Chapter 6 - THE WRONG CLASP
The photograph wasn't proof.
Denise said that first.
“Light changes things.
Angles change things.
We need someone who knows the piece.”
But Maya knew what she had seen.
Two months earlier, Claire had broken a nail trying to close the necklace before dinner.
Maya had fastened it for her.
The clasp was shaped like a tiny leaf.
The recovered necklace had a plain hook.
Denise passed that information to Ellis.
Graham supplied the old appraisal and the jeweler's name from his files.
By Wednesday, the necklace from the suitcase had been examined.
Its stones were glass.
The bracelet found in Maya's bag was genuine.
Graham read the detective's update twice before calling Claire into his office.
“Where is the real necklace?”
She stayed standing.
“Maybe your maid switched it.”
“Before or after she put a bracelet in her own bag and waited for the police?”
“You're enjoying this.”
He looked at her.
“No.”
For a moment, her face softened.
She sat beside him, touching his sleeve the way she used to when the boys were babies.
“I made a few bad decisions with money.”
“How much?”
“It isn't that simple.”
“Then start with one number.”
She withdrew her hand.
“I was going to fix it.”
He waited.
She said nothing more.
That evening, Graham helped the boys build a crooked block tower.
Owen asked whether necklaces could tell the truth.
“Sometimes things help us understand what happened,” Graham said.
“Then Maya can come home?”
He set down the block.
“Maya gets to decide where she lives.”
“But she didn't decide to leave.”
There was no answer that made him look good.
He gave the boy the honest one.
“No.
She didn't.”
Across town, Maya opened a folder of school brochures she had carried out in her work bag.
For two years, she had been taking evening classes toward an early childhood education certificate.
She had planned to finish without leaving the boys abruptly.
Now the future she had been saving for felt like another thing Claire could reach.
Denise called before bedtime.
Benton Estate Jewelry had agreed to cooperate with the detective handling the case.
The owner remembered Claire.
“He bought the original necklace six weeks ago,” Denise said.
Maya sat up.
“Six weeks?”
“There was another item in that sale.”
May you like
A pause.
“A ring listed in Monday's police report as stolen from the house.”
