Page 14 of When Fashion Turns Deadly

Chapter 6

No one was in thenarrow hall when Marit exited the lift on the fourth floor of the models’ flats the next morning. With a promise to be fast, she’d left Cole waiting outside the building’s front door. If she could manage it, she wanted to be back there before Esmee showed up.

Hurriedly unlocking the door to her temporary home, she turned on the light. Her breath caught. Half the kitchen cupboards were open. The sofa cushions were askew, and the pile of brochures they’d gathered for sight-seeing ideas were scattered across the coffee table and had spilled onto the floor.

The feeling of vulnerability Marit had experienced while waiting in the police interrogation room flooded back. Forced to acknowledge that her recent experience had rattled her more than she’d thought, she attempted to tamp down her instinctive panic. Perhaps she was overreacting. She had nothing to do with whatever the police were investigating, which meant there was no reason whatsoever for someone to break into her flat.

She glanced at Nadia’s bedroom door. It was closed. Was she still asleep? Did she know anything about this mess?

Marit crossed to her own bedroom. Here, too, all the drawers were open, and in the closet, her suitcase lay with the lid up, the shoes she’d left inside now scattered. She stared at the bedding heaped on the floor, a deepening sense of unease trickling down her spine.

A door clicked. Marit swung around. Nadia entered the flat, her eyes narrowing the moment she spotted Marit.

“Want to tell me what happened last night?” Nadia said, folding her arms.

Was Nadia referring to Marit’s time at the police station or the state of the flat?

“What do you mean?” Marit asked.

“The flat.” Anger flashed in Nadia’s eyes, and she unfolded her arms long enough to wave one in the general direction of the living room. “You trashed it.”

Marit stared at her. “You can’t seriously think that I did this!”

“Well, I didn’t. And there isn’t anyone else here.”

Marit moved away from the bedroom door. “Does your room look like my room?”

Giving her a puzzled look, Nadia stepped close enough to peer into the room Marit was using. “Yes,” she said warily. “But I have clothes strewn all over the floor too.”

What felt like a large-sized rock settled in Marit’s stomach. “I didn’t do it, Nadia. I give you my word.”

Nadia must have believed her because in an instant, her expression went from challenging to fearful. Her brown eyes darted to the flat’s front door. “I slept on the sofa next door last night because I was so mad at you. But you think someone else came in here? Someone who went through all our stuff?”

“It looks that way,” Marit said. “I was here for a few minutes around four o’clock, but then I left again. What time did you get in?”

“About eight,” Nadia said. “I was with a group of girls from the Garnier Agency until then.”

“And the flat looked like this when you arrived?”

“Worse,” Nadia said. “I cleaned some of it up.”

The rock had yet to leave Marit’s stomach. She had no idea what this was about, but having her flat ransacked at the same time she was being questioned by the police seemed way too coincidental for comfort. “Are you missing anything?” she asked.

A look of panic crossed Nadia’s face, and she disappeared into her room, only to reappear a few seconds later holding a gold watch. She held it up so Marit could see. “It was my grandmother’s,” she said. “As long as I still have this, I’m okay.”

“It’s beautiful,” Marit said. “But if they didn’t take that, they probably weren’t looking for valuables.” She gazed out at the untidy heap of brochures on the living room floor. “And if that’s the case, what were they looking for?”

“I don’t know,” Nadia said. “But we have to tell Esmee.”

“Yeah. And I have a friend who needs to know too.”

“Who?”

Marit glanced at the clock on the wall. “His name’s Cole, and he’s meeting us downstairs in twenty minutes. Grab your stuff. The sooner he and Esmee know about this, the better.”

***

Cole stood outside Marit’s building, his gloved hands in his pockets, his pistol concealed in the holster at the small of his back. He hoped he wouldn’t have to use it while here in Paris, but his decision to take the train so he could keep his weapons gave him a sense of security that he was grateful for right now.

---