LITMIR.BIZ

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Michaud,” she muttered sleepily, “rue de Monttessuy.”

      “Got it. Café Michaud. Rue de Monttessuy. Twelve noon?”

      “Mmm.”

      He took his time in the shower, answered several dozen emails, reviewed a bid solicitation on a new government contract and still made the ten o’clock signing session at Girault’s office with time to spare.

      The French industrialist was in a jovial mood, convinced he’d won a grudging, last-minute concession. Dev didn’t disabuse him. After initialing sixteen pages and signing three, the two chief executives posed for pictures while their respective staffs breathed sighs of relief that the months of intense negotiations were finally done.

      “How long do you remain in Paris?” Girault asked after pictures and another round of handshakes.

      “I had planned to fly home as soon as we closed this deal, but I think now I’ll take some downtime and stay over a few more days.”

      “A very wise decision,” Girault said with a wink. “Paris is a different city entirely when explored with one you love. Especially when that one is as delightful as your Sarah.”

      “I won’t argue with that. And speaking of my Sarah, we’re meeting for lunch. I’ll say goodbye now, Jean-Jacques.”

      “But no! Not goodbye. You must have dinner with Elise and me again before you leave. Now that we are partners, yes?”

      “I’ll see what Sarah has planned and get back to you.”

      * * *

      The rue de Monttessuy was in the heart of Paris’s 7th arrondissement. Tall, stately buildings topped with slate roofs crowded the sidewalks and offered a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower spearing into the sky at the far end of the street. Café Michaud sat midway down a long block, a beacon of color with its bright red awnings and window boxes filled with geraniums.

      Since he was almost a half hour early, Dev had his driver drop him off at the intersection. He needed to stretch his legs, and he preferred to walk the half block rather than wait for Sarah at one of the café’s outside tables. Maybe he could find something for her in one of the shops lining the narrow, cobbled street. Unlike the high-end boutiques and jeweler’s showrooms on some of the more fashionable boulevards, these were smaller but no less intriguing.

      He strolled past a tiny grocery with fresh produce displayed in wooden crates on either side of the front door, a chocolatier, a wine shop and several antique shops. One in particular caught his attention. Its display of military and aviation memorabilia drew him into the dim, musty interior.

      His eyes went instantly to an original lithograph depicting Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 landing at a Paris airfield after his historic solo transatlantic flight. The photographer had captured the shadowy images of the hundreds of Model As and Ts lined up at the airfield, their headlamps illuminating the grassy strip as the Spirit of St. Louis swooped out of the darkness.

      “I’ll take that,” he told the shopkeeper.

      The man’s brows soared with surprise and just a touch of disdain for this naive American who made no attempt to bargain. Dev didn’t care. He would have paid twice the price. He’d never thought of himself as particularly sentimental, but the key elements in the print—aviation and Paris—were what had brought him and Sarah together.

      As if to compensate for his customer’s foolishness, the shopkeeper threw in at no cost the thick cardboard tube the print had been rolled in when he himself had discovered it at a flea market.

      Tube in hand, Dev exited the shop and started for the café. His pulse kicked when he spotted Sarah approaching from the opposite direction. She was on the other side of the street, some distance from the café, but he recognized her graceful walk and the silky brown hair topped by a jaunty red beret.

      He picked up his pace, intending to cross at the next corner, when a figure half-hidden amid a grocer’s produce display brought him to a dead stop. The man had stringy brown hair that straggled over the shoulders and a camera propped on the top crate. Its monster zoom lens was aimed directly at Sarah. While Dev stood there, his jaw torquing, the greaseball clicked off a half-dozen shots.

      “What the hell are you doing?”

      The photographer whipped around. He said something in French, but it was the careless shrug that fanned Dev’s anger into fury.

      “Bloodsucking parasites,” he ground out.

      The hand gripping the cardboard tube went white at the knuckles. His other hand bunched into a fist. Screw the lawsuits. He’d flatten the guy. The photographer read his intent and jumped back, knocking over several crates of produce in the process.

      “Non, non!” He stumbled back, his face white with alarm under the greasy hair. “You don’t...you don’t understand, Monsieur Hunter. I am François. With Beguile. I shoot the photos for the story.”

      For the second time in as many moments, Dev froze. “The story?”

      “Oui. We get the instructions from New York.”

      He thrust out the camera and angled the digital display. His thumb beat a rapid tattoo as he clicked through picture after picture.

      “But look! Here are you and Sarah having coffee. And here you walk along the Seine. And here she blows you a kiss from the balcony of her hotel room.”

      Pride overrode the photographer’s alarm. A few clicks of the zoom button enlarged the shot on the screen.

      “Do you see how perfectly she is framed? And the expression on her face after you drive away. Like one lost in a dream, yes? She stays like that long enough for me to shoot from three different angles.”

      The anger still hot in Dev’s gut chilled. Ice formed in his veins.

      “She posed for you?” he asked softly, dangerously.

      The photographer glanced up, nervous again. He stuttered something about New York, but Dev wasn’t listening. His gaze was locked on Sarah as she approached the café.

      She’d posed for this guy. After making all those noises about allowing only that one photo shoot at Cartier, she’d caved to her boss’s demands. He might have forgiven that. He had a harder time with the fact that she’d set this all up without telling him.

      Dev left the photographer amid the produce. Jaw tight, he stalked toward the café. Sarah was still a block away on the other side of the street. He was about to cross when a white delivery van slowed to a rolling stop and blocked her from view. A few seconds later, Dev heard the thud of its rear doors slam. When the van cut a sharp left and turned down a narrow side street, the sidewalk Sarah had been walking along was empty.

       Eleven

      Dev broke into a run even before he fully processed what had just happened. All he knew for sure was that Sarah had been strolling toward him one moment and was gone the next. His brain scrambled for a rational explanation of her sudden disappearance. She could have ducked into a shop. Could have stopped to check something in a store window. His gut went with the delivery van.

      Dev hit the corner in a full-out sprint and charged down the side street. He dodged a woman pushing a baby carriage, earned a curse from two men he almost bowled over. He could see the van up ahead, see its taillights flashing red as it braked for a stop sign.

      He was within twenty yards when the red lights blinked off. Less than ten yards away when the van began another turn. The front window was halfway down. Through it Dev could see the driver, his gaze intent on the pedestrians streaming across the intersection and his thin black cigarillo sending spirals of smoke through the half-open window.

      Dev calculated the odds on the fly. Go for the double rear doors or aim for the driver? He risked losing the van if the rear doors were locked and the vehicle

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