CHAPTER 4 — THE SECOND RING
Chloe stared at the second ring.
“That’s not mine.”
The jeweler seated near the front stepped closer.
He had designed the original ring for Ryan’s family.
“May I?”
The officer handed it to him.
He examined the stone beneath a small light.
“This is a replica.”
Ryan frowned.
“A replica?”
“High quality,” the jeweler said, “but the center stone is cubic zirconia.”
Everyone looked toward the ring recovered from Amanda’s clutch.
The jeweler checked that one next.
His face changed.
“This is also a replica.”
Ryan’s mother stood abruptly.
“What do you mean?”
“Neither ring is the original.”
Chloe stepped backward.
“That’s impossible.”
Ryan looked at her.
“Where is my grandmother’s diamond?”
Her expression hardened.
“I don’t know.”
The wedding planner, still pale near the entrance, slowly raised her hand.
“I may know.”
Chloe turned on her.
“You work for me. Be careful.”
The planner walked into the center of the ballroom.
“My name is Marissa Cole. Three weeks ago, Chloe asked me to arrange a private meeting with a jeweler who specialized in discreet sales.”
Chloe scoffed.
“She’s lying.”
Marissa opened her phone.
“I kept the messages.”
My father’s attorney connected the phone to the screen.
A conversation appeared.
Chloe had asked Marissa to find someone willing to purchase an unregistered diamond without contacting the groom.
Ryan’s face became still.
“How much?”
Marissa looked at him with sympathy.
“Three hundred and twenty thousand dollars.”
Ryan’s mother gasped.
The original ring had been worth nearly half a million.
“Why?” Ryan asked Chloe.
Her eyes filled with tears, but they looked practiced.
“I was under pressure.”
“From whom?”
She glanced toward Eleanor.
Eleanor’s face tightened.
My father noticed.
“Open the financial folder,” he told the attorney.
The flash drive contained banking statements.
Chloe had transferred the money from the diamond sale into Bellamy Hospitality.
Eleanor had used it to make an emergency loan payment.
Ryan stared at his bride.
“You sold my grandmother’s ring to save your aunt’s company?”
Chloe rushed toward him.
“I did it for our future.”
“No. You did it because your family is drowning.”
Eleanor lifted her chin.
“Everything I have done was to protect our name.”
My father answered coldly.
“You destroyed it instead.”
Ryan removed his wedding band.
The ceremony had taken place only hours earlier.
He placed the ring on the table.
Chloe stared at it.
“You can’t leave me at our reception.”
“I’m not leaving you because of money,” Ryan said. “I’m leaving because you framed an innocent woman to cover a theft you committed.”
Chloe’s face twisted.
“If I go down, Dominic goes down too.”
Dominic looked at her sharply.
She pointed at him.
“He found the buyer.”
The guests erupted.
I turned toward my husband.
His silence told me everything.
Then Chloe smiled through her tears.
May you like
“And that isn’t the worst thing he did.”
End of Chapter 4…
