by Cara Black
Thursday, Early Afternoon
Sweat stung Jean-Marie Plove’s eye. His aching biceps strained as he struggled for the last chin-up. Go through the pain, ran the training litany in his head. Give 110 percent. And he had, when he’d been in the GIGN anti-terrorist brigade. “Take no prisoners” had been their motto.
Jean-Marie grunted, forcing that last centimeter, willing his muscles taut, going for the aching burn that would turn sweet.
His bristled chin skimmed the tree branch. He’d done it. Euphoria for a brief second until his grip loosened. He landed on his butt, twisting his left leg, which had been fitted with an aluminum prosthesis from the kneecap down. Pain shot up his spine.
“So you work out outdoors now?” said Robert Guedilen, a glint in his heavy-lidded eyes. “No wonder I don’t see you at the gym.” He held a briefcase and had a wool jacket over his arm.
Robert, a former colleague, had been the fixer on his ICTY team—the man who got the merde done. The last person Jean-Marie wanted to see.
Like Jean-Marie would work out in a gym with his prosthesis on display.
“Nature’s free,” he said, managing a grin.
Here he was, only thirty-two years old, a pathetic fool lying on the dirt in Square Gabriel Pierné. He would have been in his prime if not for the splinter bomb that had taken him down in Foča.
“Your leg is made of metal.” Tomas, Robert’s precocious four-year-old son, was holding his father’s hand.
Jean-Marie straightened his shoulders, fighting the pain in his spine, and winked. “Call me bionique.” He ignored Robert’s extended hand, grabbed the plane tree trunk, and pulled himself up. His damn kneecap was so chafed and sore from the constant rubbing of his prosthesis.
“Join us for dinner,” said Robert. “My wife’s preparing her special salade de crevettes, your favorite. Perfect for a hot summer evening.”
Jean-Marie heard the pity in Robert’s voice.
“Got a date. Désolé,” Jean-Marie said.
Pause. “A date with Żubrówka?”
The Polish vodka flavored with bison grass that helped him blot out the atrocities. Jean-Marie grimaced. “Don’t worry about me, Robert. It’s coming together.”
Robert smiled down at his little son. “Put our ice cream wrappers in the bin, okay?”
As Tomas walked away, Jean-Marie felt Robert’s hand on his shoulder. “You quit therapy, don’t answer my calls. Look, my Foča report is due at le Sénat. We need to review those details. It’s important, Jean-Marie.”
Relive that hellhole? He did that every night in his nightmares. The trees were dark green beneath the overcast sky, and drops of rain pattered on Jean-Marie’s arm.
“I’ll get back to you, Robert.”
“It’s not the outcome we wanted, I know. But think of it as some form of justice.” Robert paused. “Can you call me tomorrow, Jean-Marie?”
“Don’t want much, do you?” He brushed the leaves and gravel from his gym pants, arranged the left cuff to hide the aluminum.
“I know it’s hard, but we owe it to those victims.”
“I put it all down in my debriefing report already.”
“That report from the hospital in Nantes? The one you made while you were still doped up after the amputation? You must be able to add to that.”
Why now? Why did it really matter anymore? But he wasn’t going to ask and prolong the discussion.
Jean-Marie’s depth perception had wavered since the brain injury he’d gotten the same day he’d lost his leg. His vision problems came at random times. He’d made his life routine, took routes he knew from memory, stuck close to this quartier he’d been born in. Every day he forced himself to make a little triangle: the Franprix, his corner café tabac, and the square a few blocks from his house. Like clockwork. Next month he’d expand his circuit to the market on rue de Buci, the garden behind Saint-Germain-des-Prés where he’d played as a child by Picasso’s sculpture.
“We’ll talk tomorrow, okay?” said Robert. “Meet here.”
“I’ll call you, Robert.”
Tomas had returned and was tugging on his father’s sleeve.
Robert shook his head and checked his high-tech walkie-talkie. Still on the ministry leash. “Answer your phone. That’s all I ask, Jean-Marie.”
Like that would happen.
Then the drying sweat on Jean-Marie’s neck tingled. He snapped to attention, in that full alert mode he’d known in the field. He was in someone’s cross hairs. Being watched.
Thursday, Late Afternoon
The Left Bank café was busy with locals. Two journalists talked over beers about the latest NATO scandal. As they signaled the harried waitress for another round, Aimée’s phone rang. Saj. She wedged herself in at the café counter, ordered a Badoit.
“Coming, Saj?”
“Can’t. I’m rebooting another program.”
Right now her priority was to put together a security protocol for the École des Beaux-Arts staff. Should take an hour, tops. Then she could go home and make sure Melac had coped with Chloé.
“Dechard’s been a bad boy,” she said. The Badoit arrived with a slice of lime and a frosted glass.
“Tell me later. Listen, I found interesting stuff on the French ICTY team. Mirko, too. René asked me to update you.”
Since when had René taken this in his hands? She slapped five francs on the counter and waved off the change. “I’m listening.”
“Mirko lived in France as a kid,” Saj was saying. “And the team’s Bosnia operation is currently under review in Senate hearings.”
Her hand paused on the glass. “Mirko lived here?”
“His parents disliked Tito and vice versa. In the sixties the borders were fluid for travailleur invités, you know, guest workers. His family lived here two years, then in Belgium.”
She cupped a hand over her other ear and concentrated on what Saj was saying. So difficult over the patron conversation and the télé. “So Mirko spoke French.”
“At one time, maybe. Then again, he’s dead.”
And never appeared at the café tabac, as the CCTV footage proved. “Go back to the Senate hearings. They’re working on the budget now, non? How’s the Bosnia operation relevant?”
“I know it costs money to subsidize NATO forces, maintain a presence with the ICTY in The Hague and the former Yugoslavia,” said Saj. “So the military branch is accountable for their budget.”
“Anything on Erich Kayser, the moneyman?”
“I’ll keep searching.”
Her mind went to Suzanne’s garbled message. She fought down nagging guilt again. She hadn’t reached Jean-Marie.
But she’d think about that later. Deal with a paying job first.
“Alleged payoffs and bribes by arms dealers,” the télé newscaster was saying overhead. “Unnamed sources close to NATO’s—”
“That’s the tip of the iceberg,” said one flushed-faced journalist loudly, standing up and throwing francs on his table.
Aimée turned quickly to catch what the newscaster was saying—could it be related?—but the rest was lost in the noise of all the people coming into the café.
Sybille had already read her admin staff the riot act before Aimée arrived, but she still felt relieved once she’d delivered her Email Security 101 lecture—never download anything in an email unless you know the sender, and even then, verify; your mistakes open the whole institution to vulnerability; private emails don’t belong on the institutional email server; blah blah blah. Sybille seemed to be taking it all seriously, so Aimée thought there shouldn’t be any more problems until the next time. There was always a next time—that was how Leduc Detective stayed in business.
Grabbing a piece of chocolate from the bowels of her bag, she scanned her laptop screen. She unwrapped the tinfoil from a Lenôtre raspberry truffle. Took a bite.
Heaven, even if it was a little gooey from the heat.
An email popped up from Dechard’s lawyer outlining points he wanted her to investigate. Had she actually agreed to do this? Or did her École de Beaux-Arts contract mandate it? A quick check revealed it did not. But what would Sybille say if she refused to help? Would she be kissing any future contracts here goodbye?
She groaned inside. She needed to talk to René. And needed to do a few more things before leaving.
Better check on Chloé, to see how things went so far. But she’d deleted Melac’s number. Merde! She rang her landline. Heard her own fuzzed voice on the answering machine. “Laissez un message s’il vous plaît après le beep sonore.” Beep.
“It’s Aimée. Pick up, Melac.”
Pause.
“Melac, answer.”
She hung up. Tried again. Heard ringing.
Why didn’t he pick up? Was he out for a walk? But he wouldn’t dare leave—he didn’t have the keys to get back in.
Still no answer.
Her heart skipped a beat.
She imagined the worst. The drop-in with his mother; this second visit, supposedly to babyproof—was it all a ruse to kidnap Chloé?
Calm down. She needed to breathe and think this through. Tried her landline again.
No answer.
How could she have been so naïve and trusted him again? A man who’d been nowhere to be found when Aimée was expecting his baby, who’d remarried and dropped off the face of the earth, then just burst into their lives again?
Or what if something even worse had happened—a fire? An accident involving Chloé? Good God, had the fever returned? Hadn’t Aimée learned from reading baby guru Dr. Dolto that fever is one of the first symptoms of infantile meningitis?
Called again. No answer. If Melac were there, he’d answer.
That settled it. She’d handle the last items later.
Her scooter sputtered. Died. This time she’d forgotten to fill up the tank.
Stupid.
Frantic, she hurried onto quai Malaquais looking for a taxi. None. Merde, all these one-way streets going the wrong way. She headed toward rue Mazarine, scrolling through the numbers in her phone. Found her neighbor on the second floor. Her fingers trembled as she pressed call.
Ringing.
Idiot, such an idiot to have let Melac in the door. What stupidity to leave her daughter with a man who . . . The neighbor’s phone rang and rang, the sound echoing hollowly through her mobile. She bumped into a woman with a shopping bag, spilling her charcuterie and cheeses all over the cobbles.
“Watch where you’re going, eh?” the woman said. “You going to pay for my ruined Saint-Nectaire?”
“Désolée, it’s an emergency. My baby’s in trouble . . .” Aimée pressed a wad of francs into the woman’s hand and ran to a taxi at the corner. Jumped in.
“In a hurry, eh?” The older taxi driver hit the meter. “Where to?”
“Quai d’Anjou on Ile Saint-Louis.” She panted. Hot, storm-charged air blew in the taxi window. “Extra if you get me there in under ten minutes.” She choked back the sob rising in her throat. “My baby’s missing.”
“You’re sure?”
“I left her with her biological father. Like an idiot.”
“Don’t knit your nose hairs, or you’ll hang yourself.” Another old expression that made her think of Morbier—no. She stuffed that thought aside. The taxi driver shifted into gear and took off, horn blaring, scattering pedestrians in the crosswalk like frightened pigeons.
Her phone to her ear, she tried her neighbor again. No answer. Then her landline again. Please answer, Melac.
Only ringing.
Where had he gone with Chloé? And his mother—was she in on this? What did she even know about the woman?
Everything with him had been a disaster since he’d shown up at the christening. She wanted to kick herself for ignoring the danger signs.
Lying so he could babynap his biological daughter—how low could he go?
As her trembling finger was ready to tap out seventeen for the police, a call came in from an unknown number. A bystander on the quai watching her apartment in flames?
“Oui?” Her voice quivered.
“Might want to turn up your landline ringer volume, Aimée,” Melac’s irritated voice came over the line.
“Is Chloé okay?”
“We’re dripping wet on your bedroom floor. Chloé was having a bubble bath until Miles Davis bit my leg, barking like crazy until I finally realized he was hearing the phone.”
Good God, last night she’d turned down the ringer to avoid waking up Chloé.
Oops. Relief flooded her.
Miles Davis’s acute sense of hearing had won the day. She made a mental note to stop by the horse butcher for an extra treat.
“Melac, sorry . . .” She heard Chloé’s soft babbles and Miles Davis whining.
“Quit the panic attacks. We’re both sopping wet and getting cold.”
“Feel Chloé’s head. Any fever?”
“Took her temperature an hour ago. Normal. We’re reading her new book after dinner.”
“But Melac, if she gets fussy—”
“Fussy over what?” he said.
She heard a crash in the background.
“What’s that?” she asked.
Pause. “Miles Davis getting frisky. Knocked over the shampoo or something in the bathroom. Et alors, listen, the latest from Morbier’s doctor—”
“Don’t start, Melac,” she interrupted. Her fingers twisted tight on her bag strap. A whoosh of humid air ruffled her hair.
“She’s about to eat now.”
“Already?” There was a crack of thunder. Any minute it would rain.
“That’s the time the schedule on the wall says,” he said. “Oh, and she loved my homemade applesauce.”
He’d pureed the market apples that she’d been meaning to.
“Take your time. No need to rush back.”
Hesitant, she glanced at the time. Why not take advantage? “I’ll be back in an hour.”
“Finish what you’re doing,” he said. “Everything’s under control.”
“Under control?” But he’d hung up.
Thursday, Early Evening
Melac hit the end call button on his phone. Smothered his feelings, the helplessness, and resumed drilling holes for the baby gate. He could at least do one thing right.
“You handled that well.” The woman emerged from the tiled bathroom holding Chloé in an oversized fluffy towel. Chloé’s sparkling eyes and twisting, damp pink toes peeked out. She’d taken his heart—he’d do anything for this little thing.
“She’s got your eyes,” the woman said.
Melac stiffened. “Aimée all over.”
A sigh. The first time she’d appeared human. “Papa’s waiting, my little cream puff.”
“We say mon petit chou.” Melac opened his arms for the damp bundle that was his daughter. Inhaled her sweet, soapy baby smell. Heard a burp and felt the drool.
“You call her your little cabbage?”
“Cabbage, cream puff. Same thing.” Melac nuzzled Chloé’s champignon nose. He was rewarded with a squeal of delight. He looked up at the woman, who was folding a pile of diapers, bibs, and onesies. There was a mix of longing and happiness on her face.
“I hate lying,” he said.
“Come up with a better idea? It’s not for long. And it’s the only way.”
Thursday, Early Evening
Under control? She hated to admit that it sounded like it was, apart from her dog.
“Some emergency,” said her mustached taxi driver.
“Long story.” Aimée pulled out her LeClerc compact. She used her kohl pencil around her eyes, smudged it for a smoky look. Reapplied Chanel red an
d wished her lips weren’t so thin.
The taxi driver’s eyebrows shot up in the rearview mirror. “You trust him?”
Did she? Could she believe he wanted to build a relationship with Chloé? Hadn’t she always, deep down, wanted them to build some version of their own family?
When she was eight years old, after her mother had left, her father had run himself ragged doing his best to take on the roles of both parents. Her grandfather had stepped in, taking her to piano lessons, for a pain au chocolat after playing in the park. Times she’d savored then and still savored now. Morbier had been drafted for ballet duty.
Her heart choked her. How could Morbier have betrayed her papa?
“Et alors, my meter’s running. Where to now?”
She reined in the memories swirling in her head. Her phone trilled. “Un moment.” It was Jules Dechard’s attorney. He’d given her his card—good thing she’d entered the number into her phone. She needed to enter Melac’s before she forgot. “I got your email, monsieur,” she said.
“Mademoiselle Leduc, the victim’s gone into a coma and might not come out of it,” said the attorney. “Jules Dechard could face manslaughter charges.”
Bad to worse.
“I need you to establish his alibi,” said the attorney. “Please, talk to the art gallery. Get corroboration.”
She hesitated. “This isn’t covered by my École des Beaux-Arts contract, monsieur.”
“But I’m hiring you, mademoiselle. Faxing a contract to your office. Ten-thousand-franc retainer suit you?”
She covered her phone with her palm and leaned toward the driver. “Change direction.” She gave him the cross streets for Galerie Tournon. “That tip’s still good if you get me there as soon as possible.”
Blaring his horn, he cut over a lane and made a right. Under a threatening sky, the Seine changed from pewter to lead.
The attorney was speaking in her ear. “Jules took a taxi to the gallery earlier today.”
“Taxi?” The taxi companies kept records of every fare—that might help establish his alibi. “Which firm, and what time?”
As he told her, she used her kohl eye pencil to scribble the info on the inside of her wrist.
