by Anne Stuart
Claire nodded, disagreeing. As far as she was concerned, Nicole could have benefited from some coddling. Not that the child would let anyone close enough to do so. Maybe her grand-mère would be allowed to dispense affection. Someone to fill the terrible gap left by the loss of her mother.
Nicole fixed her flat dark gaze on Claire’s face. “How did you cut your lip, Claire?” she asked, and Claire felt the color flood her face as the memory of the night before swept back through her.
Unfortunately Marc was there, listening. He dropped the paper and spoke to her in a cold, emotionless voice, and Claire flinched in silent sympathy. The relationship between father and daughter had gone from bad to worse. Marc no longer attempted to charm Nicole out of her bad moods. He was cold, clipped, distant with her, reserving his warmth and affection for Claire and Claire alone.
Whatever he’d said to Nicole had been effective. The girl’s sallow face had turned pale and her opaque eyes grew even more blank. He might just as well have slapped her across the face, Claire thought dismally.
Once more she felt that clinging sense of desperation. She knew how much Marc loved his unpromising little daughter, and yet he seemed unable to show it. He seemed removed and judgmental, yet Claire knew it was all the act of a loving man who simply didn’t know how to treat children.
During the last few months she’d tried to help, but had quickly learned not to interfere. The best the two Bonnards could do was muddle along, misunderstanding each other, wrapped in coldness, until something broke through. And that something wasn’t going to be Claire MacIntyre, no matter how much she wanted to help them bridge the gap. They simply wouldn’t let her.
Nicole muttered a graceless apology, and Marc once more disappeared behind the newspaper. Claire tried to give Nicole an encouraging smile, but Nicole swiftly turned her head away. In another, less stalwart child Claire would have thought she was blinking back tears. But as far as she knew Nicole never cried when she was awake. It was only during sleep that her formidable defenses gave way.
Claire glanced toward Marc, then looked swiftly away. The headlines of the paper were dark, bold, screaming of something ghastly. The photograph needed no translation. Another old woman had died.
It was a cold, blustery day. Not a day for a casual stroll in the park, but Marc, blessedly high-spirited, wouldn’t take no for an answer. He’d bundled Nicole off to her grandmother’s shortly after breakfast, then took Claire back to bed for another hour. It almost wiped out the memory of the night before. With the bright, chilly sunlight streaming in the windows Claire could almost forget the refined torture of the rain-swept night before.
The streets were empty. The day was more like January than early April, with a sharp wind whistling down the streets and around the buildings, sending a chill straight into Claire’s heart. Her silk dress provided little protection against the cold, and the high, high heels on her leather shoes were making her ankles ache as Marc drew her along at a pace just a shade too brisk for a Sunday afternoon stroll.
“Where are we going, Marc?” she demanded, pulling back. “I’m not dressed for this weather.”
He stopped, his hand still possessive on her arm, and looked at her with affectionate criticism. “Darling, my grandmother dressed in clothes that were no warmer than what you’re wearing every day of her life, and she never complained about the cold. It’s all that ridiculous central heating in America. Your blood’s gotten too thin.”
“My legs are freezing,” she protested. “At least you should have let me wear jeans.”
“You know I can’t abide trousers on women,” Marc said, his bright smile taking the sting out of the words. “Don’t complain, sweetheart. It’s just another block or two, we’ll take a quick turn around the park, and then I’ll take you home and warm you up properly. I don’t know what’s gotten into me—I’m quite insatiable.”
Claire ignored the little pinch of dismay, smiling into those dreamy eyes that were on a level with hers. “It’s probably because you’re going away,” she said. “You know you’re not going to be having any for a while.”
“What makes you think I’m celibate when I’m away from you, Claire?” he countered gently. “Perhaps I have a new woman every night.”
She wasn’t even ruffled. “Then maybe I’d better find someone to fill in while you’re gone.”
They started back down the sidewalk, her arm tucked companionably into his. “You know I would kill you if you did.” His voice was teasing. “Don’t forget, I’m French. We’re a very jealous, passionate race.”
“So I’ve noticed.” She was relaxing, despite the cold. Marc seldom teased—life was much too serious a business for him. She loved him best when he was tender, lightly mocking. “At least, the passionate part. I’ve never given you cause for jealousy so I’m not sure how you’d be.”
“I would be dangerous.” He steered her into the park. “Very dangerous, chérie.”
She could have wished he’d chosen another place. Not that she was feeling guilty about the American she’d met yesterday. There was nothing to feel guilty about. It was just an innocent encounter between expatriates, an hour and a coffee ice cream cone. But Marc wouldn’t understand, wouldn’t believe she’d already forgotten the man’s name, the flattering warmth of his blue eyes.
“What do you suppose is going on?” Marc murmured in her ear, drawing her closer.
She would have thought the park would be deserted on such a blustery day. In part she was correct. There were no old people sitting on the benches, huddled against the sudden cold, no ice cream vendor plying his trade. In their place were close to a dozen uniformed police, with several plainclothes men just as clearly connected to the authorities.
“Let’s leave,” she said, pulling against his arm. There were other people there, a scattered crowd of curious bystanders, watching with great interest as the police milled about.
“Stay right here. I’m going to find out what’s going on.” He released her arm and headed toward the most official-looking of the men. She didn’t even consider moving, much as she longed to escape. She didn’t want to know what was going on. She wanted to keep walking on this cold, bright day and not think about the police.
She wrapped her arms around her shivering body. Marc was deep in animated discussion with the man, and she watched both, unconsciously comparing them. Marc never ceased to surprise her with his beauty. Every bone, every muscle in his body was perfectly formed, exquisitely trained. Even the unruly curl of dark hair obeyed him, landing at just the right spot in his well-shaped forehead. He caught her watching him, turned and smiled, that charming, possessive smile that never failed to warm her.
In contrast the man beside him was almost ugly. He must have been in his late fifties, with a lined, weary face and ancient eyes that had seen too much. He was tall, taller than Marc’s average height, and his shoulders were slightly stooped, as if under a great weight that he just managed to support. His clothes were rumpled, as if he slept in them, and his thinning hair needed cutting. And yet there was something about him, a hint of compassion around a grim mouth, a suggestion of morbid humor in the dark eyes, that Claire liked.
A moment later Marc rejoined Claire. The tips of his ears were red from the cold, and he rubbed his hands together briskly before once more taking hold of her. “As I suspected,” he said, looking mournful. “It’s this nasty business of the old ladies. I didn’t want to disturb you, darling, but another one was killed last night. She lived near the park, and the police suspect she might have been seen here yesterday.”
“The poor woman.” Even pulling the coat tightly around her, she couldn’t seem to get warm.
“These people are animals,” Marc said somberly. “They’re going to post a warning at the entrance to the park. The inspector told me they simply couldn’t guarantee the safety of the old people in Paris. They haven’t got the manpower.”
“How ghastly.”
“Be glad you’re thirty and n
ot eighty.” He smiled, dismissing the morbid subject. “As long as you behave yourself you’re safe. Let’s go, chérie. There’s no ice cream on such a cold day, and I don’t like the way all these men are looking at you.” He pulled her up tight against him, pressing a soft, damp, open-mouthed kiss against her chilled lips.
It was too cold to respond, though she did her best. When he released her they started back toward the street. She looked about her curiously, wondering which of the busy policemen had offended Marc with his importunate eyes. They all seemed intent, unaware of the well-dressed couple heading out of the park. Marc’s paranoia, she thought, dismissing it. She should never have responded to his teasing.
Still, she could feel the eyes on her. She turned to say something to Marc, casting a furtive glance over her shoulder.
The American was there, surrounded by a handful of shorter Parisians. He was looking straight at her, and his blue eyes were mournful.
Tom, his name was. Thomas Jefferson Parkhurst, she thought. And Marc had noticed him. Damn, and double damn.
“Let’s take a taxi,” she said, huddling closer to him.
Marc’s eyes clouded in surprise. “Why, darling? We’ve only a short walk.”
“Because I can’t wait to get home with you,” she said in a low voice.
He kissed her again, and she put all her enthusiasm into it, throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her hips against his. When they drew apart she was breathless, and if Marc had had suspicions she’d managed to banish them. “I doubt we’ll find a taxi,” he said, “but we can always run.”
She laughed, suddenly happy. “Or at least walk very fast,” she said.
“You always do.” They hurried from the park, in perfect amity.
Louis Malgreave watched them leave. A good-looking couple, he thought. Not the sort who usually frequented this park, not the sort he ran into in the course of his days. Their kind didn’t murder, their kind didn’t rape or deal drugs. The man looked vaguely familiar, and it only took him a minute to place him. He was a mime. Marie had grown more interested in the theater, and he’d taken her to a performance of Le Théâtre du Mime last fall. He recognized the man even without the whiteface and baggy costume, recognized the bone structure and the graceful carriage. Malgreave prided himself on never forgetting anyone. In his job he couldn’t afford to.
The woman had been a question mark. English, perhaps, or American, though she didn’t have the brassy, self-assured look he associated with American women who slept with French men. Not married, he guessed. His assessing gray eyes slid over to the tall, unhappy-looking man down by the little pond. And perhaps not faithful.
That was the least of his worries. They had nothing to do with Marcelle Boisrond’s death. For the moment that was all he could allow himself to think about, not Marie at home alone on a Sunday when he’d promised to take her to see Margritte. Not curious couples walking the icy streets of Paris. Only murder.
CHAPTER 5
Thomas Jefferson Parkhurst didn’t go straight home from the old people’s park. He stopped first at a bistro and drank too much wine, comfortably anesthetizing himself before he made his way back up to his artist’s garret. The wine was smooth and dry and a hundred times better than the vinegary substance produced by his own bankrupt vineyard, but for the first time in twenty-two months he longed for something harder. The smooth bourbon of his younger years, of his native Kentucky, would have blurred the edges much more effectively. Wine soured his stomach and gave him diarrhea.
He ducked in out of the wind and started the lengthy climb to his sixth-floor apartment, stumbling just slightly. The question was, why did he need his edges blurred today? Granted, he was cold as hell, and his apartment wasn’t going to be much of an improvement from the icy streets below. But the sun was shining, the sky was dazzlingly blue, and Paris was magnificent as always.
He hated the fact that another old woman had died. He hadn’t wanted to learn the details, but he’d already bought the paper to accompany his croissant and coffee, and his alternatives were to stare at his fellow diners in the small café or stare at his large hands. He’d read the paper.
She’d been in the park yesterday afternoon. He might even have seen her when he’d been talking to … He might even have seen her, he amended to himself as he gained the fourth-floor landing, panting slightly. He might have seen her killer.
The next flight of stairs almost proved his undoing. He’d drunk more wine than he’d realized, the unaccustomed quality of the stuff blinding him to the quantity. He slipped, banging his shins against the iron railing, and sprawled full-length on the stairs.
He considered staying where he was. No one else lived on the top floor—unless he had unexpected visitors he wouldn’t be in anybody’s way. And if someone did have the temerity to visit him unannounced they could damn well help him up to his apartment.
Except that the stairs were a lot less comfortable than his bed with the sagging mattress. And even lying stretched out on the stairs he couldn’t avoid what was bothering him. Not the thought of another old lady being brutally murdered, depressing though that was. It was the memory of Claire.
He’d been cursing himself all night long that he hadn’t found out more about her. He knew all sorts of things—where she grew up, what she ate for breakfast, what writers she read, and what she used to do for a living. He knew she couldn’t understand a word of French and was miserable and embarrassed about her inability to do so. He knew she had a soft, vulnerable mouth, humorous eyes, and the most glorious red gold hair.
But he didn’t know her last name, or where she lived. Or whom she lived with, he added bitterly, pulling himself to his knees.
He’d stayed up late last night. The novel needed something new, a sympathetic female character. He’d worked feverishly, and if the woman with the red gold hair had sounded vaguely familiar, it only added to his inspiration.
He’d called her Elizabeth, a name that suited her. The Elizabeth in his novel had been perfect; warm, glowing, sexually insatiable, and exquisitely beautiful. She’d haunted the book, haunted his dreams, so that he raced over to the park as soon as he’d finished his coffee and the gruesome details of the latest murder, and stayed there, shivering in the cruel wind, waiting for her to show up.
He never doubted that she would. That pull he’d felt had been too strong to be one-way. She’d come back, looking for him, and he’d be there, waiting.
When he first spotted her, standing alone, too lightly dressed for such a cold day, his first reaction was disappointment. She wasn’t the vision he’d remembered. Her face was narrow, pinched with cold, her mouth thin and unhappy, her slender body graceless as she wrapped her arms around herself. The hair was still glorious, but the fantasy had faded.
He hadn’t moved for a long moment, watching her, trying to reconcile reality with the dream goddess of the night before, when he saw the man. Very handsome, very French, very much her lover, he came up to the woman and put his hands on her.
Tom had waited to see her face light up. It hadn’t happened. She’d smiled at the man, but it wasn’t the same, open smile she’d given Tom just the day before. She kissed the man, her arms around him, seemingly lost in the public embrace. But Tom didn’t believe it.
She saw him just before they left. She looked directly at him, her face blank. In less than twenty-four hours she’d forgotten him. And Tom headed out to get drunk.
He staggered the rest of the way to the top floor, slammed it shut behind him, and headed for the typewriter. Much as it went against the grain to revise before he was finished, this time it was too important. The saintly Elizabeth had to go.
Malgreave was walking, shoulders hunched forward, hat pulled down low on his head, hands shoved in his pockets. He ignored the cold, as he ignored everything when he was thinking. Possibilities and suspicions danced around in his head, and he had every intention of walking in the bitter cold until it all began to make some sense.
; Josef was beside him, trotting at his heels like an overeager terrier tracking a bitch in heat. Malgreave didn’t mind—it gave him someone to talk to, to try his theories on.
When they’d finished up in the park he’d headed home, taking his assistant with him in a misguided hope that Josef’s presence might deflect Marie’s wrath at being abandoned one more Sunday. The effort had been wasted. The small, neat house in the suburbs was deserted, and there were frozen dinners awaiting him.
“Sorry, Josef. It looks as if Marie has gone to visit my daughter after all. We’ll have to make do with these things.” He gestured contemptuously at the brightly colored boxes lining the freezing compartment.
“I would consider it an honor, Chief Inspector,” Josef murmured.
“The tragedy of that, Josef, is that you mean it,” Malgreave said with a sigh. “No, I won’t subject you to that. We’ll find a café with something decent. God knows their food is probably from the freezer also. I don’t know what France has come to. It’s never failed to both enrage and amuse me, Josef, that the Americans have taken haute cuisine and in return given the poor French people frozen dinners with the taste and texture of cardboard.”
Josef nodded solemnly, drinking in Malgreave’s words, and once more the chief inspector sighed. Josef was a bright man, second only to himself in the department, and he combined a slavish adoration with a desperate ambition. The poor man was constantly being torn by those two conflicting emotions, hoping Malgreave would meet with disaster and be forced to resign, giving up his place to Josef, and hoping that Malgreave would once more triumph, bringing credit to the entire department. Malgreave had little doubt it was Josef’s harridan of a wife who was responsible for the ambition. Were it left up to Josef, he’d be perfectly content following in Malgreave’s footsteps, just as he was now.
