Murder in the Rue De Paradis by Cara Black Read Free Book Online Page B

murder . . . never.”
    “I can’t believe it either . . . you see, we’d just. . . .” The words tumbled out before she could stop herself. Her face reddened. How could she reveal herself to strangers like this . . . why couldn’t she behave professionally? All her investigating skills were failing her.
    Giséle laid a hand on her arm. “I’m sorry.”
    She blinked again. She didn’t need pity. She needed answers.
    “Heart attack . . . 84, rue Magenta,” spit from the radio on Giséle’s hip.
    Giséle downed the espresso and her partner strode out of the café, speaking into the microphone clipped to his lapel.
    Aimée tossed some francs onto the counter and followed, desperate to prise information about Romeo out of them. Something. Her heel caught between two street cobbles, cracked off, and she lurched forward, grabbing the ambulance for support.
    “Here are Romeo’s belongings,” said a flic, handing Giséle a plastic bag through the ambulance window.
    “Who did Romeo hang with?”
    From inside the ambulance, Giséle shrugged. “A type who dyes his hair and sports a ‘glam punk look’.”
    Aimée put her face to the half-open window.
    “His name?”
    “I don’t know.”
    Giselle turned the ignition.
    “Can you tell me where Romeo lived?”
    “No place and everyplace.”
    If Aimée wasn’t mistaken, Giséle had a soft spot for Romeo. Aimée couldn’t let her go. “What about last week, where did you see him?”
    The red light flashed on the roof; Giséle hit the siren.
    “Up the canal, where rue Varlin crosses Quai Valmy.”
    The siren whined in Aimée’s ears and the ambulance took off. She opened the car door, sat down, and wedged off her broken sandal with her big toe: a good pair of Manolos ruined.
    Time to go home, change, rest, and follow René’s advice. Then her phone vibrated in her pocket.
    “Mademoiselle Leduc?”
    In the background she heard footsteps.
    “ Oui?”
    “Inspector Rouffillac, Brigade Criminelle,” a voice said. “You’re late!”
    Startled, she sat up. “Pardon?”
    “Do you mind explaining not showing up here an hour ago?”
    “An hour ago?”
    “Playing dumb doesn’t cut it with me, Mademoiselle.”
    She heard what sounded like the slam of a car door, then a motor car starting up. “I left instructions at the Institut Medico Legal, Mademoiselle. Instructions you ignored.”
    “No one told me.” And then she remembered that before she threw up, the morgue attendant had called something after her. “Does this concern Yves Robert?”
    “Do I need to take you into custody, Mademoiselle?”
    “Officer Rouffillac, I’m sure you realize Yves’s murder . . .” she hestitated, caught her breath, and continued, “. . . didn’t involve the male prostitute Renaud Vorner, aka Romeo Void. There’s information I need to tell you. I’m en route.”
    She heard muffled voices. Static from a police radio. The metallic ratchet she could swear came from the snick of a gun.
    “Later. Three P.M. My office, fifth floor.”
    Not even a request, a demand. The phone clicked off.
    Unnerved, she realized that alarms must have rung in the Brigade after she ID’d Yves. But it appeared that Rouffillac had something else on his plate at the moment. She thought of the headlines in Le Monde about the bombings and turned on the car radio.
    The nasal voice of the RT1 news announcer droned, “. . . authorities discovered an explosive device at Metro Louis Blanc. Expect disruption of Metro lines 7 and 7b and heightened security at Gare de l’Est.”
    Her fingers shook. And René’s words came back to her. The last, blank message on her cell phone could have come from the murderer hitting Yves’s redial button. If Romeo hadn’t murdered Yves, the murderer was still out there. And knew her number.
    * * *
    QUAI VALMY’S EMBANKMENT on the Canal Saint-Martin ended near the Bassin Villette, a known nighttime gay cruising area backing onto Place Stalingrad. Clairfontaine, the paper