Page 81 of The Diamond Thief

“Shut up. Let me finish. But then I went to steal your tiaras and that night…it was so much like I remembered.”

“You remembered?” His eyes, glossy with pain, search mine.

“Janet, turn on the light inside.”

The front compartment illuminates. I peel off the gold scarf covering my hair. It’s back to red now, as close to my original color as I could get with something off the shelf. Two hundred dollars’ worth of red extensions have returned it to the length that he might remember.

“How did you do this?” He fingers a long piece of it.

“Extensions. But there’s something else.”

I slide a brown contact from my eye and toss it aside. Then I remove the other.

He looks into my face.

“Your eyes are green.” He can barely talk.

I half sob, half say, “They are.”

“It’s you,” he says. “Emerald.” He touches my hair, my cheeks, and brushes his thumbs across my eyelids. “How did I not recognize you?”

“I’m not eighteen anymore,” I say. “I dyed my hair. Kept my eyes brown. Stayed fake tan. I’m really good at playing a role.” I push on my boobs. “I might have a little extra in here. You know, for the job.”

“I should have known you.” He seems horror-stricken.

“It was a long time ago,” I say. “And it was just that one time.”

His hands can’t stop touching me. “I never forgot you,” he says. “I’ve looked for you. What happened?“

“My mission has always been to infiltrate the Den. I went to Club Y six years ago on my own to get started, but my father collected me a day later. He said I was too young for all that. I only met you there. Twenty-four hours with you.”

“You came back to the Den? Why?”

“To destroy it from the inside. You’re a bunch of sexist pigs, and my mission since I was eighteen was to wreck your cozy fraternity.”

He coughs and a thin trickle of blood escapes his lips. “You’re right.”

I choke back a sob and wipe the blood away with my thumb. “But you’re different than I thought.”

He holds on to me as if I might disappear on him again. “No, I’m a pig. But I’m learning.”

“I need to not lose you now. Can you do that for me?”

He nods, but his eyes are starting to cloud over. He drops his arms. The robe is soaked in blood.

I lean forward to kiss him. He won’t die on me. He really, truly can’t.