Chapter 19 #2
It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Luc. In fact, he didn’t trust anyone, but Luc was his colleague and therefore required a minimum of confidence. Maybe. He pulled the handkerchief from his pocket and coughed into it, dispensing with the pills while Luc had wandered over to the louvered window.
“She thought she was in love with you,” Luc said abruptly, and he didn’t pretend he didn’t understand.
“She’s an American. They’re always romantic.”
“Not always,” Luc said, and launched into an obscene and extremely funny story about an affair he’d had with a neurotic tourist that made him swear off Americans from then on.
For some reason, Jean-Marc didn’t feel like laughing, though he made the right, appreciative sounds. “Tell Maddelena,” he suggested. “She’d be highly amused.”
“And what’s happened between you two? Speaking of women who are in love with you.”
“Maddelena loves no one but herself.”
“Her father won’t like it,” Luc warned.
“Her father knows her, and he knows me. Le Faucon is not a sentimental man—he’s all for practicality. And Maddelena is a very impractical creature.”
“What are we doing next?” Luc asked.
“Nothing. At least for now, we stay put.”
“Maybe he’s hoping for a reconciliation with Maddelena.”
“He’s a realist. Maddelena will find someone new to entertain her and we’ll be off on a new job. That’s the way things work.”
“Yes,” said Luc, albeit with a trace of uncertainty. “He’s good with how the last one turned out. Despite the change in venue.”
“The job was accomplished, the employer was pleased,” he said briefly.
“Who was the employer?” Luc asked.
“Your guess is as good as mine. I assume it was the government of LaDonna’s home country, out to get rid of a troublemaker, or even Putin himself. It doesn’t matter one way or another. They pay their money and we give them results.”
His headache was starting up again, but he kept his mouth shut, or Luc would start feeding him more pills, and he was determined not to touch the damned things again.
Without them, he was admittedly a little disoriented, but he was tired of having things glossed over with chemicals.
The dizziness would wear off, and he’d be able to think clearly again.
Remember all the things that were lost in the mist. Forget about the things he had no more use for, such as Chloe.
She was gone, out of his life, he reminded himself. It was all for the good.
“If I were you, I’d reconcile with Maddelena. You know she’ll get bored with you in very little time—she hasn’t got that large an attention span. She’ll go on to something else and there won’t be anything between you and Le Faucon.”
Jean-Marc frowned. “There is nothing between me and Le Faucon. And unfortunately, Maddelena has never gotten sick of me.”
“Ah, the irresistible Jean-Marc strikes again. Don’t fuck her so well—she’ll be long gone.”
“I’m not fucking her at all. She’d probably give me some disease that would make my dick fall off.”
Luc made a face. “That means she’s probably going to go after me,” he said glumly.
“She’s all yours,” Jean-Marc said generously. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“I think some time off is a good idea,” Luc said, changing the subject. “I was getting worried about you.”
“Worried about me? Why?”
“I think you got a little too fond of our unwanted guest. Holding onto Chloe for as long as we did wasn’t the smartest thing to do.”
“She saved my life,” he said briefly. “I’d call that a smart choice. Did you have any luck finding out who the other shooter was?”
Luc shook his head. “There was no sign of him the next day. If he was hoping to protect LaDonna, he failed.”
“Yes,” Jean-Marc said. “We have you to thank for that.”
“I was happy to take care of it. We really had no other choice since you were missing that morning. Where were you?”
Jean-Marc shrugged, but he suspected Luc wasn’t fooled. “Trying to come up with a new scenario. Instead, you took over and got it done. Le Faucon is very pleased with you. Me, not so much.”
“He won’t stay mad for long,” Luc said soothingly, and Jean-Marc resisted the urge to growl. He didn’t need to be soothed, particularly by the likes of Luc.
He didn’t need anything. Not even their semi-willing hostage with her large brown eyes and her soft mouth. He was perfectly fine.
She wasn’t made for solitary confinement, Chloe thought three days later.
The only person she saw was one of the guards, bringing her to the toilet far too infrequently and providing meals.
It wasn’t bread and water, but it wasn’t much better, a kind of watery stew with unrecognizable meat swimming in it. She could barely touch it.
It gave her too much time to think. About Bastien’s betrayal, about the dead woman in Como.
Killing a modern-day saint was a bridge too far, and she wondered what Peter Madsen would do if Bastien ever remembered who he was.
Kill him anyway, for the horrendous crime?
No, Peter was a realist—he wouldn’t blame Bastien.
Which meant, if she ever got out of here, she couldn’t turn to Peter until Bastien knew who he was. Her children were safe with Peter and Genny, though she missed them desperately. It was up to her, and her alone, to see if she could make Bastien remember.
Would Swede and Sylvia notice she hadn’t called them in the last two weeks? Probably not—they were having the time of their lives at the archeological dig, and Genny would make sure they felt secure. She didn’t have to worry about them.