Bree kept her attention on her plate and focused on enjoying the rest of her entrée, the taste of which seemed to evolve as it cooled, giving the sauce a more caramelized consistency that made the way it lingered on the tongue even more remarkable. In her peripheral vision she saw Judge Marchant leaving.
Bree looked over. Judge Alsace and Judge Les Freres were following their colleague and acting as if they didn’t have a care in the world.
“How’s the duck?” Carole asked.
Bree turned back to the bartender. “I won’t tell my ninety-year-old grandmother-in-law, who is an incredible cook, but this may be the best meal of my entire life.”
“The veal is excellent too.”
“Tomorrow night,” Bree promised.
“Same dessert? Crème brûlée?”
“Please, and with a decaf espresso?”
The bartender nodded and walked off.
The big bald guy signed his check and left.
Bree took another bite of the duck, savoring it, before sensing something in her periphery. She pivoted slightly in her seat.
Philippe Abelmar was standing beside her and studying her with some amusement. “The duck again?”
“I could not resist,” she said, trying not to act taken aback by his sudden presence.
“I warned you that the duck can be an addiction,” the billionaire said.
“I’m beginning to understand that.”
His eyes danced and flickered over her face and chest as he said, “Do you know how an African lion keeps his dominance over a pride of lionesses?”
She thought about that. “Constantly fights other lions?”
“Not if he’s smart,” Abelmar said. “Not if he wants to live a long life. If he wants that, then he is actually sedentary much of the time, lying about in the shade with a bellyful of meat his lionesses have killed for him. But even then, in that sated state, the lion is still alert to anything new or out of place. The merest whiff of a threat and he acts, goes to the source of danger immediately and confronts it.”
“He protects his perimeter.”
Abelmar smiled and nodded. “That’s right. And if he needs to fight, he attacks right then, without hesitation. But more often than not, just the power, speed, and aggressiveness of the dominant lion is enough to send all inferior threats running without so much as a bite or a scratch.”
“Is that why you came up to talk to me?” she asked, frowning. “You considered me an inferior threat?”
“You?” he said and he laughed in a rather nice way. “No. I came because I wanted to see if you liked the duck and because you are a very beautiful woman.”
Bree smiled and said, “I appreciate that.” She held out her hand.
He hesitated and then smiled and took it. “Philippe.”
“Bree,” she said.
“Your accent is... interesting,” he said, letting go of her hand.
“Saint Martin,” she said.
“Are you here on vacation or business?”
“A little of both.”
“Your business?”
Bree paused before saying, “I work for a law firm in Saint Martin. We set up shell companies for people interested in moving their business or their money offshore.”
Abelmar cocked his head, raised his eyebrows, and said, “Saint Martin. Who knew?”
“It’s overlooked,” she said. “But I still love it.”
“You are doing this — building shell companies — for someone here in Paris?”
“I’m talking with prospective clients.”
He thought about that, reached into his jacket pocket, and retrieved his business card. “I may be interested. Call my office. Come see me and we’ll talk, Madame...”
“St. Lucie,” she said, taking his card with feigned curiosity. “Bree St. Lucie.”
Chapter 27
Pasadena
As soon as we understood the scope and the motivation behind the murders at the home of Amelia White’s parents, I went outside and phoned Sampson to bring him up to speed while Loughlin called in an army to process the scene and Mahoney arranged to put multiple heavily armed agents around the late Catherine Hingham’s home in Alexandria, Virginia.
We didn’t want more retribution killings on our hands if we could help it.
After I’d described Special Agent White’s confession and the massacre of his family to John, he told me about seeing a man outside Billie’s church whom he recognized from years before. John always had an incredible memory for faces.
“Who is it this time?” I asked.
“I ever tell you about a guy named Hayden Brooker?” Sampson said. “I knew him in the army?”
“You did two tours, John. You knew a lot of people.”
“Brooker was Delta Force. Snuck into hooches. Slit throats.”
I flashed on Amelia White and her children and felt nauseated as I said, “I remember now. You called him Master Sergeant Psycho.”
“Never to his face, man,” Sampson said, sounding horrified at that idea. “Brooker was stone-cold deadly. Scared the crap out of everyone. I never wanted to cross him.”
“You sure it was him outside the church?”
“Positive,” he said. “Little grayer, little paunchier, but it was Brooker. No doubt about it and no idea why he was there. On a different topic, I signed the documents to have Billie’s body exhumed. I don’t want to — I know M is just exploiting her death — but I have to do it.”
“That’s a lot on your plate for one day,” I said, feeling for the guy. “And I understand your reasons completely. Keep me posted. About all of it. Love you, man.”
“Same to you. How’s Bree?”
“Haven’t heard from her yet today but praying she stays safe.”
“From here as well, brother,” Sampson said and hung up.
While Loughlin oversaw the criminologists and agents arriving by the minute, Mahoney and I located the password to the Reisings’ elaborate security system, which included alarms and multiple cameras mounted high around the exterior of the house. We accessed the system, backed up the video recordings, and watched the feeds at high speed, but we saw nothing on the grounds after eleven p.m., when the two now-dead FBI agents had walked the perimeter.
“That’s impossible,” Mahoney said, gesturing at the feed from over the front door. “Agent Deeds died right there. We never see him. We never see anything.”
“Not true,” I said. “Watch this.” I tapped the feed that overlooked the pool. “Keep your eye on the potted plants. Wait for it.”
Thirty seconds later, a rodent bolted from the vegetation and scampered across the pool deck.
“What is that?” Mahoney asked.
“Tree rat,” Loughlin said.
“He does it every two minutes,” I said.
“The tree rat does?” Mahoney said, incredulous.
“Definitely. I think they hacked into the system and bypassed the actual cameras. We’re looking at a loop inserted into the recording, probably from before they attacked. Every feed’s showing a loop.”
“Well, they can’t have done it to every camera in the neighborhood,” Loughlin said. “We’ll pick them up.”
While the LA SAC assigned agents to canvass the area and request all security-camera footage, Mahoney and I tried to figure out how the killers had entered the estate and house without tripping alarms. We found no obvious footprints in the irrigated garden soil anywhere around the base of the high wall surrounding the estate.
But then I noticed that the moist earth in the northwest corner was slightly depressed in an area two feet wide by three feet long. When I got down on my hands and knees, I saw several dozen coarse fibers, each two to three inches, sticking up from the mud.
I picked up a few and stared at them and then at the nearby plants. “I have no idea what these are, but they shouldn’t be here,” I said, showing them to Mahoney.