“Because I had to find out more about you, about your involvement in this case and your motivations. Most important, I had to gather enough information to make it impossible for the Bureau to take me off the case. And, just between you and me, I hate being humiliated. And last night someone definitely got the jump on me.”
“But why pretend to be a jazz pianist?”
“It just popped into my head. I’ve always liked jazz, and Kenny, my best friend, really is a saxophone player.”
“So what do you suggest we do now?”
“First we go to the hematology lab on the Upper East Side to drop off a sample of the blood from your blouse. The Bureau works with that lab often. They’re incredibly expensive, but they have the best equipment and staff. They should be able to get us a genetic profile within two hours.”
“Good idea. And then what?”
“We drive to Boston, get our stories straight, go to the field office, and tell them everything we know. And we pray that they don’t take me off the investigation.”
Watching Gabriel, she noticed that his appearance had changed since his real identity was revealed. The jovial jazz pianist had given way to a serious cop. His look was darker, his features harder, his expression much more worried. It was like meeting him for the first time.
“All right, I’ll go with you,” she agreed. “But on one condition: I want to be part of the investigation.”
“That’s not up to me.”
“Officially or unofficially, we work as a team: you give me your information and I give you mine. Otherwise, we go our separate ways now—and you can kiss the blood sample goodbye. Take it or leave it.”
Gabriel removed a cigarette from the pack he’d found in the Honda. He lit it and took a few nervous drags, giving himself time to think.
Alice watched him from the corner of her eye. She recognized him now as one of her own kind: a monomaniacal cop prepared to do anything to stay on the case. The kind of cop who stayed up nights trying to get into the heads of criminals in order to understand their motives. The kind of cop who considered catching murderers an almost sacred duty.
He took out the keys to the Mustang and dropped them on the table. “All right, it’s a deal,” he said, stubbing out his cigarette in an ashtray. “Let’s go.”
15
Prepare for War
THE HEMATOLOGY LABORATORY occupied the top floor of an ultramodern building with a crystalline façade located on Fifth Avenue between Mount Sinai Hospital and the Museum of the City of New York.
It didn’t take Gabriel and Alice long to reach the border of the Upper East Side and Spanish Harlem. Luckily, it was midafternoon, so there were plenty of parking spaces. They found a spot on one of the streets surrounding the immense medical complex.
“Wait for me in the car, okay?” Gabriel said.
“Are you kidding? No way—I’m coming with you.”
“All right.” Gabriel sighed. “But let me do the talking. I’m leading this investigation. Understood?”
“Got it, Chief,” she mocked, opening her door.
Gabriel got out of the car too. “And let’s not waste any time, okay?” he said.
Alice nodded and followed him into the lobby and then the elevator. At this time of day, the lab reception area was practically empty. Behind the desk, an employee was eating a salad from a plastic container.
Gabriel introduced himself and asked to see Eliane Pelletier, the lab’s deputy director.
“She’s French?” said Alice, surprised.
“No, she’s from Quebec. And I’d better warn you, she’s kind of strange,” he said, raising an eyebrow.
“Meaning?”
“I’ll let you figure it out for yourself.”
Eliane Pelletier appeared almost immediately at the end of the corridor.
“Gabe, my boy,” she called to him from down the hall. “Have you brought your fiancée to see me?”
She was a small, sturdy woman with short gray hair. She wore square-framed glasses and a white lab coat open over a baggy black tunic. Her face, round and soft, was like a Russian doll’s.
“I’m so happy you finally settled down!” she teased, giving him a hug.
He took care not to prolong the joke.
“Eliane, this is Captain Schafer, from the Paris Criminal Division.”
“Bonjour, ma jolie,” she said, embracing Alice. “A Frenchie, eh?”
They followed her into her office.
“We don’t have much time, Eliane. Can you do a DNA test based on this blood sample? Our labs are overwhelmed.”
Alice took the evidence bag with the scrap of blouse in it from her satchel and handed it to the scientist.
“I’ll give it to one of my biologists,” she promised, taking the bag. “What are you looking for, exactly?”
“A usable genetic profile. How quickly can you do it?”
“Is six hours okay?” she asked, adjusting her glasses.
“Are you serious?”
“Well, I could reduce the DNA extraction and amplification time by using miniature probes, but it’s more expensive.”
“Just do it as fast as you can. As soon as you have the results, send them to Agent Thomas Krieg, along with your invoice. I’d like to call him so he knows to expect it. Can I use your phone?”
“Make yourself at home, Gabe. I’ll get right to work.”
And she walked out, leaving them alone in the office.
“What’s your cell phone number?” he asked. “If you don’t mind, I’ll give it to Thomas so he can get hold of us easily.”
Alice nodded and wrote her new number on a Post-It that was lying on the desk.
While Gabriel called his colleague, she went out into the hallway. She switched on her phone and called her father’s number, but it went straight to his terse voice-mail greeting: “Alain Schafer. Not here right now. Leave a message,” growled a grumpy voice.
“Papa, it’s Alice. Call me when you can. It’s urgent. Very urgent.”
She hung up. After a few seconds of reflection, she decided to call Seymour.
“It’s me again.”
“Thank God. I was getting worried. Have you spoken to Keyne?”
“Yes, he claims to be an FBI agent based in Boston.”
“Seriously? This guy is taking you for a ride, Alice!”
“You can try checking it, but I think he’s telling the truth this time. He’s investigating a murder similar to the Erik Vaughn killings.”
“I’ll call Sharman, that guy in Washington who we helped on the Petreus case.”
“Thanks, Seymour. Are you still at work? I’ve got another favor to ask.”
He couldn’t hold back a sigh. “Alice, favors for you is all I’ve done today!”
“I want you to take your car and—”
“Now? I can’t. My shift doesn’t end till eleven.”
She ignored his objections. “Take the highway to Metz, then continue on to Sarreguemines.”
“Alice, that’s over two hundred miles!”
She went on as if he hadn’t said anything. “There’s an old, abandoned sugar factory between Sarreguemines and Sarrebourg. I don’t know exactly where it is, but ask Castelli to find it for you—there can’t be that many sugar factories in the area.”
“I said no, Alice!”
“Take a flashlight with you, a large pair of pliers, and some glow sticks. Call me when you get there. I want you to check something.”
“Alice, we’re talking about an eight-hour round trip!”
“I wouldn’t ask you if it wasn’t important. Please, if you’re my friend, do this!” she begged. “Damn it, you’re the only person I can trust right now!”
Sensing her distress, Seymour yielded. “At least tell me what I’m supposed to be looking for.” He sighed.
“A corpse, I hope.”
The road.
Speed.
The landscape rushing past.
The roar of the V-8 engine.<
br />
On the car radio, the timeless voice of Otis Redding.
A huge tachometer in the center of the antique dashboard.
And the amber and honey highlights in Alice’s hair.
They had left Manhattan and driven for almost two hours, crossing through most of Connecticut on I-95, then getting on I-91, which took them north. Traffic was moving easily, the sky cloudless, the road edged with pine trees and occasional ginkgos, elms, maples, and oaks. They had hardly exchanged a word on the trip, both of them lost in their thoughts, alone in their suffering.
The Shelby GT drove like a dream. Behind the wheel, Gabriel imagined himself for a moment as a young man in the sixties, proud of his Mustang, driving his girlfriend to see the latest Steve McQueen movie while listening to Roy Orbison or the Doors and worrying about being drafted, maybe sent to Vietnam.
He turned toward Alice. Her face hard and closed, she had sunk into her own thoughts, fingers tensed around her cell phone, waiting for a call. With her army jacket, her pale face, high cheekbones, and hair tied in a ponytail, she was beautiful in a wild, almost warlike way. But that was hardly surprising; Alice Schafer was at war. Behind the toughness of her features, though, it was possible to glimpse, now and then, the shadow of another woman, softer and more peaceful.
He wondered what she had been like before. Before the tragedy. Smiling, calm, happy? Could he have fallen in love with such a woman if he’d met her on the streets of Paris? Would he have approached her? Would she have looked at him? He played the scene over in his head, enjoying these mental ramblings.
On the car radio, Otis Redding was replaced by the Clash, then U2, then Eminem, and the spell was broken. Goodbye to the 1960s and these romantic digressions. Back to reality.
He glanced again at Alice, catching her eye as she rearranged her ponytail.
“Keep your eyes on the road, Keyne.”
“I’d like you to explain something to me.”
He left the phrase hanging. She held his gaze.
“How can you be so sure that the fingerprints on the syringe aren’t Vaughn’s?”
She shrugged, visibly irritated. “It’s an assumption, not a certainty.”
“Don’t bullshit me. In spite of all the evidence, you haven’t believed for a moment that Erik Vaughn is in the U.S. I’ve interrogated enough suspects to know when someone is lying to me.”
She defended herself half-heartedly: “What gives you the right to—”
“Let me remind you that I am the only cop with the authority to investigate this case!” he interrupted, raising his voice. “I’ve been aboveboard with you. I gave you all my information, even though I didn’t have to.”
She sighed.
He went on: “You said you wanted us to work as a team and you asked me to plead your case with my bosses so they’ll let you join the investigation. Fine, I agree, even if I’m risking my own credibility. But if we’re partners, we have to tell each other everything. Okay?”
She nodded. This was the type of speech she liked.
“So I’m asking you again, Alice: How can you be certain that the prints on the syringe are not Vaughn’s?”
She massaged her temples and took a deep breath, then confessed.
“Because Vaughn is dead, Keyne. He’s been dead a long time.”
I remember…
Less than two years ago
I remember.
December 5, 2011.
The pale brightness of a hospital room.
A low winter sun, its light barely leaking between the blinds.
The foul smell of antiseptics and microwaved meals.
Wanting to die.
Two weeks have passed since I was attacked by Erik Vaughn, two weeks since Paul’s death. I am lying on my back in bed, staring into space. There’s an antibiotic drip attached to my forearm. Despite all the painkillers I’m being given, the slightest movement cuts into my abdomen. Despite all the antidepressants and antianxiety drugs I’m taking, the slightest thought rips open my heart.
By the time the paramedics got me to the hospital, I had lost a lot of blood. They did an ultrasound that confirmed that the baby was dead. The knife blade had perforated the wall of my uterus, severed an artery, and damaged my small intestine.
I had never needed Paul by my side more than I did at that moment. I needed to feel his presence, to mourn our baby together, united in our pain, and to ask his forgiveness. Forgive me, forgive me…
Just before they took me into the operating room, they told me he was dead. Just before they opened up my abdomen to remove my murdered baby. The last ties holding me to life were broken. I screamed with rage and despair, hitting out at the doctors who tried to calm me, before I sank under the waves of anesthesia.
Later, when the operation was over, some bastard of a doctor told me that I had been “lucky in a way.” My pregnancy meant that the fetus occupied so much space that my organs were pushed toward the back. So my baby took the full brunt of the knife wounds that otherwise would probably have killed me. My baby saved my life.
This idea is unbearable to me.
My internal wounds were sutured and part of my intestine removed. They told me that they had managed to save my uterus, meaning I could get pregnant again in the future.
As if, after all this, I might ever have another love, another pregnancy, another baby.
My mother came on the train to visit me but stayed only twenty minutes. My brother left a message on my voice mail. My sister just sent me a text. Thankfully, Seymour drops by twice a day and does all he can to console and encourage me. The other guys from the division come too, but in their silences I can sense their disappointment, their anger—not only did I double-cross them, but I screwed up one of the department’s biggest investigations in years.
I see it in their eyes as they stand at the foot of this bed: the bitterness, the reproach. I know what they’re all thinking—that it’s my fault Erik Vaughn is still at large. However horrible the things that happened to me, I have no one to blame but myself.
The pills I am given leave me in a haze of half-consciousness. Anesthetizing my brain, numbing my heart—this is the only way the doctors have found to keep me from slitting my wrists or jumping out the window.
Despite my wooziness, I hear the shrill creak of the door as it opens to reveal the heavy figure of my father. I turn to watch as he moves slowly toward my bed. Alain Schafer in all his splendor: salt-and-pepper mane, drawn features, three-day beard. He’s dressed in the same cop “uniform” he always wears—leather coat with a fur lining, turtleneck sweater, worn jeans, square-toed boots. On his wrist is an old steel Rolex Daytona just like the one Belmondo wore in Fear Over the City—a gift from my mother the year before I was born.
“How are you doing, champ?” he asks, dragging over a chair to sit next to me.
Champ. His old childhood nickname for me. He hasn’t called me that in twenty-five years. A memory emerges of him taking me to tennis tournaments on the weekends when I was a kid. It’s true that we won plenty of trophies together—me on the court and him in the stands. He always knew what to say and when to say it. Always knew how to encourage me with his eyes. The love of victory, at any price.
My father comes to see me every day. Most often in the evenings; he stays with me until I fall asleep. He’s the only one who understands me, who doesn’t judge me. The only one who defends me, because in all likelihood he would have acted the same way. An adrenaline junkie, he too would have risked everything; he too would have gone alone, gun raised, head down.
“I went to see your mother at the hotel,” he says now, opening a leather case. “She gave me something I’ve been asking her about for years.”
He hands me a photo album bound in faded cloth. I struggle to sit up, switch on the lamp above my bed, and turn the pages separated by glassine paper.
The album is from 1975, the year I was born. Pictures are stuck to the thick cardboard pages with captions written in faded ballpoint be
low each one.
The first photos are from the spring of that year. I see my mother, six months pregnant. I’d forgotten how much I look like her. Forgotten, too, how much my parents loved each other back then. As I flip through the album, a whole era comes to life through these yellowed photographs. I see the little studio apartment they shared on Rue Delambre in Montparnasse. The psychedelic orange wallpaper in the living area; the egg-shaped chair; the cube shelves filled with vinyl albums by Dylan, Hendrix, and Brassens; a Bakelite telephone; a poster of the Saint-Etienne soccer club at the height of its glory.
In every single picture, my parents are smiling and obviously thrilled at the prospect of becoming parents. They kept everything related to the big event, including the blood-test result that had announced my mother’s pregnancy, the first ultrasound, ideas for names scrawled in a spiral-bound notebook: Emma or Alice for a girl, Julien or Alexandre for a boy.
I turn the page and my throat constricts with emotion. The maternity ward on the day of my birth. A newborn baby screaming in her father’s arms. Beneath this picture, I recognize my mother’s handwriting: July 12, 1975: Our little Alice is here! And she’s just as sensible as her mom and dad!
Stuck to the opposite page is my hospital ID bracelet and another photograph taken a few hours later. This time, “little Alice” is sleeping peacefully in her crib, watched over by her parents, who have dark bags under their gleaming, euphoric eyes. And, again, my mother’s handwriting: We are starting a new life, full of new feelings. We are now parents.
Bitter tears roll down my cheeks at the description of these feelings, which I will never experience.
“Why the hell are you showing me this?” I say, pushing the album away.
Then I notice that my father is wet-eyed too.
“After your mother gave birth to you, I was the one who gave you your first bath and your first bottle,” he tells me. “Never in my life have I felt as moved as I was then. That day, when I took you in my arms, I made you a promise.”
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