The Paris Betrayal by James Hannibal (beach read .TXT) 📕

10

A heavy mist of bleach and acetone filled the bathroom. Under the vinyl curtain, Ben dropped to his knees. Free of Hagen’s grip, he had time for three wheezing breaths before the fumes creeped under the edges to find him. A patch of his face burned. He must’ve been cut in the fight. Outside his makeshift shield, Hagen gagged and groaned. The dresser rattled. He’d fled into the main room. Ben had to press his advantage before his attacker recovered, and before the second, deadly phase of the cleaning kit kicked in.

Two more packets of bleach had exploded over the bed and in the kitchen, leaving no safe space in the flat. Ben stumbled from the bathroom, fighting the urge to breathe, and found Hagen growling and trying to wipe his eyes with the sweatshirt under his jacket. Hagen heard Ben coming and took a swing. Ben sidestepped the punch, lining up a shot through his blurred vision, and landed a hook that toppled his opponent. He stomped on the two scalpels still buried in the man’s thighs, forcing a scream that would only pull in more choking gas.

His lungs begged for air, and his mental clock kept ticking. The incendiaries were timed to ignite two minutes after the chemical packets blew, when the air had reached the right saturation of flammable vapor. He couldn’t hang around to play with Hagen any longer.

Ben recovered his Glock and Hagen’s cattle prod from the carpet and kicked through the drywall beside the door, bending to work a hidden backpack free from the resulting hole. The hall outside seemed strangely quiet after the tumult of the fight. He gently closed the door, picked up his folded coat, and pulled it on over his bleach-stained shirt. To cover the throbbing wound on the back of his head, he used a stocking cap from his go-bag. Then he shouldered his pack and feigned the calm of a man heading out for a walk.

He made it halfway to the stairwell door before it opened. Clara came walking through.

She had the dog with her. She always carried that dog. Ben could never remember its name. “Clara?” He glanced behind him. Only seconds to go now. “Your floor is one down.”

“Yes, I know. I want to talk. Earlier when I spoke of dinner—”

“We said we’d do it another time.” He tried to steer her back toward the stairwell.

She jerked her arm free and stopped, poking him in the chest. “You said another time, Jacob. As always. You are busy, or tired, or packing, or unpacking. I’m not proposing marriage. Just dinner. Two neighbors, foreigners in this city sitting down for a meal.”

“Either way, I’m spoken for.”

“Really?” She made an indignant side-to-side motion with her head, flopping her blue strands back and forth. “I’ve never seen this woman. Is she real or imaginary?”

Ben had lost count of the seconds, but the two minutes had to be almost up. “I have to go.” He kept walking. “We have to go.”

Thankfully, she followed, sniffing the air. “Why do you smell like bleach?”

“Calix!” Hagen burst out of the flat and staggered into the hall. He extended his SIG.

Ben stepped in front of Clara, drawing his Glock and firing at the same time. He never saw if his shots hit the mark.

A blast rocked the building. The fireball enveloped Hagen. Cracks ran up and down the hallway plaster, and dust fell from the ceiling. The cleaning kit’s incendiary cord had finally lit the fumes.

The explosion buried Clara’s scream. Before it settled, Ben had her moving toward the stairwell. “Like I said. We have to go.”

By the time the two reached the street, police sirens wailed in the city—three, maybe four blocks away and closing. Pedestrians shouted, running into the traffic to get away from the building. Ben pointed north, up the river. “Go that way. There’s a clinic on Rue de la Tour. Get checked out.”

He walked south, glancing up at the smoke rising from the building. Everything he owned, everything but the clothes on his back, destroyed.

“Who was that man, Jacob?” Clara walked beside him with the dachshund on his leash, stubby legs racing to keep up. “Why did he call you Calix?”

“I told you to go to the clinic.”

“You shot him.”

“You can’t prove that’s what killed him. Might’ve been the explosion. You need to go. It’s not safe.”

“Not until you tell me what’s going on. The cuts? The swelling? My father was a mean drunk. My brother took the worst of it. I know a face that’s taken a beating when I see one. You had a fist fight, shot that man, and then blew up your own flat.”

He wheeled around on her, speaking through clenched teeth. “Go away.”

His sudden turn seemed to catch two men off guard, half a block behind. A man in gray trousers and a brown jacket averted his gaze. A black man wearing a dark blue sweatshirt made the same movement, walking through the park across the street from the first. A good twenty meters separated the two, but they were clearly working together. Hagen had brought friends, and they’d seen the girl talking to Ben.

“Fine,” he said. “Come with me.”

He led her another block to the river and the walkway under the Passy Viaduct, in the Eiffel Tower’s shadow.

Clara had almost as much trouble keeping pace as her dog. “You could slow down, you know.”

“No we can’t.”

She stopped anyway—not from defiance, but because the dog had picked that moment to draw a line in the sand. He tugged at his leash, refusing to go on.

“Ugh. Otto! Come, boy. Otto, come here!”

“Pick up your dog, Clara.”

“He’s fine. He’ll come. He’s not usually like this.” She patted her leg, switching to Slovak. “Otto, ty tupý pes, ku mne! Ku mne!”

Ben watched the bridge behind them. Mr. Brown Jacket and his friend Blue Sweatshirt knew they’d been made, and they were no longer trying