Read Chapter 17: The Heir to the Badge

The café was called Le Corbeau because of the black birds that roosted in the lime trees out front. Alex had chosen it himself—a busy lunch spot on the N74, halfway between Beaune and Dijon, where a dozen farmers in muddy boots and two tourist coaches guaranteed noise and cover. Inspector Delacroix was already at a corner table, nursing an espresso he hadn't touched.

“You picked a public place,” Delacroix said as Alex sat down. “Smart. The gendarmerie has ears in about four hundred private rooms between here and the estate.”

Alex ordered a coffee from the passing waiter, then leaned in. “You said off the record.”

“I did.” Delacroix pushed his cup aside. He looked older than he had at the vineyard—dark circles, a tie loosened at the collar. “What I’m about to tell you doesn’t leave this table. If it does, I’ll deny it, and then I’ll arrest you for wasting my time.”

“Understood.”

“Vincent Moreau was murdered.”

Alex felt the words land like a fist in his chest. He had suspected it—the video confession made it nearly certain—but hearing a police inspector say it out loud changed something. Made it real. Made it his to carry.

“You believe that,” Alex said slowly. “Or you know it?”

Delacroix’s jaw tightened. A group of German tourists filed past, laughing, and he waited until they were out of earshot. “I know it. The official file says accidental death. A fall into the press during a night inspection. But I pulled the autopsy myself, before it could be sealed. There was a contusion on the back of his skull that didn’t match the fall pattern. And his hands—they were clean. No grape must, no machinery grease. A man who falls into a press doesn’t come out with clean hands.”

Alex’s coffee arrived. He didn’t touch it. “Why didn’t you say anything at the time?”

“Because my commanding officer closed the case within forty-eight hours. Signed off on it personally. Told me to move on.” Delacroix’s eyes were flat. “I moved on. But I kept the file.”

“A mole.”

“In the gendarmerie, in the prosecutor’s office, somewhere up the chain. I don’t know how far it goes. What I do know is that every time I’ve tried to open a quiet line of inquiry into the Bouchard family, the trail goes cold within a week.” He let the silence stretch. “Someone’s watching. Someone with a badge.”

Alex thought of his stolen phone at the Geneva train station. The Bouchard lawyer’s precise knowledge of his movements. He had assumed private surveillance. Now a different, sicker possibility crept in—that the people tracking him wore the same uniform Delacroix wore.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you’re the heir to his evidence.” Delacroix tapped the table. “Vincent left you something. I don’t know what it is, but the Bouchards are nervous, and they don’t get nervous without reason. They’ve tried to buy you out, they’ve threatened you through that lawyer, and now they’re watching your new cellar master like she’s a suspect in a murder investigation she hasn’t committed.”

“You know about Léa?”

“I know you fired Claire Bellamy and hired a woman with a doctorate in oenology and a history of exposing wine fraud. That’s not a normal hire for a man trying to sell his father’s estate.” Delacroix leaned forward. “I’m not going to ask what you’ve found. I’m offering you something instead.”

Alex waited.

“Protection. Real protection—off the books, untraceable, people I trust with my life. In exchange, you help me build a case that doesn’t depend on the official channels. Evidence I can take to Paris, to the financial crimes unit, to someone outside the Bouchard network.”

“You want me to be your informant.”

“I want you to be my partner.” Delacroix’s voice dropped to a near whisper. “I’ve been fighting this alone for two years. I’ve lost informants, I’ve lost leads, I’ve lost sleep. Vincent was the only man who came close to bringing them down, and I failed him. I won’t fail his son.”

Alex studied the inspector’s face. There was something raw in it—a guilt that had been polished by time into determination. But Alex had spent years in banking reading people’s tells. Delacroix’s hands were steady on the table. His eyes didn’t dodge. He was either genuine or the best liar Alex had ever met.

“I have something,” Alex said slowly. “Something that could be the key. But I need to have it analyzed first.”

Delacroix didn’t ask what it was. He simply nodded. “When?”

“Saturday. There’s a specialist I need to see.” Alex hesitated. “If I bring you what I find, what happens to the estate?”

“That depends on what’s on it.” Delacroix finally picked up his espresso, drained it in one swallow. “If Vincent’s records show what I think they show—the full scope of the Bouchard operation—then the estate is evidence. You’ll lose it. But you’ll walk away clean, and your father’s name will be cleared.”

“And if the records implicate me?”

“Have they given you a reason to be implicated?”

Alex thought of Leclerc’s threat—constructing a narrative of complicity. Of the fifteen percent stake the Bouchards held through their holding company. Of the vault beneath the press house, now emptied of its false magnum but still hiding secrets he hadn't fully explored. The microfilm was his best card. But Saturday was three days away, and the Bouchards' lawyer had demanded an answer by the end of the month.

“No,” Alex said. “But they’re building one.”

Delacroix’s mouth set into a thin line. “They built one for your father. It took eighteen months and a forged audit trail. You don’t have that long.”

“What do you mean?”

“The holding company that owns fifteen percent of Domaine Moreau filed a petition with the commercial court in Dijon yesterday. They’re citing mismanagement, alleging you’ve allowed the estate to fall into disrepair while drawing funds without board oversight. It’s a prelude to a forced audit.”

Alex’s blood went cold. “When’s the hearing?”

“Monday.” Delacroix stood, leaving a few euros on the table. “The Bouchards aren’t waiting for the end of the month. They’re moving now. If you want to get ahead of them, you have three days to find something that makes their petition irrelevant. If you don’t, they’ll have legal access to every record in that estate—including whatever your father left behind.”

He buttoned his jacket, glanced around the café once, and looked down at Alex with an expression that was almost paternal.

“You’re not the only one who lost someone, Alex. Vincent was my friend before he was your father. He came to me first, you know. Three days before he died, he told me he had proof. I told him to wait—to let me bring in someone from Paris. He didn’t wait.” Delacroix’s voice cracked, just barely. “I’ve been carrying that mistake for two years. I intend to fix it.”

He walked out without looking back.

Alex sat in the café, the noise of tourists and tractors washing over him like white water. The hearing was on Monday. The microfilm would be developed on Saturday. If the film contained what his father had promised—a documented trail, shipment dates, codenames, names of corrupt officials—he might be able to use it to block the audit, or at least to force the Bouchards to retreat.

If it didn’t, the estate fell into their hands by the end of next week. And with it, any hope of clearing Vincent Moreau’s name.

He pulled out his phone to call Léa. The screen was dark. He pressed the power button. Nothing.

The battery had been full that morning.

Alex stood so quickly his chair scraped the tile floor. He turned in a slow circle, scanning the café—the tourists, the farmers, the waiter now clearing his untouched coffee. At a table near the window, a man in a navy work jacket sat with an open newspaper, not reading it. His eyes flicked up, met Alex’s, and dropped back to the page.

Alex didn’t wait to see if the man followed. He walked out the side door, into the kitchen’s steam and the shouting of a line cook, and emerged in the alley behind the café, heart hammering.

The Bouchards knew he’d met Delacroix.

And now they knew he had a Saturday deadline.