Page 46 of The Expat Affair

Thomas shakes his head, his muscles going rigid under the lambswool of his suit jacket. Not an answer to my question but a signal for me to stop talking. People are watching. They could hear. A funeral is neither the time nor the place to talk about a second dead body.

In the lobby, we make a quick pit stop at Xander’s sister, who must have no idea of the animosity between her brother and Thomas, because she accepts our condolences with a warm hug. If any of the Prins family find it awkward that we’re here, pretending to mourn the man they had patted down and escorted from the building only a week ago, you’d never know it by their heartfelt offers of sympathy. If nothing else, the Prinses’ manners are impeccable.

Thomas and I are the first to make it outside.

“I don’t think it’s one of ours,” he says, scrolling through the news clips on his phone. “It must have been an independent trader, but even then, I would have known if one of them went missing.”

“Maybe he wasn’t missing for that long,” I suggest. “Or it could have been a foreign trader.”

“Still weird I haven’t heardsomething, even if it was only a rumor. Traders are a tight-knit group, a lot of them from families that have been in the business for generations.” He shakes his head, thumb flicking on his iPhone screen. “The media’s not giving me anything but the headline.”

I think back to the words I saw on Thomas’s screen:Body of diamond trader linked to House of Prins found in AmstelRiver.Linkedcould mean anything. The cousin of a trader who works for Prins, or a transaction that happened some twenty years ago. My thoughts spin, and I can’t be the only one wondering. Social media will already be lit up by now, endless rambling theories of how the two deaths are connected, a slew of armchair detectives pointing theirconspiracies back to the House. To Thomas, who may or may not have a 3D-printed gun.

One of the double doors pops open and out breezes Willem, his cellphone pressed to an ear. “I’m guessing this newsflash means you won’t make tee time.”

Arthur, I’m assuming. Willem’s golf buddy and former fraternity brother, currently head of police for Amsterdam. Willem laughs at whatever he says, then turns for the parking lot, his wool overcoat flapping in his wake. Thomas hurries after his father like an obedient duckling, leaving me alone in the courtyard.

No, not alone. There’s a cluster of smokers huddled against an ivy-covered wall, the press huddled up at the street, and a low murmur of voices talking nearby. I look around for who’s speaking, but I don’t see anyone else.

Anna files out the door next, along with the rest of the family: Fleur and the ever-agreeable Roland, the twins looking surly and bored. Roland peels off to bum a smoke, while Fleur and Anna scurry after Willem and Thomas. The twins and I exchange a look before slowly taking up the rear.

We’re halfway across the parking lot when Yara wrinkles her perfect nose. “What is that smell?”

“It’s shit,” Esmée says, covering hers. “Oh, God, it’s poisonous. This is why I only eat organic.”

Esmée is the pretty twin, her skinny limbs draped in a white-collared dress that I’m pretty sure I saw hanging in the window at Prada, and I hate to tell her, but organic sheep shit stinks, too. The pasture bordering the lot is filled with them, a long stretch of green dotted with white and black balls of fluff. While tourists come for Amsterdam’s canal houses and museums and coffee shops, this right here is the real Holland—miles and miles of reclaimed farmland crisscrossed with dikes and canals to hold in the livestock. The girls are right, though; it’s poisonous.

We catch up to Fleur, her thumbs tapping furiously at her phone. “I’ve put out a few lines,” she says, I’m guessing to Thomas, but he doesn’t seem to be listening. His thumbs are working his phone, too. “So far nobody knows anything.”

I look around for Willem and Anna, but they must have ducked into their car, the sleek Mercedes idling at the far end of the lot.

Thomas grunts. “Wait a minute. According to theNRC, his body was found two days ago.”

“I need a name, Thomas. I can’t make a move until you give me a name.” She pauses, groaning. “Oh, shit. The AP is reporting it too, a diamond trader connected to House of Prins. Dammit. I need to get back to the office.”

Yara comes up behind her mother, poking Fleur in the ribs. “Can we just go? I have hockey and this is takingforever.”

“Yeah,” her twin says halfheartedly. With the dark, delicate fabric and those big eyes draped in mascara, Esmée could easily pass for sixteen, but everything else about her is still twelve. She holds her phone high and blows a big pink bubble for the camera. Snapchat, I’m guessing. The twins are both obsessed.

Fleur’s answer is aimed at Thomas. “Don’t just stand there.Dosomething. Call Martin, see what he knows.”

Thomas frowns. He doesn’t like being ordered around, least of all by his sister. “Martin deals with dozens of diamond traders every day. He would have told me if any of them had fallen into the Amstel.”

“Not if this guy wasn’t Dutch. Maybe Martin just assumed he flew back home.”

Thomas silently concedes the point and pulls up a number on his phone. I wonder briefly who this Martin is—an employee? an industry colleague?—but Thomas is already pressing the phone to his ear. I hear his friendly greeting as he walks away, his untroubled voice as he begins the call with chitchat, and the lightheartednessin his tone scoops out the underside of my belly. Thomas can be so contrived, so overly charming when he wants to be.

Esmée tugs on her mother’s arm. “Mama, please. It’sfreezing.”

Yara’s gaze wanders to the field, her nose crinkling in disgust. “And those sheep need a bath. At least give us the car keys so we can wait where it’s warm.”

Esmée hooks a finger around the strap of Fleur’s Dior bag and slides it from her shoulder. “Why did you make us come to this stupid thing? We didn’t even know the dead guy.”

Now, finally, Fleur looks up from her phone. “Because you and your sister are next in line. The future faces of House of Prins. Because one day, this company will belong to the two of you, and it’s best to learn now that this job means taking on responsibility for every single staff member, even the ones you don’t like very much. It means attending a lot of functions when you’d really rather stay home, and talking to a lot of people you don’t know and don’tcareto know, but still treating them like they’re your new best friends anyway. Because you are a Prins and people are watching, so you might as well get used to it now.”

Esmée rolls her eyes, flipping open the bag. “Jeez, Ma. You make it sound so appealing.”

Fleur returns to her phone, her thumbnails tap-tap-tapping away at the screen.

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