Free Mrs. John Doe by Tom Savage

turn, this time to the right, into the Rue de Rivoli. More horns and angry shouts. What on earth—
    Nora slid over toward the door and grabbed the seatbelt, fastening it across her waist as Jacques drove even faster. Buildings and people flew by outside, and the Rue de Rivoli became Rue Saint-Antoine. A familiar blur on her right was the Place de l’Hôtel de Ville; she’d dined in a restaurant near it once with Jeff, years ago. Now she knew where they were, but it didn’t allay her sudden fear. This man had seemed so polite, so friendly. Was he abducting her? Was he part of this? Was that even possible?
    Lonny had made her reservation on his own personal laptop, and early this morning he’d spirited her out a back door of the Byron Hotel and bundled her into a waiting taxi in the next street. No one had followed her to the train station; she was certain of it. How could Jacques—or anyone else—possibly have expected her arrival in France? No. Whatever was happening here, her driver couldn’t be involved. Or could he? He was definitely racing her away from—or toward—
something
.
    She twisted around to look out the rear window, but she couldn’t see anything extraordinary, merely cars and crowds going about their business. She looked forward, through the windshield. The big intersection ahead of them was the Place de la Bastille, the site of the 1789 uprising, outside the long-gone prison for which the place was named. It was a virtual wagon wheel of streets with spokes that extended out in every direction.
    “What?” she finally managed to say. “What is it, Jacques?”
    “Je ne sais pas,”
he muttered, still checking the mirrors. “Give me the moment, mademoiselle.”
    At the roundabout, he turned the car sharply and shot up Boulevard Beaumarchais, into the
arrondissement
known as the Marais. This had always been a favorite part of the city for her, reminding her of Greenwich Village with its jazzy shops and restaurants. If they continued north through this sector, they would arrive at the Place de la République, not far from the famous Conservatoire where the Immigration girl from this morning would soon be studying.
    Jacques apparently had no intention of going that far. He slowed the car to a crawl, and his head bobbed back and forth as he searched the crowded side streets. He turned abruptly into one of them, which was actually an alley, and drove swiftly down its length toward the next street. There was no one about and nothing here in this dark place but back doors of buildings and rows of garbage cans. He pulled over between two large trash receptacles and stopped the car.
    In the abrupt silence and stillness that followed, Nora’s heart gave a sickening lurch. She was in a deserted alley, cut off from the main streets, with a man she didn’t know at all. What if he were to turn around now, and aim a gun at her? Or suddenly throw open the door and leap from the car, run away while his unseen confederates closed in to finish the job? The actress in her had a sudden vision of Faye Dunaway in the car in those final moments of
Bonnie and Clyde,
that slow-motion dance of death as she was riddled with a hundred bullets…
    Jacques didn’t pull a weapon or make a sudden break for cover. He didn’t move at all. He stared into the rearview mirror for several breathless seconds before finally nodding to himself and turning around in his seat to face her. His happy grin was no longer in evidence; he looked worried.
    “
Pardon,
mademoiselle, but I must ask you a thing. Is mademoiselle in some kind of trouble?”
    She regarded him evenly. “Trouble? What do you mean?”
    “I mean there is a car,
une Citroën gris,
I see before we arrive at the
musée
this morning and again when I am waiting outside for you, coming through the street where I am standing more times than one. I do not think about it until I see for sure it follows us from the
musée.
It is a man in the Citroën, with the dark skin. Not