Chapter 2 - Lily had found it by accident
Police later asked Lily why she opened Marlene’s purse.
I expected to hear:
Curiosity.
Looking for candy.
Something nine-year-old.
Instead Lily said:
“Grandma took my mom’s necklace.”
I looked at her.
“What necklace?”
“The silver one.”
Claire had owned a small silver pendant shaped like a crescent moon.
After she died, I kept it in a wooden box in my bedroom.
Two weeks earlier Lily asked if she could wear it to a school event.
I said yes.
Then it disappeared.
I assumed we misplaced it.
Lily saw the pendant inside Marlene’s purse while Marlene was helping sort old family photographs.
She reached for it.
A folded hospital paper came out with it.
Lily saw her mother’s name.
She could read enough to understand:
Hospital.
Claire Cole.
Then Marlene walked in.
“What are you doing?”
Lily said:
“Why do you have Mommy’s hospital paper?”
May you like
Marlene panicked.
That was when she grabbed her.
