Page 56 of Shadow of Doubt

Gibert agreed, but had a different spin on what the AI had uncovered. What if the man wasn’t faking the limp? What if, as he made his way across the rooftops from Jadot’s back to the National Archives, he slipped? Maybe that’s what the woman who was listening to an audiobook at the time had heard?

It was a decent enough hypothesis and Brunelle told him so. She may have been giving the killer too much credit by assuming he would actively try to avoid gait analysis. There was, however, no question that he had taken great pains not to have his face captured by CCTV.

“And what about the ice axe?” she asked. “Ever since Powell mentioned that’s how Trotsky was murdered, I keep thinking about it.”

Gibert shrugged. “I’m confident that the killer was already in the apartment, waiting for Jadot. Perhaps he was there long enough to look around. Maybe he found the axe and thought,This would be a pretty cool way to kill somebody.More than likely, the assassin is a Russian and being aware of the whole thing about Stalin and Trotsky thought,This’ll make for a great story back at the Kremlin.That’s what these guys do. They did it in Spain too.”

“Spain?”

“Remember the story about Ukrainian intelligence convincing a Russian helicopter pilot to defect?”

“Kind of.”

“It’s an amazing story. Not only did the man defect, but he did so with his military helicopteranda bunch of top-secret intelligence. In exchange, the Ukrainians gave him a new passport under a false name and five hundred thousand dollars. While the pilot was incredibly brave, unfortunately, he was also a total idiot. He used the money to buy a flashy Mercedes S-Class and moved to a coastal town in Spain popular with Russians and Ukrainians. Even dumber, he reached out to an old girlfriend back in Russia and invited her to come visit him.

“So, surprise, surprise, two hooded assassins showed up in his parking garage one day. They waited around for him for a few hours and when he finally showed up and got out of his car, they shot him.Multipletimes. But they didn’t do it with just any old ammunition. They used nine-millimeter Makarov rounds, a pistol cartridge from the old Soviet Union. They didn’t even bother to pick up the shell casings. Then they droveover the guy with their car. It was all caught on video and is all part of a larger trend.

“Whether it’s using a nerve agent like Novichok to attempt to kill a former double agent in the UK, or bicycling by a former Chechen commander in a Berlin park and blowing his brains out with a suppressed pistol, the Russians are going back to their old, Stalinist ways. The Soviet-era practice of killings abroad is now back in full swing. The Kremlin isn’t even trying to hide it. Their assassins are actually drawing attention to the murders. And, as Peshkov is a devoted Stalinist, I’m sure he loves it. The less subtle, the better.”

They were all solid points and Brunelle nodded as he spoke. “The only thing I can’t fully scratch off my list,” she stated, “is thewhy.For Jadot to have brought down the wrath of a Russian hit team, he had to have crossed some sort of line with Moscow. What was it?”

“That’s the million-dollar question,” Gibert replied. “If we can find the killer, hopefully we’ll also find an answer. By the way, the Germans caught the Berlin assassin. Do you know where he had traveled from?”

“Don’t say Paris.”

Gibert smiled. Pantomiming a gun, he fired it at her and said, “Yep,Paris.”

Terrific,she thought to herself.

Arriving at 1 Rue de Chapon, Brunelle was glad to be able to change the subject. “Here we are,” she said.

Gibert looked at the front door and then at her. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“I wish I were. This is the last place our man with the limp was seen.”

“How the hell did he get in there?”

“With a key.”

“But where would he getthatkey?” Gibert asked. Then, seeing Brunelle produce one herself, demanded, “And where’d you get one?”

“A fireman,” she replied. “He must have forgotten it at my apartment.”

The Parisian cop felt his cheeks flush. As fucked-up as she was, the thought of her being with another man sent a surge of jealousy through him.

At the same time, he knew she took a certain pleasure in causing him pain. It was her way of getting even.

Not wanting to encourage more of it, he got himself under control. “How the hell would a Russian know about this building?”

“It’s not a state secret,” Brunelle admitted. “These fake façades are all over the center of Paris. Umberto Eco even had one in his bookFoucault’s Pendulumback in the 1980s. One Forty-Five Rue Lafayette was supposed to be an entrance to the underworld for high-level occultists.”

“I’m familiar with that book, which is fiction, as well as these buildings. They’re nothing more than airshafts for the Métro system. They’ve all been disguised to blend into their neighborhoods, like something from a movie set.”

“They’re also the perfect way to disappear. Once you go through one of these doors,poof,no more cameras.”

“I suppose,” Gibert agreed. “And probably not impossible for the Russians to get a hold of a key.”

“Shall we?” Brunelle asked, sliding hers into the lock.

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