Jules blinked. Zacharié had hit a nerve. “Ten years I’ve worked for this. They owe me in the Ministry. No one’s taking it away from me now.” Jules gave a long-suffering sigh. “Haven’t I always come through for you, Zacharié? When you were young, when Marie-Jo got sick? Made sure you were in the best prison wing, received the early parole. Now I gave you this simple job, with a reward of a new identity, a new life.”
Aimée saw the catwalk shift, straining under their combined weight.
Idiots.
“I want that to happen, Zacharié,” said Jules. “Cooperate for Marie-Jo’s sake. Trust me.”
Aimée saw him slide something from his jacket pocket. Then a glint as he raised a knife to Zacharié’s neck.
Now. She had to act now. She pulled as many levers as she could reach, praying one would work.
The stage floodlights blazed orange, throwing a fire-like halo on the two men.
Thinking fast, she reached for a thin, stapled packet, a lighting manual, stuffed under the control panel and brandished it for him to see. “You don’t mean this, do you? Zacharié left it with me.”
Jules turned. His small eyes darted from Aimée to Zacharié and back. “You neglected to tell me about your new accomplice.” His mouth tightened. “A dripping Madonna in leather pants, interesting. So Zacharié gave you the file and bonus material?” Jules kept his grip on Zacharié. But confusion flashed in his eyes.
“As soon as you put that knife away, Jules. May I call you Jules?”
Zacharié shook his head. “Don’t listen to her.”
“Long way down, boys,” she said. “And it’s never wise to upset a pregnant woman.”
Jules snorted. “Is she for real?”
“Want to find out?” Aimée waved the smudged packet.
“She’s making that up. I’ve got the file …”
“Jules, he claims I’m making it up,” she said. “But how can you be sure? More to the point, how can he trust you after I found Marie-Jo and Zazie tied up and hidden behind the bookcase?”
Zacharié’s jaw dropped.
“They’re escaping down those old servants stairs. So convenient. Safe. Nothing left to hold over him now, Jules, but if you don’t want this file …?” She flipped it open. “Someone else will.”
Jules dropped the knife, tightened his grip on Zacharié, and shoved him forward. Smiled. “Aah, a businesswoman. How much?”
She could almost hear Jules sniffing like a dog. Testing her.
“Fifty thousand, don’t you think, Zacharié?” she said.
The reflected orange light revealed Zacharié’s blackened eye, his shaking body. His foot caught in the plank’s rim, shaking it loose. The bar sailed through the air, crashing below.
Aimée shuddered. A long way down.
“Now I understand, you sly dog,” said Jules. His eyes narrowed as if assessing their relationship, his options, who to attack first. At least in his position that’s what she would be assessing.
“Playing happy families again? She’s a looker. And more stable than Béatrice, I hope. Now, Zacharié, keep moving to the cubicle.”
Jules’s blond curls had darkened with sweat, and they clung tight to his head. He gripped the catwalk rail.
“You know I’m undercover, a flic,” said Jules.
SHOCKED FOR A moment, she grabbed the wall … then remembered Cécile’s description. Old hookers didn’t lie about the law. She’d got his pressed-jeans look correct.
“So was my father,” she said, biting her lip before she said, “but he wasn’t a snake like you.”
“Then you know how the game’s played. The bond between flics. How it’s family, and in a family we help each other.”
No family to her, not after they drummed her father out of the force in disgrace. Not after the years it had taken to clear his name. Or witnessing the dead ends in the layers of corruption.
Instead she smiled. “Family maybe, but not a charity. Still, I don’t much buy into the family. My father died in a bomb explosion doing ‘routine’ surveillance. A damn setup.”
Jules gave a knowing nod. “Place Vend?me. Enough plastique to cinder the van and melt the fence around the column. I remember.”
“You?” Lying again. “You’re too young.”
“Happened during my first month on bomb disposal,” said Jules. “You never forget. Or the things that don’t add up.”
He had the details right. “What the hell does that mean?”
Stalling, the salaud was stalling for time. Trying to figure out how to kill them both.
“Word came down to leave your father’s investigation alone,” said Jules. “That’s how I learned the family punishes its own. Your papa played in the dirt; now so do you.” He shrugged. “Cut the high and mighty. You know I’m right. So it’s business now. I pay, and you provide.”
Why was she letting his words affect her? Why was her hand shaking so much she couldn’t steady it to shoot him right now, like she wanted to?
Zacharié reached the booth, and Jules pushed him toward her. Ready, she shoved Zacharié down.
“Maybe you’re lying,” said Jules. Recognition lit his eyes. “Now I remember. You’re the one on the télé.”
He’d halted, undecided, on the shaking catwalk, so close his cologne and stale-sweat smell reached her. The spiral staircase was right below him. One more step and she’d have him.
“Want to find out?”
“First my checkbook. But I need a show of good faith.”
He reached inside his blazer pocket toward a distinctive bulge. Bad move.
She shook the catwalk railing. Threw him off balance. He fell on his knees. Came up with a Sig Sauer pointed at her.
“Naughty,” said Jules. “Now put down the file and shove it with your foot.”
She shrugged. “You win.” She pushed the file forward with her toe, surreptitiously reaching for her Beretta. “Come and get it.”
Jules’s eyes flicked from her to the file, back and forth as he reached out, the gun in his other hand trained on her.