by Anne Stuart
It hadn’t taken Hubert long at all to arrange a meeting, but then, Hubert knew everything there was to know in Paris, or knew someone else who had the information wanted. In an hour it had been set. Rocco had to admire the choice of meeting places. The small park where the old people congregated was a wonderfully ironic spot for the two of them.
He wanted to be late, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He found he was hurrying through the streets, shoving people out of his way in his haste to make it to the park on time. He only hoped they wouldn’t be too noticeable on a stormy day like this one.
But Marc must have taken that into account. Marc always took every possibility into account, and just as he had twenty years ago, Rocco would follow blindly.
The notices were still up at the entrance of the park, warning the old people to be on their guard. Against him, Rocco thought cheerfully. The rain had slowed to a steady mist, and while a few damp pedestrians were taking a shortcut through the park, the benches were deserted. All except one.
Rocco recognized the set of his head, the line of his jaw, the elegant nose. He always was a handsome fucker, he thought, even as a child. It had helped him get what he wanted back then, when the others had been hard pressed to protect themselves. He would always remember that summer morning, with Marc sitting on Grand-mère Estelle’s desk, his high, well-bred little voice calmly outlining his plan.
Not that he’d been any better born than the rest of them, Rocco thought, sneering and staring at him. He’d just been an excellent mimic, picking up the accent and manners of his betters, using them to charm and infuriate Grand-mère Estelle and Georges, the gardener, using them to charm and intimidate the others.
He must have felt Rocco’s inimical gaze on him. He turned his head, his dark, fathomless eyes meeting Rocco’s across the rain-swept park, and his beautiful mouth curved up in a smile. And Rocco, fearless Rocco, a man who could cut the throat of a nun without flinching, shivered in the cold spring rain.
Nicole was asleep on the damask sofa, her dark eyes closed, purple shadows lurking underneath, staining her sallow skin. Claire sat there, watching her, ignoring the babbling of the television set with its dubbed sit-com. Nicole would usually disappear into her room at nine o’clock and reappear the next morning at seven. During those long hours the lights were off and no sounds issued forth, but it was clear by the shadows beneath her solemn brown eyes that she wasn’t sleeping soundly.
Who could blame her? Madame Langlois probably fed her fears, turning the tension between stepfather and stepdaughter into something more sinister. Damn the woman with her paranoia! Claire could no more entrust Nicole to her than she could to Jack the Ripper, even if Harriette had been willing to take her.
The television blared at her, the light and darkness shifting over the room. Marc would never have approved of its arrival, but Claire had ignored that during her defiant stage. Now she wished she hadn’t. The constant noise drove her crazy, as American television never had, but Nicole was entranced by it, preferring to keep it on all evening rather than suffer the silent apartment and Claire’s nervous chatter.
Claire sighed, leaning back and stretching her feet out in front of her. At least the dubbed French drowned out the sound of the rain outside. If only the apartment would warm up. But she knew from icy experience that there was no way to warm up the old barn of a place. She and Marc would usually just retire to bed, filling the long hours with pleasuring each other.
No, that wasn’t true. He would pleasure her, torment her, excite and arouse her. She was given very little chance to participate. He usually kept her so busy, so overwrought, that she had little to do but lie there and react.
Brian had been the other way around, expecting to be serviced when the mood struck him. Claire sat there, an expression of distaste marring her face. Surely there was something in between the two extremes? Surely sex should be give-and-take, a sharing of pleasure.
Her thoughts started to drift toward what it would be like to share, who would be likely to do so, and she pulled them back. The last thing she should do was sit there having erotic fantasies with Marc’s stepdaughter asleep at her feet. She had to make plans, for her and for Nicole, for the self-possessed child who wouldn’t let her in, but for the life of her she couldn’t think what.
Claire heard the phone ring, but she didn’t move. It wouldn’t be anyone she wanted to talk to. She would let it ring, try to make sense out of the sit-com on TV, try to make sense out of her life.
Nicole stirred, opening her eyes and blinking up at Claire. “Aren’t you going to answer the phone?” she inquired sleepily.
Claire sighed. It was easier getting up than explaining her reservations. With a weary sigh she pulled herself from the sofa, hoping the ringing would stop before she reached it.
The large, old-fashioned black phone in the hallway kept up its shrill, incessant tone. She picked it up, steeling herself for the spate of French that would greet her cautious “Hello.”
Silence. The same, absolute silence that had greeted her the night before. She’d almost forgotten about those calls, but now the memory came flooding back. No heavy breathing, no muttered obscenities, no background noise. Just complete, utter silence.
The vision came unbidden, eerie, sudden, unavoidable. Marc was on the other end of the line, in whiteface, miming desperately, communicating with her in breathless silence.
She slammed the phone down, her hands trembling. She stood there for a long moment, trying to compose herself before facing Nicole’s too-observant eyes, when the phone began to ring once more.
Without thinking she yanked the phone from the wall, the long black cord snaking free. In the distance she could hear the extensions still ringing, in the kitchen, in the bedroom. And in the doorway stood Nicole, watching her.
“Was it Marc?” she questioned calmly.
“Of course not.” Claire marveled at her own self-possession. “A wrong number.”
“Then why did you rip the phone out of the wall?”
Damn the child. “All right, it wasn’t a wrong number. It was a crank call.”
Nicole’s face whitened in the dim light. Suddenly she was no longer a distant, precocious stranger, she was a frightened child. “Did someone talk to you, Claire? Or was it silent?”
Claire could feel her own blood drain away from her skin. “Silent. How did you know? Have you had the same thing happen?”
Nicole shook her head slowly, painfully. “No,” she said. “Just before my mother died she began receiving phone calls like that. When Marc said he was out of town.”
Claire just stared at her, fighting the nausea that was rising from the pit of her stomach. And for the first time she wondered if Madame Langlois was a bitter, paranoid old woman, or wise even beyond her years.
For a large, graceless man Gilles Sahut could move silently enough. He walked down the street, his heavy boots quiet on the pavement, heading toward Belleville. The rain was coming down heavily now, pouring over his bare head and running down his face. His hair was cut so short one could see the skull beneath it, and the short stubbly growth did nothing to slow the descent of the rain. He shook his head to clear the water from his eyes, like a large, evil dog, and continued on, single-minded in his purpose.
He’d had a few bad moments tonight. He’d been inside the apartment of the old one, moving through the clutter of furniture, when he realized the rain had stopped. He’d halted, motionless, not even daring to breathe, as he listened for the sound of rain against the window of the apartment. Nothing.
She’d been asleep. She was a plump one, her black stockings rolled down below her knees, crumbs and food dribbled on her massive bosom, an impressive mustache above her pursed and wrinkled mouth. She wore a wig, an elaborate, blue white affair, and it had slipped to one side, revealing the thin strands of yellow gray beneath it.
She was snoring, her head drooping, her plump hands resting in her capacious lap. The rooms smelled of cabbage and rose
s, and he remembered the roses in the garden at the orphanage, Georges’s pride. He remembered the thorns, and how they’d been embedded in his young boy’s flesh.
He could turn and go. He couldn’t touch her when the sky was clear—he’d sooner kill himself. But he could wait. It wouldn’t stay clear for long. Sooner or later the rain would return, and he’d be ready for it.
Without a sound he moved closer, dropping his massive bulk into the chair opposite the old lady. She stirred for a moment, then began snoring more loudly, as Gilles had settled down to wait.
In the end it had happened fast, too fast. A loud rumble of thunder, a renewed downpour, and the old one had woken up, her rheumy eyes opening to view her killer just as he plunged the knife into her chest.
It was always too fast. He felt cheated, frustrated, and he knew what he was going to do about it. Edgar lived alone on the top floor of one of the mean little houses on this narrow, dirty little alleyway. The only other occupant was a drug dealer who minded his own business. He wouldn’t interfere if there was a struggle. It was time Edgar learned his place.
The door was a flimsy one, and the lock didn’t hold against a man of Gilles’s bulk. The stairway was narrow and dank, and Gilles remembered the one other time he was here. Edgar had been sick, and Gilles had come to drag him into work. He accepted no excuses—if Edgar wished to work for him he would come to work with the runs, with a streaming nose, with typhus if need be. And Edgar had come.
He remembered the mattress on the floor, the dirty gray sheets that had once been white, with Edgar’s pale face and strong boy’s body lying there. He grew hard as he remembered, as he thought about just what he would do to the boy on that mattress. Something would be salvaged out of this miserable night. And then maybe he’d move the boy in with him, for as long as it amused him.
The room was very dark when he opened the door. No moonlight filtered through on such a rainy night, and the light from the hallway barely reached the mattress. He could see Edgar lying there, the smoothly muscled shoulder and tousle of dark hair. Gilles reached down and unfastened his pants, moving across the room on his silent cat’s feet.
Edgar moved, and a dim light speared across the room. The boy looked at him, at his erect flesh and the determination, and he moved back against the mattress. He was naked, and Gilles felt himself grow even harder.
“No,” said Edgar, the first time he had ever said such a thing to his employer.
Gilles grinned. He would have enjoyed this if Edgar had been passive, but a fight would add spice to the whole thing. He outweighed the boy by more than a hundred pounds, and his muscles, honed by years of slinging dead animals around, were impressive. He carried his knife loosely, the knife that had served him well once this evening, secure in the knowledge that he wouldn’t need it to overpower the boy.
“Yes,” he said, mocking, advancing. “But yes.”
He could smell the boy’s fear, and the sour, sweaty smell was an aphrodisiac. He remembered his own fear, when he was much younger than Edgar and Georges had come after him, and his excitement increased. Suddenly impatient, he went down on his knees on the mattress, dropped his knife, and lunged for the terrified boy.
It happened so quickly. One moment he was ready to draw the boy underneath him, in the next he felt the sharp thrust up against his throat. It was wet, hot and wet all around him, pouring over him, and he knew blood too well not to recognize the feel of it, the warmth of it, the ironlike smell of it.
It amazed him to realize it was his own. Somehow Edgar had managed to get hold of his own knife and stick it in his throat. He was dying, Gilles thought in surprise. His blood was soaking them both, and he was dying.
He tried to laugh, but the sound was a gurgling noise. Years ago he had killed a man for buggering him, and now he had met the very same fate. You had to laugh at the tricks life would play on you, he thought, falling onto the mattress. It was Edgar’s mistake, though. If he could talk he would have told him. He should have waited, put up with him until he was old enough to inherit the boucherie. That was what Gilles had done, and it had served him well.
No, Edgar had botched it. He was standing there, naked, watching his employer bleed to death on his mattress, and he didn’t make a sound. And just before he died Gilles noticed, with grim satisfaction, that Edgar had an erection too.
Tom couldn’t stop thinking about that curtain falling into place. He lay stretched out on his narrow, sagging bed, breathing in the lingering traces of Claire’s elusive scent, and thought about the watcher in the window.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, he chided himself. He hadn’t been able to resist the romantic gesture of kissing her good-bye, the two of them standing outside in the pouring rain. There would have been no problem with it if she didn’t already have a live-in lover with a possibly murderous streak. He’d been alone too long. He shouldn’t be in a garret trying to write the great American novel, he should be writing romances.
He wished he could share Claire’s faith that Marc Bonnard was harmless. He knew that he should—after all, he’d never met the man and Claire had lived with him for the past four or more months.
But Claire, for all her denials, had a hunted look in her eyes, one that wasn’t caused solely by her guilt over the hit-and-run accident. And she’d never told Bonnard about that, yet she’d confided in him within days of meeting him. That ought to count for something.
No, her common sense might tell her Bonnard was safe, but her instincts were disagreeing. He wished he knew which he could believe.
He stretched out in the bed, his feet touching the bottom railing, his head brushing the top. He’d planned to leave her alone for a couple of days, to think about that kiss, but right now he didn’t think he could do it. For one thing he didn’t want to go for days without seeing her; for another, that curtain still bothered him. He’d find out who lived on the first floor, in the apartment below her, and set his mind at ease.
He was almost asleep when a sudden, disquieting thought slid into his mind, disrupting what little chance he had of a decent night’s rest. The watcher had been on the first floor of the old building, just above the ground floor. Did Claire know the difference when she told him she lived on the second story? Did she know that in Europe the first floor was the ground floor, the second was the first, etc.? Did she actually live in the apartment that held the silent watcher?
He reached for the phone, then pulled his hand back. He would only make things worse. If it hadn’t been Marc he would worry her needlessly. If it was, she was already dealing with it, and she didn’t need his interference. He looked at his watch. Quarter past one in the morning. The earliest he could show up on her doorstep was eight A.M. Not until then would he be certain she was all right.
He sighed, sitting up. It was going to be a long night.
CHAPTER 12
“Isn’t modern science wonderful, Josef?” Malgreave lit another cigarette as he stared down at the medical examiner’s report. “A butcher gets his throat cut and his body gets dumped in an alley in Belleville. There’s so much blood on his corpse you can’t even tell what color his clothes were originally, and yet the coroner was able to determine some of that blood came from someone else. Someone with very rare AB negative blood.”
“Ah,” said Josef, putting his fingertips together and waiting.
“Now you and I both know that it’s always possible that Sahut’s attacker had that rare blood, and Sahut was able to inflict some damage before he died. That would make sense, wouldn’t it? So why am I searching further, Josef? Let me hear what you’ve deduced from all this.” Malgreave stabbed the air with his cigarette. “Don’t just sit there nodding portentously.”
“I don’t think the blood came from his attacker,” Josef said after careful consideration. “For one thing, the butcher was a huge, powerful man. The only way anyone could have gotten him is by surprise. If he’d had time to fight back, there would have been more than that trace of AB blood, there probably
would have been a second body.”
“A good point,” Malgreave conceded. “But what have we got to tie a butcher from Belleville with the murder in the Latin Quarter? What do you think, Vidal? You must be here for some reason other than to look pretty. Give me your thoughts. What have we got to tie him to Rocco Guillère, to Yvon Alpert?”
“Nothing,” Vidal said, unruffled. His pants were lavender today, and far too tight. Josef had taken one look at Vidal’s apparel and started fuming.
“Nothing indeed.” Malgreave took one last, greedy suck of the cigarette and stubbed it out in an already overflowing ashtray. The room was thick with blue smoke. “Nothing but an old cop’s instinct. There may be no connection with Guillère, or Alpert for that matter. They may have been acting on their own, random, copycat killers.”
“You don’t believe that,” said Josef.
Malgreave sighed. “I never have. It would be so much easier if I did. Such a nice, neat answer to a nasty problem. But I stake my career, my reputation, on my instincts. The victims may be random, the acts aren’t. The blood on Gilles Sahut’s clothes, that which didn’t belong to him or the animals he’d slaughtered, that blood came from Marcelle du Paine.”
Josef leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs, an almost unheard-of act of relaxation in his precise lieutenant, while Vidal pulled himself upright from his lounging position in the doorway. Always at opposites, Malgreave thought with a sigh.
“How do you intend to find the connection, sir?” Josef said.
“Ah, Josef, that’s where the trouble comes in. Two years ago Rocco’s file disappeared from central records. It’s no wonder—the man has informers and friends everywhere. But it contained the only information we had about his early years. What we have now covers the criminal highlights of the last ten years of his life as we were able to reconstruct them, and there is no possible connection between him and the butcher and the bureaucrat.”
“What about the other two?”