Murder in Aix (The Maggie Newberry Mystery Series Book 5) (11 page)

“I hope I didn’t
worry you.” She didn’t really give a shit, but it was what people said. She
watched him pour his glass and hold it up to her as if to toast. If it were
anybody else but Laurent, she would have thought he was mocking her.

God, I hope Maggie knows what she’s got in this guy.

“For all that you
do have,” he said, and then drank.

“Okay, I’ll bite.”
 

He gave her a
confused look that made her laugh. “It’s an American colloquium,” she said. “I
would have thought Maggie would have taught you all of them by now. It means,
sure, tell me
.”

“You are still
beautiful.”

Grace nearly
choked on her sip and Laurent had to stand up to pound her on the back as she
coughed painfully. “I thought you were going to say my kids or my wonderful
husband or something. Oh, my God, leave it to the French. Thank you, darling
Laurent. I needed that.”

When he sat back
down, he sat down in the chair next to her, and before she knew what she was
doing she was in his arms crying as quietly and as helplessly as she could. A
part of her brain knew how painful this kind of public display must be to
someone like Laurent.
The man used to be
a Côte d’Azur conman, for crying out loud
! The only thing he
did
run from was public attention. She
struggled to control herself, but only succeeded in producing loud hiccoughs in
addition to the sounds of her muffled wailing.

“I’m so sorry,
Laurent,” she said, snuffling into his chest. “I can’t believe I’m putting you
through this.”

He made soothing
clucking noises and patted her on the back. When she finally pulled away, he
handed her a clean handkerchief and she mopped her face the best she could.

“I’m a mess,” she
said, shaking her head. “A total, drunken, mess.”

“
Non
,” Laurent said, his hand on her
back, large and warm and reassuring. “You are never that.”

They sat without
speaking for a moment, and then Laurent poured champagne in both of their
glasses and placed hers in front of her. He signaled for the waiter and ordered
two large coffees and cake. Grace wanted to protest but didn’t. She knew that
most of Laurent’s solutions to any situation involved food.

“Grace,” he said,
solemnly. “It is too late?”

She took a long,
rattling breath and fortified herself with a sip of the champagne before
answering. “It is.”
 

“
Je suis desolée
,” he said. “Is it
Windsor?”

She closed her
eyes tight and shook her head. “No, it’s me.”

“Ahhh.”

The coffees
arrived and Laurent took her hand. The two sat quietly, side by side, while
they finished their coffees.

“You want this
now,” he said. “But a year from now? Will you be glad you left?”

“I don’t know.
How can I know?”

Laurent accepted
that. The unanswerable question.

“I can talk to
Windsor.”

“Thank you,
Laurent. He’ll need a friend.”

She laughed at
his eyebrow raise. “Yes, it’s true he has one of
those,
but he’ll need a
guy
friend.”

“You will be
fine, Grace. Not just because you have to be for Zou-zou and Taylor. You are
strong.”

“I know. It just
hurts. And I don’t feel like I have the right to come to anyone for sympathy
since I’m the one causing all the problems.”

“Maggie is
impulsive,” he said. “You know that.”

“She’s only
saying what my family and everyone else is thinking. I don’t blame her for
being disgusted with me.”

“Not disgusted,
Grace. Frustrated. She will go around.”

“
Come around,
I think you mean. I hope
so.”

Both of them
looked up in time to see Danielle and her husband, Jean-Luc coming into the
café.

“I guess Maggie
is on solo baby duty,” Grace said, watching the two as they chose a table in
the dining area.

“It will give her
some practice for later.”

“They’re coming
over,” Grace said. “I should try to look a little ashamed in the presence of
the woman I abandoned my child to.”

“Danielle is not
like that.” Laurent reached out and patted Grace’s hand. “She has lived a life
of much disappointment, herself. As you know.”

“
Salut
, Laurent! Madame Van Sant!”
Jean-Luc was the first of the two to reach their table and he had his hand out
to shake with Laurent, even though Grace knew for a fact the two had spent the
day together. “If I had known you wanted to eat out, we could have made plans.
Where is Maggie?” Jean-Luc looked from Laurent to Grace and then back to
Laurent and his face took on a sudden look of horror.

“Don’t be an
idiot
, Jean-Luc,” Laurent said gruffly.
“Maggie is home with
l’enfant. Bon soir,
Danielle
. Ça va?”

“
Oui, ça va,
Laurent,” Danielle replied,
her eyes friendly and open. “Madame, we were worried about you but I see you are
well.”

“Yes, sorry about
that, Madame Alexandre,” Grace said, gathering up Laurent’s handkerchief and
carefully folding it on her lap.

“
Pas du tout,”
Danielle said. For a
moment no one spoke, and then Danielle approached the table and touched Grace’s
shoulder. “I am going to the toilet. Would you care to come too?”

Grace looked at
the older woman with relief and for a moment, thought she might start crying
again in the face of Danielle’s unexpected kindness. “Yes, Madame Alexandre.”

Danielle waited
for her to stand and then took her almost literally under her wing.

“Call me
Danielle, please, yes?”

As soon as the
women disappeared inside, Jean-Luc took Grace’s seat.

“Forgive me,” he
said. “Danielle says I often make hasty calculations.”

Laurent waved
away his apology and Jean-Luc edged closer to him across the table. “Is it true
that Maggie visits the condemned murderer in her cell in Aix?”

Laurent snorted.
“I believe there must be a trial before one can be condemned.”

“A formality,
surely? Have you wondered how is it that your wife knows so many murderers
personally?”

“Are you coming
to a point, my friend?”

Jean-Luc looked
over his shoulder in the direction the two women had gone. “My own beautiful
wife talks of little else. She knows Lily Tatois, you know. They were girls
together. This tragedy has served as opportunity for the two of them to
reconnect.”

“Lily Tatois is
at least a decade older than Danielle, is she not?”

Jean-Luc nodded.
“But friendless as a schoolgirl, I understand. And you know my Danielle. So
kindhearted she would befriend a monster.”

And had done so,
Laurent thought, thinking of Danielle’s first husband, now in prison for arson and
murder.

“It made me think
of Jacques; what a
putain
, eh? Did
anybody
like him? And that made me think
of the time last year when he publicly accused his accountant, Yves Briande of
swindling him out of his money. Right in this very café!”

Laurent frowned.
“Why did I not hear of this?”

“It was last January.
You were in America with your wife. Anyway it was widely known that Yves hated
Jacques for the humiliation. He confided to me that his business had fallen off
as a result of the slander.”

“Did he?”

“What? Swindle
Jacques? Who knows? I didn’t know Jacques had any money to be swindled out of after…well,
you know.” He gave Laurent a knowing look. “I, myself, am still recovering. But
the look I saw in Yves’s eye that day? It was definitely murderous.”

Later that
evening, after Grace and Laurent returned to the
mas
, Maggie took a long contemplative bath before slipping between
the cool sheets of her abundant king-size bed. Laurent was already in bed
reading. “So it sounds like Grace is still going through with it?”

“You understand she
is in crisis, yes?” Laurent said tiredly. “If she had committed a terrible
crime, she would expect you to stand by her. As would I.”

“Are you drawing
a connection to this situation with Julia? Because you know I believe Julia to
be
innocent
.”

“So you would not
stand by her if she committed a crime?”

“No, I didn’t
mean that. Of course I would. If it turned out she were guilty, I wouldn’t
abandon her.”

Maggie picked up
the tube of fragrant body lotion she used to keep her heels and elbows supple.
She read somewhere that lotion was good to rub across pregnant bellies to avoid
stretch marks. She glanced at Laurent. “I’ve always believed that children are
the glue to marriage,” she said.

Laurent put down
his book. “Children are not the glue. They are the cracks that force one to
search for glue.”

“Laurent, are you
serious? You think children are the thing that cause stress in a marriage?”
Maggie’s eyes widened.

“Of course. Well,
that and worry about money.” He turned to face her. “Maggie, there is no one
thing that will prevent a marriage from failing. Not locks on a bridge or
having babies or being Catholic.” He shrugged. “You look for insurance when
there can be none.”

“Then why do you
want kids at all if you think they’re just going to cause trouble for us?”

“Because I like
the glue so much.” He smiled and touched her knee gently with his large hand.

Later, when the
lights were out, Maggie was too wide-awake to sleep. From her cuddled position
in his arms, she held up her hands in the dark to tick off her suspects.

“Help me with
this, Laurent,” she said. “Okay, I’ve got this guy David Armstrong who
threatened to kill Jacques but, of course, the police haven’t even
questioned—”

“And who you will
not go see.”

“Yes, Laurent, I
already told you I wouldn’t. And then there’s Michelle, the victim’s daughter,
who found the body so that’s suspicious right there.”

“But who Bedard
says has an alibi.”

“And, of course, Annette.
The ex-wife.”

“The number one
suspect of all.”

“Exactly. Thank
you. Who nobody’s questioned.”

“She has not been
questioned?”

“Well, okay, I
don’t know if she has. Bedard doesn’t really share with me, you’ll be happy to
know. And now this Yves character, who definitely had a motive for wanting
Jacques dead.”

“A weak motive.”

“Why do you say
that?”

“The moment of
his anger was long past,
tu sais
? Now
if he stood to benefit
financially
from Jacques’s death…”

“Everyone says
Jacques had no money.”

“True, but he was
heir to Lily Tatois’s fortune.”

Maggie twisted
around in his arms and snapped on the light.

“Maggie…” Laurent
groaned as the light flashed on.

“How do you know
that?
Jacques
was Lily’s
beneficiary?”

“Jean-Luc told
me. Please, Maggie, turn off the light.”

“So that’s what
Michelle meant when she said he couldn’t even die when he was supposed to. He
died first so someone
else
will
inherit. Laurent, did Jean-Luc say who Lily’s new beneficiary is?”

“I will only tell
you if you turn off the light. And perhaps do that thing you sometimes do when
you are in a very good mood and you are particularly glad to be married to me.”

Maggie laughed
and kissed him. “I promise,” she said. “Who is it?”

“Jacques’s
cousin, Florian.”
 

Chapter
Ten

The next morning,
Laurent had a table full of females at breakfast. Grace sat next to Zou-zou,
her face alternately flushed and wan as her moods came and went. He noticed
that Maggie was quieter than usual and assumed that was because she was debating
about how to approach her friend. Hopefully, how to
apologize
to her friend, he thought as he slid an omelet onto her
plate.

“Thanks,
Laurent,” she said picking up a fork and glancing over at Grace, who was only
drinking coffee. She cleared her throat. “Did you sleep okay?”

Grace looked at
her and set her cup down. “Are you talking to me?”
 

“Well, since I
already
know
how Laurent slept,
obviously I was talking to you.”

Grace shrugged.
“Fine, thanks.”

“Look, Grace,”
Maggie said, putting her fork back down on the table. “I’m sorry, okay?”

Grace looked at
her for a moment and then nodded. “Okay.”
 

Laurent picked up
a piece of bacon with his fingers and placed it in front of Zou-zou. The baby
grabbed it as if she hadn’t already eaten a large wedge of quiche and a bowl of
grapes this morning.

“Did you get the
message from your editor,
ch
é
rie
?” Laurent asked from the kitchen.

Maggie got up and
followed him into the kitchen. “Where is the
Texas Pete

“You are going to
put hot sauce on my omelet?”

“I believe we
transferred possession,” she said sweetly, standing on tiptoe to give him a
kiss on the cheek. “Where have you hidden it?”

With a long-suffering
sigh, Laurent opened a cabinet door and extricated the bottle of hot sauce and
handed it to her. “You are going to ignore your editor? Is that wise?”

“I’m not ignoring
her,” Maggie said as she returned to the dining room. “I’ll call her back
later. The time difference, you know.”

“That’s your New
York editor?” Grace asked.

“It is. We’re
having trouble connecting lately.”

“Because of the
time difference.”

Maggie gave Grace
a quick look to try to ascertain if there was any sarcasm or hidden element in
the statement but there didn’t seem to be. Grace innocently sipped her coffee.

“That’s right.
She sent me a bunch of edits she wanted me to do and she’s calling to see what
the status is.”

“Because they’re
late?”

“No, because
she’s just interested in knowing what stage they’re in.”

“What stage are
they in?”

Maggie sighed and
looked at Grace, and then glanced at the baby, who was happily chewing on a
paper plate Laurent had given her. “They’re not at a very advanced stage,” she
admitted. “I’ve been distracted.”

Laurent entered
the dining room and tossed down his kitchen towel. He clapped his hands
together and held out his arms to Zou-zou.

“Est-ce que tu es prête, ma petite?”

Zou-zou
immediately began squealing and clapping her hands. “
Oncle Laurent! Oncle Laurent!”

Grace dropped her
cup in the saucer as Laurent scooped the child up. “Oh, my God, Laurent,” she
said, her mouth open in astonishment. “You got her to speak.”

“She got her own
self to speak,
n’est-ce pas
, little
one?” Laurent said to his squirming armful.

The sounds of
tires crunching on the gravel front drive had been obvious all through
breakfast. A quick look out the window showed that the pickers were right on
time this morning. At least ten of them—a scraggly looking bunch of
unemployed youths—stood outside smoking and waiting for Laurent.

Grace took her coffee
and went to the kitchen window. “Are you picking later than usual this year?”
she asked.

Laurent hoisted
Zou-zou over his shoulder to her squeals of delight. “
Oui
,” he said as he grabbed his cap from its hook by the kitchen
door. “But still first before everyone else in France.”

“Because the
southern grapes ripen faster,” Maggie said to Grace, proud that she knew
something about Laurent’s harvest. “How long will it take it pick our fields?”

“A week, I
think,” he said. “I will take
petite Z
to Madame Alexandre,
oui
?” He stepped
back into the kitchen to give Maggie a hearty kiss on the mouth before exiting through
the kitchen. Maggie heard him greet some of the pickers as he joined them.

“You used to hate
this time of year,” Grace said softly. “How things have changed.” She turned to
Maggie. “However, on the ever increasing good-news front, Win will be delighted
to know the baby’s first words were
Oncle
Laurent
.”

“Is Zou-zou the
reason you two are splitting up?” Maggie didn’t know the question was coming until
it was half way out of her mouth.

Grace’s smile
dissolved from her face. “Zou-zou?” A look of grim comprehension quickly
replaced the confusion. “You mean because of not knowing who her real father
is?”

“Sorry, Grace,”
Maggie muttered, looking away. “I’m not used to editing my words with you.”

“No worries,
darling. Please speak freely. No, Zou-zou has nothing to do with it. Win’s
grand gesture aside, he snuck off and had a DNA test done almost as soon as we were
back in the States. The results are in and, drum roll, please…she’s officially
his.”

“
And
by
his
, you mean…” Maggie knew she
was making it worse.

“Windsor’s.”

“Oh. Well, good.”

“Yes, isn’t it?
I’d hate for him to pay support for a child that wasn’t biologically his. Much
tidier this way.”

“He loves
Zou-zou.”

“He loves her
even more now.”

“Was it because
he got the test?”

“Darling, what a
simplistic world you live in. It must be very black and white to be Maggie Newberry
Dernier.”

“I thought we
were trying to be friendly.”

“Sorry. No, it
wasn’t because of the test.” Her voice caught. “It was because of everything
else.” Grace put a hand to her face and released a stifled moan. Maggie could
see she was trying to get her emotions under control. She jumped up and put her
arms around her friend.

“I’m sorry, Grace,”
she whispered. “I am so, so, so sorry.”

Grace reached up
and squeezed her hand without speaking. After a moment, Grace disengaged and
patted Maggie’s arm. “I’m okay, darling. I’m good.”

Before Maggie had
a chance to reply, she saw her cellphone light up where it lay on the dining
room table. She didn’t recognize the number.

“
Allo
?” she said.

“Maggie?”

Roger.

“Wow. To what do
I owe this earth-shattering event?” She said a silent prayer of thanks that
Laurent was out of the house.

“Just a courtesy
call, as you Americans would say,” Roger said. But Maggie could hear the
excitement in his voice. Something had happened that he was taking credit for
and he wanted her to be the first to know.

Something good for his case, not hers.

“What’s up?”

“I wanted to let
you know there was a break-in at the laboratory that handles our toxicology
work.”

A break-in?
Maggie’s hopes soared at the thought of something lucky finally leaning in her
direction. She willed herself not to speak lest the littlest thing dam up this
valuable flow of unexpected intel.

“Someone
attempted to destroy the samples of poisonous mushrooms taken from our victim’s
stomach.”

Maggie felt her
mood begin to deflate.

“Fortunately, the
security guard at the lab was vigilant and the perpetrator was quickly
apprehended. I thought you would want to know.”

“So the samples
were compromised?”

“No.
Unfortunately for Madame Patrick, the samples remain intact and viable.”

“The person who
tried to destroy the samples—is he a new suspect in the case?” Maggie
could see Grace’s eyes widen as she listened to the conversation.

“
Non
. He is only a person of interest.”
Roger’s voice became clipped and Maggie could just see him beginning to pout as
he reacted to the fact that Maggie did not appear as impressed as he hoped she
might be. “He was arrested and released on bail. He had no priors—”

“Roger, why are
you not treating this as the act of a guilty person?
He broke in to destroy evidence!
That in itself is proof of—”

“It is proof only
of being an idiot.” Roger huffed on the other line. “If anything, it is even
stronger proof that we have the right person in custody.”

“What are you
talking about?”

 
“The man was trying to destroy evidence
of the crime committed by Madame Patrick—”

“So you said, but
I don’t understand how that—”

“He admitted that
he’s her lover.”

Maggie turned her
shocked face to Grace and then sat down in her chair as if her legs no longer
had the strength to support her.

“
Her
lover
?”
she whispered in disbelief.

Two hours later, Maggie
sat in her car on the Rue Mejanes and waited for the phone to ring. Roger had
made it clear that a visit to the detention center would not be possible at
this time, but had agreed, if Julia wanted to speak with Maggie, to arrange for
a phone call between the two later that morning. Although she knew she wouldn’t
be able to see Julia, Maggie opted to drive to Aix to take the phone call. She
felt closer to her friend here. And she now had an errand in Aix that couldn’t
wait.

What had Julia been thinking? She has a boyfriend?
How was that even possible without
Maggie knowing?
What did it mean in all
of this?

She hadn’t even
had time to process the news that
Florrie
was Lily’s new beneficiary.
Did that even
matter?
Even if Florrie killed Jacques in order to take his place as next
in line to Lily’s fortune (
did that make
sense?),
why kill Jacques
now
?
Besides, lots of people stood to gain when a rich relative dies. Maggie,
herself, would split a sizeable fortune with her brother when their parents
passed, but she hadn’t been plotting to kill them in the meantime. It wasn’t
actually motive in this case, she realized. More like, Florrie being the next
heir was just one more interesting fact to add to the growing pile of other
interesting facts that now constituted a confusing mess that pointed in no
particular direction at all. She sighed and glanced down at her cellphone at
exactly the moment it began to ring.
 
She recognized the number as a New York City area code and hit the
“decline” button on her cell. Of course she wanted to talk to her editor, but not
when any second she was waiting to hear from Julia.

The next call that
came through Maggie recognized as the Aix prison exchange number. She punched
accept
on the phone face.

“Julia?”

“Oh, Maggie,
thank God!” Julia’s voice came over the line reedy and shrill. Her throat
sounded rough, as if she had been crying. “They lie to me so much I wasn’t sure
you’d really be there.”

“Julia, are you
okay?”
Stupid question
.
 

“Maggie, you’ve
got to help me. Nobody is telling me anything. They won’t answer my questions
and my attorney is out of town at a wedding or something. Do you know what’s
going on?”

“Well, probably
not as much as your attorney, but
Inspecteur
Bedard called me this morning to say they’d caught some guy trying to destroy
the samples in your case at the lab where they’re—”

“I know! Do you
know where he is now? They won’t tell me whether they’re still holding him or
if he’s released or anything.”

So it’s true,
Maggie thought, her shoulders slumping against the warm back of the car seat.
She’s with him.

“I…I heard he was
released,” Maggie said.

“Oh, thank God.
Thank God.”

“So who is this
guy, Jules? I didn’t know you were seeing anyone.”

“I’m sorry,
Maggie. I know it looks like I didn’t trust you but you have to understand that
after my last fiasco, I felt I needed to hold my cards close to the vest for
awhile. Do you see that?”

“Sure, Jules. So
how did you meet him?”

“He lives in my
apartment building. We just kept bumping into each other when we were taking
out the garbage and one thing led to another. You know how these things go.”

“That must have
really shocked you to hear he’d broken into a police toxicology lab to destroy
evidence pertinent to your murder case.”