J.C. and the Bijoux Jolis: The Rousseaus #3 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 14) (17 page)

Professor Harkin’s eyes were sad as he looked up at Libitz and nodded. “Over thirty thousand Marseille Jews were killed in the Holocaust. Three-quarters of their community.”

Libitz gasped, stepping away from J.C.’s touch to stand on her own, further distancing herself from the portrait. She looked back and forth from Professor Harkin to J.C., her expression horrified. “How can I find out…?”

“I suppose you could see about art schools in operation at the time. Many young models were struggling art students.” The professor sighed. “I’m sorry I can’t be of more help.”

Professor Harkin offered to have the painting rewrapped and sent back to J.C. at his hotel, and they shook hands, thanking him for his time, but Libitz was clearly upset as they left, and when J.C. suggested going out for a drink, she declined, asking for a rain check.

“I just…I can’t,” she said softly. “I think I’ll just go home.”

“Lib,” said J.C., “we’ll find out what happened to her. I promise.”

“I don’t know if I want to know,” she answered, her eyes brightened by tears. “She was so beautiful, so young and hopeful. To find out she was tortured and died frightened in a camp…I just…” She reached up and swiped a tear from her cheek. “I don’t know if I could bear it.”

Whether she wanted his comfort or not, J.C. couldn’t stand seeing her cry, and he pulled her into his arms, grateful when she didn’t push him away. A light rain started to fall as they stood together on the sidewalk in front of the museum, and J.C. held her tighter, whispering close to her ear. “Let me take you home, okay? To be sure you get there safely?”

She looked up at him with watery eyes and nodded.

He flagged down a cab and kept his arm around her until they reached her apartment building.

“Do you want me to come up?” he asked.

“No, thanks,” she said, gathering her things together. Just before opening her door, she turned back to him. “You know? I’ve heard the stories since I was a very little girl. Cousins and great-aunts who tried to get out and couldn’t. My great-uncle Milo who died in one of the camps. It’s just…it’s a part of my culture, my history…but it doesn’t get easier. And she—she was so young and beautiful. Hopeful and trusting. I can’t…”

J.C. winced at her pain, cupping her face and kissing her tenderly. “Will you be okay?”

She took a deep breath and nodded. “I will. I’ll be fine by tomorrow. It just knocked the wind out of me.”

He nodded as she scooted away from him and opened the door. “Lib! Text me if you need me, okay?”

She looked back at him, a very small, sad smile tilting her lips upward. “Jean-Christian,” she said, “I still intend to talk to Neil tomorrow.”

He hadn’t wanted to ask, hadn’t wanted to appear insensitive to her feelings about the model in the portrait. But he couldn’t deny the rush of relief he felt at her words.

“Good,” he said. “Call me after?”

She stood up, then turned around to nod at him. “See you tomorrow.”

She slammed the door, and he watched as she entered her building, watched as she turned once to wave at him before heading for the elevator at the back of the lobby.

“Where to?” asked the cabbie.

“The Mandarin Oriental,” said J.C. distractedly, taking out his phone.

If it turned out that
C.T.
’s end was brutal, he wouldn’t tell Libitz, but what if she’d survived? What if she’d somehow made it out of Marseille?

He had an idea.

They hadn’t asked
Galerie des Fleurs
about the other Montferrat models, but maybe if they could figure out who the Gemini models were, they could find out more information about the
Bijoux Jolis
model too.

Opening a fresh e-mail message, he started writing.

Home early from her nondate with Jean-Christian, Libitz changed into pajamas and poured herself a glass of wine, thinking about C.T. and wondering what had happened to her.

“The War,” as her parents and grandparents referred to World War II, was not just shorthand for the war itself but a catchall name for the catastrophic period of time that included the Holocaust, the genocide of millions of European Jews. The unfathomable notion that six million people of Jewish descent had been murdered for the sole crime of their religion was as painful and mind-boggling today as it had been seventy years ago. “The War” had always existed in her family’s narrative and in the observation of days like
Yom Hashoah
, when she and her parents would attend services at their synagogue, light yellow candles, and recite the
Mourner’s Kaddish
together in remembrance of the lost. As Libitz had been reminded hundreds of times, the most important mission of future generations was to ensure that the world never, ever forgot what had happened to their people.

Perhaps because of this lifelong conditioning, Libitz felt a profoundly personal connection to the model in the painting in a way that resonated more deeply than old stories of relatives she’d never met. C.T. felt so
alive
to Libitz. The idea that this vibrant, beautiful girl had been led to the gas chambers, like so many other frightened, innocent European Jews, made her heart ache with sorrow in a way she couldn’t explain to Jean-Christian.

Sipping her wine, she dialed her mother’s number, needing to hear the familiar and beloved New York accent of her Brooklyn-born mother, who’d married up and now lived in a duplex not far from Libitz on Central Park West.

Ring, ring. Ring—

“Libitz? Sweetheart?”

“Hey, Mom,” she said, reaching for a blanket on the back of her plush couch and covering herself as she snuggled against a throw pillow. “How are you?”

“I have a bad cold…but more important, how are you?”

“Aw, I’m…I’m okay.”

“What’s wrong, Libby? What happened? I can hear it in your voice. Myron,” she called to Libitz’s dad. “Libitz is upset!”

“I didn’t do anything to upset her,” said her father in the background. “Ask her what’s wrong.”

“What’s wrong?” her mother asked into the phone.

“Nothing, really,” said Libitz. “This painting I found…it just has me turned around.”

“Go back to your program,” said her mother to her father. “It’s just about a painting.” Her mother blew her nose before speaking again. “
Oy,
this cold.”

“Have some chicken soup sent over from Artie’s,” said Libitz, referring to her mother’s favorite delicatessen.

“Good idea,” said her mother. “Tell me about the painting.”

“It was painted in France in 1939, and the model was Jewish, and…I don’t know. You know she probably didn’t make it out, and it just…it’s sad. I feel sad about it.”

“Oh, Libby,” said her mother. “These stories. Everyone has these stories.”

“I know, Mom,” she said, taking another sip of wine, exhaling a mournful sigh. “Hey…wasn’t Bubbe’s mother from France?”

“Mm-hm. My grandmother.
Ma grand-mère
.”

“You didn’t call her Bubbe?”

“No. We called our other grandmother Bubbe. My mother’s mother was
Grand-mère
.”

“I wish I’d known her.”

“Not much to know,” said her mother. “She was a quiet lady. But she loved art. Just like you, Libby.”

“You never heard her speak it? French?”

“No,” said her mother. “She didn’t like to speak it. Learned English as soon as she got here and never spoke French again…well, until she was dying, poor thing.”

“And then she did?” asked Libitz.

“Bubbe says she did. She’d get confused and speak French now and then, but my mother didn’t understand a word of it.”

“Do you know when she came over, Mom?”

“Late thirties, I guess. Before the war, but I’m not sure of the exact date.”

Libitz sighed. She’d had a fleeting, ridiculous fantasy that maybe her great-grandmother had known the mystery model…whether she’d realized it or not, Libitz had hoped that maybe her mother could say something that would shed more light on the model’s life.

“What was her name?” asked Libitz.

“Ummm. Camille.”

C
, thought Libitz, a rush of excitement making her fingers cold. “Camille what?”

“Lévy.”

“No,” said Libitz, rolling her eyes. “Her
maiden
name.”

“All these questions! Libby, I have no idea. I doubt even your
bubele
knows her birth name. You have to understand: she turned her back on France—shut down whenever any of us asked her about it. I think it broke her heart.”

“France?
France
broke her heart?”

“Mm-hm. It felt like that.”

“But she came to New York
before
the war?”

“Yes, I think so.”

Libitz sighed. The war started a few days after
Les Bijoux Jolis
was painted. She shook her head, annoyed with herself. She had an
emotional
connection to the painting, and it was making her fantasize about having a
personal
connection to the dead model.

“Are you all right, Libitz?”

“Mm-hm. Just wish I could figure out what happened to the model in the painting.”

“Better not to know,” said her mother, sneezing again three times in a row.

“
Gesundheit
,” she murmured reflexively.

“Libby,” said her mother, her tone changing from normal to slightly wheedling. “I had the nicest chat with Shana Leibowitz. Things are going well for you and Neil? You know me, I try not to pry.”

Like hell.

“He’s very nice, Mom, but—”

“So we’ll see you both at Shabbat this Friday? Shana’s making brisket.”

“I can’t make it, Mom.”

“What are you—Myron, she can’t make it to Shabbat at the Leibowitz’s! What are you talking about, Libitz? It’ll be very awkward without you there.”

Oh, God. Did she have the strength to explain about Neil and J.C. tonight?

No. No, she did not.

“It’s a work thing, Mom.”

“Get out of it. What’s the use of being the boss if you can’t take off early when you want to?”

“You sound like Neil.”

“What’s wrong with Neil?”

“Mom, please.”

“Please what? Please make me a grandmother before I die?” She sneezed again before answering her own question. “Yes, thank you.”

“Maybe Neil and I aren’t meant to be.”

“
Meant to be
,” muttered her mother. “Who’s meant to be? You
like
Neil.”

“I do, Mom. He’s a great person…but I have to follow my heart.”

Her mother sighed. “Follow your heart by all means, Libby, but you’re not getting any younger.”

Libitz finished her wine in a single gulp and poured another glass. “I love you, Mom. Maybe give Mrs. Leibowitz your regrets, huh? Stay home and nurse your cold.”

“Now, Lib—”

“Tell Dad I love him too. Talk soon.”

Before her mother could say anything else, she pressed the “End” button, and then, knowing her mother as well as she did, she powered down the phone completely. It’d be ringing all night if she didn’t.

In the dim quiet of her apartment, she snuggled back into the couch and closed her eyes. Before long, she was asleep, her dreams mixed up yet vibrant—tangled musings about C.T., the model, and Camille, her mother’s
grand-mère.
Jean-Christian cameoed in the role of Pierre Montferrat, and she saw herself, as a teenager, wearing emeralds and a yellow star as she ate brisket, vowing, in perfect French, never to speak it again for as long as she lived.

***

Arriving at his hotel room early had allowed J.C. to call Jessica English and catch up on the day’s business. She’d sold the Anthony Primo chandelier in the gallery and had commissioned six more for a new restaurant in Philadelphia, in addition to finding a buyer for the Atroshenko ballerina who had so captured J.C.’s imagination before it had been stolen by
Les Bijoux Jolis
. He gave Jessica permission to sell it for a tidy sum and complimented her on her sales skills.

“It’s hard to say no to a pregnant woman,” said Jess, laughter thick in her voice.

“And even harder to say no to
beautiful
pregnant women,” said J.C.

“You’re a terrible flirt,” she said, “but I’m immune. I married the worst of them and lived to tell the tale.”

Alex English, Jessica’s husband of almost two years, had once been one of J.C.’s biggest rivals, though J.C. was three years Alex’s senior. They’d both dated casually, bedding the same women for sport without an iota of conscience or commitment. But Jessica Winslow had tamed her husband’s wild ways…in much the same way that Libitz appeared to be taming J.C.

“Speaking of Alex…can I ask you something?”

“Sure. Anything.”

“Were you ever scared about your feelings for Alex? Didn’t you worry? About his reputation, I mean?”

“Of course,” said Jess, laughter thick in her voice. “It was a problem at first. We had to move to England for a year because it felt like he’d screwed half of Philly.”

And I screwed the other half
, thought J.C. with a grimace.

“But you got over it?” he asked.

“You have to understand. I’d loved Alex since I was a little girl,” she said, her voice tender. “I wasn’t going to let him go when I was finally old enough to marry him.”

“What about Alex?”

“What about him?”

“How did he…I mean, how long did it take for him to realize…to know that you two…”

“Asking for yourself or a friend?” asked Jess with a touch of sass, and he would have sworn she made mimed quotation marks when she said “friend.”

Why lie?
He was curious about how Jess and Alex had managed to mesh their lives together. “Myself.”

“Ooo! Honesty!” she exclaimed. “How refreshing! And who is the lucky lady?”

“None of your business,
petite
.”

“Fine,” Jess grumbled. “Well…I can’t speak for Alex, really. I can only tell you this: once we were together, there was no one else. I knew I wanted him the second I saw him. I think he’d say the same. We danced around it. He fought it to preserve my reputation. I backed away when I saw that the streets of Philly were
littered
with his conquests. We almost walked away from it, but we couldn’t. In the end, we
had
to have each other and no one else. There was simply”—she sighed—“no other option.”

Her words, albeit about her own marriage, resonated so strongly with Jean-Christian, he battled the urge to sigh along with her. Catching himself just in time, he straightened in his hotel desk chair. “What if it hadn’t worked out? Wouldn’t you have been devastated?”

“Yes,” she said. “Shattered. But it did work out.”

“What if it hadn’t?”

“It
did
.”

“What if—”

“We could go on like this all day,” said Jess, her voice edging into exasperated, “but the fact will always remain: it
did
. And we’d never have known if we didn’t take a chance.”

It suddenly occurred to J.C., in blinding clarity, that while it felt like he was taking the bigger risk of the two of them, it was actually Libitz (by a thousand miles), and it made him profoundly grateful that she’d somehow been able to see through his bullshit and smarmy come-ons and daddy issues, and find something worthwhile underneath. He needed to do everything he could to convince her she wasn’t wrong…and that meant staying in New York a little longer.

“Invite me to the wedding,” said Jess. “But make it next summer, so baby English is here and I can wear something cute.”

“No wedding on the horizon, Jess,” he said.

She chuckled indulgently like Mad and Jax did when they knew he was wrong about something but they didn’t have the heart to call him out. “Whatever you say, boss.”

“Speaking of being your boss, how do you feel about staying on for a little while longer?”

“Great,” said Jess. “I love it here. I was sure I’d miss the museum, but I don’t. I love this side of things, and it’s keeping me off my feet, so Alex can’t complain.”

“Then get comfortable,” said Jean-Christian, staring out the window at the traffic of Columbus Circle. “Because I just might open another gallery in New York.”

***

As the clock ticked the day away, closer and closer to the gallery’s closing time of six o’clock, Libitz became more jumpy. She’d get home by six thirty and have half an hour to kill before Neil arrived to take her out to dinner, totally clueless about the fact that she planned to break up with him. She shuddered. Maybe she should throw back a couple of vodka shots in that half hour so she wasn’t so edgy. She felt terrible about what she was about to do.