by Josh Lanyon
Taylor’s face tightened. “I’m not one hundred percent sure, no. And I’m not taking a chance with my family.”
“Okay. Okay. I’m not here to argue with you. I just got the okay from Stone. I’m working the art theft angle with you.”
Taylor’s expression came to life then. He looked less thrilled than Will might have expected. “Why would you be? Your theory is —”
There were plenty of things Will could have replied. He cut straight to the chase. “Because we’re partners.”
Taylor’s eyes flickered. “Yeah, only we’re not. Remember?”
“You know what I mean. It doesn’t have anything to do with where we’re posted. We’re a team.”
Taylor looked away. A muscle in his jaw moved. His eyes rose to meet Will’s. “Are we? Where does David Bradley fit in?”
It must have cost him to say that aloud.
In the main room the other agents were making plans for traveling to the coast. Will stepped away from the door. He kept his voice low. “My memory might be shaky on certain points, but I meant what I said in the car. Nobody means more to me than you do. So if I’m going to have to choose who I’m watching over for the next forty-eight hours, I’m watching you.”
Taylor gave him an unblinking look. Then he smiled. It was an odd smile. “That’s because you believe me about the stolen paintings. If you thought the threat to Bradley was —”
“This is going to come as a shock to you, MacAllister, but you’re often wrong. About a lot of things.”
Taylor’s gaze dropped. He shrugged, clearly unconvinced on that point.
Will let it go. This wasn’t the time. When it was all over, they were going to have a serious and uninterrupted talk. As crazy as this whole amnesia thing was, it had allowed him to see their situation from the outside looking in. And what he saw was pretty damned alarming.
Right now they had other things — even if not more important things — to deal with. “So what’s our next move?”
Taylor hesitated. “We’ve got a few hours. Grab some dinner, I guess? Make a plan?”
Now that Will thought about it, he hadn’t eaten since that morning. Maybe that persistent yawning emptiness inside him was just hunger. He nodded agreement.
As they walked down the grand marble staircase on their way out of the embassy, Taylor quickly caught him up on recent events.
“But Hinault did exist,” Will objected. “He lived in Burbank. He was married and owned a business.”
“He existed in the States, yes.”
“Helloco lived forty-something years under a false identity?”
“Yep.”
“With his brother?”
“It kind of looks that way.”
“So Yves and Yves’ wife must have been complicit too.”
“Yes. A regular family affair.”
“How does that help us?”
“I don’t know that it does. It eliminates some of the possibilities, though.”
And it raised some.
Neither of them had much to say on the drive to Will’s place. Taylor had to concentrate on his driving — the Parisian evening traffic was a lot trickier to negotiate — and by then Will was starting to feel all his bumps and bruises. He was very tired. In fact, there was nothing he’d have liked more than to go to bed, pull the covers over his head, and wake up with his reality — whatever it was — restored to him.
He was increasingly impatient with the sensation of groping in the dark for his memories. Amnesia struck him as weak and gutless. He hadn’t chosen it, but he was still angry with himself for giving in to it. The doctors had described his condition as retrograde or declarative memory loss, a kind of posttraumatic amnesia most likely resulting from a combination of shock and head injury, and likely to be mostly temporary.
Already things were starting to come back to Will in unsettling lurches. While he’d been working on his own that afternoon, he’d remembered stocking up on bottles of French beer because Taylor liked trying different beers. He’d remembered buying soft Egyptian cotton sheets for his bed — for Taylor. The memory had dried his mouth, but he’d recognized it for the truth. And he remembered that he had bought a small, expensive possible birthday gift — or possible something else gift — that was currently sitting at the bottom of his underwear drawer. And the memory of that had reached out and grabbed him by the throat, nearly throttling him.
So whether he remembered or not, whether he thought it was a good idea or not, he and Taylor were most definitely romantically involved. He trusted himself enough to know he wouldn’t have made that choice lightly or carelessly. He’d known what he was doing, and that meant he needed to show Taylor he honored that commitment.
As for Taylor… He’d been through hell during the past twenty-four hours. Will had put him through hell. The memory of Taylor’s stricken expression when Will shoved him away wasn’t something Will was going to forget anytime soon, amnesia or no amnesia, and it was one reason he was determined to stick to Taylor like glue. No way was he letting Taylor walk into potential trouble because his mind was distracted or because he simply didn’t care enough to be careful. The very possibility of that sent Will’s heart into thunderous overdrive.
For all his stubborn resilience, sometimes Taylor took things too much to heart.
Still preoccupied with their separate reflections, they reached Will’s apartment and went inside. In unspoken accord, they went downstairs to the kitchen and started to put a meal together. They didn’t speak — didn’t need to — and Will found the familiar rhythm of being together like this soothing. It brought back good memories of winding down after other operations.
As far as Will recalled, they’d never cooked beef bourguignon together, but the old mind meld seemed to be working again. Will cubed the stewing beef while Taylor chopped the vegetables.
“Where do you think the paintings are hidden?” Will asked while the oil heated in the pan.
Taylor didn’t hesitate, so he must have been giving it some thought. “Père Lachaise Cemetery.”
“Because Helloco kept painting it?”
“Because it’s huge and crowded with lots of tombs and crypts and nooks and crannies. Lots of great potential hiding places.” Taylor scraped the vegetables from the cutting board into the heavy skillet. “And, yeah, because Helloco kept painting it. He was obsessed with the place. That’s got to mean something.”
“You really believe the bomb threats were all about setting up this giant diversion so he could retrieve the paintings?”
“I do. I’m guessing Helloco already has buyers lined up because transporting the paintings would be complicated and dangerous.”
“Nothing he ever shied from before.”
Taylor considered that. “True.”
Will poured enough wine and bouillon to cover the meat and vegetables. “Why do you think he came back now?” He covered the pan. The dish would need to simmer about three hours, but that was no problem. Taylor was adamant that they didn’t want to show up at the graveyard until well past closing hours.
“I don’t know. Maybe he needed the money. He must have always intended to at some point. Maybe he knew it was now or never. He’s not getting any younger.” Taylor drank from his bottle of beer. He flicked a drop from his full lower lip, and Will found himself mesmerized by that unconsciously sexy gesture.
“Yeah. Well.” Will filled a glass with water. He’d have preferred wine or, better yet, bourbon, but his brains were scrambled enough. “And our plan is what? We’re going to stroll around the cemetery until we spot Helloco with his trusty spade?”
Taylor laughed. Will’s heart lightened. It felt like it had been a very long time since he’d heard Taylor laugh.
“No. I’ve got a list of the gravesites we need to check out.”
“Aren’t there something like seventy thousand graves?”
“Seventy-something plots. Over three hundred thousand graves.”
“Please tell me you
narrowed the list?”
Taylor’s eyes tilted. He seemed to be thoroughly enjoying his private joke. “Don’t worry. We’re only going to be checking out the graves marked Hinault. ”
* * * * *
Chopin’s grave was alight with flowers and burning candles. Bright moonlight illuminated the downbent head of Music atop the pale pedestal and gilded the composer’s profile within the stone medallion beneath the statue. The profusion of red roses ringing the tomb rustled in an invisible breeze.
“Wait. I think maybe we’re going the wrong way.” Taylor stopped walking. The moonlight also delineated his features as he studied the map he’d purchased from the florist shop outside the walled city of the dead.
Will peered over Taylor’s shoulder. The night air smelled of Taylor’s — actually Will’s — soap, damp earth, and sycamores.
“We have to go back.” Taylor folded the map again.
“Don’t think I’m criticizing, but —”
“We’re not lost.”
“Okay. But if —”
“This way,” Taylor said briskly, turning back the way they had come. Will followed.
Taylor was a little in the lead as they started up two sets of stairs, turned right toward the intersection of small chapels, and turned right again onto avenue Laterale du sud. They took the steps of avenue Transversale #1 briskly, the pound of their boots in perfect time as they moved — straight to a dead end.
Taylor swore.
They stared up at the towering obelisk to the right.
The gravesites at Père Lachaise encompassed everything from simple, unadorned headstones to towering monuments like the obelisk puncturing the heavy canopy of stars above them. There were statues too numerous to count, fenced plots, and even elaborate minichapels dedicated to the memory of a well-known person or family, and all of it crammed together in an architectural hodgepodge. Many of the moss-covered tombs provided perfect hiding places, roughly the size and shape of phone booths, with just enough space for a mourner — or a shooter.
One hundred acres of potential ambush, in Will’s opinion. The cemetery — or park, if you had a taste for the macabre — was enclosed by a massive wall, its maze of dirt and gray cobblestone paths lined with five thousand and more chestnut and sycamore trees. There was no rhyme or reason to the layout as far as Will could see.
A motion to the left, and they both drew their pistols.
A pale cat walked delicately across the top of a headstone and vanished with a flick of its tail.
Both men relaxed. They’d already noted the strange number of cats prowling the grounds.
“Back,” Taylor said tersely.
They retraced their footsteps. Scattered flower petals whispered against the cobblestones, blew like grave dust across the grass. Overhead, the stars glittered in the midnight vault of sky. The same stars that had watched over the cemetery for centuries.
“It seems like you still have feelings for Bradley,” Taylor said suddenly.
Will threw him a quick look, but there was a conspicuous lack of lighting along the avenues and boulevards of Père Lachaise.
Taylor’s tone was neutral. Will kept his tone neutral too. “I like him, sure.”
“It’s got to be more than that. If you can remember being with him but not me.”
“I don’t know why my brain made that jump,” Will said honestly. “I’m sorry for the hurt that caused you. “
“This way.” Taylor turned and headed up a small stone staircase. At the top of the steps was a large urn. The plaque underneath it read HINAULT. Taylor sighed. “What do you think?”
“I still think we’re looking for a tomb or a chapel.”
“Agreed.”
Over the course of the long evening, they had eliminated thirty of the forty-three possible sites labeled Hinault. That still left a busy night ahead of them.
Will said, “On the plus side, this place must have changed a lot in forty-something years. Helloco is probably as lost as we are.”
“Unless he’s on his way to Normandy,” Taylor said darkly.
“No.”
“We don’t know that for sure.”
“You’ve got good instincts, MacAllister. I’m going with you.”
Taylor huffed a breath — a sure sign he was on edge. Will reached out and hooked an arm around his neck, pulling him close in a rough hug. And God, it felt good — right — to hold Taylor. Even that briefly. Even feeling Taylor’s instant tension and instinctive drawing back.
Will said against his ear, “I don’t know why this happened to us, but we’ll get through it. I swear to you.”
Taylor freed himself, turning his back to Will. Will watched the quick rise and fall of his broad shoulders in the pale moonlight.
Will took mercy on him. “Are you sure the police know we’re here? It feels like we’re the only people in this entire damned labyrinth.”
“They know. Somewhere out there we’re supposed to have some backup.”
“Where to next?”
Taylor turned. “I could tear this list in half and we could split up. We’d cover a lot more ground that way.”
“We don’t do so well on our own.”
Taylor snorted. “Give it a rest, Brandt. I know you’re sorry. I’m not blaming you. Let’s just get through this. Then we’ll see where we are.”
Will nodded. They both stiffened at the distinct sound of a muffled bang drifting through the wall of trees.
“Explosives,” Will identified.
“Where? Where did that come from?”
“North.” Will pointed. They were already running, gaining speed, separating as they headed for the sound and the hint of smoke that still drifted on the night breeze.
Taylor ran like a deer, with a fine disregard for low fences and graves alike. Will tore after him, but he’d never been quite as fast as Taylor and he was slower now, thanks to his assorted injuries. His head pounded with each footfall as he sprinted around the gravestones and statues that seemed to rise in his path like pop-up targets in a training course.
As Taylor pulled farther ahead — vaulting the obstacles Will veered around — Will put on more speed, swearing under his breath. It was like watching Riley jetting after a cat. He’d need fucking wings to catch him.
He watched Taylor scramble over a short wall and disappear. A sudden dread filled him.
The wall was carved with a long row of ornate, smiling skulls.
Memory opened up beneath his feet, and once again Will was in the catacombs feeling the earth tremble, the roar of the ceiling giving way, the screams of the men around him as the lights went out. His final vision: the black and cavernous smile of a yellowed, cracked skull.
And his only thought — his final thought: Taylor.
A distant and unmistakable pop bounced off the limestone and marble. Adrenaline flashed through his veins, and Will hurdled over the low wall of skulls and shot across the wet stretch of grass. His feet thudded on the damp earth.
He crossed another cobblestone walk and faced another city block of tall sepulchers and tombs. The silence was eerie. Where the hell was the cemetery security or the police who were to provide backup?
Heart thundering, Will pulled his weapon. He wound his way through the monuments, sticking closely to cover until he came to a short set of steps leading down to a small crypt. From behind the shed-sized building came the grating scrape of stone on stone.
Will pressed back against the wall, stole a quick look around the corner. His heart stopped.
Taylor lay facedown on the walkway in front of a comparatively plain square of limestone, about the size of a large sofa. An elderly man dressed in black was busily using a crowbar to pry open the face of the tomb.
As Will stared, Taylor stirred and tried to push up. The elderly man turned, made an exasperated sound, and raised his crowbar to bring it down on Taylor’s head.
“Don’t do it.” Will stepped out from behind cover and brought his weapon up.
Will spared a quick look. “MacAllister?”
Taylor muttered something, sounding reassuringly alive and pissed off.
“Are you okay?” Now there was a silly question. But somehow it was the only one that mattered.
Helloco soundlessly stepped back into the concealing shadows.
“Don’t take another step,” Will warned him, half his attention still on Taylor, who made another clumsy attempt to push up.
Will stepped forward, locking a hand in Taylor’s collar and dragging him out of range of Helloco’s feet or reach. It wasn’t easy to do and still keep his pistol trained on Helloco. Helloco remained still and watchful.
“Come on, MacAllister. Get it together.”
Taylor muttered something that might have been assent or just obscene.
Will kept his gaze on Helloco. The moonlight silhouetted the old man’s aquiline features and the silver of his hair. He never said a word, his black eyes as hollow and unrevealing as any death’s head.
“Turn around. Lock your hands behind your head,” Will ordered.
The old man didn’t move.
“Do it.”
“Shit…” Taylor bit off the rest as he made it to his knees, using one hand to balance and the other to grab for the black wrought iron fencing of a nearby tomb.
Will ignored him, but Helloco either misread him or figured he had one chance and one chance only, because he suddenly snatched at his waistband and brought up a gleaming and efficient-looking Beretta.
Will shot him.
The bang of his SIG Sauer crashed through the forest of stone and iron, reverberating around the monuments and statuary.
It wasn’t possible to miss at that range. Helloco clutched his chest, staggered back, and fell over the tomb. Taylor snapped upright, turning to Will and then the fallen Helloco in shock.
“Jesus.”
“He was armed.” And Taylor had been perfectly positioned to get caught in the crossfire. No way was Will taking chances with that. He stepped around the tomb and looked down. The pistol lay a few inches from Helloco’s outstretched fingers. The center of his chest glistened in a pool of spreading darkness. Helloco’s eyes were wide open. They stared fixedly up at the moon. Will watched him for a few seconds.