Page 52 of Shadow of Doubt

“They’re not Belarusian Armed Forces,” he replied, advancing to fresh imagery. “They’re actually Russians. We’ve traced several of their vehicles. They belong to the Wagner Mercenary Group.”

“Why would Peshkov be using Wagner mercs to protect his nukes?” Maggie mused aloud. “That’s the purview of the 12th Main Directorate back at Russia’s Ministry of Defense.”

“Two birds, one stone?” one of the analysts sitting nearby suggested.

“Go on.”

“Even though Belarus is a satrapy of Russia, Peshkov can’t fully trust the security of his nuclear weapons to them. He also can’t afford to redeploy any competent troops away from the war in Ukraine. But by using Wagner Group operatives, he gets battle-tested Russians guarding Russian nukes without upending current Russian Army deployments.”

Maggie nodded. “And sprinkled in with those battle-hardened mercenaries, he can include the specialists and engineers with the know-how needed to maintain those weapons.”

Around the table, the analysts nodded their heads in agreement.

“Any other updates?” Maggie asked.

“Right now,” Dunlop replied, “that’s our most current intel.”

Maggie stood from her chair. “Excellent job, everyone. I’m recommending this for today’s PDB, so please get a write-up to my office straightaway.”

As she exited the conference room, she checked her watch. Conroy would be in soon and she wanted to be the first person he saw.

CHAPTER 24

PARIS

“This is the last meal I’m buying until you crack the encryption on that flash drive,” Brunelle said as she set down two Styrofoam containers on MoMo’s desk, loaded with halal food.

“I’m working as hard as I can,” the young man replied.

“La Crim cracked the same guy’s iPhone yesterday.”

MoMo wasn’t impressed. “It’s a six-digit password. Everybody thinks iPhones are impossible to crack. They’re not.Obviously.”

Brunelle was in a disagreeable mood. Shortly after she returned home from Powell’s apartment last night, heavy thunderstorms had moved in, keeping her awake. To top it off, in the elevator on the way down, Gibert had suggested they go for a drink before calling it a night.

He was concerned about the “tension between them” and wanted to “clear the air.” She said no to the drinks and told him to get over it, as she had done awhile ago. Either that, or he should see a therapist. His guilt wasn’t her problem.

When the storms finally abated, it was nearing 5 a.m. She fired off an email to her superior saying that she would be following a lead this morning and wouldn’t be in until later. Then she rolled over and, after more tossing and turning, was able to grab a few hours of sleep.

Rolling into the office, having consumed two coffees at her apartment, one at the Métro station and another just outside DGSI headquarters, she stopped by MoMo’s desk and tried her best to be nice. She knew what she could be like when she hadn’t slept well. Sometimes all the coffee in the world was incapable of improving her attitude.

Without looking up, MoMo offered to work through lunch, but only if she agreed to go get it for him. The urge to choke him, right there at his workstation, was strong, yet she maintained her professionalism, took a breath, and waited for it to pass.

On the way back with the food, she made a decision. DGSI often hired outside hackers. If MoMo couldn’t get the job done by the end of the day, that was going to be her next move.

Normally, she would have to get approval, as well as funds, from higher up, but since she’d removed the flash drive from the crime scene, that could pose multiple problems for her. Better to keep it under the radar. Heading back to her office, she reread a text Gibert had sent on her way to work.

His officers had canvassed residents of the rooftop apartments adjacent to Jadot’s and, as Brunelle had suspected, at least one of them had heard something the night of his murder.

It was described as a thud of some sort. Too heavy to have been a pigeon, but the resident wasn’t sure if it had been a person. It was raining pretty hard, she only heard it once, and she had been listening to an audiobook with AirPods in her ears at the time.

Officers had done a full search of her roof, as well as the others nearby, but hadn’t found anything. The same, unfortunately, was true for the new dump of CCTV footage they’d received. In the race to solve Jadot’s murder, Gibert and his vaunted la Crim were starting to fall out of medal contention.

She was halfway back to her desk when something clicked in her brain.That was it!Turning around, she trotted back to MoMo.

“Still nothing,” he replied. The irritation was evident in his voice as he ate his lunch and continued to work on the flash drive.

Brunelle let his attitude slide. “Do you remember the Depeche Mode concert a couple of months ago? It was at the Accor Arena.”

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