A confession fifty years in the making puts everyoneโs favorite Paris dรฉtรฉctive trรจs chic, Aimรฉe Leduc, on a collision course with the โHand,โ a cabal of corrupt Parisian cops among who masterminded her fatherโs murderโ and among whose ranks he might have once found membership. When a friendโs child is kidnapped while wearing her daughterโs hoodie, Aimรฉe realizes that the case has crossed into the realm of the personal in more ways than one.
A dying man drags his oxygen machine into the office of รric Besson, a lawyer in Parisโs 13th arrondissement. The old man, an accountant, is carrying a dilapidated notebook full of meticulous investment records. For decades, he has been helping a cadre of dirty cops launder stolen money. The notebook contains his full confessionโheโs waited 50 years to make it, and now it canโt wait another day. He is adamant that Besson get the notebook into the hands of La Proc, Parisโs chief prosecuting attorney, so the corruption can finally be brought to light. But en route to La Proc, Bessonโs courierโhis assistant and nephewโis murdered, and the notebook disappears.
Grief-stricken รric Besson tries to hire private investigator Aimรฉe Leduc to find the notebook, but she is reluctant to get involved. Her father was a cop and was murdered by the same dirty syndicate the notebook implicates. Sheโs not sure which sheโs more afraid of, the dangerous men who would kill for the notebook or the idea that her fatherโs name might be among the dirty cops listed within it. Ultimately thatโs the reason she must take the case, which leads her across the Left Bank, from the Cambodian enclave of Khmer Rouge refugees to the ancient royal tapestry factories to the modern art galleries.
© 2003-2026