Was it possible?
Was it possible that a portrait found in the attic of a mansion in Pennsylvania could have a direct tie to Libitz? She couldn’t deny the profound connection she’d felt to Les Bijoux Jolis since the moment she’d laid eyes on it, but this? To be related to the model? It would be— “Are you okay?” asked Jean-Christian, rolling down the window for some fresh air. “You’re pale.”
“I’m stunned. For her name to be Camille, just like my great-grandmother—”
“Lib,” he interrupted. “Camille is a common name here.”
“I know that,” she snapped, suddenly feeling foolish. “I know, but…I look like her. So much like her. I just…”
“You do,” said Jean-Christian, putting his arm around her and pulling her into his side. “I know how much it meant to you to find out if C.T. survived. Now that we know she shares the same first name as your grandmother, it must feel really…personal.”
“It does,” she admitted.
But he was right. The chance of the Camille Trigére in the portrait being her great-grandmother would be a next-to-no-chance coincidence. She sighed, the wind leaving her sails. “I don’t even know where my great-grandmother was from. She could have been from Paris for all we know.”
He nodded beside her.
“It was just…a surprise.”
“Of course,” he said, squeezing her a little closer. “We’ll find out more at the Grande Synagogue, hopefully, and then I’m taking you out for a memorable dinner, followed by…”
She turned to look up at him, and he dropped his lips to hers in a sneak attack. “Lots of this.”
“Hey,” she said, drawing away from him so she could look into his eyes. “Who are you, anyway?”
“Jean-Christian Rousseau.”
“No way,” she said. “I heard all about him. Jean-Christian Rousseau is a dog.”
“Jean-Christian Rousseau was a dog,” he corrected her. “He’s under renovation.”
“A new and improved version?” she asked.
“Trying like hell, Elsa,” he said, his eyes vulnerable as they looked into hers.
She kissed him tenderly. “I wasn’t supposed to fall for you.”
He sighed. “I know.”
“We need to talk to Kate and étienne at some point,” she said.
“We will,” he promised, nuzzling her neck with his nose, his lips pressing hot kisses to her skin. “But not yet. Let’s just be you and me for now.”
“You and me.”
“Us,” he said simply.
“So we’re officially…together?”
“Hell, yes,” he said.
“Exclusive?” she clarified.
“A hundred percent,” he said. “No more Nice Neil…or anyone else for that matter.”
“Except for you,” she murmured, watching Marseille sail by out the window as her lover, her love, swept her off her feet.
“Except for me,” he said, raising his head to kiss her again.
All too soon, the cab stopped in front of a large white building behind a tall, black wrought-iron fence, and the driver asked for the fare. Libitz opened the door and stepped out of the cab onto the sidewalk, looking up at the synagogue built in the 1870s, a place where Camille Trigére may have attended services as a girl.
“Can we go in?” Libitz asked Jean-Christian, looking at the fence.
Jean-Christian sighed. “There have been some anti-Semitic attacks on the local Jewish population in the past several years. It looks like the synagogue isn’t open to the public anymore.”
“A dead end?” asked Libitz, feeling frustrated.
“Well…hold on,” said Jean-Christian, pulling out his phone. “Give me a second.”
As he tried to figure something out, Libitz looked up at the beautiful building—the spotless white facade with a huge double door at the top of a small white-marble staircase. There was a round stained-glass window over the door, very high up, with a small clock on the middle. How she wished she could see inside, hear her feet on the marble floor as Camille may have once heard her own. See the colors of the stained glass, which were impossible to detect outside on the sidewalk in the strong Marseille sun.
“…merci beaucoup, madame. Au revoir.” Jean-Christian took her hand as he tucked his phone away. “We can’t go in. But the secretary was quite amenable and said she’d have a quick look at the birth records for us…see if she can find a Camille Trigére born in 1921 or thereabouts. I gave her my cell number, and she said she’d call if she can find anything.”
Libitz beamed at him. “My hero.”
He chuckled. “In the meantime, let’s get something to eat?”
“I’d love it,” she said, letting him lead her away from the synagogue. She took a deep breath of the brackish air. “Do we really have to leave tomorrow?”
“Oui,” he said. “You have a gallery to run, remember?”
“I remember.” She sighed. “So do you.”