelope with my name, Halston, spelled out in rainbow-glitter glue, and inside was a card announcing that I’d been signed up for a dozen tennis lessons at the local YWCA.

Honestly, I think my mother simply liked the idea of having a daughter who played tennis. It conveyed normalcy, as if we were your typical upper-middle-class family living in Westchester, New York. (Spoiler alert: We weren’t.)

But that’s what most alcoholics do, and that’s why my mother used to bury her empty liquor bottles at the bottom of our recycling bins: They try like hell to hide the truth. Or, better yet, they construct their own reality. So whether or not I was having fun playing tennis didn’t seem to matter much to my mother. It looked good, like she was being a good parent. Who cared if I enjoyed it? (Spoiler alert: I didn’t.)

Still, I never missed a single one of those tennis lessons. I learned how to play, and that of course included learning how to keep score. It’s ten years later, I’m twenty-two, and I haven’t picked up a racket since then. But I still know how to keep score.

And that’s where this story begins.

“Skip, talk to me. How’s the volume?” I whisper, testing the level in my earpiece, which is hidden by the blond wig underneath my baseball cap. I’m in Queens at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, right next to Citi Field, where the Mets play, so I’m wearing a Mets cap. This whole operation is about blending in.

“Volume’s good,” I hear back in my ear, “although I’m getting a little static, and you broke up on me there for a sec — ”

Skip’s voice suddenly cuts out, and I start dropping F-bombs, thinking we’re screwed. Skip laughs. He’s messing with me. That’s what older brothers do. He can hear me crystal clear in his hotel room at the W Hoboken over in New Jersey. The hotel has good Wi-Fi, over 100 Mbps. More important, at least according to Skip, it’s got a kick-ass bacon cheeseburger on the room-service menu.

“You logged in?” I ask.

“Yeah,” says Skip.

“Are they done warming up?”

“Yep. They’re just about to start.”

It’s day two of the US Open tennis tournament, still the first round in a crowded field of over two hundred men and women. That means the most matches are being played on the most courts with the most chair umpires being used, including none other than the man of the hour, Lucas Montgomery.

Lucas is a very tall, lanky Australian in his late fifties who doesn’t so much sit in his umpire chair as fold himself into it, contorting his body so his bended knees are nearly as high as his chest. Perched above midcourt, he looks like a human accordion. I absolutely love Lucas. I’d follow him anywhere, and this summer, after graduating college, I literally have. The Mallorca Championships, Wimbledon, the Swiss Open Gstaad. What a great way to see the world, and all of it paid for with wagers placed and won in split seconds.

courtsiding (verb): Transmitting real-time information from a sports event (especially a tennis match) for the purpose of gaining a betting advantage

In other words, if we can place a bet online before the bookmakers adjust their real-time odds, we have the upper hand. Advantage us. All it takes is that certain chair umpire who officially updates the score after each point a teeny bit slower than I update Skip on his laptop at the hotel. Someone like Lucas Montgomery, aka Slow Hand Luke.

Is courtsiding against the law? Technically, no. Just don’t try telling that to the guys who run the online betting site offering the highest limits for live, in-match betting. That crew tends to have a slightly different opinion about courtsiding, one that they’d be more than happy to make me painfully aware of — and I do mean painfully— should they ever get the chance. Like today, for instance.

Because today I’m going to make a mistake. A big mistake. Huge.

The kind that will forever change the rest of my life.

I’m going to get caught.