‘Today, James.’ George rolled his eyes and stepped back for Charlie to enter, before swinging the door shut behind him and taking a seat behind his mahogany desk. ‘Sit, take notes.’
Charlie plonked into the chair and opened her notebook.
‘So. We have a situation in Tours. A stiff.’
Charlie shuddered. She’d never get used to how callous some newsmen could be when laying out the facts.
‘Tours?’ Charlie couldn’t help expressing her surprise. The area was known for being the darling of the Loire Valley. A place brimming with ostentatious châteaux, vineyards covering every hill; a river valley dotted with restaurants, and paths carved into the landscape for hikers, wine enthusiasts and tourists. Still, sheknew better than anyone that dark things could happen in the most heavenly settings.
‘Accident, sir? Natural causes?’ She balled her fists, internally chiding herself—she knew George hated being called sir.
George shook his head. ‘My contact at the Metro Police just called it in.’
Charlie tried to hide her disappointment. Last week she’d had lunch and shared notes with her own contact, Inspecteur Bernard, seeking closure on the Maisy Bell case. Or rather, seeking answers, but Bernard had closed the case. There were no serious leads from the reward offered in the newspaper. Clementine and Mason Bell were already making plans to sail home. This troubled Charlie. Everyone had given up on Maisy Bell.
Everyone except Charlie James.
Perhaps Bernard was right and Charliehadstarted to take the case too personally. Like Maisy, Charlie was a young foreign woman far from home, seeking adventure. It seemed unfathomable that just three weeks ago, this young American woman had had dreams and aspirations of her own. Now those dreams had been replaced with a void. Maisy Bell’s story would remain unwritten and it saddened Charlie in ways she couldn’t quite put words to.
She’d thought that, over lunch at Chez Georges, Inspecteur Bernard had understood her attachment to this case. Then again, Charlie’s persistence and attachment to the last story had helped to resolve the case, but at great personal cost. Perhaps she’d mistakenthe inspecteur’s professional concern for something more. She tried not to think of the weight of his hand on her own, the brush of his thumb against her skin.
Just as the inspecteur had pointed out at lunch, crime did not halt with one story. Here she was on a new day with a new story. Such was life on a newspaper.
George gave Charlie the facts and she wiggled her toes as she took notes, syphoning all thoughts of Bernard from her head as she tried to concentrate and catch the details from her editor much like a seagull waits for scraps at a beach.
‘Stiff was a chauffeur.’
‘Male?’
George gave her a withering look. ‘Yes,’ he hissed. ‘No name released—well, not to me, anyway. I guess they haven’t located the family yet. See what you can do there.’ He gave her a pointed look over the top of his glasses. ‘They found a bullet in the base of his neck, so not a natural death. Body discovered by a pair of trail walkers in a forest just south of Tours. Another reason not to go bloody tramping through the countryside for pleasure, James.’ He shook his head as he hitched his belt up around his portly belly. ‘My wife tried to arrange a group of us to walk in the Cotswolds for three days, staying in some fancy hotel every night. I told her I’d skip the walking part but do the hotels—you can imagine how my better half took that.’
‘Did you go?’ asked Charlie, confused at this sliver of a genial personal life from her boss. She couldn’t picture him out of athree-piece suit, tie and braces, let alone relaxing in the countryside or a quaint little bar, drinking whisky and eating Scotch eggs and mustard with friends.
‘OfcourseI went, James. My good wife runs holidays like a military operation. Earned my single malt, I promise you.’
Charlie studied her boss and tried to imagine someone in feminine form even more gruff and imposing than him.
Bewilderment must have been written all over her face, as George scratched his temple and said, ‘Enough of this chin-wagging. I want you to take yourself off to Tours to see what you can find. Better to go to the scene. Should be a couple of days, so go home and pack a bag before you take the train. Get Violet to give you enough to cover expenses. And James …’
‘Yes, George?’
He paused and took a deep breath, as though inwardly debating whether to say something. In the end, he said softly, ‘Take care out there.’
‘Will do.’ She nodded briskly as she closed her notebook, stood and left the room.
When the office door clicked closed, Charlie made straight for Violet’s desk. As she approached, the scent of fresh-cut roses mingled with the new Schiaparelli perfume. On Violet’s desk were neat piles of letters and expenses sheets she was completing for George. Underneath those were colourful sketches of dresses that seemed to dance across the thick art paper.
‘Aleksandr could be an artist,’ said Charlie, admiring the line of a woman’s neck, the way the long emerald dinner dress seemed to shimmy over the woman’s waist and twirl about her feet.
‘Heisan artist,’ corrected Violet.
‘Touché.I’ll be the first to say this place will fall apart without you, Violet. But when are you going to hand in your resignation and work with Aleksandr full time?’
‘My parents still don’t know about Aleksandr,’ she said mournfully. ‘I’ve told you a million times, they’d never approve.’
‘Of Aleksandr the lover or Aleksandr the finest young designer in Paris?’
‘Shh! Both.’ Violet giggled as she glanced over her shoulder. She wore a midnight-blue silk shirt and matching pencil skirt and her hair was pulled back into a high ponytail with a matching blue silk bow.