I looked back over at Sean and Jake. They were deeply involved in their conversation. I swallowed back my fear and leaned back against the bench. My heart had started beating again, and I tried to breathe normally.
“It’s a beautiful day out, isn’t it?” Rien asked. He smiled broadly, his golden eyes glittering in the sunshine. If I hadn’t known who he was or what he was capable of, I would have thought he was handsome.
“Who are you?” I asked.
“I’m only a friend,” Rien said, pulling out a stick of gum. He offered me some, and I declined. I wasn’t about to take candy from a kidnapper.
“A friend?” I echoed.
“A friend of Sean’s. He said he needed help, and I owed him one. I hate owing people anything, don’t you? Being indebted to a person is so irritating. But when you work in my profession, you’re bound to do favors for someone at some point.”
“So you’re a professional bad guy.”
To my surprise, Rien burst out into enthusiastic laughter. He slapped his hands on his thighs, making me jump. But then he bit back his laughter.
“It’s not just me. There are lots of us.”
“Lots of who?”
“Killers. Lots of us.” He snapped his gum.
“Are you all so cold-blooded?”
Rien shrugged.
“We come in all kinds. Some of us are neat, some of us are sloppy. But we all enjoy the kill. ”
“That’s what you do?”
“That’s what I’m good at.” He smiled at me, as though it was utterly normal for a killer to be sitting on a bench next to the Eiffel Tower, talking about killing.
“Is that what Sean does?” I asked. If he was really Jake’s brother, then I wanted to know. But Rien only shrugged again.
“He’s trying to get out of the game.”
“Why? So that he doesn’t get caught by the police?”
Rien chuckled. He put his arms around the back of the bench, basking in the sun.
“We’re above the police,” he said. “We avoid them, because it would be messy to explain. But people who work for the CIA … we aren’t people. Not really.”
“You’re not people?” I tilted my head. I didn’t understand.
“We don’t exist. On paper, anyway.”
The witness protection program. I was beginning to realize how it all fit together.
“Sean is… well, Sean Carville is dead. I used to be someone else, too. There’s always a place for us in the good old intelligent forces division, though.”
“But Sean doesn’t want to do it anymore?”
“Sean is a wonderful son. He’s taking care of his mom. That’s the reason he took the jobs he took. Now that he’s got money, he doesn’t need to.”
“That’s why he held me for ransom?”
“I don’t think that’s the only reason. He’s been checking in on Jake’s career for years and years. Watching him.”
“Creepy.” I shuddered, thinking of Sean tracking Jake’s life while he didn’t even know his brother existed.
“Wouldn’t you? If you had a brother?”
“Why didn’t he get in contact with him sooner?”
Rien shrugged.
“I’ve never asked.”
I looked back over at Jake and Sean. Sean was standing up, offering Jake a hand. Jake took it.
“Why—”
I turned back to face Rien, but he was already walking away. Just another person who didn’t exist, walking in the crowds of a big city. I shuddered.
Jake and Sean walked over to me. I was a little shocked to see Jake’s eyes ringed red. Had he been crying?
“Come on, Lacey,” Jake said. “We’re going to the hospital.”
“Hospital?”
“Yes.” He looked over at Sean, and I saw the certainty in his eyes.
“I’m going to go see my mother.”
Chapter Ten
Sean led us to the hospital, a small hospital on the edges of the south Paris suburbs.
“This is where she’s staying?” Jake looked critically at the worn down architecture, the dingy walls of the hospital entrance.
“It’s a good hospital,” Sean insisted. “She likes it here. This is why she wanted to live in France. All of the old buildings and cracked plaster walls.”
Jake chewed his lip. I could tell he was uncomfortable. His mom—someone he’d grieved for his whole life—was suddenly alive again. And he knew nothing about her.
We checked in at the front desk. The nurse eyed me warily and spoke to Jake in French. I couldn’t understand what they were saying. Finally she relented and waved us through.
“What were you saying?” I asked.