Chapter 11 - The Locket
They did not return through the gate.
Rosa let Claire in through an old servants’ tunnel that connected the carriage house to the wine cellar.
Daniel stayed outside with Martin to get his shoulder bandaged by a private doctor.
Claire and Rosa climbed the cellar stairs in darkness.
“You knew about the tunnel?” Claire whispered.
“I have worked here thirty-one years.”
“Is there anything you don’t know?”
Rosa gave her a tired look. “Yes. Why rich people build houses with fifteen bathrooms and still refuse to wash their own cups.”
Claire almost laughed.
It was the first normal sentence anyone had said all night.
Upstairs, the house was silent.
They reached Claire’s bedroom.
The jewelry box was open.
Empty.
Claire’s heart dropped.
“The locket.”
Rosa checked the floor.
A thin silver chain lay beneath the dresser.
No locket.
“He found it.”
Then Claire noticed something strange.
The velvet lining of the jewelry box had been sliced open.
Whoever searched it thought the object was hidden inside the box itself.
Maybe they had not recognized the locket.
Claire checked the laundry hamper.
Nothing.
Her suitcase.
Nothing.
Then she remembered wearing the locket two months earlier at a family brunch. The clasp had broken, and she had handed it to Eleanor.
“Eleanor has it.”
Rosa’s eyes widened.
“She said she would have it repaired.”
They drove to the hospital.
Eleanor remained unconscious under guard.
Claire entered using a visitor badge Rosa had obtained from a nurse she knew.
Eleanor looked fragile in the hospital bed, stripped of pearls, power, and perfect posture.
Claire took her hand.
“You knew my father,” she whispered.
Eleanor’s eyelids fluttered.
Claire leaned closer.
“Eleanor?”
Her eyes opened.
Barely.
“Claire,” she breathed.
“Where is my locket?”
Eleanor’s mouth moved.
Claire bent closer.
“Not… locket.”
“What?”
“Key… inside… pearl.”
Claire stared at the pearl necklace bagged among Eleanor’s personal effects on the counter.
One pearl was larger than the others.
May you like
Before Claire could reach it, the hospital door opened.
Officer Hale walked in.
