Private Monaco

Chapter 34

I hesitated. Not as a result of confusion or indecision, but because I noticed something in Duval’s hand. I crouched to examine it and saw it was an old Nokia phone from the days before touchscreens and 5G. What was he doing with something like this, and why had he died clutching it?

I grabbed the phone as more sirens arrived with screeching tires, barked commands, and the sounds of commotion on the street below. I heard the tramp of heavy footsteps.

“Come on, Jack,” Mo-bot said. “Get out of there!”

I ran from Duval’s office, wondering why Roman wanted me to be framed for murder rather than luring me somewhere he could kill me. Why wouldn’t he just try to abduct one or more of us again?

Maybe he was just getting me out of the picture while he tried to take Justine or Mo-bot or Sci, I thought, and sudden panic sent adrenalin surging through my body.

“You guys need to leave now,” I told Mo-bot. “I’ll meet you at the apartment.”

“But—” she tried. I interrupted her.

“No buts. I don’t like this. We’re all at risk. Go now.”

“Okay,” she conceded, and I heard her relay my instructions to Sci and Justine.

I crossed the lobby, but when I reached the door to Duval’s suite, I was greeted by shadows rising up the stairwell wall and the sound of thundering boots. I knew the exit was blocked, so I retreated and shut the door.

I ran to a window behind the reception desk, grabbed the handle and pushed it open. A safety bar kept the gap to six inches. I picked up the receptionist’s heavy chair and smashed it into the frame, breaking the restraint.

The window swung wide. I climbed onto the sill and looked around. There was a column rising to my right with climbable features, fleurs-de-lys, flowers and cherubs carved into the stone, that looked as though they could take my weight.

The door to Duval’s suite burst open and a squad of police officers in black tactical gear raced inside. That was my cue to make a leap of faith and grab the cap of a floral motif. The stone held and I used it to haul myself off the window ledge.

Below me, dumpsters, pallets and recycling bins crowded the alleyway behind the building, but as I looked west, I saw police officers running from the street into the narrow cut-through, making a fall into one of the dumpsters a risky endeavor that would likely end in my capture.

I went up instead, climbing as fast as I could, ignoring the shouts and sounds of activity from inside the office below me. Within seconds, I was on the flat roof of the building, sprinting east.

I managed to get a fifty-foot head start on the first cop to follow me up. As we ran across the rooftop, with him yelling commands, he was joined by two of his colleagues.

With three police officers on my heels, I saw a fire escape on the adjacent building, but it was only as I closed in on it that I realized there was a fifteen-foot gap between the two structures. I couldn’t risk getting arrested and thrown in jail where I’d be a sitting target, and I couldn’t see an alternative to gambling.

I accelerated toward the edge of the roof, my legs pounding out an increasingly rapid beat, my heart thumping in my ears, and when I was a step away from falling, launched myself into a long jump, my arms flailing for purchase, my legs kicking out for something solid.

I flew across the gap, and when I slammed into the metal fire escape on the other side, tried to find a grip. My hands weren’t quick enough and I dropped, plummeting a story down before I managed to catch hold of a railing and arrest my fall. I cried out as an arm was almost pulled from a shoulder socket, but I held fast for a moment before dropping the remaining fifteen feet to the ground.

I sprinted along the driveway onto Avenue des Citronniers and glanced both ways.

A crowd had gathered around the police vehicles outside the cafe where I’d left Justine, Mo-bot and Sci. There was no sign of them, but I did spy a man on a motorbike at the very edge of the gathering. He was straining to peer over the heads of the onlookers to see what was going on.

I sprinted into the street, jumped the flowerbeds and raced toward him. He was distracted by the lights and cops in tactical gear, holding his phone high above his head to capture the action. He didn’t notice me until it was too late.

I pushed him off his bike, caught it before it fell, pressed the starter button, and as he came to his senses and realized what was happening, I raced away, leaving behind his cries of outrage, the flashing lights and angry cops as quickly as the little bike would carry me.