aling Cordero's departure. The vi

oom. The spilled coffee on the tablec

e Amanda had fled. She saw Amanda's car pe

vive this. She would spin a story-stress, a misunderstanding, a pre

verage. And she

mbination-Cordero hadn't changed it from the default factory setting yet. 0-0-0-0. He didn

ocuments. She ignored the cash. Taking

. It wasn't a Boone heirloom. It was the one gift her biological mother had lef

convinced her to trade it for

cketed th

n't use the family driver.

rict. The man behind the counter, a guy with thick glasse

nted, barely looking at t

85. The center stone is a 2.5-carat cushion cut, VVS1 clarity, color E. The setting a

up, adjusting his glasses.

d and fifty thousand," he

I walk to the guy next door who kn

again, but he op

d closer. The faint, tarnished inscription was almost unreadable, but she recognized the elegant script: 'To Arthur, Love Mary, 1965'. Grandpa Boone's name was Arthur. His late wife was Mary. She remembered his stories about a lost pen, a tre

ok on Hamburg's corporate etiquette. She knew Cordero's company was merging with a Hamburg

ffee shop, coun

. A text from an

nd Amanda, taken from a distance. They were

er living with a psy

f Cordero's office building. Amanda had ambushed him. And looking closely

leted the

y," she

was in three days. Mrs. Boone's 60th bi

hat was too tight and too short. Amanda had

going to war. And

ng to gift Mrs. Boone a "handmade" gown. Sh

. A cold, pre

where that dress