The Paris Apartment

Someone knocks on the concierge’s loge, a rare occurrence that reminds her of the time Ben knocked to introduce himself. Sophie is at the door. She asks the concierge to alert her to all of Jess’s comings and goings.

Jess shouts and bangs on the basement door, and a young man eventually opens the door. When he speaks, she discovers he’s British, too. He claims he found the door jammed, but he doesn’t believe someone purposefully locked her in. He introduces himself as Nick, Ben’s friend who helped him move into the building.

Nick invites Jess up to his apartment and is surprised that she and Ben have different accents and mannerisms. He tells her that the cellar was once used by the Gestapo for keeping prisoners. Nick believes that Ben could be missing because, as Ben often did, he grabbed some cash and chased a story. Nick and Ben met in college, and their reunion three months earlier took Nick by surprise. Ben was in Paris searching for a story to establish his name in journalism. Nick helped him get the apartment in his building at a low rent. Jess’s cellular data is low, so she helps herself to Nick’s computer to investigate Nick’s social media.