Chapter 4 - The Necklace That Was Never Missing
Detective Price returned with an unexpected discovery. Security footage showed Vanessa removing the diamond necklace herself and placing it in her handbag before dinner. She had then gone upstairs and returned without the bag.
The necklace was recovered from a locked drawer in her dressing room.
I should have felt vindicated. Instead I stared at the photograph of my mother on the detective's tablet and wondered how long someone had been watching her.
Vanessa's attorney insisted the accusation had been an emotional misunderstanding. Luca disagreed. He canceled the engagement in front of the lawyer, the detective, and me.
“You cannot humiliate me like this,” Vanessa said.
“You tried to have an innocent employee arrested,” he replied. “And someone used her mother as leverage.”
Vanessa turned toward me. “You think he is protecting you? Ask him what happened to your father.”
My father had died six years earlier in a warehouse fire. The official report called it an electrical accident.
Luca's face changed at the mention of him.
I noticed. So did Vanessa.
“What do you know?” I asked Luca.
May you like
He didn't answer quickly enough.
I left the mansion with Detective Price, taking the photograph and a question I could no longer ignore: had my family's misfortune started long before the engagement dinner?
