Fear No Evil

Chapter 43

Paris

The last twenty minutes of the flight were endless. I barely got an hour of sleep despite the reclining seat and I was feeling frayed as we made our approach to the city almost twelve hours later.

As we came in for a landing, I prayed for Bree, as I had on takeoff and a hundred times since. And I prayed for myself, asking for the strength to carry on should the worst-case scenario prevail. My stomach lurched when we touched down. My fingers trembled as I turned on my phone.

I expected a barrage of texts but got only one, from a number I did not recognize. It said: You’ll thank me later — M.

Before I could digest that, my phone started to go haywire. The housing got hot, the screen flashed several times, and it shut down. I started it again and tried to call Elena Martin but I got an error tone and a recording in French. The same thing happened when I tried to call my home phone and Jannie’s cell.

It was maddening, but I managed not to explode with frustration as we pulled up to the gate. I had my carry-on down the second the seat-belt sign dinged off and was fourth in line for the door.

When it opened at last, my entire focus was getting through to a Wi-Fi connection as soon as possible. But I had taken only one step beyond the plane door when a man said, “Dr. Cross?”

He was tall, black, and wore a full SWAT outfit. He was also carrying a submachine gun. So was the shorter woman beside him.

“Yes?” I said.

“Directorate for Internal Security,” the big man said, opening a side door off the Jetway. “You will come with us, please.”

There’s no arguing with agents of the French organization dedicated to counterterrorism, so I went through the door and down the steep staircase. Two other French agents similarly clad and armed were waiting at the bottom.

When the tall agent reached the tarmac, he said, “Are you carrying a weapon?”

“No,” I said.

“We must be sure. Turn around. Hands on the stair railings.”

I did as he asked and spread my legs as well. He patted me down thoroughly and then used a metal-detecting wand.

“Passport,” the female agent said when he was done. “And your phone, please.”

I got both from the top pocket of my carry-on and handed them to her. “Can I ask what this is all about?”

“You can ask,” she said. “But we cannot give you answers because we do not know them. We are here to transport you, nothing more.”

The big agent’s name tag read HEBERT; the female agent’s read RIVIÈRE.

“Where are we going?” I asked as they led me toward a waiting black van.

“To a place with no name,” Hebert said.

Rivière said, “Which is why we cannot let you see the route there.”

I didn’t like it but I climbed inside the van. “Please, can you at least tell me if my wife is alive? I believe she was caught in the middle of the terrorist attack in the seventeenth arrondissement last night.”

“Again, Monsieur Cross,” Hebert said as I took a seat by a blacked-out window facing black drapes separating us from the driver, “we do not know. In terror cases, this is how it works until authorities decide to talk.”

The rear door shut. The van started moving.

“But the attack must have been reported on the radio,” I said. “There must be basic publicly known facts you can share with me. Are there confirmed dead?”

Rivière looked at Hebert, who said, “There are multiple confirmed dead and wounded. Victims have not yet been identified.”

Multiple confirmed dead... “What else?”

“The terrorists were on rooftops shooting down at people in the streets.”

“Arrests?”

“None,” Hebert said. “They managed to elude police and remain at large.”

“No leads?”

“Not our job, sir. The investigation continues.”

I had no idea where they were going or how long we drove. I was so tired, my chin dropped and I dozed deep and dark.

Rivière shook me awake. “We’re here, Dr. Cross.”

The van’s door slid back. We were in an underground garage facing a set of bulletproof glass doors. Two armed agents stood between the van and the door as I stepped out. Rivière and Hebert stayed with the van when the doors slid closed.

The new agents walked behind me down a short hall to an elevator, which opened for us. I immediately caught a whiff of an unmistakable odor: the cleaning liquid used to scour morgues.