by Cara Black
A motorcycle revved, shattering the quiet. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of its headlight, bright and steady. So out of place on this shadowy street. The blinding headlight made it impossible for her to read the cell phone’s display.
“What’s wrong?” Madame Vasseur asked.
“Let’s drive to the Grands Boulevards. We shouldn’t linger.”
“Why?”
The motorcycle was coming the wrong way down the oneway street. A wave of fear hit her. “Get in the car. Now.”
Madame Vasseur stood by the door, still digging for her keys, as the blinding light got closer and closer.
“Watch out.” Instinct took over, and she yanked at Madame Vasseur’s arm, trying to pull her out of the street.
But too late. She heard a low pop so distinctive it chilled her blood. Only a gun with a suppressor made a sound like that.
“Get down!” she yelled, pulling at the woman’s shoulder with one hand and shielding her stomach with the other as they hit the pavement. The woman shook off her grip as Aimée rolled on the sidewalk toward the shelter of a massive doorframe. Another pop pop followed, echoing in the street. Metal pinged, glass shattered by her ear. A stinging in her shoulder, then a cold, oozing wetness.
When the revving of the motorcycle had faded away, Aimée pushed herself up to her hands and knees. In the dim streetlight, she saw something glinting under the car. Bullet casings.
She reached out, grabbed the door’s metal carriage protector and crawled, keeping low. Madame Vasseur sprawled on the cobbles. Blood seeped from the grey-ringed holes in her white linen jacket. Her eyes were wide open to the night sky. The last whine of the motorcycle echoed, and Aimée turned to see the red brake light disappear.
“Non, non,” she gasped. With shaking fingers, she felt for a pulse. Faint but beating. “Hold on … stay with me.” Despair and frustration mingled with regret for this difficult, sad woman.
Where was the woman’s cell phone? She needed to call for help. Frantic, on all fours, she crawled on the dark pavement looking for it. Her fingers came back wet and sticky.
Had the shooter been after Madame Vasseur or her? Cell phone, where was the damn phone? When Aimée tried to stand, waves of dizziness hit her.
“Mesdemoiselles, mesdemoiselles,” came a drunken shout. Two men were coming down the narrow street. Laughing. “Join us for a drink.”
Aimée’s vision blurred. Doubled. The two men were now four men. “Can’t you see? She’s been shot. Call an ambulance.”
Why didn’t these men respond? Why were they staring at her, backing away?
“Now!” she yelled. “Call eighteen.”
She tried to stand, staggered against the side of the Mercedes, clutching her stomach. But her hands were red, sticky. Blood.
Pain choked her, and everything blurred and spun. “Oh my God, my baby …”
Tuesday, 9 P.M.
ZACHARIÉ PACED ACROSS the old tiled bathhouse in the shadowed courtyard, alert to car horns, a muted saxophone, high heels clicking on the pavement. His neck was tense with fear. He squeezed the cell phone so tight he thought he’d break it in half, cursing Jules for the millionth time.
He’d tried every crony and gotten nowhere. Either Jules had paid them off, or they owed him silence. And the piece of merde wouldn’t answer his cell phone.
His palms were wet, perspiration beaded his lip. Dervier and the team, right on schedule, entered the misty courtyard, followed by Jules’s driver, the Corsican with a scar-rippled eyebrow.
Zacharié froze. The Corsican had never been part of the plan.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Boss’s orders.”
Insurance.
“Where’s my daughter?”
The Corsican shrugged.
The team was disappearing one by one into the old water workers’ entrance at the side of the bathhouse. Dervier looked back. “Let’s go, Zacharié.”
“I don’t go in there until I hear from my daughter,” he said to the Corsican. “Call her.”
“You know I can’t. Cell-phone towers will triangulate this location.”
“Like I care? I don’t go in until I talk to her.”
The Corsican hit speed dial on his cell phone. Zacharié grabbed it from his hand.
“Jules? I want my daughter.”
“Soyez calme,” said Jules, “she’s right here. Go ahead, talk to her yourself.”
He heard fumbling, scratching as the phone was handed over.
“Marie-Jo? Are you all right?”
“Papa! Papa, get me out of here.” A gulp. “I’m scared.” Marie-Jo’s voice broke. “Do something, Papa. Zazie’s hurt. Help us.”
Zacharié’s stomach clenched.
Muffled noises, then Jules’s voice. “Finish the job, Zacharié. We’ll meet you afterward, as planned.”
His mind went to the arranged rendezvous spot, the flower stall at the east exit of the Gare de Nord. Originally he’d planned to take the Thalys from there, and he and Marie-Jo would have breakfast in Brussels. A new life.
“I don’t go in and do your job until I see her, Jules.”
“With a rapist on the loose, the area’s crawling with flics. You can’t be too careful.”
Zacharié bit his lip so hard he tasted blood. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Watch the news, Zacharié.” Jules sighed. “That hot female detective’s face is all over the place, looking for a red-haired girl.”
And then the woman with the big, intense eyes flashed in his mind. That leggy pregnant looker on rue Chaptal searching for Marie-Jo’s red-headed friend. He hadn’t told her that Jules had abducted his daughter and the redheaded girl and was going to use the rapist to hide his tracks, because he hadn’t understood until now.
Zacharié wanted to kick the stone, smash the metal drainpipe.
“You complicated everything by kidnapping Marie-Jo and her friend. Stupid, Jules. Not like you. What about the repercussions?”
A sigh. “Bad planning, I admit.”
Zacharié sensed an element of desperation in Jules’s plan. That was a first. “Someone’s got you by the balls.”
Pause. “I need this, Zacharié.”
And now that other people were searching for the girls, too, Jules was risking everything on this little kidnapping insurance scheme. What about this file Zacharié was supposed to steal was so precious that Jules would go to these lengths to ensure Zacharié saw the job through to the end?
If the woman twigged on the girls’ abduction and got too close … He couldn’t worry about that now.
“Do the job and we’re done, Zacharié. Think of your new passports, new country, a new life.”
A thin red laser beam danced on the worn stones. Dervier’s signal—the team were in their positions along the dry vestiges of the ancient river Grange-Batelière. Zacharié needed to hang up the phone now and finish this job—he had no choice. It was beyond his control.
In one last hopeless attempt, he said into the phone, “You want the job done, you bring those girls. Now.”
A deep sigh came over the line. “In fifteen seconds I’m going to shoot off Marie-Jo’s toes, then work my way up unless you perform the job as planned.”
The phone clicked off.
The Corsican smiled and grabbed the phone. “Satisfied?”
“Get the hell out of here.”
In several long strides, the Corsican crossed the damp pavers and disappeared into the street.
Bile rose in Zacharié’s throat. He wanted to spit the sour taste out of his mouth. He was stuck.
Tuesday, 9:20 P.M.
THE BRIGHT GLARE hurt Aimée’s eyes. Her shoulder stung and throbbed. Her head reverberated with the whines of the ambulance’s siren and the beeping from the machines. Her hand flew to her stomach, and she saw the tube in her arm. She moaned into her oxygen mask.
“Blood pressure a hundred and fifty-five over eighty-six,” said one me
dic to the other. Both sapeurs-pompiers, firemen, always the first responders. “Pregnant woman, gunshot wound to the shoulder,” he said into his radio. “Alert: Emergency. Possible preterm labor.”
Preterm labor? Fear scorched her. “My baby, you have to save my baby.” She was shouting. Her words, muffled in the oxygen mask, vaporized with her breath.
She wanted to kick herself free, but restraints strapped her ankles to the gurney. The stark ambulance lighting glared whiter than daytime; the medics poked and read from the machines. What was wrong with these idiots? She thrashed her arms, yanked the mask off. Wetness spread over her legs and ankles; her arms were streaked with blood.
“Check my baby,” she said, gasping.
“Calm down, Madame. We know what we’re doing,” said the frowning medic. “First we have to stop the bleeding. We’re about to apply a compression bandage.”
“Then compress, for God’s sake.” Just one year of premed but she knew the signs: jumping heart rate, elevated blood pressure, all putting her and her baby at risk. She panted. Wild-eyed, she looked around. She needed to center, get control. Something beside her was whirring, and she recognized a smaller version of the ultrasound machine her doctor had used.
“You’re listening to my baby’s heart?”
“First things first,” said the red-cheeked one. “You need to calm down. Leave it to us.”
“Don’t talk to me like an idiote,” she said, trying to breathe deep. What if the trauma stimulated uterine contractions? Why were the first-response team always men?
Oh, God … calm down, she had to calm down.
Cold, viscous gel was rubbed on her exposed stomach, the rest of her covered by a white cotton sheet. She felt pressing on her stomach. Heaviness.
The medic strapped the mask back on. “Breathe deep, again and again,” he said. “No spotting. That’s good. Relax. Keep still so I can listen to your baby’s heartbeat.”
She felt pressure. More heaviness.
“Give me the other gel,” said the medic.
“We’re out,” said his partner with a quick shake of his head. The siren rose, drowning the rest of his answer.
The ambulance made a sharp turn. Stopped with a screech. Cymbals, a wheezing accordion then shouts over the siren.
“Merde! And now a traffic accident, too?” he said. “We need a Doppler to check fetal heartbeat. This one only checks blood flow.”
“You mean it’s not the right one?” she shouted. The mask fogged. She tore it off again. “My baby’s not even six months. Give me something to prevent contractions.”
The medic sucked in his breath. Not good, she could tell.
“We need to prep you.”
A throbbing cramped her stomach. She shook her head as he tried to put the mask back on her. Bit down hard on his finger.
The medic yelled out in pain.
“I feel a contraction.” Tears brimmed her eyes. “You’ve got to save my baby.”
“This will shut her up.” She felt a jab in her arm.
The rest happened in a cold, white blur.
Tuesday, 9:15 P.M.
SWEAT BEADED ZACHARIÉ’S forehead in the moist, decaying air. The team’s headlamp beams bobbed over the lichen-encrusted stone. Water dribbled down the walls, and rats scurried in the dark. Layers upon layers, centuries of muck and detritus surrounded them in this narrow tunnel. Dervier had tunneled into the ancient sewer and excavated with precision. In single file, they stepped over the jagged concrete into a storeroom.
Their headlamp beams caught on silver tea sets, old masters in antique frames and jewelry filling glass display cases. This subterranean storeroom of Hôtel Drouot, the auction house, reminded him of a glorified pawnbroker’s, overflowing for the upcoming auction.
Ramu grinned, took out the tools from his bag. “Like old times, eh?”
Ripe for the team’s picking. And three minutes ahead of schedule.
“Hurry up, old man,” said Tandou, wiping his hands. He was grinning, too.
The cavern storeroom was lined with shelves of porcelain dinner plates, bronze statues, silver bowls, paintings, more display cases of jewelry and even a nineteenth-century mattress-delousing machine. Dervier’s men got to work filling the canvas sacks with the jewelry and smallest items first.
Zacharié spotted his destination, a metal door lit by a lantern. Dervier had already snipped its padlock with his wire cutters—they would replace it on their way out—and Zacharié followed him to a second old, rusted padlock on a second metal door. With a quick tug, Dervier opened the door to reveal a mildewed abri, a bomb shelter from the war. Peeling notices dated March 1942 indicated a thirty-person capacity. Seconds later Dervier cut the third door’s rusted padlock, rubbed olive oil on the door’s hinges and pulled it open. Ahead, a short series of concrete steps led up to the courtyard.
Two key cards were slipped into Zacharié’s hand.
“The yellow for the rez-de-chaussée entrance and the white for the top floor.” Dervier checked his watch. “You’ve got ten minutes from when I disable the alarm. Then I padlock all three doors and trigger open the courtyard exit.”
“I knew you could do it, Dervier.” Zacharié hit his stopwatch. “See you in nine minutes.”
While he went into the next building, Dervier’s crew would be stocking up on a haul worth a good number of zeros to waiting auction houses in Bordeaux, Strasbourg, Aix-en-Provence and Nice. By next week, when the items were discovered missing, Dervier would have re-cemented the tunnel hole and replaced the re-rusted locks on the metal doors.
The added beauty to their plan was that once Dervier disabled the alarm with his remote, Zacharié would be able to enter the temporary Ministry storage depot via the subterranean bomb shelter, only crossing through the building’s unmonitored courtyard, without leaving any trace on the video cameras stationed in the front foyer or street entrance.
A quick in and out.
His goal lay in the temporary repository of Ministry files that had been stored here after a basement had flooded. While his team busied themselves emptying the auction house’s cavern, he’d remove the file Jules had hired him to steal.
There’d be no connection between the jobs. If later, during inventory audits, the file couldn’t be found, it would be assumed it had been misfiled, misrouted to another location in the usual bureaucratic fashion. At least that’s what Jules was counting on.
It took him a minute and a half, according to his stopwatch, to reach the top floor and slide the white key card into the storage room’s lock. A tiny click, and he entered. The grey room smelled of damp and wet paper. Consulting Jules’s diagram, he bypassed cartons, boxes, shelves of files as innocuous as in a doctor’s office. His headlight beam revealing the labels, he located iixx.450dsM, a box like all the others. The Ministry file. He flipped it open with his gloved fingers.
Clipped on top was a note: Addendum in ixx.451dsM1.
Better take that, too.
He slipped both inside his jumpsuit.
He crossed the ivy-covered courtyard to the sewer access door—oiled and left unlocked by Dervier. Once he’d gone down the steps and was back inside the old sewer, Zacharié checked his time in the dripping tunnel. Four minutes ahead of schedule.
He heard a shout followed by a series of muffled pops coming from the auction house’s cavern down the tunnel. His pulse thudded. Shots? This wasn’t part of the plan.
Had the flics appeared?
Zacharié hunched down, terrified for his team, that he’d be next, the job ruined, his Marie-Jo …
A figure climbed over the jagged cement hole out of the cavern. From the silhouette he recognized the Corsican, who was clutching a duffel bag and headed his way.
No way was he supposed to be down here. He should be waiting in the car to move the goods. Zacharié’s hands shook. It all came together now—Jules had used the Corsican to betray them.
But Zacharié had the file Jules wanted. His mind raced, debating wheth
er he should escape, make a run for it through the sewer. Risk everything?
But that would put Marie-Jo in more danger and catch him up in a world of revenge. He had no weapon, no way to defend himself. Seconds, he had seconds to decide.
The Corsican paused, as if listening. Zacharié tried not to breathe. If he ran, he’d be heard the moment his feet splashed through the puddles.
But the Corsican stepped back into the hole.
No way could he trust the Corsican or Jules. He had to act. Wasting no time, Zacharié edged behind the metal sewer door, careful to keep it half open, as Dervier had left it.
A moment later the Corsican’s running footsteps splashed in the water, headed toward the door. Zacharié heard metal on metal, the snick and click, the unmistakable sound of a cartridge loaded. The Corsican was going to kill him, would already have killed him if Zacharié hadn’t been running so far ahead of time. Sweat streamed down Zacharié’s neck. He held his breath, kept his body rigid until he heard footsteps go through.
Un, deux and on trois Zacharié slammed the sewer door shut behind the Corsican.
He tried to flip the bolt back. But it stuck and wouldn’t lock. Pounding and muffled yells sounded from the Corsican on the other side. His arms strained, pushing the bolt down, progressing a centimeter at a time. Grunting and heaving, he felt it wedge into place.
The Corsican would have to scale the two-story stonewalled courtyard to escape, or enter the building and set off the alarms. Zacharié had put him out of commission for now.
Panting, Zacharié ran back to the auction-house cavern to find his team. He skidded on the old tiles, sticky with blood. Horror-struck, he found his childhood friends sprawled among the jewelry glittering in his headlamp. Gunshots to the backs of their heads.
A sob rose in the back of his throat. Jules had betrayed him and his friends, hired the Corsican to seal their deal permanently. Zacharié would have been next. The traitor had escalated from felony to group murder.
Fear ground in his gut. How could he trust that Marie-Jo would be safe? He’d never known Jules to go this far, to take such risks—what was in the file that made him so desperate?