And just as she feared, it was Maximilian.
"What are you doing back here?" he asked, his tone light, unaware of the storm brewing inside her.
"I…" Catherine almost told him the truth.
The words sat right at the edge of her lips, but disbelief held them back. She still couldn't accept it herself—how could she have lost something so important, something she had waited for with such anticipation?
Instead, she turned away again, searching once more, as if the ring might suddenly appear out of sheer desperation. She retraced every step she had taken that morning, checked every surface again, every corner she had already checked twice, three times over.
Nothing.
Her thoughts scrambled as she tried to remember the last moment she had seen it on her finger.
She couldn't.
She wasn't used to the weight of it yet.
And that realization only made it worse.
