THE MAFIA BOSS FOUND HIS MAID DYING IN A CHRISTMAS BLIZZARD—THEN THE DIAMOND HIS FIANCÉE LOST EXPOSED THE BETRAYAL THAT COULD DESTROY HIS EMPIRE

The west gallery had been closed since Christmas Eve. Tony said it was because the security team was reviewing the estate, but I suspected he also couldn't bear to walk through rooms where people had applauded while I nearly died outside.

I returned to the house with Evelyn, Marco, and a local detective. My hands still ached in the cold, so I wore soft gloves. Dr. Ellis had told me recovery could take time. I was learning not to treat my own body as an inconvenience.

The clock stood against the far wall, its brass pendulum still. The glass reflected the pale winter light.

"I used to clean here," I said. "Mrs. Gable told me not to touch this one."

Evelyn photographed the case before anyone approached. A technician inspected the hinges and found signs that the rear panel had been opened recently.

"We need a warrant or clear authority before examining anything that may belong to the Vances," the detective said.

Tony produced purchase and loan records through his lawyer. The clock was listed as a temporary loan from Vance Heritage Holdings. The detective arranged legal authorization while the others waited.

That delay was unbearable. I walked to the window overlooking the terrace. The snow had been cleared from the stone, but I could still see where I had curled beside the railing. For a moment my chest tightened and I couldn't breathe.

Tony noticed. "We can leave."

"No."

"Grace, you don't have to prove anything."

"I'm not proving anything. I just want to see what happens when the truth is allowed into this room."

He stood beside me without touching me until I reached for his hand.

When the authorization came through, the technician opened the rear panel. Inside, behind the concealed face, was an empty brass compartment. A fresh scratch marked the lock.

"Someone got here first," Marco said.

I felt the hope drain out of me.

Then the technician noticed a thin strip of paper wedged beneath the clock's base. It bore a handwritten inventory number and a date from three weeks earlier. The transfer record had been signed by Mrs. Gable.

"She moved something," Evelyn said.

Mrs. Gable had disappeared after the gala. Her bank account showed a large deposit from a Vance subsidiary, and her car had been seen leaving the estate before dawn. Investigators had issued a request to locate her.

"She wasn't just cruel," I said. "She was working for Lana."

"It appears she was paid by someone connected to the Vances," Evelyn replied. "We still need to establish what she did."

I nodded. I appreciated her refusal to turn suspicion into a verdict, even when I wanted one.

That evening, Tony invited me to dinner at the hotel restaurant. I nearly declined. He was my employer. I was the woman he'd carried out of a storm. Every headline in the world would turn dinner into a scandal.

"No cameras," he said. "No obligation. If you'd rather not, I'll understand."

I went because I wanted to.

He arrived without an entourage at our table. We talked about ordinary things first: the books I taught in Chicago, the terrible coffee at his first office, the way Aspen looked after fresh snow. He told me his mother had loved poetry and that he had inherited her annotated copy of Jane Eyre. I told him my students used to argue over whether Rochester deserved forgiveness.

"Did he?" Tony asked.

"Forgiveness isn't a prize for suffering. It depends on what a person does after admitting the harm."

He looked at me thoughtfully. "That sounds like advice."

"Maybe it is."

After dessert, his phone rang. It was Detective Ortiz. Tony put the call on speaker only after asking my permission.

"We located a building matching the photograph," Ortiz said. "It was rented through a Gambino associate. The room is empty. But we found evidence your father was there recently."

"Is he alive?" I asked.

"We don't know yet. We're continuing the search."

I held the edge of the table until my knuckles hurt.

"There's more," Ortiz said. "We recovered a page torn from a ledger. It has a list of account transfers and the initials T.M."

Tony went still.

"My initials," he said.

"Yes. But the transfers are dated before you assumed control of the company. We're examining whether the entries were fabricated or attributed to someone else."

I looked at Tony. He had turned pale.

"What are they trying to do?" I asked.

He answered quietly. "Make it look as if I ordered the payments."

"Why?"

"Because if they can destroy my credibility, the Vances can seize the shipping assets under the financing agreements."

I thought of Lana's ring on the library table, the earring she had never lost, and the way she had smiled when Tony threatened to call the police.

"She wanted you to rescue me," I said suddenly.

Tony frowned. "What?"

"She wanted the ballroom to see you choose me over her. The scandal would make you look reckless. Then they'd release the ledger and say you were hiding crimes."

Evelyn, who had joined the call, was silent for a beat.

"That is a plausible theory," she said. "We need evidence."

Tony looked at me with an expression I couldn't read.

"You think this was staged from the beginning?"

"I think Lana knew you'd come looking when I disappeared."

My phone vibrated with a message from an unknown number.

It contained a photograph of my father, alive, holding that day's newspaper.