Central Park by Guillaume Musso (ebook reader macos .TXT) 📕

“Let me take care of that,” Gabriel said, buckling his seat belt.

To put as much distance as they could between their bugged shoes and themselves, they drove farther north, crossing Hell’s Kitchen to Forty-Eighth Street. They parked in a dead end that led to a community garden, where a group of children were picking pumpkins, watched over by their schoolteacher.

It was a quiet neighborhood. No tourists, no crowds. So quiet, in fact, that it was hard to believe they were still in New York. They parked under the yellow foliage of a maple tree. Orange rays of sunlight filtered through its branches, intensifying this feeling of tranquility.

“So what do you have in mind for the briefcase?” she asked, pulling the parking brake.

“I’m going to use the knife you stole to open the locks. They don’t look very solid to me.”

She sighed. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

“No, but yours will never work.”

“We’ll see!” he said defiantly, turning to the back seat to pick up the briefcase.

She gave him the knife and watched, skeptically, as he attempted to insert the blade between the jaws of the lock with no luck. After a while, losing patience, Gabriel tried to force it, but the knife slipped and grazed his palm. “Ow!”

“Jesus Christ, concentrate on what you’re doing!” Alice scolded.

Gabriel gave up. His face was serious now. Something was very obviously bothering him.

“What’s up with you?” she demanded.

“You.”

“Me?”

“Back in the store, I saw the scar on your stomach…what happened to you?”

Alice’s face suddenly darkened. She opened her mouth to retort, but, overcome by a vast weariness, she turned away, sighing as she rubbed her eyes. This guy was just going to keep causing her problems. She’d sensed it from the very beginning.

When she opened her eyes again, her lip was trembling. The pain was returning. The memories resurfacing, large as life.

“Who did that to you, Alice?” he insisted.

Gabriel could feel that he was trespassing on sensitive ground. He said more softly, “How do you expect us to get out of this fix if we can’t even trust each other?”

Alice took a drink of water. Her determination not to confront the past was fading.

“It was early November three years ago,” she began. That was where the story started—with the murder of the young schoolteacher named Clara Maturin…

I remember…Two and a half years agoA year of blood and fury

Another Woman Murdered

in the West of Paris(Le Parisien, May 11, 2011)

Nathalie Roussel, a 26-year-old flight attendant, was found this morning strangled in her home on Rue Meissonnier, a quiet street in the 17th arrondissement. The young woman lived alone and was described by her neighbors as “a quiet person who kept to herself and often traveled for work.” The man who lived across the hall from her saw her a few hours before she was murdered: “She was in a good mood because she’d just bought tickets to see a concert the next day at the Olympia. She didn’t act as if anything was wrong.”

According to sources close to the investigation, several witnesses claim to have seen a man rushing from the premises and driving away on a Piaggio three-wheel scooter. The suspect is described as a man of medium height and slim build, wearing a dark-colored motorcycle helmet.

The investigation is being carried out by the judicial police. Initial reports do not suggest that theft was the primary motive for the attack, even though the victim’s cell phone appears to have been taken.

This murder has strange similarities to that of Clara Maturin, a young schoolteacher in the 16th arrondissement, who was savagely strangled with a nylon stocking in November of last year. Asked about these similarities, the public prosecutor said that nothing was being ruled out at this stage of the investigation.

Murders in the West of Paris:

Police Suspect a Serial Killer(Le Parisien, May 11, 2011)

Forensic analysis shows that flight attendant Nathalie Roussel was strangled with a pair of tights belonging to Clara Maturin, the young schoolteacher murdered last November, says a source close to the investigation.

This fact, until now kept secret by the police, establishes a macabre link between the victims, leading investigators to believe they are tracking a fetish killer whose modus operandi is to use the underwear of his previous victim to murder the next one.

For the moment, the police refuse to confirm this conjecture.

New Murder Victim

in the 16th Arrondissement(Le Parisien, August 19, 2011)

Maud Morel, a nurse at the American Hospital in Neuilly, was murdered the day before yesterday, in the evening, in her apartment on Avenue de Malakoff. The building’s concierge discovered the young woman’s body this morning. She had been savagely strangled with a pair of stockings.

Although police refuse to confirm it officially, this last detail would seem to point to an obvious connection between this homicide and those committed last November and this May in the 16th and 17th arrondissements.

While the motive for the murders remains mysterious, investigators are certain that the three women knew their attacker well enough that they did not suspect him. All three victims were found inside their apartments without any suggestion of breaking and entering. Another disturbing detail: none of the victims’ cell phones have yet been found.

Murders in the West of Paris:

More Clues Point Toward a Serial Killer(Le Parisien, August 20, 2011)

After the savage murder of Maud Morel, a nurse from the American Hospital in Neuilly who was murdered three days ago, investigators no longer have any doubt that there is a link between this homicide and the two others committed in the same area since November of last year.

Questioned about the possibility of this being the work of a serial killer, the public prosecutor was forced to acknowledge that “the three murders do show similarities in their MOs.” The pair of stockings with which Mademoiselle Morel was strangled belonged to Nathalie Roussel, the flight attendant murdered last spring, who was herself strangled with a pair of tights belonging to the schoolteacher Clara Maturin.

This