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It was eleven minutes to eight, and members of the homicide department were gathering for the regular Monday-morning meeting to discuss ongoing investigations.
Though there was very little “regular” about this meeting. About this morning. The room was electric with anticipation. Now heightened even further by what was blowing up on their phones.
“Merde,” muttered an agent. “Having achieved the pinnacle of power as Chief Superintendent of the Sûreté,” she read, “Gamache promptly abused it. Deliberately allowing catastrophic amounts of opioids onto the streets. After an investigation, he was demoted.”
“They have no idea what they’re talking about. Still, that’s not too bad.”
“It goes on. He should have been fired, at the very least. Probably put on trial and thrown in prison.”
“Oh.”
“That’s insane,” said one of the senior officers, grabbing the phone and reading it for herself. “Who’s writing this crap? They don’t even mention he got the stuff back.”
“Of course they don’t.”
“I hope he doesn’t see it.”
“Are you kidding? He’ll see it.”
The room fell silent, except for the soft clicking from each device. Like the sound of near-dead tree limbs in the breeze.
Words were muttered under their breaths as they read. Words their grandparents had considered sacred but were now profane. Tabernac. Câlice. Hostie.
One senior officer put his head in his hands and massaged his temples. Then, dropping them, he reached for his phone. “I’m going to write a rebuttal.”
“Don’t. Better if it comes from the leadership. Chief Superintendent Toussaint will set them straight.”
“She hasn’t yet.”
“She will. She trained under Gamache. She’ll defend him.”
Off in the far corner, one agent was staring at her phone, a deep line forming between her brows.
While the others were pale, she was flushed as she read not a text or tweet but an email.
Though in her mid-forties, Lysette Cloutier was one of the newer recruits to homicide, having been transferred from the Sûreté’s accounting department. She’d spent years quietly keeping track of the budget, now surpassing a billion dollars, until Chief Superintendent Gamache had noticed her work and thought she’d be helpful tracking down killers.
While she couldn’t follow a DNA trail or a suspect to save her life, she could follow the money. And that often led to the same place.
Everyone else in that conference room had worked hard to get into the most prestigious department in the Sûreté du Québec.
Agent Lysette Cloutier was doing her best to get out. And get back to nice, safe, predictable, understandable numbers. And away from the daily horrors, the physical violence, the emotional chaos of murder.
Cloutier always chose the same seat at these meetings. Making sure her back was to the long whiteboard, on which were tacked photographs.
She considered the email she’d just received, then typed a response and hit send before she had time to reconsider.
“What do you wanna bet some of these tweets are from Beauvoir?” said one of the younger agents.
“You mean Chief Inspector Beauvoir?”
All heads turned to the doorway. And then there was a scramble and a scraping of chairs as everyone got to their feet.
Isabelle Lacoste stood, cane in hand, staring at the young agent. Then her expression softened to a smile as she looked around at the familiar faces.
The last time she’d been in the Monday-morning meeting, she’d chaired it, as head of homicide. Now she entered limping.
Her injuries, though almost healed, were not completely gone. And never would be.
