Murder in Passy (30 page)

“You call this fun?” She’d edged her hand into her coat pocket. She gripped the pistol that the other man had dropped, angling the barrel nose-up, holding her breath.

He gave a mock sigh. “Seems like he won’t need his insulin now.”

She edged her forefinger around the trigger. “Why?” She had to keep him talking.

“Plan B.”

Plan B again. She perspired under the dress shirt and
le smoking
jacket she was wearing and wished to god
she
had backup.

“So what’s this Plan B?”

“Damn hot down here.” He pulled off his mask and shook a head of black curly hair, his other hand holding the pistol aimed at Robbé. “That’s better.” He shot her a grin, revealing a set of silver braces.

A bad sign when a terrorist removed his mask: he didn’t care about witnesses.

“I’d like to know Plan B.” She caught the girl’s eye. Hoped she got her message. “She would, too.”

“You’ll find out,” he said, stepping closer to a shivering Robbé.

Her heart thumped against her chest.

“I’ll let him find out first.”

She squeezed the trigger, shooting through her coat pocket. There was a deafening crack. He grabbed his chest, his other hand jerking, and fired wildly into the low ceiling. Stone chips and dust rained down. Aimée fired again, hitting his shoulder.

“
Salope,
how did you … ?” he asked, a surprised look on his face. Then his legs gave out and he fell backward.

A line of blood trickled over the cracks in the stone.

She tried to ignore the singed odor and the heat in her pocket. She turned to the girl, who’d closed her eyes. “Can you walk?”

A nod. She took the Swiss Army knife from her bag and sawed the duct tape from the girl’s wrist. Then she rubbed her ice-cold arms.

Robbé slumped, his eyes flickering in his head.

“Robbé?”

The girl screamed. “He’s dead!”

Aimée dropped the knife and felt for Robbé’s pulse. Rapid. His hands cold and clammy.

“Please … please cut me loose.”

No time to finish undoing her. She handed the girl the knife. “Here.” Took the insulin kit from her pocket.

“My hand’s numb. I can’t.” The girl broke into tears.

“Try. You have to try.”

Robbé mumbled. His legs seized up. He’d gone into diabetic shock. She pulled out the syringe, flicked the ampoule, and hoped she remembered everything Irati had told her.

She rolled up Robbé’s sleeve, stuck the needle into his upper arm muscle, and released the plunger.

The coppery smell of blood mingled with that of the damp in the stone alcove. It made her light-headed.

The girl crawled on the floor, shivering, and tugged her hand. “There’s more of them.” Her teeth chattered. Her face was smudged with dirt, her hair was matted, and she looked like she hadn’t eaten.

“Where?”

“I don’t know. One of them’s hurt. Joxi. He helped me.”

“Then we’ve got to get out of here. Now.”

She rolled down Robbé’s sleeve. Why hadn’t the color come back to his face?

She took off her coat, draped it around the girl’s shoulders. “You can do this. I know you can.”

Robbé’s eyelids fluttered.

“He’s coming around. See?” she said. “Help me get him on his feet.”

Somehow, with the girl’s help, she got Robbé over her shoulder.

“Which way?”

The girl shook her head.

“Didn’t you hear noises?”

“Down there.” She pointed to the long tunnel branching into a fork.

Think. She had to think. René had indicated that the way to the reservoir pools was through the outdoor staircase. From the pool level, another way out existed through a now-disused maintenance house exit.

To the right, she saw a sloping cove lined by raised dirt beds. Electrical wires from a switch box in the low ceiling led to a short walkway through thick walls. Beyond was a green door similar to the one at the entrance.

“This way,” she said.

At the door, she pulled out the key ring, propping Robbé against the damp wall. She tried each key. The dress shirt plastered wetly to her back; drops of perspiration beaded her brow. The eleventh key clicked and turned. She shoved the door open.

“Someone’s coming,” the princess said.

She prayed that this led outside and not to a storeroom.

“Let’s go.”

A dark night and fresh cold air greeted them. A concrete spiral staircase wound upward.

For a thin man, Robbé weighed heavily on her shoulder. “Can you walk, Robbé?”

He blinked at her, disoriented. “Let go of me.” He jabbed her with his elbow and fell back against the railing.

Pounding sounded on the metal door below. She’d locked it. But how long before they located another key?

“You tried to kill me,” he said.

“Me?” she asked panting. “If Irati hadn’t given me this, you’d still be in diabetic shock.” She shoved the kit into his hand and took his arm. “Hurry.”

Unsure, he stared.

“Next time you won’t be so lucky,” she said. “The Basque put a gun to your head, remember?”

“Get going now,” the girl yelled. She pushed him up the stairs.

Few stars shone above them in the night sky. A half-moon wisped by clouds hung over the Arc de Triomphe, a postage stamp—sized yellow glow in the distance. Faint lights glimmered on the surface of swimming pool—like reservoirs. She inhaled the algae-scented wind, heard the splash of a fish. To the right, the blue-lit needle of the Eiffel Tower poked behind the building rooftops. From below, one would never know that several stories above the street, a whole other world existed.

“That way. Quick.” She pointed toward the far end of the smallest pool, calculating the direction of rue Paul Valéry. They had to escape. A long narrow walkway rimmed the pool at the rear of the dark stone walls of apartment buildings.

Running now, she made out the nineteenth-century two-story mansard-roofed house, quaint and incongruous, at the edge of the water. Unlived-in, dark, with torn shades in the window. It reminded her of a village train station complete with geraniums, similar to the gatehouse at the rue Copernic entrance.

The exit. She had to find the exit to the street. In the crusted brick wall edging the house, she saw another green metal door.

“Hurry. Go to the door.”

The girl ran, coat flapping in the wind, Robbé behind, trying to keep up. She took the key ring, tried the larger old-fashioned keys first. None fit.

“I don’t like this,” the girl said, her voice quavering. “Hear that?”

Shouts carried over the water.

The girl balled her wool sleeve around her fist and punched in the glass panel of the house’s door. Glass splintered, caught the light, and sprayed the coat like shiny sequins. She reached in and turned the old-fashioned handle. “Locked,” she gasped. “What do we do?”

Aimée’s mind raced. Should they try to break down the door, barricade themselves inside, and call for help? Who knew how long she could hold them off?

But she couldn’t give up. Finally, the last key clicked and turned. “Let’s go.”

Running down the narrow, dark stairs between the reservoir foundations and brick walls, she hit the taxi driver’s number on her cell phone.

“
Vite!
Rue Paul Valéry, near the corner of rue Lauriston.”

If a reception committee was waiting, she hoped the taxi would deter them.

She turned the key in the last door to the street.

“Whatever happens, turn right and get into the G7 taxi.”

The girl rubbed her runny nose with her sleeve, nodding.

“Can you do that, Robbé?”

“What about you?” he said sullenly.

She pulled the gun out of the girl’s coat pocket. “Just don’t look back, okay?”

“Look, I’m sorry I.… ”

“Forget it. Go.”

She stepped out, the gun raised. Four dark figures were in the middle of rue Paul Valéry, the taxi idling at the corner behind them.

She hit the taxi driver’s cell number again. “See those
mecs
? I’m sure you can scare them. There’s three of us just beyond them. Whatever you do, don’t let them reach us.”

A little laugh.
“Pas de problème.”

All of a sudden, the taxi gunned down the street, headlights blinking, horn blaring. The
mecs
jumped and scattered. With a squeal of brakes, the taxi stopped in front of Aimée.

She opened the door and pushed the others into the back seat, then climbed in front beside the driver.

Without a word, he ground into first, tore down rue Paul Valéry and into Avenue Victor Hugo. In a few blocks, he pulled into the roundabout of Place de l’Étoile circling the Arc de Triomphe, a maze of headlights and hundreds of darting cars. He opened his window, stuck his fist out at a driver who slowed, then cut in front of a truck. He grinned at Aimée, his eyes shining. “No one can follow us here. We’ll be lucky to get out alive ourselves.”

“Great job,” she said.

“I haven’t had this much fun in years,” he said.

“
Bon,
let’s keep circling and I’ll make some calls, figure out where we’re going next.”

She turned to the girl in the back seat. “We haven’t been introduced. I’m Aimée, and you are … ?”

“Maria.”

“I thought so,” she said. “Your father’s looking for you.”

Robbé sat back, rubbing his arm. “That’s an understatement.”

* * *

A
FTER CIRCLING THE
Arc de Triomphe for twenty minutes, the taxi turned into Avenue Foch, the wide, tree-lined boulevard radiating from Place de l’Étoile. Town house after fashionable town house and mansion after mansion lined the street. The taxi pulled up to a grilled metal gate. A security guard nodded to the taxi driver. The automatic gates opened to a driveway where there was an ambulance standing. The ambassador paced on the front steps of the town house, which had lights blazing in every window.

Aimée turned to Maria. “Remember what we said? Forget my using the gun. But describe the Basque who helped you, the rail-line diagrams, and everything else you remember.”

Maria swallowed. “The ambassador doesn’t look too happy. I think I’m in big trouble.”

“Wrong. You’re giving him a feather in his diplomatic hat. You’re safe, Maria. Don’t let him forget it.”

Maria gave a small smile and struggled out of the coat. “Wouldn’t want to forget this.” Her torn chemise hung from her thin bruised shoulders.

Aimée pressed a card with Martine’s number into her hand. “Call my friend Martine, the journalist, in a little while. You can trust her.”

A grim-faced ambassador, in rolled-up shirtsleeves, his tie loosened, opened the taxi door. Without a word, he took Maria’s arm, helped her up the steps, and gestured to the waiting paramedics.

He’d left a calling card on the coat. A military-issue satellite cell phone with built in GPS tracking. Courtesy of Colonel Valois.

Just what she’d feared. Sitting in a taxi on the wealthiest street in Paris didn’t equate with fighting rebels in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Or did it?

According to Léo, the moment she flicked on the phone it would activate the GPS, alerting the military, who would immediately track her location. Deal with the devil? She needed to think about that. Figure out how to use it to her advantage.

The phone rang.

Of course, the thing was already on.

Robbé handed it to her.

“Mademoiselle Leduc,” said Colonel Valois. “Interesting solo operation. Our team would have handled it with more efficiency and a lower body count.”

She doubted that. His formerly inviting tone had turned frosty. Maybe he wanted to take back his offer.

“So you say, Colonel,” she said. “I guess you had to be there.”

Pause. “If my men told me that, I’d remind them of the families left behind.”

Sanctimonious bastard.

“Next time a terrorist’s ready to rape a young girl and puts a gun to the head of a man in diabetic shock, I’ll try to remember that.” She bit her tongue. Stupid to provide fodder for an investigation.

“That’s besides the point, Mademoiselle Leduc,” he said. “Our mission’s not accomplished.”

“You’ve got the princess—”

“I’m referring to loose ends,” he interrupted. “I think you know what I mean. It’s very much in your interest to cooperate.”

So now he’d twist shooting a Basque terrorist in self-defense against her? Big boys with big toys, Martine had said, and frustrated at not using them. Her intuition told her to act interested in working for him.

“So, don’t I get paid now?”

“Did I imply that?” His tone warmed. “The offer stands.
Bien sûr,
and according to our terms. Our protocol, that’s the way we operate.”