Murder at the Porte de Versailles

by Cara Black Narrated by Carine Montbertrand

Overview

This riveting 20th installment entangled Parisian private investigator AiméeLeduc in a dangerous web of international spycraft and terrorist threats in Paris's 15th arrondissement.
November 2001: in the wake of 9/11, Paris is living in a state of fear. For Aimée Leduc, November is bittersweet: the anniversary of her father's death and her daughter's third birthday fall on the same day. A gathering for family and friends is disrupted when a bomb goes off at the
police laboratory-and Boris Viard, the partner of Aimée's friend Michou, is found unconscious at the scene of the crime with traces of explosives under his fingernails.
Aimée doesn't believe Boris set the bomb. In an effort to prove this, she battles the police and his own lab colleagues, collecting conflicting eyewitness reports.
When a member of the French secret service drafts Aimée to help investigate possible links to an Iranian Revolutionary guard and fugitive radicals who bombed Interpol in the 1980s, Aimée uncovers ties to a cold case of her father's.
As Aimée scours the streets of the 15th arrondissement trying to learn the truth, she has to ask herself if she should succumb to pressure from Chloe's biological father and move them out to his farm in Brittany. But could Aimée Leduc ever leave Paris?

Editorial Reviews

MAY 2022 - AudioFile

Narrator Carine Montbertrand returns to portray the characters that make up PI Aimée Leduc’s Paris. With Montbertrand’s perfect French pronunciation of phrases and place names coupled with Black’s rich descriptions of settings, including their historical significance, listeners will find themselves easily drawn into Leduc’s world. Those not familiar with the backstories of Leduc, her family, and friends may be challenged to understand the complicated relationships in this 20th addition to the series. Leduc, while struggling with single motherhood, is drawn into an investigation of a bombing involving a close friend, and possibly one of her father’s past cases. Montbertrand masterfully differentiates the characters, including a 16-year-old witness. Fans will appreciate this ride-along with Leduc, which focuses on the tense and fearful world following 9/11. E.Q. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

From the Publisher

Praise for Murder at the Porte de Versailles

A CrimeReads Best Traditional Mystery of 2022
CrimeReads Best New Crime Fiction of March
CrimeReads Most Anticipated Books of 2022

“While fans may wonder what’s next for the redoubtable Leduc after Paris, it’s clear from the intricate plotting and tantalizing loose ends that Black has plenty of stories left to tell.” 
—Paula Woods, Los Angeles Times

“The 20th Aimée Leduc novel, Murder in the Porte de Versailles, is taut, vivid, smart, rich in humanity and addictive momentum. It is set in 2001, only a couple of months after 9/11, and police and international authorities are on high alert. A dear friend of Aimée’s is found unconscious in an explosion’s rubble, with evidence indicating that he may have set the bomb. Black races ahead, in alternating scenes with Leduc and crooked cops and everyday people caught beyond their depth.”
—The Washington Post

“Black’s chatty style quickly transports the reader to the banks of the River Seine, and Leduc, as always, is an engaging heroine.”
—The Financial Times

“A Paris-infused mystery with many twists and turns, and just enough of a cliffhanger at the end to make sure we come back for the next book.”
—Reviewing the Evidence

“Everyone’s favorite sophisticated sleuth is back . . . When Aimee’s friend Boris is accused of setting a bomb off at a police lab, she throws herself into clearing him of the accusation, glad for the distraction, but will her newfound energy lead her into more danger than ever before?” 
—CrimeReads

“This is the twentieth installment in Cara Black’s consistently well-researched and entertaining Leduc novels . . . Rife with references to both well-known and hidden Paris locales, the always fashionable Aimée manages to get herself entangled with French secret police as they draft her into using her connections to assist them . . . Aimée’s family consists of characters regular readers will be glad to see return, from daughter Chloé to godfather Morbier to lover Melac . . . Come take a tour of La Ville Lumiere with its blue-lit bateaus-mouches, Notre Dame with the inky wash of the Seine, Saint Michel’s spot-lit fountain, past the dark expanse of the Jardin du Luxembourg.” 
—Deadly Pleasures Magazine

“Fans will appreciate this ride-along with Leduc, which focuses on the tense and fearful world following 9/11.”
—AudioFile

“This deep into the series, Aimée has acquired a complex backstory. Devotees will sail through . . . Black’s pithy, pacey style enables her to efficiently sketch in background while moving the story forward and creating that all-important ambience. Hanging over the book is the suggestion from the father of her child that Aimée and Chloé leave Paris to live with him in the country. Better for Chloé, perhaps, but for Aimée? Jamais.”
—Air Mail News

“Black's series is at home on bestseller lists and has long been a particular favorite of librarians and library patrons . . . Set in November 2001, the story unwinds against the backdrop of 9/11 and, more personally, the question of whether Aimée should move to Brittany with her three-year-old daughter, Chloe, and her biological father. Forget it, Aimée: we want you in Paris, not clomping about a farm in Birkenstocks.” 
—Booklist

“In bestseller Black’s riveting 20th Aimée Leduc investigation, tensions are high in Paris two months after 9/11 . . . Rich with detail about life in Paris, this entry illuminates the complications that friends and family can unwittingly create. Black shows no signs of losing steam.” 
—Publishers Weekly

“A bombing at a police lab has all Paris on edge . . . As days pass without an arrest, Aimée moves into action. Will she find the bombers before the police arrest Boris and before Melac decides that Paris is just too dangerous a place for his child? Black delivers again with a combination of political intrigue and tight detective thrills." 
—Kirkus Reviews

Praise for the Aimée Leduc investigations

“Wry, complex, sophisticated, intensely Parisian . . . One of the very best heroines in crime fiction today.”
—Lee Child
 
“The finest PI series now being written.”
—Mick Herron, author of the Slough House series

“As always, with airfares so high, Black offers armchair travelers a whirlwind trip through the City of Light.”
—USA Today
 
“Marvelous . . . boasts all of Black’s trademark charms, including deft plotting, sharp dialog and colorful sights and sounds.”
—Chicago Tribune
 
“Cara Black’s Aimée Leduc is a gem: a stylish, brave private detective (and new mom) who zips around Paris on a scooter . . . Beguiling tours of some of Paris’ little-known corners.”  
—The Seattle Times

“Black creates rich, plausible characters, giving them individuality and depth.”
—San Francisco Gate
 
“Whether read as a crime story with roots in international politics or as the latest chapter in a fascinating family drama, this is a deeply satisfying and entertaining novel.”
—Booklist, Starred Review

Library Journal

02/01/2022

November 2001 brings mixed feelings to Aimee Leduc. Her father died years ago, but the anniversary of his death is the same day as her daughter's birthday. This year, Chloe's third birthday party unites beloved friends until one of them, Boris Viard, remembers he left her present on his desk at the police lab. Boris doesn't return, Aimee receives a strange call from his phone, and she heads to the lab to find him. She discovers a scene of chaos. Just two months after 9/11, bombs have exploded at the lab, and the police suspect terrorism. Even worse, when traces of explosives are found under Boris's fingernails, they suspect him. As owner of Leduc Investigations, Aimee returns to field work to prove that her friend is innocent. After Chloe's father takes her to Brittany, Aimee is free to explore a complicated case involving multiple murders, the bombing, suspicious police activity, and, of course, possible terrorism. VERDICT Black's latest is a fast-paced, atmospheric mystery that brings back memories of worldwide fear after 9/11. It's best for fans of the series who will recognize the numerous characters and memories brought together in the 20th in the series (following Murder in Bel-Air).—Linda Gray

MAY 2022 - AudioFile

Narrator Carine Montbertrand returns to portray the characters that make up PI Aimée Leduc’s Paris. With Montbertrand’s perfect French pronunciation of phrases and place names coupled with Black’s rich descriptions of settings, including their historical significance, listeners will find themselves easily drawn into Leduc’s world. Those not familiar with the backstories of Leduc, her family, and friends may be challenged to understand the complicated relationships in this 20th addition to the series. Leduc, while struggling with single motherhood, is drawn into an investigation of a bombing involving a close friend, and possibly one of her father’s past cases. Montbertrand masterfully differentiates the characters, including a 16-year-old witness. Fans will appreciate this ride-along with Leduc, which focuses on the tense and fearful world following 9/11. E.Q. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2021-11-30
A bombing at a police lab has all Paris on edge.

Birthdays should be happy. But the third birthday of private investigator Aimée Leduc’s daughter, Chloé, brings as much anxiety as joy. First, Chloé’s father, Melac, has become more of a presence in their lives since his recent divorce. His pleas that Aimée and Chloé would be much safer living at his farm in Brittany sends Aimée down a rabbit hole of second-guessing: She wants her daughter to be safe, but she wants to support her child financially, and that means staying in Paris, where she and her business partner, René Friant, run a successful investigation agency. Then disaster strikes at Chloé’s party. Aimeé’s good friend Boris realizes that he’s left the toddler’s gift on his desk at the police crime lab at Porte de Versailles. While he’s retrieving the gift, the lab is bombed. Leaving Chloé with Melac, Aimée rushes to the lab only to find Boris has been taken to the hospital, unconscious. A note she finds shoved in her pocket claims, “WE HAVE STRUCK AGAIN.” But who? Detective Loïc Bellan of the Groupe d’Intervention La Gendarmerie Nationale has his sights on Action Directe, a radical group from the 1960s. The police suspect Boris, who has Semtex explosive under his nails. But a teenage voyeur has a videotape of a shadowy figure leaving the lab just before the explosion. As days pass without an arrest, Aimée moves into action. Will she find the bombers before the police arrest Boris and before Melac decides that Paris is just too dangerous a place for his child?

Black delivers again with a combination of political intrigue and tight detective thrills.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940178497616
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	03/15/2022
Series:	Aimée Leduc Series , #20
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

November 2001 • Sunday • Late Afternoon • Paris


Directrice Bécard’s work phone vibrated on the crowded café’s zinc counter in a frenetic burst. On the blaring télé, sports fans shouted “10 . . . 9 . . . 8 . . .” in the championship game’s last seconds just as she answered.
     She strained to hear, her wine glass still in hand. Silly idea to come here for peace and quiet after a long day of meetings at the anti-terrorist unit. Cigarette smoke spiraled to the ceiling. People jumped and cheered. She pressed the phone tighter to her ear.
     “Hate to bother you, Madame la Directrice, but you said you wanted to know the latest.”
     Her stomach clenched. Had the threat level been raised since she’d left work?
     “Of course. What’s happened?”
     “Police reports of stolen explosives, possibly military-grade or industrial, just crossed my desk. Purportedly taken last night. We’ve been kicked into high alert.”
     She almost choked on her wine. Merde. She’d feared those words since 9/11.
     Protocol kicked in. Trained for emergencies—as if one could ever really be prepared—her brain scrambled to the next step. She dropped a five-franc note and rushed out into the late afternoon.
     Once outside, she gulped the chill fresh air and hit redial. “Give me more on the threat level status.”
     “What’s your ETA?”
     “I’m across the street. Is this confirmed? Do you have a location?”
     “Confirmed.” Castel, her department colleague, sighed. “But no location.”
     She ran on rue de Dantzig past the wall plaque—a memorial to a local résistant shot here in the war. A faded bouquet tacked onto it shriveled in the shadows. Through the tall metal and glass Deco door, she entered the building complex home to the bomb squad, the laboratories and scientific police, and arson investigation. She crossed the lobby, nodding to the duty clerk, who gestured her upstairs.
     Fluorescent lights flickered on the scuffed vanilla walls and brown tiled stairs as she padded to the top of the building to what they used for a situation room.
     Panting, she looked down the glass-windowed hallway reflecting the ribbon of the Seine, backlit by a sky lush with burnt orange.
     “Here’s the latest,” said Castel, handing her a printout from the ministry. Five or so desks occupied by techs sat near hastily mounted wall maps.
     Just as she’d feared.
Credible Intelligence Indicates Imminent Explosive Attacks—Duty Personnel Maintain High Alert.



Sunday • Late Afternoon • Père Lachaise Cemetery

Aimée Leduc’s eyes misted under the lead-grey sky in the Père Lachaise cemetery columbarium. She placed white chrysanthemums at her father’s niche. Filled with the lingering ache of loss, she kissed his name etched in stone: jean-claude. Aimée helped her daughter, Chloé, do the same; the child’s kiss landed with a slobbering effect. Three years old on the anniversary of her grandfather’s death. The bitter and sweet of life.
     “I can’t believe it’s been twelve years, Mademoiselle Aimée. But I know he’d be proud of you.” Martin, the only other mourner, had been an informant of her father’s. Every year on this day Martin had mass said for her father. Martin’s oversized glasses, silver pompadour, and leathery tan—even in November—gave him the appearance of a seventies-era film producer at Cannes. He dabbed his nose with a handkerchief. “I miss him.”
     Aimée squeezed his arm. “I miss him, too.” Half the time she still expected her father to walk through the doors of Leduc Detective, flash that lopsided grin of his, and sling his coat on the hook. Following his death, Aimée had taken over the agency, focusing on computer security, earning good money. Fed up with field investigation, she’d recently gone into consulting and qualified as an expert witness for court testimony. It gave her more time with Chloé.
     A mosaic of yellow and orange leaves crisped into gold over the cemetery’s charcoal cobbles. On a mausoleum, damp oozed from moss on an angel’s wing, the cracked stone frozen forever in flight.
     Aimée opened her umbrella to the patter of drizzle. A broom scraped as a bent old woman, her scarf tied under her chin, swept leaves off a gravestone.
     Martin ruffled Chloé’s blonde curls as she tottered on the slick stones and grabbed his leg for support. “Bon anniversaire, ma petite.” He held out a Printemps box as big as Chloé.
     Chloé’s laughter numbed the welling sadness. Time to move on, Aimée told herself—she had a daughter to raise. At that, her phone chirped. The message was from her partner, René—a reminder that she had a business to run, too.
     “Voilà,” she said, scooping Chloé up in her arms. “Now it’s time for your birthday party, ma fille. Grand-père would like that.”
     Martin nodded. “He’s watching over you, his two beautiful mesdemoiselles.”
     They embraced goodbye among tombstones freckled with mold and lichen. Aimée wondered, noticing Martin’s age and faltering step as he walked away, if it was for the last time.
 
 

Sunday Evening • Ile Saint-Louis

Fuchsia helium balloons and pink streamers bobbed in Aimée’s high-ceilinged seventeenth-century Ile Saint-Louis flat, the place warm for once from the body heat of partygoers and the sputtering tapers in their silver candelabras. Chloé ran past in her furry leopard-print boots, an early gift. She wouldn’t take them off, had even slept with them on.
     Already a petite fashionista.
     It was a circus, Chloé chasing little Miles Davis, Aimée’s bichon frise, and preschoolers trailing streamers and squealing in delight. The birthday party would end soon.
     Not soon enough.
     Martine Sitbon, Aimée’s best friend since lycée, a writer for Libération and a party animal, had conned her into not only throwing the birthday party but also having it catered. With her hair dyed pink for the occasion, Martine danced into the salon holding a chocolate-raspberry gâteau with three candles.
     At last, Aimée thought. Not only were the three-year-olds restless, but their parents had been glancing at their watches for the past twenty minutes. It was, after all, a school night.
     Aimée pinged a wine glass with her fork. “Attention!”
     She nodded to René, Chloé’s godfather, to capture the moment with his video camera. René struggled to climb up on a chair, brusquely refusing help from a parent who’d offered him a hand. A dwarf at four feet tall, he prided himself on being self-sufficient. His black belt in karate helped in that department.
     “Let’s sing ‘Happy Birthday,’” said Aimée.
     René panned the video camera as Chloé’s puffed cheeks blew out the candles to rousing cheers. Lifting her up was Melac, her biological father, whose grey-blue eyes she’d inherited. Beside them hunched Morbier, Aimée’s white-haired godfather, his basset-hound eyes crinkled with laughter as he pulled out the candles for Chloé. Michou and Boris Viard, a gay couple who were René’s neighbors and close friends of Aimée’s, blew her kisses.
     Yet Chloé’s grandmother, Sydney Leduc, was a no-show. Typical. Aimée’s American mother, a seventies radical who had once been on Interpol’s Most Wanted List, had taken a therapeutic “cure” at a salt spa outside Kraków. But a check with several zeros drawn from a Swiss bank account had arrived for Chloé’s “education.”
     Aimée wiped the crumbs off her bébé’s cheeks, moved by the candlelit faces shining with love for her daughter.
     Michou, his eye makeup perfect, popped a cork; vintage champagne flowed. Boris, in black leather with streamers in his hair, lifted Chloé into the air and kissed her. “I can’t believe my favorite fille is so big!”
     Chloé kissed him back, grinned, and raised three chubby fingers. Aimée was so proud that her daughter attended the école maternelle around the corner, Aimée’s own alma mater. She took in another glimpse of Michou and Boris, etching this picture of them into her mind. She loved these two and often relied on them as backup babysitters.
     As Martine sliced the cake, Melac took Aimée’s hand—his thumb catching on the gold bracelet he’d given her—and leaned into her ear. “Next year, we’ll have her birthday on the farm in Brittany. Everyone will come. Chloé will love it.”
     Not this again. A former flic, Melac ran a corporate security business and wanted to be more than a part-time dad. He also wanted to leave the city. Aimée’s thoughts ricocheted. Live on Melac’s farm, work remotely, and look out her window to see goats, not the Seine?
     Her?
     “It’s healthier by the sea, out in nature. What do you say, Aimée?”
     If only this appealed to her. Was it selfish not to think of how it might benefit Chloé? She had to stall.
     “Not now, Melac.”
     “Don’t brush me off again.” Hurt edged his voice. “I’m tired of waiting.”
     “I told you, I’m thinking about it. Seriously.”
     Wasn’t she?
     His gaze read her indecision.
     “You need to decide now.” His tone notched up in irritation. “What’s so difficult about this? It should be an easy choice.”
     Pack up and go just like that? What about Chloé’s friends? Her school? Not to mention Aimée’s whole life and her business were here. Her relationship with Melac had been fraught after Chloé was born; he’d disappeared, then returned at her christening with a new wife, wanting custody. They’d finally come to an arrangement, then the wife left and Melac became more of a constant in their lives.
     Could she trust him?
     As usual, he’d picked the worst time for an ultimatum. She needed to hurry the party along.
     She stood, summoned a smile, and raised a champagne flute. “Time to open presents.”
     Boris clapped his hand over his mouth. “Quelle horreur!”
     Everyone turned and looked at him.
     “I had Chloé’s present sent to my office,” he explained. “It’s sitting on my desk at the police lab.”
     Michou stomped his high-heeled foot. “Mais zut alors, how often does Chloé turn three?”
     “Désolé,” Boris said, shamefaced. “I feel so stupid for forgetting.”
     “Don’t worry,” Aimée soothed. “Just pick it up another time.”
     But Boris, after downing a flute of champagne, had piled into a taxi at quai d’Anjou.
     After the ensuing flurry of presents and the departure of the children and their parents, Aimée swapped Chloé’s sticky, sugar-smeared polka dot dress for pajamas. Done, she returned to the salon with Chloé on her hip to say goodnight. She took in the scene before her. On the floor, the stuffed bunny from Morbier, his replacement for the one dropped in the Seine. Laughing Martine, blowing Chloé kisses from across the room. Morbier in the Louis XVI chair next to Melac, deep in conversation, relaxed for once, talking flic to flic. As she’d often seen Morbier do with her father, his first partner.
     How could she have ever thought herself an orphan? Even if her mother was nowhere to be seen, here was family.
     Her family.
     She gathered up the ribbons, fashioned a bow and tied it around Miles Davis’s collar.
     “Poor Miles Davis,” said Morbier, pronouncing it Meelz Daveez. “And catering a kiddie party? Really, Leduc?” Morbier grunted as he got out of the chair.
     Always a critic. She wouldn’t let him fault her nonexistent culinary skills. The next minute he’d accuse her of spoiling Chloé, something he did shamelessly.
     “You seemed to enjoy it,” she said, brushing specks of foie gras off his jacket sleeve. “Or should I have left the baking up to you?”
     Melted Berthillon ice cream dribbled on the table next to empty Veuve Clicquot bottles, a Bordeaux from Chateau Figeac in St. Emilion, and remainders of hors d’oeuvres. Sputtering decorative candles dripped wax. Pah—it could wait until tomorrow.
     Everyone kissed a sleepy-eyed Chloé goodnight and bid adieu. When Melac took Chloé from her arms to put her to bed, Aimée realized Boris hadn’t returned.

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