He swept the sat phone off the table as if it were a chess piece. No, he thought, the best thing he could do was to go forward one step at a time into the dark. He was used to that. He had burst from the darkness of an unknown life into this shadow world where everything in front of him was black as night. There was a pain inside him—the agony of unknowing—that he had lived with so long he often forgot it was there. And yet every now and again it rushed back at him with the power of an express train. Nothing in his past was real, nothing he had once done or accomplished, nothing he had felt, no one he had known or cared about. All had been obliterated by his fall into the void. He kept looking for the things that were now impossible to find. The occasional shards that came back to him from time to time only increased his sense of isolation and helplessness. Often, they were disturbing in their own right.

At once, he saw again the woman in the stall of the Nordic disco, the sheen of sweat on her face, the sardonic smile, the muzzle of the handgun she aimed at him. What make and model was it? He strained to remember, but all he could see was her face, devoid of fear or even resignation. He felt the fur collar against his cheeks. Her mouth had opened, those red lips parting. She had said something to him in the moment before he had killed her. What was it? What had she said? He had the impression that it was somehow important, though he was at a loss to say why. And then the memory slithered away from him, back into the blackness of a past that felt as if it belonged to someone else.

To lose everything—your very life—was an unspeakable agony. He was wandering in an unknown land. The stars overhead were arrayed in unfamiliar constellations, and the sun never rose. He was alone, the impenetrable darkness ahead his sole companion.

The darkness, and, of course, the pain.

6

SORAYA ARRIVED IN Paris early on a gray, rain-washed morning. She didn’t mind. Paris was one of the only cities she loved in the rain. The slick surfaces, the melancholy mood mysteriously heightened the beauty and romance of the city, the modern-day crust sluiced away, revealing the facades of history, turning like the pages of a book. Besides, hours from now she would be seeing Amun. In the first-class lounge, she showered and changed into fresh clothes, then spent fifteen minutes applying makeup while she drank a cup of awful coffee and ate a croissant that tasted pre-packaged.

She rarely wore makeup other than a neutral lipstick, but she wanted to make an impression on Jacques Robbinet, whom she was also meeting today. However, it wasn’t the minister of culture who met her outside of security but a man who introduced himself as Aaron Lipkin-Renais. His credentials identified him as an inspector with the Quai d’Orsay.

He was tall, reed-thin, with one of those unmistakable Gallic noses that rode before him like the prow of a pirate ship. He wore his hand-tailored suit as only the French can. A gentleman, she thought, because he offered his hand to her and bent low over it.

“The secretary sends his apologies,” he said in a softly slurred English, “but a meeting at the Élysée Palace kept him from meeting you himself.” The Élysée Palace was the residence and office of the French president. It was where the Council of Ministers met. He offered a self-deprecating smile. “I’m afraid you’ll have to settle for me.”

“Je ne crains pas le moins du monde,” she replied with a perfect Parisian accent. I don’t mind in the least.

Aaron’s long, horsey face broke into a huge grin. “Eh bien, maintenant, tout devient clair.” Ah, well, now everything becomes clear.

He took her carry-on from her, and as they walked together through the arrivals hall Soraya had a chance to study him in more detail. She judged him to be in his midthirties, fit for a Frenchman. Though she wouldn’t call him handsome, there was nevertheless something appealing about him, a certain boyishness in his gray eyes and informal manner that countered strongly the inevitable crusty cynicism built up by intelligence work. She thought they would get along.

Outside, the rain had become a gentle mist. The sky seemed to want to pull apart its gauzy layers. It was exceptionally mild. A light breeze ruffled her hair. Aaron led her to a dark Peugeot waiting at the curb. When the driver saw them, he got out of the car, took Soraya’s carry-on from his boss, and stowed it in the trunk. Aaron opened the rear door for her and she climbed in. As soon as he was settled in beside her, they pulled away from the curb and threaded their way out of the airport.

“M. Robbinet has booked you into the Astor Saint-Honoré. It’s centrally located and is close to the Élysée Palace. Would you like to go there first and freshen up?”

“Thank you, no,” Soraya said. “I’d like to view Laurent’s body and then see the forensics report.”

He took a file out of the pocket in the driver’s-seat back and handed it to her. “You’re half Egyptian, aren’t you?”

“Is that a problem?” She looked into his gray eyes, searching for a sign of prejudice.

“Not for me. Is it for you?”

“Not at all.”

She smoothed her hackles back down. Now she understood. Aaron was Jewish. With the recent huge influx of Muslims, Jews were having a harder time in France, especially Paris. Jewish children were being particularly targeted in schools. Almost every day, there was a report of a Jewish child being beaten by a gang of Muslim children. She’d recently read an alarming report that many Jewish families were leaving France altogether because increasingly they found the charged atmosphere unsafe for their children.

He smiled at her, and she could very clearly see herself in him—the Semitic heritage that Arabs and Jews shared but, tragically, could not bear to contemplate.

She smiled back and hoped that he saw the same. Then she opened the file and looked through the pages. There were several photos of Laurent taken by the forensics team in situ. It was not a pretty sight.

She sucked in her breath. “It looks to me as if the car struck him, then ran him over.”

Aaron nodded. “Yes, it would seem so. There’s no other way to explain the two sets of injuries—the first to his sternum and rib cage, the second to his head.”

“They couldn’t have been made in one strike.”

“No,” he confirmed. “Our coroner says definitely not.” He tapped one of the photos. “Someone hated this man very much.”

“Or didn’t want him to talk.”

Aaron gave her a sharp look. “Ah, the light dawns. So that is your interest in this murder. It has international implications.”

“I’m not saying a word.”

“You don’t have to.” That boyish grin again.

Soraya was appalled. Was she flirting with him?

They drove onto the Périphérique, the boulevard that girdled the city, and entered Paris via the Porte de Bercy. The moment the Peugeot hit the streets, Soraya felt the welcoming warmth of the city. The familiar streets seemed to beckon to her, smiling.

Soraya tore her gaze away from the old mansard-roofed buildings and returned to her reading. The body exhibited no marks other than those consistent with being run over. His blood work was still being parsed, but the preliminary results noted no elevated alcohol levels or noticeable foreign substances. She returned to the photos, looking more closely at the ones that showed an overall view of the crime scene.

She pointed to a small, vaguely oblong-shaped blob in the lower right-hand corner of photo number three. “What’s this?”

“Cell phone,” Aaron said. “We think it belonged to the victim, but the damage to it made it impossible to manually access the phone book.”

“What about the SIM card?”

“Bent and creased,” Aaron said, “but I took it myself to our best IT technician. He’s working on getting the information out of it.”