Lovers and Liars Trilogy (153 page)

One yard; half a yard. Go on, she thought—walk on by.

“Mais regarde, Papa
—
cet homme-là
…” Pascal’s reaction speed, honed from years in war zones, was very swift. Even before Marianne’s footsteps faltered, before she began on that high puzzled remark, Pascal had halted, turned, scooped Marianne into his arms. He was starting to turn, starting to move away as Star got to her door, opened it, and said: “Okay, Gini—get out.”

Gini did not move. She could see Star’s white face bent toward her, leaning into the car. She could see the gun—and she thought that he was blind as well as deaf. He hadn’t heard the sirens, he couldn’t see Pascal or Marianne, if she could just give them another fifteen seconds, twenty—that would be enough. She stared at the gun, waited to hear the retreating footsteps. There was no sound of footsteps, just a terrible white and endless silence. Then Star began to scream. His scream jolted her heart, echoed along the street.

“Out of the fucking car, out,
now.
You get out or I blow your fucking head off—out, out!”

She slid out fast: speed, not delay, might be the answer. She twisted out of the car and up, almost into Star’s arms, and he was yanking her arm up behind her back, jabbing the gun in her neck. From the corner of her eye she could see Pascal, four feet to her left, clasping Marianne in his arms, one arm locked around the child’s waist, one hand, fingers spread, pressing her face against his shoulder. One tiny flashing frame of film: she saw his face, white, intent, poised, the pre-firing-line look. Had Star seen them? Was he aware they were there?

“Please, Star,” she began, moving between them, holding his eyes, lifting her free hand to his face. “Just take me inside. I want to be inside, with you…”

Something was happening to his face, to his eyes. Something was kicking in, something that gave him a new, concentrated, rapacious look. His arm was curling around her shoulder now, his grip becoming gentler. He began to draw her toward the portico steps, holding the gun, rubbing the gun against her throat. Up the steps, all eight of them; under the cover of the canopy. He fumbled with his left hand, drew the keys out of his pocket, handed them to her.

“You open the door. Open the fucking door. Get the elevator quick…”

It’s all right, Gini thought. No one was moving, no one was near: it was just her and Star and this key; the world had narrowed to this tiny, fraught space. Her hands shook; she couldn’t stop her hands shaking. They were shaking so badly, she couldn’t insert the key into the lock. It scratched and jittered against the metal.

“Let me help you, Gini,” said a cool voice from right behind her, and she felt Pascal’s hand close over hers.

He guided the key at once into its slot.

Pascal could feel the shutters clicking in his mind. A series of fast, power-driven shots. The distinctive car, being driven erratically, accelerating fast, then braking sharply, just those few feet in front of them. One part of his mind was still listening to Marianne, and the birthday party she would be having, and the magician who could produce rabbits from hats, then he was also seeing the man get out from the passenger seat, and seeing the blood, then the glint of metal. And it was still—just—all right, because he had Marianne in his arms, was starting to turn, there was a doorway behind them less than five feet away, and the man, crazed, moving jerkily, like a marionette, did not seem even aware of their presence on the sidewalk. So there was still time to turn, shield Marianne, walk, not run, he thought—and then he heard Gini’s name and he did not turn or move away—which was simultaneously the one right thing in the world to do then, and the most terrible mistake.

She bought him time. He watched her do that in a moment that lasted less than ten seconds but felt a century long. She shielded them with her body, then she walked up the portico steps with the man and she bought him time to set Marianne back down on the sidewalk, push her back into the doorway beyond.

“Don’t move,” he said. “Wait until I’m in that building, with Gini and that man, and the door is closed. Then run back to Maman. Tell her to call the police—at once. Tell her what you saw. Where I am. You understand, Marianne?”

She lifted her face to his, her eyes wide and fixed on his. He felt a second’s terror that she would cry, or argue, or cling to him. Then he saw her features become set and still and determined. She nodded, and Pascal, seeing for the first time how much she was his daughter, felt a sudden tight and agonizing love for her. He pressed her hand in his, ran soundlessly back along the sidewalk and up the steps. More tiny, quick flashes of information as his hand closed over Gini’s and he helped her insert the key in the lock. The gun was a Beretta, a 93R, he saw, and the man holding it was unused to firearms, hyped, but with a delayed reaction speed. Pascal watched his white face and jittery eyes. He thought he wasn’t really aware of Pascal, hadn’t taken him in until they were all three in the lobby with the entrance doors shut. Then, in the middle of that black-and-white chessboard floor, with the elevator behind him, Gini clasped in front of him, and the gun still thrusting at her neck, jabbing under her chin, he seemed to see Pascal for the first time.
Slow the film down,
Pascal thought, because he could see the man had some movie racing in front of his eyes, looping, too many frames per second, so he’d get sense, then a gap, sense, then a gap.

Pascal met his eyes and smiled at him as if they were old acquaintances. Shouldering his camera bag, he said, “You want me to get the elevator? Which floor?”

The simplicity of the question seemed to help the man.

“Just get the gates,” he said.

Pascal did so, moving slowly, without threat. The man backed inside, still clutching Gini, still jabbing the gun at her throat. Pascal made to close the doors on them, then, at the last moment, held them and inserted his foot in the space.

He was trying to read Gini’s expression, trying to pick up some tiny hint. He could make no violent move, and no threat. Gini’s eyes, wide with fear, had been fixed on him. As he held the door, he saw her face become tight with meaning. He saw her look very deliberately at his camera case.

“Can I help?” Pascal said, trying to read this message. “I work with Gini, you see, and”—he frowned, then understood—“I’m a photographer…”

“You are?” The man was staring at him, his eyes glazed, then alert. He made a small twitchy movement.

“That’s cameras?” He jerked his head at Pascal’s case. “You have cameras in there?”

There was, just perceptibly, something that might have been excitement, even awe, in his voice.

“Sure. Cameras. Lenses. Film. Color. Monochrome…”

“Well, what d’you know? Now, how about that?”

The man gave a small shiver. He kept the gun under Gini’s chin, and his eyes on Pascal.

“This is Pascal Lamartine,” Gini said in a low voice. “He and I—we work together…”

“Look, why don’t I come up with you?” Pascal stepped into the elevator. He stood well back, by the gate. “Which floor?”

He watched the man’s face carefully. He had expected some reaction when he moved through the gates, but there was none. The man seemed to be reacting to his name; as soon as Gini used it, he registered racing disbelief, then glazed incomprehension, then—as they traveled upward, and he seemed to get a fix on the name, a curious elation and relief.

Not in the elevator, Pascal was thinking, and not in the tenth-floor lobby either. These spaces were too confined, and the man was still holding Gini too tight. In the apartment, he thought as the man tossed him some keys and told him to open the door; yes, here, Pascal thought as they entered a large, overfurnished room: here—when he finally moves away, if he relaxes, loses concentration…

“I know you, Pascal…” The man’s face now wore an expression of almost messianic triumph. He had had the sense to position himself with his back to the fireplace wall, with Gini still in front of him, the gun still at her neck.

“I know you. I’ve followed your work. I have pictures of yours. Those ones of Caroline of Monaco you took? Remember those? I clipped those. And that American movie star—Sonia Swan? Those were great. I clipped those too. You work for all my favorite magazines—
Paris Match, People…
” He frowned. “I haven’t seen your stuff so much recently…”

“No. I’ve been doing other things recently. You know how it is.”

“Sure. Sure. I do. I mean, it must have been tough, getting in so close to all those celebrities, getting past the security, the dogs. Taking the pictures the world wasn’t meant to see… I loved that. I mean, that bitch Sonia Swan, no better than a hooker. You showed us what she
really
was.” He was quivering with excitement. Pascal thought: how ironic. The three years of his own life he most despised, the three years of his life that shamed him still—and yet they were the three years that were useful now. He looked at this man, and thought: a specific kind of insanity; a fan; a fanatic.

“I still have pictures of yours I clipped.” He gave a high-pitched laugh. “I’ve got them here. I keep some of my things here, in my mother’s room across the hall. We could look at them later, maybe? They’re in this suitcase, under the bed…” He paused again, then regained control. He gave another small, twitchy movement.

“So, listen, Pascal—you’re smart, right? This is what I want you to do. I want you to go through this apartment, every room, and close the shades and the drapes. Put the lights on and leave them on. Then go in the kitchen and get me some water. Bottled water, okay, out of the fridge. Mathilde keeps it there for me. Bring the sealed bottle and a glass. And don’t stop being smart, Pascal, because—”

“No. No. Sure. I understand.”

Pascal moved to the windows of this room. He was calculating time. Five minutes? Ten? Would they use sirens, or opt for the silent approach?

He moved fast around the apartment, learning its geography. One long central corridor, windowless; on either side of it, two large rooms; on the right, two bedrooms, each with its own bathroom; on the left, the sitting room they had first entered, then a dining room beyond that; finally, at the end of the corridor, a large, old-fashioned kitchen. It had almost exactly the same layout, though smaller, as Helen’s apartment—and as he realized this, his hopes rose.

He entered the kitchen, and they were dashed. Like Helen’s apartment, this, too, had a service door that led out to the fire escape stairs. Pascal stared at this door angrily: he had been counting on it. It was blocked by a huge, immovable refrigerator. He unlatched each window, as he had done in all the rooms, though he doubted it would be helpful. The windows looked long unused; they had been painted in. He leaned hard against the one above the sink; it did not budge an inch.

He looked around the room, then quietly began opening drawers. He finally found the kind of implement he was looking for: a long, thin, very sharp boning knife. He slipped it inside his jacket pocket without great optimism. A knife was a close-range weapon; a gun was not.

He was returning with the water—why water?—when he heard from the room beyond a sound that made his heart stop. A low moan, then a muffled cry from Gini. “No, please…” he heard. “Star, no—listen, please, not yet. We have to talk. You want me to do the interview. I have a tape recorder in my bag, and tapes, and—”

Pascal reached the door five seconds too late. There might have been an opportunity, but it had gone. Whatever Star had been doing, he had heard Pascal’s footsteps and had stopped. Pascal halted in the doorway, white-faced.

He could read the scenario, and it made him deeply afraid. Gini had been forced to her knees in front of Star. She was trembling violently. Star’s belt was undone. He held the gun nuzzling against her temple with his right hand. His left hand was grasping Gini by the back of the neck. On his face was an expression of arousal and urgency that was naked. As Pascal entered, he jerked Gini back up to her feet.

“Put the water down. Get back over there. Now.” He waited until Pascal had done this. “Okay. We do the interview. Pascal can take some pictures. Yeah. That could be good. I have to tell you the whole story, and…” His eyes glazed slightly, then focused again.

“I did have a whole lot of things I wanted to say. But I don’t know. I might keep it brief. I—there’s other things I might want to do. You know, before…”

He stopped. His head jerked around like an animal’s. He became instantly alert. He listened, and Gini listened, and Pascal listened—to the whoops of many sirens.

They came closer, became deafeningly loud, then stopped.

Star gave a long, slow sigh. He drew Gini back against his body, and Pascal, watching Gini’s face with horror, knew why he had done that. He watched the blood drain from her face. She closed her eyes; her fists clenched. Star’s right hand held the gun to her throat; he moved his left hand so it rested on her breast.

He had listened to the sirens. Now he seemed to listen to the silence.

“I guess the audience just arrived,” he said.

At eleven-thirty, as fuchsia-dressed Quest swung out along the runway, Rowland moved up the aisle of the salon to its exit doors. He looked at the rows of pale faces, at the line of operatives circling the rear tier, and every instinct in his body said
wrong.
This scenario was too neat, too convenient, whatever Mina had been told. He left the building at once. This was a piece of
theater,
he thought—and wherever its director was, he was not, had never intended to be, out front.

As he left the building, his sense of being an extra in someone else’s production increased. The arrival of the GIGN had, inevitably, intensified the interest of the press. Outside the courtyard of the Cazarès building, a huge mob of reporters and photographers and TV crews were engaged in a series of running battles with the police. They would spill across the barricades at one point, then be forced back, then advance again. Rowland cut around behind them and turned into a series of side streets. He passed a mews with locked gates, where the fleet of Cazarès Mercedes were presumably garaged, then found his way to the rear staff entrance.