Page 54

When Colette came to, there were two paramedics kneeling beside her, and another behind them with a stretcher at the ready.

“Where is he?” she asked, struggling to sit up, looking around wildly.

Had she dreamed it, or had she really just come face-to-face with her sister’s killer, mere moments after the funeral of the man she’d thought was the culprit?

Was he still here? Or had he taken advantage of her collapse to flee once and for all?

As Daniel swam into her still-blurred field of vision from the right, she blinked and reached for his hand.

“Daniel, where is he? Where’s the man who killed my sister? ”

“Whoa, whoa, easy does it, ma’am,” said one of the paramedics.

“What happened?” she asked.

“You had a reaction to the stress of recognizing Lucas’s grandfather,” Daniel said. “And don’t worry. He’s still here. Lucas won’t let him go until we clear this up.”

“Clear this up?” Colette repeated blankly. What was there to clear up? She would have known the man anywhere, even after all these years. It was him; she was sure of it.

“I believe you’ve experienced what we call vasovagal syncope,” the other paramedic explained as Daniel squeezed her hand.

“A sudden drop in your heart rate and blood pressure, as a response to stress, leading to reduced blood flow in the brain. That sounds consistent with what happened here.” She glanced at Daniel, who nodded, his expression full of concern.

“But we still need to take you into the emergency room to get you looked at.”

“No,” Colette said, struggling once again to sit up. “Absolutely not. I need to see Guillaume Charpentier.”

“Who is he, Colette?” Daniel asked. “How do you know him?”

“He’s an old student of my father’s, the policeman I saw disappearing with my sister the night she was taken.”

“Are you certain it’s him?” Daniel asked.

“More certain than I’ve been of anything else in my life.” Colette looked up at Aviva, who was hovering uncertainly behind the paramedics. “Aviva, dear, what name did you say he was using?”

“Bill Carpenter,” she said, stepping forward. “Are you all right?”

Colette closed her eyes. He’d been hiding in plain sight all along.

William Carpenter was a direct anglicization of the name Guillaume Charpentier, probably picked out decades ago when he stepped off the boat from France.

She opened her eyes and refocused them on Aviva.

“So I was wrong about Hubert Verdier. I badgered an innocent man to death.”

“Colette, he had the bracelet. And he had an affair with Lucas’s grandfather’s wife. He was obviously tied to this somehow.”

“I need to talk with Charpentier,” Colette said. “I need to talk with him now.”

The paramedics exchanged looks. “Ma’am, without knowing for sure what caused your loss of consciousness, we need to take you in,” said the fair-haired one. “You’ll need an echocardiogram and some blood tests at the very least.”

“No,” Colette said. “I’m sorry, but no. I have been searching for seventy-six years for a monster, and now I have found him. I’m not about to let him walk away before he gives me some answers.”

They looked to Daniel for help, obviously assuming he was a husband who would talk sense into her, but he put a hand on Colette’s back. “This is something she needs to do,” he said firmly. “She’s staying.”

The paramedics exchanged looks, and the darker-haired one sighed.

“We’ll make you a deal,” said the fair-haired paramedic.

“We’ll give you five minutes, with us standing right here with you, and then you’ll let us take you in.

But the moment you start to get worked up, we’ll need to end the conversation. All right?”

“Fine, fine,” Colette said. “Now, where is he?”

Aviva beckoned to Lucas, who was standing several yards away with his grandfather, as Daniel and one of the paramedics helped Colette to her feet.

She expected to feel woozy and unsteady, but as she watched the old man shuffle slowly toward her, a look of shame and resignation on his face, everything suddenly felt crystal clear.

She straightened her spine, drawing herself up to her full height.

Daniel’s hand was on her back, and both paramedics were hovering uncertainly nearby, but she didn’t need their support.

She had been waiting for this moment for most of her life.

“Guillaume Charpentier,” she said when he had finally reached her. “Why?”

His face was red as he leaned on his walker. “Please, you must let me explain,” he rasped. “I thought until very recently that you were dead. I was told that your whole family had died. If I’d known, I would have—”

“You would have what?” she shot back. “As if there’s some excuse for creeping to our window on the worst night of our lives and kidnapping my defenseless sister?”

There were tears rolling down his cheeks now. Lucas and Millie were standing beside him, listening to every word, and they looked horrified. “I was trying to save her, you see,” he whimpered. “I was trying to save you both.”

She stared at him, understanding suddenly settling over her. “You knew the Germans were coming for my mother.”

“I—I fear it may have been my fault. You see, my wife told my boss that your mother was the one who stole the diamond bracelets from a high-ranking German officer.” He drew a deep, shaky breath. “It all happened so fast. I was trying to warn you.”

She choked out a laugh. “Oh, a monster with a conscience?”

He flinched. “Please, allow me to explain—”

“No!” She could feel rage rising within her. “What explanation could you possibly give me? The one thing my mother asked of my father and me before she died was to find Liliane. And instead, we returned home to the news that her body was found floating in the Seine.”

“Granddad?” Lucas breathed, his expression horrified.

“No,” Guillaume Charpentier rasped. “It isn’t true. You must believe me, Ms. Marceau.”

Colette glared at him. “Why on earth would I believe you ? The man who took her? The man who murdered her?”

“Because I didn’t murder her!” he said desperately. “I would never harm a child!” He was crying now, and his grief made her skin crawl. “I took her because I thought I was saving her life, you see. And then, later, when the concierge of your building told me that you had all died…”

“So what happened?” Colette spat, her fury at the long-dead concierge fueling the fire of her anger now. “Liliane became a handful? She was upset that she’d been kidnapped by a monster like you? You had no choice but to end her life?”

“No!” He looked so upset now that the fair-haired paramedic had taken a step in his direction, reaching his hand out in concern.

“Sir,” the paramedic said, “if you’ll just calm down—”

“No,” Colette snapped, glaring at the paramedic. “This bastard has spent the last seventy-six years running from what he did. If he feels a bit of emotion now, so be it.”

No one spoke for a moment. Guillaume Charpentier stared at Colette, breathing hard, and she stared back, daring him to deny her the closure he had owed her for so long.

“What… did… you… do… to… my… sister?” she finally said, drawing each word out.

“I saved her, Ms. Marceau,” he whispered. “I saved her life. We made her our daughter, and when we moved to the United States, she came with us.”

Of all the things that might have come out of his mouth, that was the last thing Colette expected.

She was vaguely aware of Lucas’s sharp intake of breath, of Millie’s gasp a second later, but she still wasn’t grasping what he was saying.

“No. Liliane is dead. She was found floating in the Seine wearing her nightgown…”

Guillaume Charpentier put a hand over his face.

“We got rid of the nightgown that first night. It matched the one you were wearing, remember? My wife—my wife said it would have been a sure sign that she was the missing Marceau daughter if anyone came looking. We threw it away, Ms. Marceau, and perhaps someone took it from the trash. Those were desperate times. But the child found floating in the Seine was not your sister.”

“But the bracelet…”

“We felt it in the hem of her gown when I was trying to revive her.”

“Revive her?” Colette was beginning to feel hysterical.

“She lost consciousness in my arms as I ran from your apartment. I—I had my hand over her mouth, and it all happened so quickly…” He drew a shuddering breath.

“I didn’t want to keep the bracelet, but my wife insisted.

She was obsessed with it—she thought I’d had an affair with your mother, and I think she felt triumphant having something that had been stolen from her.

Later, we gave it to Hubert Verdier as a payment for helping us to immigrate to the United States. ”

Colette stared at him. “You’re telling me that Liliane lived?”

“I swear it on the lives of my family.” He looked her right in the eye.

“I thought we were saving her life—and that she was the answer to our prayers. My wife and I had lost three babies to miscarriage, and a son in infancy, and it was destroying us. I was desperate to make things better for Francine, and I thought—after your family was taken—that I finally had the perfect solution. Your sister became our daughter. If I had known, though, that you and your father had lived…”

Colette still wasn’t sure whether to believe him, but even if he was telling the truth, what he had done was abhorrent. “You certainly didn’t look very hard for us, did you?”

“I went back. I swear it. Your building’s concierge said you’d all been killed by the Germans. We left Paris the next day—my wife wanted to raise our new daughter in the countryside, in her family home.”

“Well, while you were enjoying the countryside with your wife and my sister, my father went to his grave thinking that she was dead. And my guilt over her death has been at the very core of who am I. You did that to us. You took her, and then you took everything.”

Tears were rolling down his cheeks now. “Ms. Marceau, I’m so terribly sorry. I truly thought I was doing what was right for her. I thought I was giving Anne a future.”

Lucas stepped forward then. “Granddad, you’re not saying…?”

“Her name,” Colette growled, “was Liliane .”

“It was, yes. But Anne was a family name, and my wife had always hoped to name a daughter that.” The old man turned to Lucas, who was gaping at him. “I’m sorry, son.” He looked back at Colette and said weakly, “Lucas here is your nephew.”

Colette put a hand over her mouth and stared at Lucas. She saw it now, in an instant—the resemblance she’d missed before because she hadn’t been looking. He had his mother’s green eyes, the slope of her nose, the dimples in his cheeks.

“But my mom never said…” Lucas said, glancing at Colette as his voice trailed off.

“She was only four years old,” the old man said.

“We didn’t want her to remember her past, to know that she’d had any other parents before us.

For a while, it seemed to be working—but when she was a teenager, she began to rebel.

Just after she turned eighteen, she told your grandmother that she hated her.

That she would never consider us her parents.

It was the biggest fight they ever had—and it was the night your mother left home.

She didn’t come back until after she’d had you. ”

“My mother always talked about a terrible fight,” Lucas said. “But she never explained.”

“She reconciled with us, but I believe it was because she needed our help with you after your father died. There was always a distance there. You know that. Your grandmother was so insistent that the only way forward was to forget. She refused to talk to your mother about the past. She told her that she had imagined the life she had before she came to us. But there was a piece of her that remembered.”

“And you never thought to be honest with her?” Lucas demanded. “Even after Grandma was gone?”

He looked down. “I was trying to respect your grandmother’s wishes.”

“Ms. Marceau.” Lucas turned to Colette, looking dazed. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. About all of this. I couldn’t have imagined…”

“It isn’t your fault, Lucas,” Colette said as she reached out to squeeze his hand.

“And to know that after all this time, you are my family…” She turned to Lucas’s daughter, who was looking on with wide eyes that were so obviously familiar.

They were Liliane’s eyes, her mother’s eyes, Colette’s own eyes. “You and Millie.”

Colette couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down her face now.

So much had been lost. But so much had been found, now, too.

If only her sister had lived long enough to witness it, but perhaps it would be enough to know that she had survived for a time, and that she had gone on to have a son, and then a granddaughter. Another generation after all.

“Now, please,” she managed to say after a moment. “Will someone tell me what happened to my sister? How long ago did you lose her?”

Millie and Lucas exchanged looks. “Lose her?” Lucas asked.

“How long ago did she die?” Colette said, hardly believing that she was asking the question. She’d lost Liliane once so long ago, and now she was bracing herself to lose her all over again, just as she had found and lost Tristan in a blink a few days before. “Aviva mentioned that she was gone.”

Lucas glanced quickly at Aviva, and then he stepped forward and grasped Colette’s hands. “Ms. Marceau… my mother isn’t dead.”

Colette felt the air go out of her lungs. “What? But Aviva said…”

“What I told Aviva was that my mother was gone—as in gone to another state. She lives in Vermont.”

“Vermont?”

“What do you say we pay her a visit?”

“Visit Liliane?” Colette whispered. “She’s alive? You’re telling me that in just a few hours, I can be face-to-face with my sister for the first time in seventy-six years?”

“Not so fast, ma’am,” said the fair-haired paramedic. Colette had almost forgotten that they were still there. “We still need to get you checked out.”

“But—” Colette started to protest.

“What do you say I drive?” Lucas said. “Mr. Rosman and Aviva can come, too. We’ll make a quick stop at the hospital just to make sure you’re all right—and then we’ll head up to my mom’s.”

“Yes, please,” Colette replied. She could hardly believe she was saying the words. “Let’s go see my sister.”