Chapter 6

Evelyn's POV

After walking out of the estate, my phone buzzed with an incoming call from an unfamiliar number.

I answered.

"Evelyn, are you all right? I heard about Julian and Melanie."

I recognized the voice instantly. It was Sean Miller, my ex-husband.

I moved to hang up immediately.

"Don't hang up!"

Anticipating my reaction, he rushed to speak before the line went dead:

"I called because there's something you need to know. Your mother's necklace—do you still remember it?"

My hand froze.

Of course I remembered.

It was the token of love between my mother and father—a pearl necklace.

When they divorced, my mother took nothing with her except that single piece of jewelry.

Later, when life became too destitute to bear, she was forced to pawn it.

Yet my mother had kept the empty jewelry box. When I was a child, I often saw her sitting by the edge of the bed, staring blankly into that empty box for entire twilights.

"What are you trying to say?"

"I saw that exact necklace featured in an auction catalogue. The auction is tonight. I knew how much it meant to you, so I thought I should tell you."

"Thank you."

I hung up and immediately searched for the details of the auction.

My mother had left me nothing when she passed away. That necklace was the thing she had cherished most in this world.

I had to win it back.

That night, at the auction.

My mother's necklace was presented as the grand finale lot of the evening.

I raised my paddle.

Right behind me, a familiar voice called out a higher bid.

I turned my head. Julian sat in the VIP row diagonally behind me, paddle raised, with Melanie lounging beside him.

I gritted my teeth and placed another bid. He matched it immediately.

I bid again. He followed again.

With every round, his bids were tossed out with effortless unconcern, as if he were toying with an insect.

In the final round, he outright doubled the existing bid.

Even if I emptied every single cent of my savings, it wouldn't come close to that astronomical figure.

The gavel fell with a sharp crack. The necklace belonged to Julian.

He accepted the jewelry piece, and right before my eyes, he fastened it around Melanie's neck with his own hands.

Melanie tilted her chin to let him clasp the chain, a seductive, thoroughly satisfied smile curling on her lips.

The last remaining relic of my mother... and I had still failed to protect it.

I turned to leave, but Melanie stepped directly into my path, blocking my way.

"Evelyn, you lost."

Utterly baffled, I looked at her and asked:

"Melanie, why are you targeting me like this?"

As though she had waited an eternity to be asked that very question, Melanie's smile twisted into something hideous:

"Why? I'm a celebrity, a daughter of the Sterling family! My background is better than yours, I'm prettier than you—so why does every single one of them fall for you?!"

She leaned in, dropping her voice to a venomous whisper:

"I want to tear away everything that belongs to you. You honestly thought I wanted to be your friend? Let me tell you the truth: the only reason I ever got close to you was to destroy you!"

Looking at the borderline deranged obsession burning in her eyes, a shiver of cold disgust ran down my spine.

"Then I wish you the best of luck."

I stepped around her and walked toward the exit.

Just as I reached the doors, Melanie's tearful wail erupted behind me:

"Julian! The necklace you just gave me is gone! Evelyn was the only person who came anywhere near me..."

I whipped around, blurting out instinctively:

"It wasn't me! I didn't touch it!"

Melanie's eyes were red, the picture of wounded innocence:

"Evelyn, I know you wanted that necklace. If you had just told me, I would have gladly given it to you! Why do you have to bully me like this?"

I looked toward Julian:

"You know I would never do something like that."

Julian said nothing.

Melanie sobbed harder:

"Are you saying I'm framing you? The necklace vanished the second you stepped close to me! It has to still be on you right now!"

Julian threw a cold glance at the bodyguards flanking him.

"Search her."

"Julian Vance! I told you I didn't take it! Go pull the security footage!"

Julian furrowed his brow, his gaze locked unblinkingly onto me.

I fought with everything I had, but my strength was utterly useless against two grown men.

My coat was ripped away, the buttons of my blouse tearing open to expose the lingerie beneath.

The stares of the surrounding guests pierced into me like a barrage of needles.

Instinctively, I crossed my arms over my body, a wave of humiliating shame crashing over me like boiling water.

Once, during a business dinner, a client had merely stared at me a second too long, and Julian had beaten the man into the hospital.

Now, he had personally ordered them to strip me in front of everyone, exposing my body to the entire room.

The suffocating despair of having my dignity crushed underfoot was overwhelming.

Biting my lip, I couldn't stop the tears from streaming down my face.

Seeing my breakdown, Julian's expression shifted violently, and he opened his mouth, about to call a halt.

But just then, the pearl necklace slipped out from my torn, disheveled collar and hit the floor.

Whispers erupted through the crowd in an instant.

"She really stole it? She looks so respectable, too..."

"Stealing in broad daylight... how shameless."

Julian stared at the necklace on the floor, the flicker of heartache in his eyes swallowed whole by disappointment.

His face hardened as he looked at me.

"Evelyn, you've disappointed me completely."

Paying me no further mind, he wrapped an arm around Melanie and walked away without looking back.

I collapsed there alone, half-naked, subjected to the gawking stares of the crowd, frozen in place.

In the end, a waitress who couldn't bear to watch handed me her coat.

"Miss, please put this on first."

Wrapping the coat tightly around myself, I stumbled out of the auction house.

My phone buzzed. It was a video from Melanie.

On the screen, she stood by the artificial lake outside the venue, dangling the pearl necklace and smiling at the camera.

With a casual flick of her fingers, she let go, letting the necklace drop into the lake.

Staring at the video, only one thought consumed my mind.

That was the last thing my mother had left behind in this world.

I sprinted to the edge of the lake and threw myself in without a second thought.

The late-autumn water was bone-chilling, the icy current instantly piercing deep into my marrow.

I searched underwater frantically, blinded by silt and tangled in water weeds, unable to see a thing.

I didn't know how long I searched before my fingers finally brushed against a segment of cold metal chain.

Clenching it tightly in my fist, I struggled with everything I had to swim to the surface.

But my freezing, waterlogged body refused to obey. A sudden, violent cramp seized my calf, the sharp pain causing me to choke on a mouthful of water.

Water flooded my nose and mouth, and my consciousness began to slip away.

Just as I was about to sink, a hand clamped firmly around my arm and hauled me violently out of the water.

Dragged onto the shore, someone wrapped a coat around me.

A pair of arms held me tight, and a familiar voice called out frantically in my ear:

"Evelyn! Wake up!"

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