The Book of Lost Fragrances: A Novel of Suspense by M. J. Rose

Author:M. J. Rose [Rose, M. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-03-13T06:00:00+00:00

Thirty-two

8:58 P.M.

Jac stepped out onto the terrace and reached for the light switch.

“Wait.” Griffin stopped her. “Let’s see if there’s enough ambient light.”

“None of the surrounding buildings can see down into the maze.”

“The maze? Is that where you think Robbie is?”

She nodded. “I’ll show you.”

Griffin looked up and craned his neck. “Are you sure no one can look down on us? What about there?” He pointed.

“That’s part of our building. These trees were planted so that no one can see the labyrinth except us. One day if a skyscraper goes up nearby, perhaps, but not yet.”

“It’s still better if you don’t turn on the lights. Even if they can’t see us directly, there might be some kind of glow. You don’t want them to know you’re out here at night.”

“I’m just taking a walk in my own garden,” she argued. “How suspicious could that be?”

“Let’s try it without the lights.”

As stubborn as Jac was, he was worse. She bristled. How, after so long, could they reprise their roles so easily? The good and the bad. The comforting and the annoying. Over the years, Jac had assumed the grooves they’d worn in each other’s psyches would have smoothed out. But they hadn’t. In little more than twenty-four hours, she and Griffin had slipped back to the way they had a decade ago.

It was a moonless night. Opaque black. But Jac knew the twists and turns in the warren of lanes by heart and led the way without a misstep. She could have done it blindfolded—by smell. There were roses and jasmine planted in the center, and the stronger their scent, the closer she knew she was.

Arriving at the maze’s heart, she dropped to her knees and with the palms of her hands moved the black and white pebbles away, revealing the metal disc she’d discovered earlier that afternoon.

There had been no flashlights in the parfumerie. Or if there were, she didn’t know where to find one. Griffin always carried a penlight in his briefcase, but that was back in his hotel room. A supply of scented candles from the shop was the best they could manage. Fat, expensive votives that were imbued with the signature fragrances of the House of L’Etoile.

Griffin squatted beside her, struck a match. Once the candle came to life, he shone it on the manhole cover.

“This is a couple of hundred years old.” He ran his fingers over the metal numbers.

1808.

“How could I have missed that this afternoon?” she said, annoyed with herself.

“You weren’t looking for it. You were looking for Robbie.”

What had been impossible for Jac to do alone, she and Griffin did in their first effort. They lifted the plate and moved it aside revealing a three-foot-wide hole in the ground.

“What’s down there?” he asked.

Trying to ignore her growing panic, Jac kneeled down and peered over the edge. The scent that wafted up contained dirt and dust. Slightly rotting wood and moldy stone.

Griffin lowered the candle into the hole. The small flame only illuminated the metal rim and a few feet of stonework.

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