Chapter 16: The Ring

The officer held the ring photograph beside my bare hand.

"When did you last see it?" he asked.

"On my mother's lawn. I left it on the podium."

"Mr. Ingersoll says you took it after the cameras cut."

"He proposed with it ten months ago," I said. "I wore it every day until that noon."

"Do you have proof you gave it back?"

"The lawn had nine cameras and a hundred people."

The officer kept his voice calm, but I could hear the team moving closer.

The team had come in for practice and stopped along the rail.

The reporter with Joel's interview still stood by the door.

"Cameras didn't cut," Toni said.

She pulled up the lawn footage on her phone.

The officer leaned close as I removed the ring onscreen.

I placed it on the podium and walked away.

Grayson waited until my mother turned toward a reporter.

Then he put the ring in his pocket.

Toni dragged the video back to that second and played it again.

"There," she said.

"Freeze it," the first officer said.

Toni held the frame where Grayson's fingers closed around the ring.

I recognized the polished nail on his thumb.

He'd held that same hand against my back while I stood at the podium.

"Can you send us the whole clip?" the officer asked.

"Yes. I'll send you the full recording," Toni said.

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