“And you never considered that Gene and Nadine Renard may have lied about the truth?” he asked, lifting a skeptical eyebrow. “People make up stories all the time, especially when it makes them look better.”

She saw the doubt in his eyes and quickly turned away as denial swept through her. This had to be wrong. It had to be! How many times had her mother, Nadine, told her the story of their adoption, the red tape that they’d fought to claim Valerie and Camille as their own? She remembered her father, at the kitchen table, recounting the story of talking to the parish priest, demanding that he be allowed to adopt his “blood kin.”

“I was there today,” Slade said, and she snapped back to the present.

“Where? At St. Elsinore’s?” she asked. “Why?”

“I had time to kill.”

“A lot. That’s miles away,” she thought aloud, remembering the whitewashed church and high wall surrounding the playground of the school where church bells never rang. The empty bell tower had been as run-down as the rest of the buildings.

He lifted his shoulder. “The parish office was closed. But I did find this.” He handed her a flyer for the upcoming charity auction that was advertised as a gala event for the express purpose of raising money for the new orphanage.

“And the reason you went up there is . . . ?” She knew it was no coincidence that he had visited the orphanage today.

“First of all, you made it pretty clear that you needed some space. So I decided to back off and see some of the places you mentioned, places from your past. I went by your old house, and the schools, too.”

Her skin prickled with uneasy goose bumps. She tried to conjure a kind face or a tangible memory, but all she came up with were blurred images of confusion and fear, of not understanding what had happened to her parents, of worrying for her baby sister. There had been hands touching her, trying to calm her as disembodied voices tried to explain that her parents were gone. She remembered strangers’ blurred faces filled with compassion and worry, soft whispers and words that were used to placate her when she’d been scared and alone.

“Everything will be all right,” an elderly woman had whispered, patting her shoulder.

“It’s not up to us to question God’s will,” a man in embroidered robes had cautioned.

“God moves in mysterious ways,” yet another woman with curly bluish hair had intoned.

But all Valerie had known was that her life would never be the same. And then, out of nowhere, Gene and Nadine Renard had appeared, saviors who would adopt not only her, but her baby sister as well. “This is all so surreal,” she admitted now as she stared into her cup, where the tea settled dark against the white enamel.

Slade asked, “Do you remember your biological parents at all?”