Page 241 of Only Be Mine

“That's right.”

“And you said you found something.”

I didn’t answer right away. The word ring felt too loud to say. Like naming it might summon Trevor’s hand from the doorway, might make him appear in the glass like a reflection.

Marshal didn’t rush me.

That was the thing about him, he didn’t fill silence with pressure. He let it sit long enough to become honest.

I took a breath. “I found something that belonged to John.”

His expression didn’t change, but I saw the shift in his attention. A tightening. A narrowing.

“What was it?” he asked.

I slid my hand into my pocket.

The ring was heavier than it should’ve been. Cold metal, familiar weight. It felt wrong that something so small could split a life clean in half.

I held it up where he could see it.

Marshal stared, too long to be casual. Then he nodded, slow.

“That’s… significant,” he said carefully.

“It’s his,” I whispered. “There’s no way it’s not.”

Marshal’s eyes flicked briefly toward the house again, then back to me. “Where did you find it?”

The question hit my chest like a shove.

In his desk.

In his drawer.

In a place he kept things that mattered.

But I couldn’t make myself say it yet, because saying it made it real in a different way. It made it evidence, made it a line crossed, made it something that couldn’t be walked back with apologies and a warm dinner and a hand at the small of my back.

“I need to know something,” I said instead, voice thin. “Is… is it possible he had it for some other reason?”

Marshal didn’t answer immediately, and that pause was worse than an outright no.

He leaned closer, just enough that I had to focus on him, not the porch, not the shadow of Trevor just beyond.

“Cate,” he said, using my name like an anchor, “I’m going to be direct. That ring should not be in your husband’s possession. There is no innocent explanation that makes sense with what we know.”

My stomach turned. “What you know,” I echoed, and it came out bitter.

Marshal held my gaze. “We know John was killed the week he disappeared. We know his identity was swapped. We know the original file was closed in a way it shouldn’t have been. We know someone had the means to make that happen.”

I heard Seth’s voice in my head. Power… help cleaning it up… someone close.

Marshal’s face didn’t harden, but his tone did. “And now we have an item from John’s body in your home.”

A cold wave passed over my skin.

My home.