“Rick. Rick Beaudreau. My pleasure, mademoiselle. I’m sorry, is it mademoiselle? I’m terribly rude, I guess. I’m sorry, I just saw you standing there . . . and . . .”
“I’m not married,” Ann told him. “So, you’re obviously a visitor in Paris. Though your name is French.”
“I’m Cajun,” he told her. “From New Orleans.”
“Ah.”
“Please, enjoy your croissant.” He indicated the food she hadn’t touched. She nibbled a bite. She’d been starving. And now . . .
His smile deepened. He was a very handsome man. Striking blue eyes went with his blond hair. She hadn’t met anyone so attractive since . . .
Willem.
She felt a surge of temper. For a moment, it included all men. Well, this one was just a tourist. But he was nice, and attentive. And very appealing.
“I’m not married either,” he told her.
“You’re on vacation—I assume.”
He shrugged. “In a way. I’m in the midst of a healing process, you could say.”
“Oh?”
“I’ve been in Europe quite a while. In fact,” he said ruefully, “my French should be much better. I was in an accident a while back. A terrible fire. I’m still doing a bit of recuperating.” He leaned toward her. “Paris seemed the place to be right now. I came to ... look up some people. But now . . . well, I think I was just maybe called to be here for much more.”
His appreciation of her was definitely a line. But a good one. And he was polite, his admiration in his eyes, and in his tone.
“You’re very flattering,” she said, forcing her tone to be dry. She was French after all, and not in the least naive.
“But truthfully,” he said. “you’re just—beautiful.”
She laughed. “Thank you.”
“Truly, my pleasure.”
She stared at him, nodding with a wry smile still in place. Then she glanced at her watch. “I’ve got to go—I’m afraid I’m not on vacation. But it was lovely to meet you.”
“Do you come here every day?” he asked, catching her hand.
She glanced down. He had great hands. Big. Slightly calloused. She could imagine ...
“Sometimes.” She didn’t want to pull her hand away. She wanted to linger. She sighed inwardly. She had to get back to work. She grinned suddenly, forcing herself to extricate her hand. “I go out at night sometimes, too. Tonight. With my cousin. An American. I believe we’ll be going to a place called La Guerre.”
With those last words, she pulled away, hurried out.
Though she was tempted to do so, she didn’t look back. Her cheeks, she realized, were flaming.
So much for her sense of sophistication!
No, she would not look back, and she would force the flush from her face.
He knew where she would be. If he was interested, he would be there.
Back at her desk, she started to work, then felt the presence of someone at her door. Willem was there. Tall, suave as ever, perfect in a designer suit. Her heart leaped. He had been there a while, she thought with amazement. There had been a time when she would have known the second he had arrived. And now ...
She thanked God for the American. He had returned her confidence to her, and her poise. She was able to remain seated. She stared at Willem, without moving.
“I’m not in the office,” he told her.
“What do you want?”
“Forgiveness.”
She shook her head. “I never forgive, and I never forget.” She tried to look down. But there was something about him. There always had been. She looked back up.
“I love you,” he told her. His voice was husky and thick. His expression was pained, so much so that she nearly jumped out of her seat to go to him. Somehow, she remained seated. “I don’t know . . . what I was doing. Maybe I was afraid at how deeply I cared about you. Or maybe I resented the fact that you’d see me, but you’d never bring me home, you didn’t involve me with your family, with your life. I’ve tried so hard to do what you wanted. I knew I was wrong. But since we’ve been apart ... Ann, I know. I want to marry you.”
She stared at him, shocked. Just a little more than a week ago, such words would have had her in a swoon, shaking, delighted, on top of the world.
And now ...
What a strange day. The American in the café, and now Willem ...
“Ann?”
“I don’t know. Let me think. Maybe we’ll talk later.”
She looked back down. The words on the page before her blurred. She fought hard not to look back up.
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
“Tonight?”
“No, I have plans with my cousin.”
“Your American cousin? Whom I’ve not met.”
The resentment was there. Maybe she had been too mistrustful. Maybe she owed him.
He’d cheated on her!
“In a few days, perhaps, we’ll talk.”
She felt it when he left her doorway. She heard him walk to her secretary’s desk. They talked casually about a publication schedule.
Ann bit her lip hard. She wanted to stand, and race after him. No! Tonight, she was going out with Tara.
And perhaps she would see the handsome American again. And then, perhaps, know herself better. Know what she really felt, and at the least . . .
Pay Willem back for what he had done.
Dubois was infuriated.
The police could be so incredibly annoying, especially Inspector Javet. The man apparently thought he was some kind of a solid wall of testosterone with the right to meddle in things that he knew nothing about.
For the third time, he was questioning Dubois. This time, Javet had come to his house. The last time they had spoken, he had been down at the station. Then, he had been introduced to special crime scene detectives from Paris who explained to him that his dig site would be closed for some time. Well, he had simply exploded.
Javet had patiently explained that a man had been killed.
Dubois had simply blown up. “You fools! This is history. This is a find in the scientific world, a find that is far greater than the loss of one man! Do you think Howard Carter never lost a worker when looking for the tomb of Tutankhamen? You can not, must not, stop my work!”
He shouldn’t have blown up. He went on to say how very sorry he was about Jean-Luc. But it was too late. The gentlemen began to question him again.
Then, of course, he had tried to make them see that they were harassing the wrong man. They should have been after the American, Brent Malone.
“Naturally, we are keeping up on his whereabouts, but I don’t believe that your worker can tell us anything more than he has already.”
“Surely, if he had murdered the man, he would not walk in and tell you so!” Dubois was impatient that the police seemed like such fools.
They’d had little to say. They had been entirely cordial. They had excused him.
And now, Javet was here. Dubois didn’t ask him to sit, nor did he ask if he would like wine, water, or anything. He barely let him through the doorway. Again, Javet seemed impervious to his rudeness and the blunt fact that he didn’t want the inspector in his house.
“Professor Dubois, I think you can give us a great deal of help with knowledge you may not even know that you possess. We’d like to see all your notes regarding the dig. And especially, we’d like to know about anyone you approached for assistance in financing, anyone to whom you might have suggested that the dig could provide incredible treasures with a current high monetary value.”
“My notes . . .” He frowned and hedged. “Inspector, I made quite a large contribution to the present St. Michel to be granted the right to the dig. And my work ... no, no, I’m sorry. You cannot have my notes. My work is private. My work is like an artist’s canvas. I allow no one to view it until it is complete.”
“I must say, Professor, we were curious about that hefty donation. I’m afraid we humble police
men rather thought of teachers and scholars being much as we believe ourselves to be—woefully underpaid.”
“I am capable of saving,” Dubois said icily. “I live very plainly, as you can see.”
“The house is quite enchanting,” Javet said, smiling casually as he glanced around.
“The house is quite old, and falling down around my ears,” Dubois snapped back.
“Ah, well, then, I had hoped there might be some help you could give us. If you think of anything, please call. ”
Javet nodded politely, turned, and left by the door which was just at his back, since Dubois had positioned himself in the entryway to keep the inspector from stepping in farther.
When Javet was gone, Dubois leaned against the door, his heart beating too quickly, his palms sweaty. He swore. Javet was an ass. But he was trouble. Pure trouble.
As was the American. Dubois smiled. The American was a problem that could be solved. He just had to say the word.
Feeling better with that thought in mind, he went into his kitchen and poured himself a large measure of good Russian vodka.
Yet as he stood at the window, his heart began to sink. His mouth and throat went dry, despite the liquor. In a gulp he finished off the double shot before turning.
He knew he was not alone.
His visitor stood at the door to the kitchen and stared at him contemptuously. “You fucked up, Dubois. You fucked up—and you’re going to pay for it.”
Dubois’s glass fell to the floor as his visitor took a step toward him.
CHAPTER 7
At last, Jacques was sleeping.
Tara had done her best to listen, to pretend that she believed, that she understood. But he had seen her expression—one that she hadn’t been able to hide when he expressed his belief regarding the murder—and he had immediately become upset. He had suddenly forgotten his English and switched to French, speaking so quickly and so wildly that she hadn’t begun to understand what he had been saying.
And fear had set in.
Her grandfather was losing his sanity. He was such a wonderful man, and he had cherished his ability to think and reason all his life.
To think that his mind might be going ...
It was horrible.
But in time she did calm him. She convinced him that she would keep an open mind. She assured him that she could find out what the police were doing without ever having to say that she had been there when the murder occurred. She could be a concerned tourist, just trying to feel safe in the city of Paris, and in the little village where she was staying. She had sworn that though she found his words impossible to believe, she would keep an open mind. And he had gone to bed.
Long after, she sat out on her balcony. She wondered whether or not to tell Ann about the incident, then knew that she couldn’t betray Jacques. She had to pray that the police would find the murderer quickly. That would set his mind at rest.
She worried that perhaps shell shock was setting in, now that he had returned to Europe after having been in the States so long. It had been on the front here that he had fought, a special Resistance fighter with the Allied troops. Perhaps he needed to talk to someone, a trained professional, not a granddaughter who doted on him and was involved so deeply and emotionally.
As she worried, Katia came to tell her that Ann was on the phone. Her cousin was bright and cheerful, swept away in the workaday world. “Meetings, meetings, meetings! We have meetings about when to schedule meetings!” Ann told her. “But do you know what? Despite what has happened, we’re going to go out. I have one of those special little shock weapons, you know. Long ago, Grandpapa insisted I carry it. And then I have mace, as well—which your father insisted I carry.”
“Yes, I know. He insisted I have it in New York, as well,” Tara said.
“The really big city.”
“Paris is a pretty big city.”
“Of course, but we won’t exactly be in Paris tonight. We’ll stick close to home, and be smart, watchful, and wary. You’re not afraid to go out?”
“No.”
“Good! I need a few drinks. A few laughs. And maybe a few dances with a handsome man. Or, at least, a man. Come to think of it, just for a dance, any old geezer—or young one—will do. Listen, I’m working late, so I’ll just breeze by, beep the horn, and you’ll come down, if that’s all right. We’ll go to La Guerre—it’s just in town, not too far from the church. If you’re not afraid of going near the church, that is.”
“I hardly think that the murderer is going to stick around the site of the murder,” Tara said.
“Is everything all right there?”
She hesitated, then answered quickly, “Yes, fine. Grandpapa is sleeping.”
“Bien! He won’t mind that we take a night out together. He is always pleased when his family remains close.”
“I’ll be ready when you beep.”
Tara hung up from her conversation with Ann. She needed to go out. To a smoky, chatty, loud bar.
Where there might be drunks and lechers . . .
But sane drunks. And ordinary lechers.
Sleep . . .
Sleep too often meant dreams, and dreams too often meant nightmares.
Nightmares were often made up of the past.
He could almost feet the pain again. The agony that seemed to beat continuously against him, flesh and bone, outside, inside.
He could remember the men speaking, the doctors staring down at him. He could remember the needles, the way they injected him, tested his strength, his reaction to pain. He remembered the helplessness, the agony, the rage.
There was the doctor in charge, who saw to it that he was secured to the bed with steel clamps every time he would begin his experiments. The doctor didn’t bother to make introductions, but he liked to inform the lieutenant that he could be referred to as the god of death at any time. The men called him either Doctor or General Andreson. Sometimes, when the lieutenant twisted and turned, damning him, Andreson would lean close, as if he listened to rhapsodic music rather than the screams and curses of a man in agony. Then he would touch the lieutenant’s head almost tenderly and tell him, “Damn me, if you will. By any name, for I use several. Damn me ... curse me, for your words are just a melody in my mind. Your strength is quite incredible. You should be dead by now, but you are not. Doesn’t that make you the least bit curious? Ah, but it fascinates me!”
Andreson was a master of torture and pain. And as long as he lived, the lieutenant would not forget him.
But he could remember Dr. Weiss as well. The man who would stand in still silence, hands behind his back, face grim, as so much went on. And he would never forget the way that the man came to him in those times when the others were gone. The cooling cloth on his head. The pills quickly placed under his tongue, antidotes to pain.
He knew that Weiss stole the pills. And he knew that Weiss risked his own life to help in any way. When he tried to thank him, the man would redden and reply, “We are not all monsters. We are so many good people. But we are afraid. And fear . . . well, fear is the greatest weapon on earth.”
The lieutenant formed words with his lips. “Thank you. Thank you. I still believe there is a God, and he will bless you.”
The slim little man with the wire-rimmed glasses reddened even more. “If you would thank me at all, please believe that there is goodness among my people. Those who love their children, who honor God, who abhor ... pain.”
The pain pill began to work. He could almost smile. “I know, Doctor Weiss. I know. I don’t hate people, I hate rulers who have no regard for human life. Not that it will matter, will it? I will never get out of here alive.”
“Oh, I think that you will live,” Dr. Weiss said, and the sound was almost sad and bitter.
“No one else survived, did they?”
“No one, no one among the Allies, and no one of our soldiers, either.”
“So strange . . .”
“You don’t know, do you? You don’t unders
tand at all what happened, do you?”
“We were shooting, they were shooting, and suddenly, it seemed that every wolf in Europe was fighting its own war.”
“Poor boy . . .”
Dr. Weiss smoothed back the hair from his forehead, looking to the windows. He stared back at the lieutenant uneasily.
“They want to know your strength. They want to use you. They want to know just how you have survived . . . and if and how you will continue to survive. But you see, I know.”
“And how is that?”
Dr. Weiss didn’t seem to hear his question. “Somehow, and soon, I must get you out of here. I must. They will realize your strength, and they will be afraid, and they will destroy you. I must think . . . must think.”
He was drifting to sleep, but he could not help but think of Weiss. The man had showed incredibe kindness at severe risk.
“I am probably more than half dead already,” the lieutenant said. “Don’t do anything foolish. Your country will need men like you, when this is over.”
Again, the doctor wasn’t looking at him.
He was staring out at the night.
And he stared back at the lieutenant, his features contorted in fear. His words came haltingly. “I pray . . . I pray . . .”
“What is it?” His words were beginning to slur.
“I pray that it is not you who kills me.”
He woke himself up with a jerk. Sweat was running down his back.
Sleep, rest.
Dreams, nightmares.
God, no more!
That night, La Guerre was hopping.
The bizarre murder was a topic of conversation, but not one that seemed to concern many people.
A band was already playing when Ann and Tara arrived. They were doing mostly American pop hits.
The tables were full. There were a few seats left at the bar and Ann and Tara took them. Ann instantly introduced her to Tomas, the bartender, as her American cousin. Tomas told them he had an especially good house wine that night, did they want to try it? They did.
Realm of Shadows (Vampire Alliance) Page 11