The Wife of Riley (Mercy Watts Mysteries Book 6)

by A W Hartoin

  Monsieur Barre went to his little stove and poured another mini cup of espresso from his Moka Express pot. It made the best espresso, in my opinion, but I wouldn’t be mentioning that to Chuck or he’d buy one. As little as they were, I didn’t have the room.

  “What does this person do for you?”

  “He looks at data.”

  “The data you have on your phone?”

  “Yes, unfortunately. It’s so much. I don’t know how to approach it,” I said.

  Monsieur Barre sat down and took a long sniff of his espresso, swirled his cup, and then took an evaluating sip like a wine connoisseur would. “Ask me how I know when one of the tenants of this building is doing something they ought not do.”

  I smiled. Anything to distract me from the task at hand. “Alright, I’ll play. How do you know?”

  “I know them, their patterns, their likes and dislikes. When those change I know something has happened.”

  “You’re telling me to look for a change in pattern. I already know to do that,” I said.

  “Then why aren’t you doing it?”

  “It’s…so much on this little screen…and I don’t want to.” I didn’t know until that moment that I wasn’t doing what I should because I was mad. This was Spidermonkey’s wheelhouse. I wasn’t supposed to have to sift through data. I hated that crap.

  Monsieur Barre smiled. “Make it small. What do you know?”

  “She went to a certain restaurant and there are some pictures of a man at the restaurant, but I can’t identify him.” I shouldn’t have said that much, but talking was a nice way of avoiding the data.

  “Monsieur LaFeche began an affair last August. Before last August, he came home at seven o’clock in the evening every night. After August, that changed. He came later on Fridays and then Wednesday as well. Then it became Thursdays and meetings on Saturday afternoon. Madam LaFeche noticed in November and caught him in December, on the eleventh. I changed the locks for her on the twelfth. This was a short period, but when Madam asked me about his comings and goings, it was easy to pinpoint when the affair started.”

  “You think my subject was having an affair?”

  “Yes.”

  “I hate to tell you that she’s not the type,” I said.

  “You don’t want her to be the type, but there is no type. People are illogical. They do what they shouldn’t.”

  I sighed and looked at the screen, tapping a few times to look at credit card charges in St. Louis the day before Angela disappeared. Nothing. No Panera. Then I moved back through time, searching for Panera and found zero in the last two months before Angela disappeared. What the heck? Novak said there were lots of Panera charges. I did a universal on the account and found he was right. Angela went to Panera a lot, but apparently not in those two months. I returned to the timeline and worked backward. For two months before she disappeared, Angela never went to Panera. In the three months before that, the charges were twice a week. Prior to five months before she disappeared, the charges were once a week for a solid two years. So something dramatic happened at five months before and two months before her vanishing act in Chicago. That’s when Angela’s pattern changed.

  “You found something?” asked Monsieur Barre.

  “Maybe, but the changes could be a coincidence,” I said.

  “You think so?”

  My queasy gut said no and I shook my head before texting Gina to ask why her sister went to Panera Bread so much, thinking she would answer when she woke since it was the middle of the night in St. Louis. But Gina was a light sleeper, anxious for news about Angela, and she came right back. Gina said that Angela liked to get out of the house, do the bills, and write her poetry. I took a shot and asked why only once a week. Gina answered that that was all the time Angela had. She volunteered in each of her kid’s classes every week, had a book club, and all the other stuff wives and mothers do. I thanked Gina and said I would hopefully know something soon.

  As Monsieur Barre suggested, I went over what I knew and then jumped into Angela’s email, looking at specific dates the ones where she added a Panera trip and low and behold, there it was. A clue. A clue. Angela, at five months before she disappeared, began skipping her book club and telling teachers she couldn’t make it to the class. She was very good at lying. I should’ve known she would be, given the way she handled herself in that Chicago bar. Angela spaced her excuses so that no one thought anything of it. She didn’t drop all the kids’ classes, just one, here and there. She went to book club, but missed three meetings in the five-month period. Those excuses didn’t cover all the times she went to Panera. I assumed she fit in the other times when she was supposed to be doing other stuff, like grocery shopping or whatever.

  I checked the police interviews and it was as I suspected. Nobody, from the teachers to the book club ladies, said anything about Angela dumping her obligations. They didn’t notice. Her excuses were too good and she didn’t overdo it. The woman was good. I had to find out who the Panera guy was and there was only one person in Angela’s life I could safely ask. Gina. She wasn’t totally stable, but she was all I had. I texted her that I needed her to look at a picture, but not to tell anyone about it. She promised and I sent one of the Panera pictures, crossing my fingers that she would recognize him and not tell a single soul about it.

  “I don’t know him. Seems familiar,” Gina texted.

  “Familiar how?”

  “Saw him somewhere.”

  I sucked in a big breath and texted, “The bar in Chicago?”

  It took a couple minutes before she answered. “No. Don’t know where.”

  Damn.

  “Call me if you remember,” I texted.

  “No affair. Angela wouldn’t.”

  I’d bet the farm that everyone who knew Angela would say the same thing. She wasn’t the type. Of course, she wasn’t the type to fake a kidnapping and leave her family either and she did that. Monsieur Barre was right. There was no type.

  “Okay,” I texted. “Trying to figure out who he is. Do you remember Angela being sick or the kids being sick in the months before she disappeared?”

  “No. Why?”

  No one else mentioned the illnesses she used as excuses to get out of book club or volunteering either.

  “Just checking,” I said.

  Then I told her that she absolutely could not tell Angela’s husband, Phillip, or Calpurnia about this guy. No asking around about him. It would hurt my investigation.

  “You found her,” she texted. It wasn’t a question.

  I hated to lie, but I couldn’t confirm it yet. Outing a government protectee was a very bad thing. “Maybe. Still checking on leads. Paris is huge.”

  Gina agreed on the hugeness of the city and had to go. I hoped to god it wasn’t to go show everyone she knew the picture of the Panera guy. Calpurnia thought she was a nut, but Gina loved her sister. I only hoped she could stay on her meds and keep herself to herself.

  Aaron walked into the living room, yawning. “You hungry?”

  “We had croissants,” I said.

  He went into the kitchen anyway and started banging pots. Not sure if that was a rebuke for eating without him or what. Monsieur Barre raised his eyebrows at me. “He likes to make breakfast.”

  “And every other meal, snack, and beverage.”

  “Your friend is a genius. I met him when he was Chef de Cuisine at Guy Savoy. Wonderful.”

  “I have no doubt.” I went back to the phone and then jerked my head up. “What was Aaron like back then? I assume they didn’t let him cook in Batman tees and jean shorts.”

  “You would assume incorrectly,” said Monsieur Barre.

  “Seriously?”

  “He is much as he ever was.”

  “Really?”

  Monsieur Barre smiled and lifted one shoulder. “He didn’t need to change to cook magnificently.”

  “I thought there were rules,” I said.

  “It would be foolish to be a slave to
the rules.”

  Or to plans.

  “Excuse me,” I said, standing up. “May I use your bathroom?”

  Monsieur Barre shook his head in dismay and his few remaining hairs waved at me. “You still don’t trust me, a loyal servant to your family for many years.”

  “For the last time, I’m not a Bled, and I trust you.”

  “I see you are taking your phone with you.”

  I looked down at my hand like I was surprised. “Oh well, I’m attached. You know my generation. We’re over-connected and over-share.”

  His mouth tightened around the edges and I knew I’d disappointed him, but there wasn’t any choice for me. Monsieur Barre was loyal…to the Bleds. If he told The Girls what I’d said so far, I could weasel my way out of it, saying it was some generic investigation for a friend. The minute I said Angela Riley, I was so done.

  “Thanks.” I went down the little hall with two sets of eyes on me. At least I could tell Aaron what I was up to later. I found the bathroom, scrupulously clean and not much more modern than Elias’s bathroom, old tub and all. I turned on the water and tucked myself into the corner farthest from the door.

  “Novak,” I said. “It’s me.”

  “Did you find something?”

  I scooted down the wall and hugged my knees. “I think Angela was having an affair with the Panera guy.” I explained about the credit card charges and the changes in her schedule.

  “Perhaps she was sick.”

  “Her sister says no.”

  Novak made a humming noise and I could hear keys clicking in the background. “What do you want me to do with this information?”

  “Can you find other charges at that Panera at the time Angela was there?”

  “Of course,” he said.

  I gave him a particular week in which Angela was there three times and he said he’d get the charges around the hour Angela bought her coffee. If we could find the same card being used during those times or a Panera Rewards card, we’d have him. I was excited. Novak wasn’t so much.

  “He could’ve used cash,” said Novak.

  “Don’t pee on my parade.”

  He chuckled. “I will keep that saying. It’s a good one.”

  “Well, good. Enjoy.”

  A knock sounded on the bathroom door and Monsieur Barre said, “Miss Watts, your other phone is ringing. Shall I answer it?”

  Ah crap!

  “What are you going to say?” I asked.

  “That you are indisposed.”

  I sighed and told him to go ahead.

  “What was that?” asked Novak.

  “I got caught having a second phone by a friend of the family.”

  “This will be trouble?”

  “I have no idea,” I said. “I think I want to get into Angela’s hotel room today. There might be something of interest there. Is she working?”

  Novak typed like mad and then said, “Yes. Tell me if you find a new lead.”

  “Same to you.”

  I hung up and forced myself to walk out and face Monsieur Barre, but there really wasn’t any facing to do. Aaron had made him the fluffiest omelet known to mankind and he barely looked when he told me that Chuck was up and awaiting me at Elias’s. I gave Aaron the Novak phone and tucked my regular one back in my purse. Aaron gave me a cup of thick hot chocolate with a beautiful, shimmering swirl of raspberry puree in the middle.

  I didn’t think I had the time, but Aaron bounced up and down on the balls of his feet, awaiting my judgement. Why I made one ounce of difference to him was a mystery. The best palates in the world had tasted his food. I was me, a girl that refused seafood and was grudging in my praise because he bothered me.

  “You need it,” he said.

  “I suppose I do.” I took a tentative sip. Raspberry is a classic pairing with chocolate, but I never liked it. In my opinion, chocolate should be unsullied by flavorings. Aaron managed to change my mind. It was fabulous and the strangest word came to mind: unctuous. People use that word to describe food like it’s a good thing, even though it really means fatty or false earnestness and some other less than good things. But unctuous came to my mind for the first time ever. The hot chocolate was so rich and luscious, it was almost fatty, but in a good way. I couldn’t say unctuous out loud like some snotty prig, so I said, “It’s amazing, Aaron, and I don’t even like raspberry so that’s saying something.”

  Aaron clapped his hands, poured Monsieur Barre his own cup, then whipped off his apron and said, “I’m ready.”

  “Alright then.” We said goodbye—actually, only I said goodbye. Aaron just left. Monsieur Barre didn’t notice since he was in ecstasy.

  Back in Elias’s apartment, Chuck wasn’t waiting at the door as I expected, tapping his foot. I tapped on the bathroom door and heard a splashing. “Don’t come in.”

  I rolled my eyes. Heaven forbid. “How’s your neck? Don’t get it wet.”

  “It’s okay. Healing pretty good. I’ll be out in a few.”

  A few too many. Sucker.

  “Take your time. Aaron and I are going to class.”

  “What?” Big splash. “No. I’ll go with you.”

  “You’re too busy.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Talking your way into the Marais apartment. Novak gave you the info,” I said, giving Aaron a thumbs-up, which he stared at like he’d never seen one before. Weirdo.

  “I’ll have better luck with you there. You can flirt with the manager,” said Chuck.

  “Maybe he’ll like you better. You never know until you try.”

  “Mercy, I’m getting out.”

  “See ya,” I called out. “I’ll call when we’re done. Get into the apartment.”

  A string of cursing rang out behind the bathroom door. Somebody’d been listening to Uncle Morty and learned his lessons well. I closed the front door mid-curse and hurried to the elevator, dragging Aaron behind me. “To the hotel. We’re close. I can feel it.”

  “Close to the hotel?” asked Aaron.

  “To an answer.”

  The elevator opened and Chuck yelled down the hall. “Mercy!”

  I laughed and we got in.

  Better luck next time.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  We were close to the hotel, a Novotel at Gare de Lyon. Aaron and I went down into the metro for the short trip and were shocked at the amount of people. It was absolutely packed and at ten o’clock in the morning, too. We couldn’t wedge ourselves on the first train that came in, but I forced us into the second and ended up in my usual armpit. This pit was dressed, thankfully, and scented with the now familiar Savon de Marseille olive oil soap and belonged to a man carrying what looked like an oboe case. He apologized for whacking me with his oboe several times. That didn’t trouble me at all. What were a few bruises? What bothered me was the sense that someone was watching us. Little prickles kept going up and down my back. I searched for the culprit, but, in the crush of humanity, couldn’t catch anyone at it.

  Aaron and I squeezed out at Gare de Lyon and I asked as we walked up into the enormous station, “Did you see anyone suspicious in there?”

  “Huh?”

  “Never mind.” I glanced over my shoulder and found no suits or anyone who resembled Poinaré with his angular face and cold eyes. Maybe I was crazy, but I didn’t think so.

  We went into the main part of the train station and, instead of going out the door, Aaron trotted off toward the food stands.

  “Where are you going?” I called out after him. “You can’t be hungry.”

  Aaron ignored me as he always did. I chased him to a little stand selling tiny, delicate pastries so beautiful they looked like they were for a magazine shoot, not for real eating. Aaron threw up his hands and shouted, “Baptiste!”

  A rotund man with a pointy corkscrew mustache ran out from behind the counter and they embraced. I’d never seen such emotion from Aaron. He was smiling and waving his arms around. So was Baptiste. They embraced again an
d I was so transfixed I didn’t see the rush of travelers headed my way. In a second, I was swept up and carried away toward the trains. I got turned around, pushed this way and that. Trains were coming in and dropping their passengers at an incredible rate. The little prickles got stronger. I had to get back to Aaron. I caught several men looking at me, but I couldn’t tell what they were up to, Corsican mafia or just guys who liked breasts.

  The station seemed abnormally busy and by the time I got back to the pastry stand, Aaron and Baptiste were gone. I asked the girl left in charge where they were and she didn’t know. She thought they may have gone for a café since they were friends from the old days. Aaron might go for a café and leave me. I called him and he didn’t answer. My heart started pounding. I shouldn’t have ditched Chuck. I shouldn’t be in Paris at all. Stupid favor owing.

  I wasn’t sure what to do, but I did have a timeline. Besides, the station was packed. Witnesses galore. I didn’t let myself remember Dad saying that busy places are places where no one is paying much attention. I clutched my purse to my chest, glanced around, and headed for the exit. I’d go to the Novotel. Maybe Aaron would, too. I passed by nooks and crannies, trying to avoid any place I could be snagged and dragged away. About two blocks from the station, the crowds thinned and I caught sight of him, a man dressed like an American tourist with khaki shorts, white tennis shoes and socks, a fanny pack, and a floppy canvas hat that concealed much of his face. I’d seen him before on the train. He’d looked like he was in a group, but there was no group now. It had to be Poinaré.

  Instinct told me not to go to my goal. Instead of turning for the Novotel, I hung a left onto a shopping street and spotted a likely shop, a boulangerie. I went inside and dithered over the choices of pre-made sandwiches while keeping an eye on the street outside. Sure enough, five minutes after I entered the shop, Poinaré aka the tourist passed the window with a discreet glance inside. I had a tail, but a curious one. He could’ve separated me from Aaron on the train. Aaron got off first and the tourist must’ve been behind me. He could easily have pulled me back and the doors would’ve shut, cutting me off. The train was crazy busy, though, and I would’ve screamed my head off. This was a pro. He must have a plan. What was he up to? Just following? Why? I wasn’t that far from the Marais apartment, but not that close either.