* Lawrence *
I hadn't set foot in this villa for months, maybe a year. Yet the moment I stepped through the doors, the past came rushing back like a tide that refused to ebb.
My father sat in his usual chair near the window, glasses low on his nose, a newspaper open but unread. My mother was at her vanity, touching the pearls at her throat, as though compensating for what was no longer there the pink diamond ring on her finger.
The infamous diamond.
That cursed jewel had done more damage than anyone dared admit.
I could still hear my mother's voice from that night at Magnolia resort. "It's gone! My pink diamond is gone!" Panic had cracked her perfect composure, the staff scattering like frightened birds.
I closed my eyes. Even now, the memory clawed at me. Jana, just a teen standing
