I took a few minutes to disguise myself. I wanted to pay homage to Cort, my handler in Florida, who had taught me so much about disguise, but I would have needed more time to be that amazing. I would be a bum for this mission, and I hoped it would be the last disguise I’d have to use in Paris.
Since all Division cars would be tracked, I chose to go on foot. I pushed my number into the keypad and let the optical scanner identify me so I could leave the garage. If Siron didn’t already know I was going after Jeremy and Halluis, she would shortly.
Chapter 16
I slipped out into the twilight, one address and the best routes to get there spinning through my mind. I stuck to the subways, the most appropriate transportation for my disguise. I hugged my go bag to my chest. If only my original alias had been a bum here in Paris, I wouldn’t be in the position I was now in. No one would have ever tried to pick me. I huffed and used my burner phone for Internet access as I hid under the ratty blanket I had wrapped around me. I was glad I’d never bothered to get a new Division phone when I’d been let back into Siron’s graces. If I had, they’d be able to find me, just as they’d found Jeremy. The train seemed to become uncharacteristically packed as we got closer to my stop.
I memorized every detail of the area around the house I was heading to. It was in the Marais neighborhood, a trendy, busy, and fashion conscious area of Paris. I could see the lure of it for the boss of a pickpocket gang. It was so busy, no one would ever wonder why so many people entered and exited a particular building all day long. The building appeared to have five different entrances disguised as separate apartments and a business front on street level. It was also the area where the Bastille was found. The history of the area had probably spoken to such a corrupt and villainous person. Plenty of people had lost their heads here. I hoped Jeremy still had his. No, I was not going to think like that. He was alive, and I was going to rescue him.
To my surprise, when I climbed out of the train, the platform was packed. Many were dressed as if going out on the town, while others were dressed in costume as if going to a street festival. I puzzled over this until I stepped out onto the street, brushing against a woman dressed as a sexy Marie Antoinette, and saw the banners and fliers all over the place. I was smack-dab in the middle of the Marais Art Festival. A man in drag with excessive sparkles and massive plumes of feathers cut in front of me, the feathers tickling my nose as he passed. Surprisingly, no one snickered or stared at me in my bum attire. I seemed to fit right in with the partygoers.
A large section of rue Beaubourg had been shut down to accommodate all the revelers as well as a large stage where a band had just finished playing a song. The French words of one of the band members boomed out over the crowds.
“Yes. It’s true we have our very own Prime Minister here today. Why don’t you come up and say a few words to all your loyal subjects before you continue on with your art tour?”
The crowd cheered, obviously loving the idea. I saw hands wave above a head, and I wondered if it was him.
The band member sighed loudly into the microphone and said, “Just one sentence would suffice, Monsieur. We don’t need a full speech.”
After almost a minute of near absolute silence, only a few intoxicated revelers shouting out here and there, the crowds parted and the Prime Minister, second only to the President of France, walked up to the makeshift stage and took the microphone, “Vivre le festival artistique de Marias!” His hands shot up in the air and behind him, my eyes found something I wasn’t expecting to see: Cardwell. He stood behind the Prime Minister, acting as some type of a guard, his eyes sweeping the area. I shrank back into the crowds, as if he would be able to pick me out of such an enormous group of people. Cardwell had had a busy day today. He looked upset. I would be too if I’d lost the two people I was supposed to have locked in my dungeon.
Suddenly, my brain registered what I was seeing: Cardwell worked for the Prime Minister. There was no way this was a coincidence. The kidnappers were tied to the Prime Minister, and by the looks of things, they worked directly for him.
I gasped and felt my way back to a building, any building that I could press up against. My mind reeled. Pieces cascaded into place, suddenly making sense. Adolphe and Cardwell had been looking for the drive, and Dufor had said the drive contained incriminating evidence against a powerful public official. The Prime Minister must have somehow been implicated by the information Dufor was planning to give us—but what could it have been?
A perfect image of Dufor’s agitated drawings flashed through my mind. The man with the knife in his back—betrayal. Liberté, égalité, fraternité: the national motto of France, crossed out. Prime Minister Alden had betrayed the people of France? Then the twisted quote, “Poverty is the mother of crime and he is the father.”
