Confessions: The Paris Mysteries by James Patterson Read Free Book Online Page A

upside down looking for him.”
    “What I mostly remember is how hard you took the news, even with your zero-emotion pills,” said Harry.
    I nodded, my throat dry. I don’t think I’ll ever truly get over losing her.
    Harry began emptying the third cardboard box. He was flushed and wheezing through his asthma-challenged lungs.
    The thing about twins, even ones like us who aren’t telepathic, is that without reading the other’s actual thoughts, we each knew what the other was thinking.
    Harry and I both realized we had to get to the bottom of this mysterious cache of documents before Jacob caught us with our hands in the cookie jar.

The brown, letter-sized envelope at the
bottom of the third and last box looked dirty. It was rumpled and maybe sticky, as if it had been carried around for a while, possibly rolled up and used to swat flies.
    Harry and I went for it at the same time, but I got it first.
    I held it out so he could see that there was no address on the front; then I turned it over. A name and address were written faintly in pencil on the back. It was as though the writing was an afterthought.
    I read out loud, “ ‘D. Tremaine,’ ” and added, “and there’s a street address in Montmartre.”
    There was no cell phone coverage in the cellar, so checking out this lead would have to wait. Meanwhile, I saw that the envelope’s flap had been sealed and opened repeatedly, and while it looked unsavory, it was at the same time irresistible.
    Harry hung his head over my shoulder, mouth-breathing as I pulled out the scant contents of the envelope.
    The first paper was a bill, an invoice from a detective agency in New York called Private, addressed to Peter Angel at his home address, also in New York. The charges were not itemized, just a flat fee of nine thousand dollars “for services rendered”; the invoice had been stamped PAID .
    A private detective had been hired to do what? Why? And why was this invoice in a box of Katherine Angel artifacts secreted in Gram Hilda’s basement?
    Had Peter hired this private eye when my father was unsuccessful in his hunt for Katherine’s boyfriend?
    I put the invoice down on the table and went back to the brown envelope. I stuck my hand in again and pulled out three individual sheets of paper that were clean and bright. I ran my eyes over them fast, but still, I caught the salient point.
    “I don’t believe this,” I said to Harry.
    “Show me,” he said, making a grab for the papers, which I yanked out of his reach.
    “Just show me!”
he shouted.
    I did. Each of the three sheets was embossed with letterhead in Hebrew letters. But the typed portions were in English: three individual authorizations for payment to Private for three thousand dollars each. The signature read
Jacob Perlman
.
    I said, “What the hell? Was the Israeli army interested in Katherine? If so, why? And if not the army, what was Jacob’s interest in Katherine?”
    Harry said, “We met Jacob for the first time three months ago when Uncle Peter sent him to take over the rotten job of babysitting us. It always struck me as suspicious that a man like Jacob would take that job.”
    “I don’t know why Jacob was kept as a big dark secret,” I said slowly. “Why didn’t Malcolm ever tell us he had an older brother?”
    “We have to think of Jacob with a big question mark over his head from now on,” said Harry.
    I suddenly felt faint and nauseous. I stood so that my back was against the wall, the flats of my hands pressing the cold, rough stone. I saw flickering lights that weren’treally there and felt like an ice pick was pushing through my brain toward the back of my right eye.
    I’d only had a migraine once before, and I quickly realized I’d been exposed to a bunch of triggers that could set one off: extreme stress, lack of sleep, change of diet, even change of environment, like the dry air in this basement room.
    My vision was narrowing. Harry’s voice was way too loud, and yet I