Gavin’s face fell. “I was in a rush and...”
She remembered he’d decided to come instead of going to Christopher’s wedding. He probably hadn’t been his usual self when he packed.
Putting an arm around him, she gave him a squeeze. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. Thanks for coming out here to help me.”
His expression brightened. He loved to help. She just wished he hadn’t come out to help her in what might turn out to be too dangerous a situation.
They came out above ground at one end of the posh Boulevard Haussmann near the famous Galeries Lafayette. Ryenne set a fast pace on the crowded sidewalk. “Amazingly, Chantal’s boutique is open on Sundays,” she said. “It’s practically unheard of here, so it must serve an international clientele. There are several hotels in the area.”
Gavin glanced around with wide eyes and his mouth agape. “Paris is beautiful.”
“You’re welcome.” Ryenne laughed and realized this was his first view of the city. Wait until he saw the Eiffel Tower in person.
Tourists in sneakers and shorts shared the sidewalk with locals in sun dresses and heels. Backpacks and shopping bags jostled for space. Gavin clearly loved it, especially the high-end shops and the beautiful clothes displayed in the windows.
Ryenne stopped in front of a narrow stone building with iron balconies on the upper floors, sandwiched between a brasserie with a red awning and a book store with a green awning. Behind them, a motorcycle sat under a leafy tree. The window boasted two headless mannequins in what Ryenne assumed must be the latest fashions. She wouldn’t know. She wore her usual jeans and a tank top. It was too warm for her leather jacket, but she never left home without her shit-kicking boots. After all, she never knew when she might have to kick the shit out of a rogue.
Inside, the air-conditioning almost made her wish for her jacket. But the sight of Chantal’s smooth honey-blond hair flowing through the air as she turned toward the door made Ryenne’s blood boil.
When Chantal caught sight of Ryenne, her face hardened and her gaze searched the street outside. “What are you doing here?” she hissed.
“I’ve come for answers,” Ryenne said.
“You have to leave.”
“Not until you tell us why you’re dogging Lucien,” Gavin said. “You don’t get to take him back when you decide you’re ready.”
Chantal looked from him back to Ryenne. “This has nothing to do with you. Please leave.”
“Nothing to do with her?” Gavin asked, voice incredulous.
“Who was the guy with you at the restaurant last week? And at the club?” Ryenne asked. “Is he your boyfriend?”
Chantal’s face blanched.
“Bitch, if you have a new boyfriend, why the hell are you chasing after Lucien?” Gavin asked.
Ryenne sighed but she was glad to have him on her side.
“You have to go,” Chantal whispered, face still white, eyes wide with fear.
Ryenne glanced around but there was no one else in the store and no one paying attention to them outside. “What’s wrong, Chantal? Talk to me. Maybe we can help you.”
“If they see you here, they’ll kill us.”
Ryenne glanced around again. “Who will? Why? Did the Fangs put you up to it?”
Chantal’s face went even whiter. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and shook her head. Through rigid lips she hissed, “You must leave. You’re putting me in danger.”
“Let us help you,” Ryenne said.
“I can’t. Get out of here. Please,” she added, desperation coloring her tone.
Ryenne nodded. She wouldn’t get more out of Chantal like this. She’d have to think of a way to convince her to talk, maybe somewhere she felt safe. “Okay, but if you change your mind, you know where to find me.”
She led the way outside and strode back to the metro station without looking around, in case the Fangs were watching Chantal’s shop.
Gavin caught up to her before she descended the stairs. “Do you think she’ll change her mind?”
Ryenne shook her head. “Don’t know, but I think she’ll stop calling my boyfriend.” Actually, Ryenne was more worried about the Fangs knowing she’d been there. And now knowing about Gavin.
If anything happened to him because of her, she’d never forgive herself.
THIRTEEN
Monday was cooler outside than it had been the previous week and, thanks to jet lag, Gavin had risen very early and made enough noise in the bathroom to wake Ryenne. He was staying in one of the two guest rooms at the back of the top floor, across from the room she shared with Lucien.
She joined him downstairs for an early breakfast at the kitchen table.
The sounds of TV floated in from the salon where the girls waited for Emma and Pascal to come down. Lucien had left for a run while it was still dark outside. He hadn’t talked to Ryenne yet about the call from Chantal, and Ryenne hadn’t told him about her visit to his ex.
“What are we going to do today?” Gavin asked. “Sight-seeing?” His face took on a hopeful smile.
Ryenne hated to ruin it for him. “Wish we could but we still have the Fang situation to deal with. We don’t know what their next move will be, but they’ve made threats. Grieux told us to expect war. It wouldn’t be safe for us to split up now or stray too far from the house.”
Gavin nodded but his lower lip protruded in a slight pout.
“I hope we end this soon so I can show you around,” she said.
“So, what are we doing, then?” His expression changed to one of resignation.
“What you do best, my friend. Research. We need you to find out everything you can about Grieux and Lord Enterprises in France. We don’t yet know what will work as ammo against them and we don’t know what we’re looking for, so just go as deep as you can.”
Gavin nodded and drained the last of his coffee. “I’ll be upstairs in my room with my laptop. I’ll let you know if anything stands out.”
“Thanks, Gav.” After he left the kitchen, Ryenne went to the office to check in with Françoise. “Anything new?”
“No, thank goodness.” Françoise looked up from the computer and took off her glasses. “Could he have been trying to merely scare us into accepting their offer? Maybe he’s waiting to hear from us.”
Ryenne didn’t think so but Françoise knew Jean Grieux better than any of them. He had already shown he had no compunctions about murder and she was glad all the Malraux were under one roof.
The phone rang and Françoise answered it. At first she sounded happy to hear from the person on the other end of the line, but soon her posture straightened and her face froze in an expression of confusion. Ryenne wished she could understand.
Warmth next to her made her glance to the side. Lucien had joined them, fresh from the shower, his hair still damp and curling at the ends.
“What’s wrong?” she asked in a whisper.
He shook his head and seemed to concentrate on his mother’s conversation. Ryenne realized he could probably hear the other side of it, too.
Françoise ended the call and hung up. She sat for a moment, her hand still on the receiver.
“I missed the beginning,” Lucien said. “Why does Bazzini think we’re going out of business?”
She shook her head. “It’s baffling. He says he heard it from his chef who claims he heard it at the market early this morning when buying supplies for the restaurant.”
“At least you set him straight,” Lucien said. “But if it’s already spreading this quickly, it’ll be hard to refute.”
Françoise nodded. “I’ll draft an email to all of our current clients to let them know it’s business as usual chez Malraux.”
“What about prospective clients?” Ryenne asked.
“I worry that making such a statement will make them wonder what’s wrong and change their minds about us,” Françoise said. “They might decide we’re too much trouble.”
Ryenne wished she could do mo
re. The inactivity was getting to her by lunchtime. She found herself pacing in the backyard, dreaming up ways to convince Chantal to tell her the truth. She must’ve been wrong about the guy she’d seen with Chantal. He must not be her boyfriend if Ryenne’s mention of him scared her. Was he a Fang? Why had he been with Chantal? Did he stab Lucien? Why did he frighten her?
The questions ran on a loop while she paced.
As they gathered in the kitchen for lunch, the office phone rang again. Françoise and Lucien locked eyes. They hadn’t told Emma and Dany about the earlier call from the longtime client, Bazzini. They’d hoped the email to clients would halt the rumors.
Françoise strode into the office and answered the phone. The girls came in then, clamoring for food, so Ryenne couldn’t hear Françoise’s tone of voice. Lucien, Dany, and Emma followed their mother.
Gavin looked at Ryenne. “What’s going on?”
Ryenne shrugged.
The little girls looked from Gavin to Ryenne and back again.
“Hungry?” Gavin asked them.
Aurélie, the older one, nodded. Sophie responded in a stream of French.
“I think she said chicken,” Ryenne said with a shrug. Leaving her and Gavin alone with kids was dangerous. Neither of them had any experience with children.
“Chicken, okay,” Gavin said, opening the fridge. “Aha, here’s some leftover chicken and a salad. Meat and vegetables, that works, right?”
He put the platter of chicken and the bowl of salad on the table while Ryenne pulled out plates and forks. The girls sat at the table with big smiles, waiting for the two inept grownups to bring them everything they needed.
“Oh, drinks,” Ryenne said.
Gavin opened the fridge again. “What do you want, girls?”
“De l’eau, s’il vous plaît,” Aurélie said and Sophie nodded.
“Water,” Ryenne said, happy she’d picked up a few important words in French. “Gazeuse ou plate?”
“Gazeuse,” Sophie answered.
“Plate pour moi,” Aurélie said.
“One bubbly and one still,” Ryenne translated for Gavin.
He brought out the bottles and Ryenne grabbed glasses from a cupboard. “Nicely done, Ry. We should stay until the end of the summer, an extended working vacation. You’ll be fluent by the time we leave for New York.”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”
Ryenne was cutting some chicken off the carcass for Sophie when the Malraux burst into the kitchen, all talking at once. She caught Lucien’s eye and lifted her eyebrows in question.
“The bank called. Our accounts have been frozen by the government because we’re under investigation,” Lucien said.
“Investigation?” she asked, voice rising. “For what?”
“We don’t know but it must have to do with embezzlement or fraud or something white collar like that,” Dany answered.
Ryenne shook her head. What were they playing at? “Obviously, it’s the Fangs,” she said. “But what do they gain by starting rumors and cutting off your access to your funds?”
All four Malraux shrugged, concerned expressions on their faces.
“Devaluing our business means they can buy us for less,” Françoise said.
“They don’t really care about our business, anyway,” Lucien said. “They want us. Our skills. Our name.”
“But surely it doesn’t help them to ruin your name in the meantime,” Ryenne said.
Lucien shrugged again.
One last phone call continued the devastation of Malraux Frères. It came in the mid-afternoon.
It was their newest client, le Zénith, the arena Dany and Guy had visited the day of the café robbery.
When Françoise hung up the phone, she was shaking.
“What did they say?” Ryenne whispered to Lucien.
“They’ve canceled our contract,” he said. “They say they can’t afford to get involved with a failing business because shifter security is too important, especially with the renewed tensions from rogues in recent weeks.”
“Shit,” Ryenne said.
Several family members nodded.
But the word didn’t fully express how Ryenne felt. Anger rose within her and she stomped out to the patio where she could pace and curse in English all she wanted. These rogues couldn’t get away with what they were doing to the Malraux. She wouldn’t let them.
FOURTEEN
Ryenne drank the last of her mother’s elixir she had brought from home and found Dany alone in the kitchen. “I want to confront Grieux and find out why he’s doing this and what it will take to make him stop.”
Dany’s face showed surprise. “Are you crazy?”
“Maybe. But don’t you want to know why? Don’t you want answers? What he’s doing is crazy.”
Dany nodded.
“I don’t want to go by myself,” Ryenne continued.
“Hey, what am I? Chopped liver?” Gavin asked.
Ryenne smiled at him. “Of course not. I know you can take care of yourself, but these shifters are more dangerous and more vicious than what we’ve been used to in the past. So, I was hoping for some shifter backup.” She turned to Dany. “Are you in?”
Dany wiped her hands on a dishtowel. “You bet. Let’s go.”
“Where’s Guy?” Ryenne asked.
“With one of our clients, trying to convince them not to give up on us. But I’ll message him and maybe he can meet us there.”
Ryenne nodded.
“What about Lucien?” Dany asked. “He’s upstairs with Pascal.”
“He’d just talk me out of it.”
Dany narrowed her eyes. “I don’t like lying to my brother, but...” She dropped the towel on the counter and marched to the front door. Ryenne and Gavin followed.
Dany drove her mother’s car and Ryenne rode shotgun.
Ryenne knew they’d never get past the receptionist from the other day, the one with the severe black bob. She caught a glimpse of her beyond Lord Enterprise’s glass front door as the car crawled past, looking for a parking spot as well as a second visible entrance on the street.
They ended up on the next block—far enough away to stay under the Fangs’ radar but close enough for a quick getaway.
“Maybe you should stay here with the car,” Ryenne suggested to Gavin.
He raised his eyebrows at her. She knew it was a long shot, but he hadn’t been with her in Kenya, and she knew what the Fangs were capable of. She didn’t want him anywhere near Lord Enterprises but she hadn’t been able to slip out of the Malraux house without him.
She sighed. Why did he insist on being so hard to protect?
They decided to split up in order to check different directions of the building and text if they found a way in. Ryenne insisted Gavin come with her so she could keep an eye on him.
Because there was always the slight chance the severely-coiffed receptionist would turn her head just as Ryenne and Gavin walked past, they took the near side of the building and sent Dany—who was hopefully still unknown to most of the Fangs—to the far side, past the front door.
“Do French buildings have the same rules and regulations as American buildings?” Gavin asked. “Do they have to have an emergency exit?”
“I don’t know. But a building this size is bound to have another way in even if it isn’t on the ground floor.”
But they quickly found there was no visible side of the building. It was attached to the building next to it. They walked back to the corner, in the direction in which they’d parked the car, and turned down the nearest side street to look for an alley running behind. When they didn’t find a handy alley, they kept walking to the next block.
“What if we can’t find a way to the back of the Lord building?” Gavin asked.
“There’s got to be another way in. There just has to be. We’ll find something even if I have to rappel down from a roof.”
“Or maybe Dany will find something on the other side,” Gavin mumbled.
They reached a point they thought was directly behind the Lord Enterprises building. There was no alley and no way into the building.
Ryenne huffed out a breath. “In New York City, there’d be an alley.”
Her phone buzzed with a text. “Hopefully Dany has some good news for us.” She glanced at her phone. “Awesome. She’s found what looks like a gate into a back garden.” She tapped out a response and then strode off down the narrow street, lined on both sides with cars parked willy nilly on both the street and the sidewalk. “Come on.”
Dany waited for them at the next corner. “There’s another building between Lord Enterprises and the side street, but I found this gate. Maybe from the garden we’ll find a way into the Lord compound.”
Without other options, it was worth a try.
“The gate’s locked,” Dany said. “But I figured one of us would be able to get it open, between my supernatural strength and your tools.”
Ryenne pulled a lock pick out of the wristband of her watch, the one her mom had made her years ago.
Dany smiled. “See? I knew you’d have a way. If I had to use my shifter strength, someone would know we’d been here.”
The lock was old and yielded easily to Ryenne’s pick. The gate, more like a wooden door in a frame in the stone wall, swung open with a creak. Inside, the compound had clearly not been tended in years. Grasses stood at waist height, stone pavers were slippery with moss, and there was an abundance of growth between each one.
They immediately got into the shadow of the building and crossed the yard. On the far side was another wall that jutted out from the end of the building where it joined, almost seamlessly, with the next building—that of Lord Enterprises. They searched for a door or gate or an easy way over the wall.
The sun beat down on Ryenne’s bare head and she wished she’d thought to bring a hat. It was summer, after all. But she never wore hats and hadn’t even in the brutal sun of Kenya.
A door slammed against stone behind them. She whirled around. The door to the building that dominated this overgrown yard hung open, and men and women in black business suits and sunglasses poured out of it. Some had earpieces, some had bared claws, all had stern expressions.
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