Private Paris (Private 10)

“Why’s that?”

“Changing times,” he said with a note of wistfulness. “Now, the young are all in relationships, except when they are—how do you say?—exchanging.”

“Exchanging what?”

“Each other,” he said.

“You mean swinging?”

“That’s the word,” Louis said. “There are clubs, even, for these things.”

As we pulled out into traffic, I stared out the window at people and wondered how many had mistresses, or were mistresses, or were swingers. I live in L.A., and I am hardly a prude, but I found Paris behind closed doors oddly fascinating.

“Are they right?” I asked. “About the redhead being at the center of it?”

“She’s part of it. But the center? I don’t think so.”

“Reason?”

He brooded for several moments before saying, “Just my instinct, Jack. Still nothing hard that I can hold on to yet.”

That seemed to remind Louis of something because he got out his iPhone and started punching in numbers. Before he finished and hit send, my own cell rang. It was Justine calling from L.A.

“How’s Sherman?” I asked.

She sounded exhausted and upset. “He’s in surgery, Jack. They’re removing a piece of his skull to relieve the pressure from brain swelling.”

“That’s awful,” I said, frustrated again that we didn’t have his granddaughter in a safe place. “What’s his prognosis?”

“The doctors won’t tell me,” she said. “I’m not next of kin. But a nurse in the ICU said he’ll probably be held in an artificial coma for the next couple of days. Is the granddaughter on the way home?”

“She ran. We don’t have her.”

“This is bad, Jack,” she said. “There’s no one here to make decisions.”

“Find out who he named as the executor of his living will.”

“After I get a few hours’ sleep,” she promised. “It’s four a.m. here and—Del Rio just came in. He wants to tell you something.”

“Jack?” Del Rio growled.

“You’re up early.”

“Late,” he replied. “One of the great perks of the job.”

Del Rio told me that he’d gone through Wilkerson’s home before alerting the L.A. sheriff about the assault and break-in. The deputies and detectives who arrived weren’t very happy about the delay in notification, but they’d live.

“You figure out what they were looking for?” I asked.

“No,” Del Rio replied. “At least nothing that jumped right out at me. But I did find something you might find useful. Wilkerson still keeps paper bank statements around, and some involve her trust.”

“You’ve got an account number?”

“I do. She uses a debit card and makes cash withdrawals from ATM machines. No checking account.”

“You have records of the withdrawals?”

“Not for this month yet, if that’s what you mean.”