Unintended Consequences

of blocks from the hotel and stopped for a traffic light.
    “Stone, will you continue to have business with M’sieur duBois?”
    “I expect I will,” Stone said. “From what I’ve heard, he’s the reason I came to Paris. Eggers and I met with him in New York.” He didn’t feel it necessary to tell Lance more than that.
    “Well, I hope you will keep me abreast . . .” Lance, who was sitting behind the driver, stopped talking and looked out his window. Suddenly he threw himself across the car on top of Rick, who was in the middle, and Stone.
    Stone looked to his left in time to see an enormous truck grille hurtling toward the car. It struck with enormous force, shattering glass and rolling the large car onto its side. Even upended, the truck’s engine was still roaring.
    “Get out! Out!” Lance shouted.
    “How?” Stone asked.

21
    I ncredibly, the truck’s engine continued to roar. The car began to move again and rolled onto its back.
    “Out!” Lance shouted again.
    With the car on its top, Stone’s door was now free. He got it open, but now his door faced the truck and was pressed against it. Then the truck’s engine abruptly stopped, and there was shouting from outside the car.
    “We’re trapped in here,” Stone said. “Lance, can you get your door open?”
    “I’m working on it,” Lance said. He grabbed Rick’s briefcase and used it to batter the remaining glass from his window, then he crawled out into the street. Rick followed, then Stone. Stone noticed that they both held themselves low, looking around. Rick had a gun in his hand.
    “I smell gasoline,” Stone said. “We’ve got to get the driver out.” He managed to get the front door open, and they dragged the man into the street. He had not been wearing a seat belt. Stone had hold of his jacket, and he could see the butt of a gun in a shoulder holster, so he grabbed it and tucked it into his belt.
    Lance was on his phone, shouting the name of the intersection. “Chopper now!” he yelled. “And an ambulance!” He put the phone away and resumed watching the perimeter of people who stood gawking.
    “Who are you looking for?” Stone asked.
    “I don’t know,” Lance said. “Anybody with a weapon will do.”
    The sound of police cars could be heard in the distance, and, incredibly, a helicopter appeared, flying down the Seine, then hovered over the intersection.
    Lance turned to Rick. “Deal with this,” he said. “I’ve got to get to Le Bourget.” He slapped Rick on the back, shook Stone’s hand, and ran toward the descending chopper.
    “Central Paris is a no-fly zone,” Rick said. “Only Lance could manage that.”
    “Rick, do you have any idea what’s going on?”
    “Assassination attempt, I should think,” Rick said.
    “On whom?”
    Rick chuckled. “You and I aren’t worth bothering with.”
    The helicopter rose, turned 180 degrees, and headed back up the Seine.
    Police were running toward them. “I hope you’ve got your diplomatic passport,” Rick said, reaching for his and holding it up. “
Diplomate américain!
” he shouted.
    Stone held up his passport, too. Rick entered into conversation in rapid French with the police, while Stone turned to the driver. He had a massive head wound, but there wasn’t much blood. Stone felt the man’s neck for a pulse but couldn’t find one.
    “This man needs . . .” he started to say, but he was pushed out of the way by a uniformed medical attendant.
    Stone looked at the truck; the cab was empty.
    •   •   •
    A n hour later Stone and Rick were in Stone’s suite at the Plaza Athénée, having been given a lift there by the police. Rick was on the phone and had made half a dozen calls. Finally, he hung up. “Mind if I stay here for a while? Doug Hobbs thinks this is the safest spot, for the moment.”
    “Sure.” Stone handed Rick the driver’s gun. “You’d better have this,” he said. “I don’t need it.”
    “You don’t?” Rick asked. “Oh, that’s right, Lance armed you, didn’t he?”
    “Do you have any idea what happened back there?”
    “I told you what I thought. Do you doubt it?”
    “They were after Lance, then?”
    “Who?”
    “How the hell should I know? I’m the civilian here.”
    “They could have been after all three of us. I mean, it wasn’t exactly a surgical attack, was it? Our driver is dead, and we could have been, too, if the car hadn’t been armored. I don’t know if you noticed, but the truck