Murder in Nice (12 page)

“
Well, the French are more
evolved,” Grace said.

“
God, you cannot be worried
about Laurent,” Maggie said, laughing. “Those kids couldn’t
be
any safer. Why do you
think Grace and I are over here sucking up our freedom like
convicts on work release?”

Maggie paid for a dozen
sunflowers. “Besides,” she said, “didn’t you hear Laurent
complaining this morning about me leaving the clothes basket at the
top of the stairs? He’s convinced
I’m
the real danger to anyone’s idea
of safety.”

“
Well,” Haley said, “he has
a point. Even without carelessly placed obstacles, the steps at
your house are very slick. I’ve caught myself several times coming
down them.”

“
Those steps are eighty
years old,” Grace said. “Laurent’s uncle built the house in the
late thirties.”

“
Older than that,” Maggie
said. “His uncle did the renovations on the existing
mas
. Domaine St-Buvard
dates back to the eighteen hundreds.”

“
So no wonder the stairs
are slick,” Grace said to Haley. “They’ve been worn down over the
generations. Can you imagine?” Grace looked out over the bustling
festival. “I love how old France is. It’s like living in
history.”

“
Yes,” Haley said
impatiently, “but my point is that perhaps—especially with children
in the house—a little more care might be taken.”

Maggie frowned and chose to ignore the
criticism. After all, Ben and Haley weren’t likely to visit again
any time soon. Best to just smile and let it go.

“
Good point,” Maggie said,
looking around the festival. “Oh, there’s someone selling
calissons
. In for a
penny…”

“
I think the rest of that
saying is
in for another
pound
,” Grace said.

“
Gosh, you are so amusing,
Grace, I can barely stand it,” Maggie said, heading for the candy
kiosk. “I’m buying them for Jemmy and Zouzou.”

*****

Laurent shifted Jem to his other arm and
looked around to see if he could spot Maggie. It was a warm day,
not unusual for summer, but the huge plane trees that bordered the
square provided ample shade for the festival. He spotted her easily
and, as usual, a smile curved around his lips when he did.

It was good that just the sight of her
always gave him pleasure. She never seemed aware of herself, how
she moved, how she looked. He glanced at Grace next to Maggie, and
while he admitted Grace was beautiful, he saw a more relaxed, less
practiced way of moving in Maggie. It was this unselfconscious
presentation to the world that intrigued and delighted Laurent the
most.

To stare much longer would
inevitably generate the possibility of catching her eye, and just
now that was not his intention or desire. He turned and slipped
behind the awning of a tall kiosk selling barrels of glistening
olives bobbing in oil. He didn’t need to look down to know that
Zouzou was by his thigh. The child was devoted to him and mindful,
even at her young age, of the necessity of not wandering off—at
least not from
Oncle
Laurent.

He sat in a wooden chair pushed up to a
table well hidden from view and settled Jem on his lap. Zouzou
stood next to him: solemn, alert, curious.

“
Bonjour
, Laurent.”

He smiled at the woman who seated herself in
the chair opposite him, then leaned over and kissed her proffered
cheeks in greeting. She was flawless in that way of French women
who know their assets and step into them as comfortably as
breathing. He had often compared her to his Maggie. Adele Bontemps
was completely secure in her effect on men. That was clear from the
message in her eyes to the smile on her pink, full lips.

“
Are we hiding
today?”

“
Not at all. Are we
drinking?”

Adele smiled and held up a single, slim hand
without taking her eyes off Laurent.

A bottle of clear
amber
pastis
was
set on the table between them, with a crystal ewer of water and two
small glasses. Adele poured a healthy shot into each glass and
added a small amount of water. Instantly the yellow liquid
clouded.

Laurent watched her eyes go to Zouzou as she
lifted the glass to her lips.

“
Never mind,” Laurent said
to Adele as he reached for his own glass. “The little ones keep my
secrets.”

Eight

“
Non
. I forbid it.”

“
Okay, stop that, Laurent.
You know you can’t forbid me.”

“
I am doing it.”

“
Well, no, you’re not. We
live in the twenty-first century.”

“
You said this woman was no
longer a friend of yours. Not for years. Why does this matter to
you? Explain this to me.”

“
Okay. Lanie’s mother used
me as the paragon of perfect daughterhood with Lanie growing up.
Annie was going through a bad time and she—”

“
But this is
something
she
did.
Not you.”

“
I’m not doing it because
of guilt.”

“
That’s not true. That’s
all this is about. Your guilt.”

“
She
asked
me, Laurent.”

“
Hasn’t she caused enough
problems? First with her own daughter, and now making you feel that
her death has anything to do with you?”

“
I feel sorry for her,
Laurent. And yes, I feel guilty because I left the friendship and I
didn’t try to find out why she didn’t want to be friends anymore. I
just gave up on her.”

“
And you think this giving
up led to her death? You think if you had stayed friends she would
not have divorced? Or been bitter and angry? You think you have
that much power,
chérie
?
Vraiment
?”

“
I played a part in it.
Lanie needed my friendship—”

“
You said she turned away
from you.”

“
Yes, so what? She needed
me!”

“
You are seeing this
relationship through different glasses now, no? It is like an adult
child of divorcing parents rewriting his memories of his
childhood.”

“
Maybe it’s seeing the
truth for the first time.”

“
I think it is foolish and
self-indulgent to go.”

“
But?”

“
But I suppose I can see no
real harm in it—as long as you do not climb out on any tree limbs.
Eh? Promise me that? No skulking in caves or slipping into
abandoned mines?”

Maggie burst out laughing.
“You’ve been reading Jemmy’s
Hardy
Boys
.”

“
It is much the same with
you, no? Promise me you will not be stupid. You are somebody’s
mother now. Jemmy needs you in one piece. As do I.”

“
I promise. Two days. I’ll
ask some questions—all of which will no doubt confirm that Olivier
is the murderer—then reassure Annie and come home to my little
family.”

Laurent grunted but pulled her into his arms
for a long kiss.

*****

Grace turned off the car but didn’t
immediately get out. She listened to the sounds of the engine click
and shudder as it settled into silence. She was pretty sure she was
the only one who ever stopped at this dirt turnaround, half of a
mile before the sign for the village of St-Buvard was visible. She
didn’t remember when she’d gotten in the habit of stopping here.
When she used to smoke, that’s for sure, she thought wryly as she
noted the impulse to dig through her purse for a cigarette. She’d
quit two years ago.

Annoying, she thought with a smile. It was
always so much more pleasant with a cigarette.

Grace loved
St-Buvard
. That was almost
the worst thing about leaving France a year ago, leaving this
little world behind. Perched on the side of a hill with the remains
of a Roman aqueduct at its base,
St-Buvard
was tinier than most little
French villages. With one
charcuterie
, one
bureau de
tabac
, and one café,
St-Buvard
was indeed
petit
. That was precisely why Grace
and Windsor had settled there over eight years ago in a small,
renovated
château
ten kilometers outside the village.

Had it really been so long ago? So much had
changed. So much was gone.

She glanced at the cell phone sitting in its
recharger dock in the console. She reached out and tapped it with a
finger and then decided against calling.

What would I say?
Hi there. I’m sitting out in front of the village
remembering how it used to be. Is your girlfriend there? Can you
talk?

Grace curled her outstretched fingers into a
fist and placed it in her lap. She glanced at her watch. Maggie was
probably en route about now, but there was a section of country
from Aix to St-Tropez where cell reception was nonexistent. Perhaps
Maggie was nearly to the coast? She picked up her phone.

I am the last person to
need advice on affairs of the heart
.
And God knows, Maggie is the last person I’d be
mad enough to look to for answers in that category.

Wasn’t it just amazing dumb luck that Maggie
had found Laurent? And then kept him?

Grace dropped the phone
back in its dock.
Now that’s a thought.
What if it really is a skill you’re just born with?

Because while it was absolutely true Maggie
had the fashion sense of a demented Minnie Pearl, and equally true
she tended to blunder her way though her marriage like a bull on
steroids, it was also true that her friend had a man who was deeply
in love with her.

Grace turned the car on.
She had plenty of time—thank you, Haley. She had a good three hours
before she was to meet Gabriel at
Le Deux
Garçons
in Aix. Her stomach clenched
briefly when she thought of him.

Stop
that
, she admonished herself.
You’re just nervous.

She would arrive in town
with plenty of time to park and see if there were any new boutiques
on the
Cours Mirabeau
. It was positively startling to her that it had been so long
since she’d been to Aix.

She drove down the narrow tree-lined road
away from St-Buvard, feeling the cool breeze of her car’s air
conditioning gently rearrange her long curls as they framed her
face. Bless Haley for watching Zouzou today, she thought again with
a smile, and felt her mood lift.

Her eyes strayed to her
purse. Perhaps she would stop at a
tabac
in Aix. Surely one cigarette
wouldn’t hurt.

*****

Maggie tapped the pedometer but the numbers
didn’t budge. There was no way she hadn’t walked more steps than it
was reading.

Stupid thing. Probably
measuring in kilometers or something useless like that.
She sighed and clipped the pedometer back onto the
waistband of her white linen shorts. Grace had begged her not to
wear the shorts—said they’d make her look big-bottomed and she’d
never be able to keep them from wrinkling desperately—but they were
cool and comfortable.

She really wished she’d listened to
Grace.

Laurent had driven her to the Aix train
station early that morning, where she caught the train to Fréjus on
the coast. Her brief conversation on the phone with Bob Randall
assured her she’d have “loads of fun” and would finish the tour in
a little more than two days.

That was just about the limit of Laurent’s
patience. To be honest, Maggie wasn’t sure what she would do on the
tour or even what questions to ask. She had no overriding reason to
believe Olivier was innocent. Really, she was just collecting
information, talking to the people who had known Lanie, and then
checking it off her list so she could call Annie back and tell her
she’d done her best.

What did it mean that Olivier was not the
father of Lanie’s unborn child? Could it have been as easy as the
fact that Lanie had an affair? Well, she certainly had never
reported a rape, so it was a pretty safe bet if it wasn’t Olivier’s
that Lanie had stepped out on him.

Unfortunately, the baby not
being Olivier’s now gave him a motive.
Poor
Olivier
, Maggie thought, shaking her head
as she watched the flat expanse of French countryside fly by her
window.
Way to have that one turn around
and bite you on the butt
. She hoped his
attorney would at least argue that if Olivier had known the
baby
wasn’t
his
would he logically have begged for a DNA test? Clearly, he assumed
the baby was his.

But if you took Olivier out of the picture
for just a moment the news meant that the father of Lanie’s
baby—whoever that was—might have a class-A motive for killing her.
Especially if, say, a knocked-up tour guide on your popular
television travel show displayed a propensity to reveal her
sources?