“Have you known about me all this time?” I ask bluntly.
“To some degree, yes.” Janna relaxes easily against the couch cushions and crosses one leg over the other. “I knew I had a sister and that she was being raised by my aunt. I didn’t understand the details until more recently.”
I stare at her, waiting for her to continue. Finally, she does.
“A little over a year ago, I found out where you were. I contacted Sofia and asked about you. She told me it wasn’t time to introduce you to the family just yet. She thought you had enough on your plate and didn’t need the added encumbrance of knowing your extended family. She said you were happy here, and we accepted that.”
“We?”
“Me and my brother, Jay. Your brother, too, of course. We tried to convince her to just let us come and meet you, but she refused. She asked us to wait another year, and of course, she passed away before we had the opportunity.”
“But you didn’t come to her funeral.” I look at her suspiciously. I’ve been duped by these unscrupulous families before. Well, just one member of one family, but still. I am not about to trust her word. “I knew everyone who paid their respects when she died, and you definitely weren’t there.”
“I wanted to come then,” Janna says sadly. “I didn’t know her well, but I know my father—our father—loved Aunt Sofia, and I wanted to be there for you, but we were concerned it would be too much for you too soon. We decided to wait a couple of months to give you time to grieve in peace. The next thing I knew, you’d moved to Cascade Falls and hooked up with…that man.”
“Nate.” I watch Janna wrinkle her nose at the mention of his name.
“Oh, my sweet sister, if only you knew what that family is like!”
“You’re the ones who murdered his brother.”
“Is that what he told you?” She tilts her head to the side and narrows her eyes.
“Yes.” I glare at her. “Do you have a different story?”
“You want to know the truth?” Venom seeps into her tone. “It was all in self defense. Micha attacked Jay and tried to kill him.”
“Why would he go after Jay?”
“Why do you think? It was all about you, dear sister.”
“Me?”
“Micha found out about you. He brought us a bunch of information about you, claiming you were a threat to the balance of power in town. He threatened to ‘take care of you,’ which is how the Orsos have always handled their issues, and Jay got angry. I was angry as well, and when we told Micha Orso not to touch you, he just laughed. He and Jay exchanged more words, and then they fought. Micha threw the first punch and pulled out a gun. Yes, Jay did kill him, but it was self-defense.”
“That all sounds a little convenient.” Though part of her story makes sense, given that Micha had a file on me, I’m not quite buying her version.
“I don’t have a secret video recording of the incident, so I can’t prove to you what happened. I was there though. I saw it all.”
“And Micha started it?”
“He absolutely did and not for the first time. There have been fights between our families before, and some have been brutal, but there hadn’t been a death for a long time. I think Carlo knew exactly what happened, and that Micha tried to kill Jay. That’s why he didn’t come after Jay immediately.”
“I…I don’t know what to say.” I bite my lip, wondering if there is any chance what she’s saying could be the truth. Micha did know about me, and it seems as though he took after Carlo Ramsay more so than Nate did. Could Micha have threatened to kill me long before I knew about any of this?
“Do you really think the Orso family would have stepped aside and let us take out the next head of the family unless we had been attacked first? Carlo knew Micha had overstepped and violated the treaty. That’s why he didn’t retaliate.”
“Nate said they didn’t know for sure,” I reply softly, not knowing if anything I heard from him is true or not.
“He lied to you, Cherry. I can’t imagine he wasn’t privy to his brother’s investigation. He likely knew about you before you moved to Cascade Falls. It makes sense, really. With Micha gone, Nataniele decides to woo you instead of killing you. He’s been lying to you the whole time.”
What she’s saying does make some sense, but I have no reason to trust her. In fact, I don’t trust any of them to tell the truth. I don’t know why I keep coming up as the centerpiece of all of this, but I’m tired of it.
I glare at Janna, feeling all the anger I’ve been holding down inside of me boiling to the surface as I stare at her.
“Why, Janna? You seem to know so much about all of this, so tell me why. Why was I sent off to live with my aunt? Why was I never told about the rest of the family? Why have I been hidden for years, and why am I suddenly so interesting to everyone now?”
“Well, that’s a lot of questions!” Janna huffs a breath through her nose and squares her shoulders. “If you’d just come back to Cascade Falls with me, I could tell you everything.”