Chapter 1

"Ethan said this ring came from his ex-wife. He said she didn't want it anymore."

Bella's words made my whole body go cold. I was holding the sapphire ring with both hands, staring at the tiny initials inside the band: M.H. Margaret Hayes. My mother's name.

"That ring is mine," I said. "My mother gave it to me before she died."

Bella looked uneasy for half a second, but then she folded her arms. "Ethan told me his ex-wife got rid of it herself. He said she was upset that night and didn't want anything connected to her mom."

The people around us went quiet. I could feel them listening, waiting for me to explain why my mother's ring was sitting on Bella's table with a cardboard label tied around it.

I had searched for that ring for three months. I had checked every drawer, every coat pocket, every box in the attic. I had even crawled under the bed with a flashlight because I thought maybe it had rolled somewhere I could not reach.

Ethan had watched me cry in our kitchen and held my hand while telling me not to blame myself.

"Maybe it will turn up when you stop looking so hard," he had said.

Now it had turned up right in front of me.

I turned the ring slightly and found the small scratch beside the stone. My mother had made it years ago when she caught the ring on a garden gate. There was no mistake. Ethan had taken it from me.

"You need to give it back," I told Bella. I kept my voice low because I knew what would happen if I raised it.

Bella shook her head. "Talk to Ethan. He said it was his to give away."

As if someone had called him, Ethan walked over with two coffees in his hands. He looked calm. He looked worried. He looked exactly like the kind husband everyone in the neighborhood loved.

"Hannah," he said softly, "what's going on?"

I held up the ring. "Tell her the truth."

For one second, he only looked at it. Then he sighed, and something inside me dropped.

"Hannah got rid of that ring a few months ago," he said. "She was going through a difficult time. She had been drinking, and she said she didn't want anything that reminded her of her mother."

I stared at him. "I never said that."

His expression softened in that careful way I had seen too many times. "You don't remember that night clearly. I didn't want to embarrass you by bringing it up again."

He did not call me unstable. He did not have to. He said it like he was protecting me, and that made it worse. I heard someone behind me whisper, "That's sad." Another person looked away.

"You watched me search for this," I said. "You watched me tear apart our house."

"I was trying to help you," Ethan replied. "I thought you had misplaced it."

"No," I said. "You wanted me to think I had."

His jaw tightened, but his smile stayed in place. "You're under a lot of pressure right now. Let's not make a scene."

That was when I understood what he wanted from me. He wanted tears. He wanted me to shout. He wanted everyone to see a grieving woman lose control, so he could put his arm around me and tell them I was not thinking clearly.

I looked at the ring one last time, then placed it carefully back on Bella's table.

Bella blinked. "What are you doing?"

I took out my phone and photographed the ring, the initials, the scratch, and the cardboard label. When I lifted my phone toward Ethan, his face changed. Only slightly. But I saw it.

"You said I got rid of it," I said.

"Yes," he answered.

"Okay."

He frowned. "Okay?"

I put my phone away. "Okay."

Then I walked away before he could touch my arm or lower his voice and turn me into the problem again.