Page 18 of Desert Wind

“What just happened?” asked Jenna. “Why were Antoine and Luc here?”

“I’ll explain everything,” said Nash. “Let’s go somewhere that we can sit and have lunch. I’m sure the two of them will join us.”

“Fine. But I think I deserve an explanation as to why you wouldn’t allow me to at least see the rest of my childhood home.” He nodded, frowning at her.

“There might be explanations needed all around.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Nash found a small Mexican restaurant off the main roads and out of view. When Luc and Antoine walked in behind them, neither was surprised to see the other.

After taking their seats and ordering food, Jenna stared at the three men.

“What is going on?”

“Jenna, Nash told you earlier that we’ve been concerned about the ways in which your family died. We had trouble finding your parents’ death certificates or any sign that they had indeed died.”

“I told Nash that I was at their funerals. They died literally within days of one another.”

“Did you see their bodies?” asked Antoine. She looked at him and shook her head. “You didn’t because it was a closed casket. It was closed intentionally because of the brutality of their deaths.”

“Wh-what?” she whispered.

“Jenna, have you ever heard the name Genevieve St. Martine?”

“No. Was she someone in history? Someone famous?” she asked innocently.

“Yes, sort of,” said Luc. “Genevieve St. Martine was the infant daughter of Claudia and Jacques St. Martine. Jacques was a very well-known French businessman, often dealing in things that weren’t exactly legitimate.”

“I see,” she frowned.

“When Genevieve was just nine months old, she was kidnapped while in the park with her nanny outside of Paris.The nanny was murdered, and the child was taken, never to be seen or heard from again.”

“That’s terrible,” she frowned.

“It is terrible. The police in France and here in the U.S. all believed it was an act of vengeance from another family. The Ciprianis.”

“That name sounds familiar,” she said, looking at the men. Nash nodded at her.

“The Cipriani family is one of the most brutal mob families in Italy and have businesses on the East Coast. They’re known for their illegal activity of all kinds. They had a vendetta against St. Martine because he turned over evidence to Interpol that cost them billions of dollars and the incarceration of two very important people in their operations.”

“It all sounds very sordid,” she said. “But what does this have to do with me?”

“Jenna, when you were in our clinic, we did a number of tests on you. They were all routine bloodwork, x-rays, that sort of thing.”

“I remember,” she said softly.

“Our team realized today that you are Genevieve St. Martine. Your DNA and blood match identically. There’s no other option,” said Luc. She stared at them, then started laughing.

“You’re joking,” she smiled. When they didn’t smile back, she sobered. “Y-you’re joking. That’s not possible.”

“Jenna, we believe that the people you thought were your parents were, in fact, working for Cipriani. You were always going to be used as leverage between the families.”

“B-but why let me go to the convent?”

“It’s possible that the people acting as your parents didn’t want any harm to come to you and thought the convent would be safe for you. Your sisters were, in fact, blood-related, but there is no way that you were born of the same parents.”

“I don’t understand any of this. I’m not related to them. I didn’t have three sisters?”

---