Page 5 of Icebound

Most of her misgivings fled. “My husband,” she said, thrusting the picture out for him to see. “Have you seen him?”

He took the photo in his meaty hand. It was a good picture of Bastien—she’d taken it on a sunny day near the lake in North Carolina, and he looked relaxed and happy, nothing like the Bastien she’d first known, the one she’d stayed with when they ran for their lives in Paris so many years ago.

The man perused it, squinting. “Your husband, you say?” He handed the photo back. “Maybe he doesn’t want to be found.”

“Have you seen him?” she asked again.

“Maybe. What’s in it for me?”

Chloe bit her lip. She had two hundred euros in her purse, hardly enough for a good bribe. “I can get you money…”

“How much?”

She quickly calculated. “How much do you want?”

He tilted his shaggy head, surveying her like an overgrown bird. “Five hundred euros. He’s a hard man to find.”

“I only have two hundred.”

The man shrugged his bear-like shoulders. “You can give me the rest later.”

She reached to open her bag but he quickly stopped her. “Not here,” he said roughly, taking her arm. “Wait till we’re away from everyone.”

He was dragging her out of the bar, into the shadows of the early afternoon, and she realized for the first time that the streets were surprisingly empty, and the man’s grip on her was heavy and unbreakable. “Where are we going?”

“To find your husband, lady. Isn’t that what you want?”

“Yes.” She didn’t stammer, but fear sliced through her like a knife. She couldn’t break his hold, and there was no one around on this warm spring day, no one to turn to for help. “But I should go home and get you the money…”

“You’re not going anywhere.”

And she knew she’d made a very grave mistake.

Chapter

Three

Jean-Marc leaned over his diagrams, sipping at his glass of whiskey. He never drank wine—it was too civilized for him. Glancing up, he surveyed the hideout Luc had found for him among the torturous pathways of the catacombs. It consisted of three subterranean rooms, damp and barely habitable, but it was safe and far away from curious tourists, and as long as Flambeau and Luc kept quiet, it served him well enough. A job of this complexity required a great deal of planning, and Jean-Marc couldn’t afford to be distracted.

Someone had cleared the bones from the rough wooden shelves, which amused Jean-Marc. They were in the business of death—why not have it around for décor? But Flambeau was superstitious, and he suspected Luc wasn’t too happy with the bones, so off they’d gone to join the other skeletons in the winding underground rooms.

Leaning back, he surveyed the empty room. He needed a woman, had been needing one for weeks now. Sex was something that didn’t matter when you had it, but it grew to mammoth importance when deprived, and Jean-Marc had been deprived for too long. He knew perfectly well that he couldn’t afford to complicate matters by bringing someone else into their fold and he certainly didn’t want to have to factor another human being into his plans. Still, his need to fuck was quite bad, and it was getting more and more annoying.

It wasn’t as if planning an execution, even a high-stakes one, wasn’t child’s play for him. But he had an unfortunate habit—the more he thought about death, the stronger his needs, and it was overwhelming him that evening.

If only he weren’t so damned foggy—he couldn’t remember any of the women he used to work with. Well, there was Maureen, but she’d disappeared and he had no idea where she’d gone, and the rest were all a blur. Like most of the last decade and a half.

He should take another pill. Luc doled them out to him, and he was grudgingly grateful. The pills put things back into focus, even if they didn’t answer any questions, and they kept his thundering headaches at bay. It would all come back soon enough, as soon as he’d accomplished what he’d set out to accomplish, and in the meantime, he just needed to concentrate, and it would all begin to make sense.

He heard the noises from a distance and he cursed, pushing away from the table and folding up his papers. Flambeau was back, and there was no way he was going to be able to concentrate with him around. Why they’d chosen him as his…what was Flambeau? His bodyguard? His assistant? His keeper? Why’d they’d chosen him was a mystery, but then, too many things were a mystery to him nowadays. He wasn’t even certain who was behind this particular high-profile job. It was Le Fauçon, the Hawk, who made the arrangements, but apart from that, Jean-Marc knew nothing. He simply told Flambeau or Luc what he needed and they supplied it. He wondered what they’d say if he asked for a woman. He hated to think what Flambeau would drag back.

And then Flambeau walked in with a woman tossed over his shoulder.

“Is that for me?” he said. He didn’t remember asking but then, unless it had something to do with his job, he didn’t remember much at all. All he could see of the woman was a pair of long legs and a nicely rounded butt, but that was good enough. He liked a good butt.

“You could say so,” Flambeau said, letting the woman slide down onto the hard floor. “She’s the one looking for you.”

Jean-Marc stared at her. She was a pretty woman, not a beauty, somewhere in her mid-thirties, he guessed, with streaky brown-blond hair and a sweet mouth. He’d never seen her before in his life.