Murder in Montmartre is the sixth book in the Aimee Leduc series. Aimee is once again enmeshed in a dangerous investigation, trying to clear a childhood friend of murder. Laure’s papa was a flic, just like Aimee’s, and she followed in her father’s footsteps, finally gaining a posting. One night, while attending a retirement party, Laure invites Aimee to come along and see some of her father’s old colleagues. She hasn’t been there long when Laure gets into an argument with her partner, Jaques. They leave the bar together, with Laure telling Aimee she’ll be back in five minutes. Something doeasn’t smell right to Aimee so she follows them and finds Laure bleeding and on the verge of unconsiousness while her partner Jaques lies dying from a gunshot wound to the chest.
The story winds up and down those famous stairs, through the seedier sides of the district and amongst the bobos, Corsican separatists, and flics on the take. Aimee soon finds links to her fathers past which could lead to discovering who organized the bombing on the Place Vendome that killed him. Even though she is warned off the case at every turn, she believes the answers she is searching for is within her grasp, if she can just make that one last connection.
There were always ghosts, she thought, and they were even more poignant at this time of year: souls, wandering at night over the cobblestones, flitting through the dark, paved courtyards, leaving exhalations of the past behind them.
In other Aimee news, Guy comes to his senses, realizing he can’t change her, so he leaves and takes a post with Doctores Without Borders in the Sudan. I was not saddened by that turn of events. Bye bye, Guy, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.