Page 74 of All the Devils Are Here

Reine-Marie walked up the steps and into the store.

When she came out again, she had in her purse a small blue-and-gold box. Containing a cologne.

* * *

Jean-Guy sat at his desk and was about to log in to his computer when he paused. Considering the options and the consequences. But not for long. It was already just after two, and he needed to meet Annie and the others in less than an hour.

Making up his mind, Beauvoir walked next door into Séverine Arbour’s office. He looked around. As far as he knew, there were no cameras here. Though he couldn’t be sure.

It was a risk he had to take.

Sitting down, he first rifled her desk, or tried to. The drawers were locked, and all he succeeded in doing was rattling them.

Then he turned to her computer. It, too, was locked, but as head of the department he knew her code.

Her computer sprang to life. There was a document already up. The Patagonia project. He’d managed to rattle her after all.

Minimizing it, he began typing, and up came the file on Luxembourg.

Beauvoir knew that their cybersecurity unit could find out who had accessed which files, and on which terminal.

If anyone wanted to know who was snooping around the Luxembourg dossier, on a Saturday, all they’d see was Séverine Arbour. Not him.

He couldn’t get into her emails, he’d need her password for that, but he could get into the main files and bring up internal reports.

Which is what he did.

He was just about to send it to himself when he stopped. That would be a fatal error. Instead, he hit print.

Out in the main office, over by the wall, a large industrial printer sprang to life.

Now he needed to find the emails between the engineer on-site and the executive overseeing the project. Scanning the file, he found the name of the engineer.

And the name of the executive.

Carole Gossette.

He sat back, staring at the name. Madame Gossette. Head of operations. His boss. His mentor.

Now why would such a senior executive be overseeing such an apparently minor project? Because, he thought, it wasn’t such a minor project after all.

There was a soft ding.

“Merde,” he whispered, his heart leaping in his chest. He recognized that sound.

The elevator door at the end of the hallway opened. Without glancing up, Beauvoir tried to stop the printer, but it wouldn’t be put on pause. Hitting the button several times, Beauvoir eventually gave up and put the screen to sleep.

Across the large open room, the Luxembourg file was still printing out. And the guard was getting closer.

There was no way to get to the printer before the guard arrived. Instead, Jean-Guy quickly left Arbour’s office and ducked into his own, leaving the door open.

In the background, he could hear the large machine making what now sounded like a racket.

And then it stopped, and there was silence just as the guard entered the offices.

“Monsieur Beauvoir,” he said. “I’d heard you were in.”

The man was in his late twenties. Tall and sturdy. Fit.