Then Diego saw her hand.
On her left ring finger rested a silver ring. Simple at first glance, but unmistakably crafted by someone who cared. The metal was etched, not mass-produced. At its center, a pale blue topaz caught the gray light of the storm and scattered it softly.
The world tilted.
Diego’s breath stopped—not dramatically, not suddenly—but as if his lungs had simply forgotten what to do.
He knew that ring.
He had designed it himself sixteen years ago, sitting in a tiny workshop with a jeweler who charged too much and talked too little. He had insisted on the stone. Insisted on the engraving hidden inside, invisible unless you knew to look.
D & X. Forever.
He had slipped that ring onto Ximena’s finger the night before she disappeared.
She had been three months pregnant.
She left a letter. One he could recite without effort. One that lived in his bones.
