Chapter 4

"You can't touch this."

I pulled the necklace back.

Ellie hadn't expected to be refused. Her whole face scrunched up.

"Uncle Cardo said I can use anything here. Everything here is mine."

"But this is mine."

I closed my fist around the pendant.

She looked furious. Suddenly she lunged at me, her voice sharp.

"I don't like you! Get out!"

Her hand grabbed the chain and yanked, hard.

The silver snapped. The pendant slipped through my fingers and hit the floor.

I went completely still.

When I was little, my father called me his little deer.

Every birthday, he'd make me a deer-shaped pancake with his own hands.

The year he died, he couldn't make pancakes anymore, so he found a silversmith and had this necklace made.

The pendant was a little deer, my name engraved on the back.

He said, this is the last little deer I'll ever give you.

After I became Cardo's Donna, I had more fine jewelry than I could count.

But I always kept it.

And now it was broken in the hands of a six-year-old.

Ellie froze too, but only because she saw my face. She burst into frightened sobs.

Cardo and Camilla came in fast.

"What happened?"

Ellie threw herself into Cardo's arms, sobbing so hard she could barely breathe.

"Auntie wouldn't let me play with the necklace, and she yelled at me!"

Camilla crouched down and held her, then looked up at me with just the right amount of apology in her voice.

"Donna, I'm sorry. I didn't know my being here would make you this upset."

I knelt down to pick up the broken half of the chain.

Cardo was faster. He bent, picked up the pendant, and weighed it in his hand.

"It's just a necklace. I'll buy you a new one tomorrow."

I looked up at him.

"You don't know what this necklace is?"

Cardo paused. He looked down, saw the broken little deer, and his expression changed at once.

On the day of the funeral, I sat in the last pew of the church and told him about this necklace.

The deer. The pancakes. My father's hands.

That day he held me for a long time and said he'd treasure it.

He clearly remembered now.

He set the pendant back on the table, impatience creeping into his voice.

"She's a child. She doesn't understand."

"She doesn't," I said, looking at him. "But do you? Do you not understand what this necklace means?"

Cardo's brow furrowed.

"Viv, don't throw a tantrum right now."

Camilla pulled Ellie closer and spoke with red eyes.

"Cardo, it's my fault. If I hadn't come, Donna's necklace wouldn't be broken. It's on me. I'll take her and go right now."

She took all the blame onto herself, but not once did she make Ellie say sorry.

I looked at her, then at Cardo.

The way he stood guard over the two of them was so natural, like this was how it was always supposed to be.

Suddenly I felt so tired.

"Get out."

Cardo frowned. "Calm down."

"This is my room."

I gritted my teeth.

"All of you. Out."

Cardo looked like he wanted to say more, but Ellie in his arms cried harder.

Camilla tugged gently at his sleeve and murmured that he should take the child out first.

The door closed.

I sat on the floor, picked up the two broken halves of the necklace, and put them in a plastic bag.

A broken chain can be mended. A cracked pendant can be repaired.

But some things, once broken, never go back to what they were.

At dinner, Cardo knocked and called me out to eat. I didn't answer.

Half an hour later, he pushed the door open and set a bag from a jewelry store on the table.

"I had the best goldsmith in New York make you a new one."

Inside was a gold necklace, the pendant exquisite and expensive, glinting under the light.

"We can make new memories."

I said nothing.

He stood there a moment, then said, "Let's have dinner together later, and we can put this behind us."

I didn't touch the bag.

I only put the plastic bag with the broken chain at the very bottom of my suitcase.