The Bourne Dominion by Robert & Lustbader Ludlum

M. Laurent was hit,” he said.
    “Anything on the car that hit him?”
    “Not much. The eyewitnesses disagree on the manufacturer. BMW, Fiat, Citroën.”
    “None of those cars look alike.”
    “Eyewitnesses,” he lamented. “But we did get black paint off the victim.”
    Soraya was studying the roadbed. “Not much help there, either.”
    Aaron crouched down beside her. “The same eyewitnesses claimed he had just stepped off the sidewalk.”
    “He stepped out into traffic without looking?” Soraya looked doubtful.
    Aaron shrugged. “He might have been distracted. Maybe someone called to him, maybe he remembered he had to pick up the dry cleaning.” He shrugged in that totally Gallic manner. “Who knows?”
    “Someone knows,” she said. “The person who killed him.” Something occurred to her and she stood suddenly. “Where was his cell phone found?”
    Aaron showed her and she went back onto the sidewalk several paces. “Now, when I step down into the street, run into me.”
    “What?”
    “You heard me,” she said a bit impatiently. “Just do it.”
    She took out her phone and put it to her ear, then walked at a brisk pace to the edge of the curb and down onto the street, whereupon Aaron, running, hit her. Her right arm flew diagonally out, and if she had not held on to it her phone would have hit the street more or less where they found Laurent’s.
    A slow smile spread across her face. “He was talking on his cell when he was hit.”
    “So what? Businesspeople are on their cell phones constantly.” Aaron appeared unimpressed. “It was a coincidence.”
    “Maybe it was,” Soraya said, “maybe it wasn’t.” She turned toward his car. “Let’s talk to your tech and see if he managed to pull anything from the phone or its SIM card.”
    As they were walking back to Aaron’s car, she stopped and turned around. She looked at the building directly across the sidewalk from where the hit-and-run took place. Her gaze rose up the gleaming green-glass and stainless-steel facade.
    “What building is this?” she asked.
    Aaron squinted up through the noonday gloom. “It’s the Île de France Bank building. Why?”
    “It’s possible that’s where Laurent was coming from.”
    “I don’t see why,” Aaron said, checking his notes. “The victim worked for the Monition Club.”
    Another fact Soraya hadn’t known about her would-be informant.
    “It’s an archaeological society with offices here, Washington, DC, Cairo, and Riyadh.”
    “When you say here, you mean La Défense?”
    “No. The Eighth Arrondissement, at Five, Rue Vernet.”
    “So what the hell was he doing here? Getting a loan?”
    “The Monition Club is quite wealthy,” Aaron said, again consulting his notes. “In any event, I checked with Île de France. He had no appointment with anyone at the bank, he wasn’t a client, and they never heard of him.”
    “So why was he here on a busy workday morning?”
    Aaron spread his hands. “My men are still trying to find out.”
    “Maybe he had a friend there. Have you talked to his associates at the Monition Club?”
    “No one knows much about him, he kept to himself, apparently. He reported directly to his superior, so no one could tell me what he was doing at La Défense. Laurent’s superior is out of town until tonight. I have an appointment to interview him tomorrow morning.”
    Soraya turned to him. “You’ve been very thorough.”
    “Thank you.” The inspector couldn’t hide his smile.
    Soraya walked to his car, but before she got in, she took one last look at the Île de France building. There was something about it that both drew and repelled her.
    T he semi’s driver called to his pal, and the man turned and went back to where the other driver waved a book of wooden matches. The openbed driver leaned forward while the other one struck the match and held the flame to the end of his cigarette. He reared back, pulling the smoke deep into his lungs. The semi’s driver