The steam in the bathroom hadn’t fully cleared yet. A layer of condensation still clouded the mirror. I stepped out, wrapped in a towel, and reached for the second drawer on the right side of the vanity.
My hand grasped empty air. I looked down. The drawer held only a box of Q-tips and a half-empty tube of hand cream.
The bracelet was gone. My heart skipped in a way that had nothing to do with surprise. I never took that bracelet off.
Not since I was seven years old, when my father had a micro-locator chip the size of a grain of rice embedded inside the silver band. For twenty-two years it had felt like an extra bone grown into my wrist. I’d remove it right before stepping into the shower and put it back on the second I stepped out.
No exceptions. No excuses. I ransacked the drawer again.
Crouched down to check the grout lines between the floor tiles. Nothing. “Ethan,” I called toward the bedroom.
His voice drifted from the living room, carrying that lazy resonance I’d come to find comforting. “What’s wrong?”
“Did you see my bracelet? I left it right here in the vanity drawer.”
Unhurried footsteps.
He appeared in the doorway wearing a gray heathered Henley, hair slightly tousled, wearing the gentle smile that had made me feel safe for three years. He walked over, pulled the drawer open, bent down to scan the floor. “I don’t see it.
Did you leave it somewhere else?”
“Impossible. I put it here every single time.”
“Could it have fallen down the drain? You took it off and left it on the counter, and the water—”
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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