The Second Life of a Discarded Heiress

Chapter 554

Theo followed their gazes and glanced over, pausing in surprise when he saw the woman's face.

"Jeanette? What's she doing here?"

Remembering she was a friend of his younger sister, he hesitated for a moment, then made his way over and sat across from her.

Jeanette's heart was pounding with excitement, but she forced herself to act oblivious, pretending to be tipsy and out of sorts.

"Who... who are you? Why are you sitting here?" she slurred, looking up at him with feigned confusion.

Theo frowned. "This isn't the kind of place you should be hanging around. Go home, Jeanette."

Jeanette threw her hands in the air in wild exaggeration. "Go home? Go where? The house is gone, my father's in jail, my mother left... I don't have a home anymore."

Only then did Theo remember the recent events, the headlines from earlier that day. He pressed his lips together. "Then you should at least get a room at a hotel for the night."

Jeanette shook her head stubbornly. "I... I haven't had enough to drink yet."

Theo's frown deepened. "You're already drunk. I'll have someone take you back."

leave, but suddenly Jeanette

"Don't go," she pleaded.

away, but her grip was surprisingly strong-he couldn't shake her

slipped from beneath the collar of Jeanette's

from her neck—a battered old locket-and demanded urgently,

eyes flashed with a sly, triumphant look,

mock confusion. "What are you talking about? This locket's a family keepsake.

you have it

course," Jeanette replied, giving him a

intricate pattern and the single deep scratch across its surface-a mark he remembered all too well. Memories rushed

he visited Havencrest with Talbot. Talbot had work to do, so Theo wandered off

was dazzling for a child, full of noise and color, and Theo-restless and mischievous at that age was drawn straight to the busiest

tourists. In the chaos, Theo didn't notice the group of shady men

alley when they jumped him,

fought as hard as he could, but they were stronger-he was

he was done for, a little girl charged out of nowhere, flinging a handful of cayenne pepper into the

men staggered back, blinded