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To the unsung heroes who fought hatred and persecution with uncommon courage and strength.

Your sacrifice and efforts will not be forgotten.

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Chapter 1

Chapter
1

Aurelia

Paris, France
10 June 2017

The woman was nude.

Painted in a swirl of angry scarlets and oranges, the woman’s arms were flung over her head, her hands outstretched, her hair a cloud of midnight floating behind her. Caught in the shaft of light that fell through the open apartment door, she gazed out with dark eyes from her canvas, angry and accusing, as if she resented the intrusion into her space and privacy. Lia froze in the open doorway, one hand clutching the heavy key and the other gripping the packet of neatly organized legal papers that said she had every right to be here.

And that this unknown apartment, along with all its contents, now belonged to her.

It is an incredibly valuable property, the lawyers had assured her. Your grandmother must have adored you, the administrative assistant had said enviously as she had examined the printed address. And Lia hadn’t replied to any of them because Grandmère’s motives in death were as murky as they had been in life, and Lia couldn’t be sure that adoration had figured in either.

“Utilities should be on,” the building’s concierge said from the top of the stairs behind Lia. The property caretaker was a surprisingly young woman with a close-cropped pink bob and a quick smile who had introduced herself simply as Celeste. Lia had liked her immediately. “I’m not often in the office but I’m always around if you need anything else. Just ring me.”

“Thank you,” Lia replied faintly, slipping the key into her pocket.

“You said on the phone this place was your grandmother’s?” Celeste leaned casually on the stair railing.

“Yes. She left it to me when she passed.” Or at least that was what the lawyers had said when they had summoned her to their offices and laid a steady stream of documents before her. And while the flat had been paid for and maintained from an account with Grandmère’s name on it, as far as Lia knew, Estelle Allard had never lived anywhere other than Marseille.

“Ah.” The woman’s expression softened. “My condolences on her passing.”

“Thank you. It wasn’t unexpected. Though this apartment was a…shock.”

“Not a bad one as shocks go, I think?” Celeste remarked. “We should all be so lucky.”

“True,” Lia acknowledged, playing with the enameled pendant at her throat. Until this morning, the antique necklace had been the only gift Grandmère had ever given her, presented without fuss on her eighteenth birthday. She considered the concierge. “How long have you worked here?”

“Six years.”

“I don’t suppose you know anything about this apartment? Or my grandmother? Estelle Allard?”