C'est la Vie (Raja Williams Series) Read online

  C'est la Vie

  Jack Thompson

  Copyright © 2012 by Jack Thompson

  Published by Crackerjack Publishing

  Cover art: © Saniphoto | Dreamstime.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

  A list of other titles by Jack Thompson is included at the end of this book. For more information visit JackWrites.com.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1: The Panicked Professor

  Chapter 2: Prayer for an Angel

  Chapter 3: Rude American

  Chapter 4: Nightmare

  Chapter 5: Life is a Cabaret

  Chapter 6: Raja Goes to Bat

  Chapter 7: Back to the Drawing Board

  Chapter 8: Showtime

  Chapter 9: Margaret meets her Captor

  Chapter 10: Best Laid Plans

  Chapter 11: Dancing Madly Backwards

  Chapter 12: The Funeral

  Chapter 13: Raja's Big Bust

  Chapter 14: The Czechoslovakian Brothers

  Chapter 15: The Hunt for Mrs. Browning

  Chapter 16: Out of the Frying Pan

  Chapter 17: Streetwalker

  Chapter 18: Sexual Healing

  Chapter 19: No Means No

  Chapter 20: Single White Females

  Chapter 21: Raja and the Rookie

  Chapter 22: On the Waterfront

  Chapter 23: Raja Interrupted

  Chapter 24: Remy Plays Detective

  Chapter 25: Free at Last

  Chapter 26: Raja on the Rampage

  Chapter 27: Margaret and Didier

  Chapter 28: Man in Black

  Chapter 29: Last Man Standing

  Chapter 30: Down the Garden Path

  Chapter 31: Meet the New Boss

  Chapter 32: Dinner for Two

  Chapter 33: A Day at the Docks

  Chapter 34: Holiday Memories

  Chapter 35: The Scorpion

  Chapter 36: Margaret and Phillip

  Chapter 37: Pierre and Yvette

  Chapter 38: Final Fallout

  Epilogue

  Preview Book 3

  About the Author

  Other Titles from Jack Thompson

  Contact Jack

  Prologue

  Margaret Browning strolled along the Rue des Écoles, enjoying a holiday in Paris which her husband Phillip had been promising her for the past two years. Usually Dr. Phillip Browning’s academic commitments as ranking professor of literature at King’s College London in Westminster took precedence in their lives, leaving little time for holiday. However, a hastily convened conference in Paris on a newly discovered written work by nineteenth century French author Guy de Maupassant, and his wife’s persistence had finally won out. Today Phillip was somewhere inside the Institut de France, giddy over the possibility that a de Maupassant story had gone undetected for over one hundred thirty years and reeling with the opportunity to be one of the first to study it. Such a once in a lifetime happenstance overwhelmed and absorbed the professor completely, dimming the rest of the world and leaving his wife Margaret free to shop on her own. The day before, a small antique shop had drawn her interest, but a scheduled dinner with her husband’s colleagues had delayed her chance to explore it until now. As she neared the shop, she phoned Phillip, catching him waiting for the museum preservation room to finish preparing the next batch of documents he was to study.

  “Margaret, I trust you have found something to entertain you,” said Phillip. He well knew how excited his wife was to be in Paris.

  She was about to launch into an animated rundown of the places she had visited, when she spotted his wry humor. Without missing a beat, she said, “Why, yes, Phillip, although I may have to hire an extra cab to carry all the expensive antiques I have purchased.”

  Phillip smiled. He and Margaret knew each other too well. “Where are you now?” he asked.

  “I’ve just arrived at that shop you pulled me away from yesterday. They will surely have some bargains … oh dear.” The shop had all the curtains drawn together and the sign on the door read FERMÉ. Margaret looked at her watch, hoping it might be a short dinner break. Then she cupped her hands and peeked in through a gap in the window curtain. “Oh, dear Lord,” she said.

  “What is it, Margaret?” asked her husband, hearing the alarm in her voice.

  Margaret never heard him. Her phone had already dropped to the sidewalk. Inside the shop, she saw a man strapped to a wooden chair. Two men held him roughly by the shoulders. Another man with a horrific tattoo on his neck stood in front of the victim, alternately firing questions at him in French and pistol whipping his face.

  Margaret could do nothing but stare like a passerby at an accident, frozen by the sheer brutality of the scene. Her husband continued to call her name from the phone lying at her feet, but it was a faraway dream.

  Finally the man with the tattoo forced the barrel of his gun into the other man’s mouth and pulled the trigger, splattering blood and brains on the men holding him.

  The loud blast snapped Margaret from her trance. She backed up into the street. A small blue car screeched its tires, barely avoiding her, and the driver laid heavily on the horn. Margaret turned toward the car and watched the driver’s mouth move angrily as he passed by. Then Margaret remembered what she had just witnessed and she looked back to the shop, hoping that no one inside had noticed her.

  An arm yanked aside the window curtain and she was face to face with the tattooed man. The evil in his gaze cut her to the bone. As adrenalin took over, Margaret turned and ran headlong across the busy boulevard, careening off the hoods of several cars before reaching the other side. She looked back and saw two men dart out of the shop across the way, guns drawn. She knew they were coming for her. With nowhere to run, she stood helplessly, resigned to a certain death.

  Suddenly a blue and white police van she had not noticed swerved over to the curb in front of her and stopped. The side door opened.

  “Montez! Montez!” said the officer in the van.

  Needing no translation, she darted inside. The door slammed shut and the van sped away into the flow of traffic.

  “Thank you so much,” said Margaret, to the two uniformed police officers who were in the back of the van with her. “You saved my life. Those men…” Her voice trailed off.

  “You are safe now. What did you see?”

  “I don’t know. A man with a tattoo.”

  “Could you recognize him?”

  “I will never forget his face. He shot a man. He killed him.”

  The policemen spoke to each other rapidly in French.

  There was an explosively loud crunch, and Margaret was thrown violently into the wall of the van. The van rocked and spun around, skidding to a stop. Woozy from a bump on the head, Margaret slumped to the floor. She tasted blood. One of the policemen was lying next to her, his head twisted at an odd angle. She heard shouting from the front, then gunshots. The other policeman opened the side door and stepped out, disappearing to the rear. More gunshots, then nothing.

  A long ten seconds later, a man in a black ski mask appeared in the side door opening and climbed into the van. When he reached down toward her, Margaret passed out.

  Chapter One: The Panicked Professor

  Sitting at his desk, the police inspector gazed wistfully at a picture of a woman holding a small boy in her arms. It was a picture from a happier time. His son was now twelve, and he had not seen him for six months. Not since his wife had gone to “visit” her family in Alsace Lorraine and taken Lucien with her. The note she left had seem
ed innocent enough at the time, but had turned out to be a prelude to a full divorce. Personnel cutbacks in the police force had made his case load so heavy he barely had time to call, much less attempt any sort of reconciliation. Of course, that was the problem, according to his wife Claudia. He saw it another way. Her late evenings spent with a certain young assistant curator at the Louvre were not about art appreciation. Did she not think he had earned his inspector’s badge?

  As he stared at the picture, he wondered how much taller Lucien had gotten since he had last seen him. Now that his case load had lightened, he would have to take a few days off to go see his son.

  The inspector’s assistant rang the intercom, breaking his reverie.

  “Yes, Claude?”

  “There is a professor on the phone—he says something has happened to his wife.”

  “What has happened?”

  “He doesn’t know. But he is quite panicked. He’s here from London over at the Institut de France where he is studying something—an old book.”

  The inspector knew that the professor’s wife had probably gotten lost in the city. Foreigners always had difficulty with the Parisian streets. Most likely her phone had gone dead. Simple. However, he also knew that a British citizen could create a lot of trouble for him if the misunderstanding wasn’t handled quickly. The French and the British were never more than one or two incidents from a full blown diplomatic war. He didn’t need such trouble, especially now. “All right, Claude. I will see to it. Where is the professor?”

  “He’s in the security offices of the institute. They are having difficulty calming him down. He’s still on hold.”

  “Put him through.” The inspector sighed. Perhaps his wife was right about his being too absorbed in his job. But, all that was going to change. He had a plan. He would show her.

  “Hello, hello?” said a distressed voice.

  “Professor Browning? This is Inspector Gilliard of the Paris police.”

  “Inspector, you must help me. My wife. She has gone missing.”

  “When did you last see her?”

  “This morning.”

  “Paris is a big city. It has been less than a day, perhaps—”

  “She is not just lost. Something awful has happened.”

  “Have you tried calling her?”

  “Of course. Do you take me for an idiot?”

  The inspector refrained from any comment. “I ask only whether you have tried every means to reach her.”

  “Yes, I am sorry. I am terrifically fearful that something has happened to Margaret. She was on the phone. Then suddenly she was gone.”

  “Perhaps her phone went dead.”

  “You are missing the point. Something happened while she was on the Rue des Écoles. I could hear it in her voice.”

  “What is that?”

  “Fear.”

  The inspector sat up in his chair, immediately interested. There had been several calls about gunshots on Rue des Écoles. He had two officers checking it out, but had not gotten a report yet. “Where did you say?”

  “The Rue des Écoles. Margaret was at an antique shop—gold antiques—Les Antiquités D’or. I think it was near the College of France.”

  “Just a minute, s’il vous plaît,” said Gilliard, switching to the assistant. “Claude, where was the report of gunshots?”

  “Rue des Écoles, near Rue de Beauvais.”

  “Close enough. Have we gotten an update?”

  “Nothing yet from the detail you sent to check it out.”

  “Send them to Les Antiquités D’or.”

  The inspector switched back to the professor. “Excusez-moi. You say she was near the antique shop on Rue des Écoles?”

  “She was right there at the shop. We had seen it the day before and—it doesn’t matter. Please help me.”

  “I think you had better come to the police station.”

  “Oh no. Has something happened? Is Margaret all right?”

  “I don’t yet have any information. Should I send one of our cars to pick you up?”

  “That will not be necessary. The security director here at the museum said he will arrange a ride.”

  “Very good. I will see you soon. Don’t worry, we will find your wife.” After the call the inspector winced. He hated to make promises he wasn’t sure he could keep.

  As soon as Dr. Browning stepped into the reception area of the police station, he started right in. “My wife Margaret. She is gone.” Although he stood in front of the officer at the reception desk, he spoke to no one in particular. He didn’t care if anyone understood English. “She is always very careful. Something terrible must have happened. I never should have left her alone in this terrible city.” He rubbed his face, desperate to brush away the fear and panic that choked him.

  “Monsieur, s’il vous plaît,” said the officer, pointing to a long wooden bench across from his desk.

  The professor had no intention of sitting down. “Is anyone going to help me find my wife?” he said loudly.

  “Professor Browning,” said a new voice from behind him. Intimate knowledge of how upset a man could be over losing his wife tempered Inspector Gilliard’s voice. “I will help you. Please come with me.”

  Professor Browning whirled toward the voice, eyes wild and desperate. Seeing kindness and calm in the inspector’s eyes gave him hope. “Yes, yes, whatever you need,” he said, and obediently followed Gilliard down a hallway and into another office.

  After sitting in the plain wooden chair in front of the inspector’s desk, Professor Browning took a deep breath and asked, “What have you found out? Where is my Margaret?”

  Inspector Gilliard paused, knowing he must choose his words carefully. “We do have witnesses who confirm her whereabouts on Rue des Écoles at the time you spoke with her.” Gilliard did not want to give any details of the brutal triple murder inside the very antique shop where Margaret Browning was shopping. “We have not yet located her, but I’m confident we will. We did find her cell phone.” He placed a black smart phone on the desk.

  Phillip Browning recognized the phone. Margaret kept it with her at all times. It was a running joke between the two of them that she would leave him before she would leave that phone. His heart pounded in his chest. “Witnesses? To what?”

  “There is no need to panic. We are investigating every possibility. It is standard police procedure.”

  “You haven’t seen panic. I may be merely an academic with no sense of your police work, but I’m an intelligent man, Inspector. And I know you are keeping something from me. This is my wife we are talking about, please.”

  “There has been a murder in the vicinity. Not your wife,” the inspector quickly added. “There is likely no connection at all.”

  “Oh, dear God,” said the professor.

  The inspector had the same sentiment. He did not mention that a witness had seen a woman fitting Margaret Browning’s description getting into a police van near the scene. Or that the van had been found several blocks away, along with three dead policemen and no sign of the woman. The Director-general was already raining fire on the police department to find the killer. He couldn’t let the professor find out the connection.

  “Do you know of any reason your wife would be in trouble?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Has she been to Paris before?”

  “No.”

  “How were the two of you getting along?”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “I am looking for a reason for her disappearance. Sometimes with a spouse the cause is, how shall I say it, closer to home.”

  “I assure you that our marital relationship had nothing to do with her disappearance. Moreover, it is none of your business. I demand you do something to find my wife. Otherwise, I shall be forced to go to the British Embassy.”

  The inspector’s attempt to sidetrack the professor had blown up in his face. He said stiffly, “I have a half dozen men tracking down every
lead. We will find her. Let us do our job. You should go to your hotel in the event that she shows up there.” Gilliard called the front desk and arranged for a car to take the professor home. When an officer came to escort the professor, Gilliard said, “I will personally contact you as soon as we know anything. I have your cell number.”

  Once outside, Professor Browning refused to go to back to the hotel. “Take me to the British Embassy or I march right back inside.”

  The officer decided bringing the professor back into the station would be worse for his career. Ten minutes later he dropped the professor at the front gate to the embassy.

  Using the intercom, the professor gained entry into the embassy compound by briefly explaining his predicament. The main hall of the building was decorated with intricate gold leaf that was at least one hundred fifty years old and the walls displayed portraits of English kings going back even further. On another day he might have felt compelled to study them more closely. Today he barely noticed.

  A pleasant young woman hustled out to meet him. “Professor Browning, I presume,” she said, offering her hand. “Please, follow me. The deputy ambassador is eager to see you.”

  The expressed urgency gave the professor hope. He followed the woman into an office no less ornate than the hall. The queen looked down from the wall behind a small man seated at a desk that seemed too large for his petite stature.

  “Deputy Ambassador, this is Professor Phillip Browning,” said the woman. “Professor—the Deputy Ambassador, Reginald Hamm.” As the men shook hands, the woman left the room, closing the heavy carved wooden door behind her.

  “Please be seated. I have received word from the police that you think your wife has been the victim of foul play.”

  “Not think. I know.” Browning told his story to the ambassador who listened intently.

  The ambassador nodded frequently until the professor paused for a breath. “I have been assured that the local police are searching city wide for her as we speak,” said the ambassador, continuing to nod. “I’m sure she will turn up soon.”

  The professor knew patronizing when he heard it. “Look—Deputy Ambassador, is it? The police are hiding something from me. They mentioned a murder. I want you to force them to cooperate. I demand it,” he said, raising his voice to a volume he was not comfortable using.