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A Stolen Heirloom * A Deadly Codicil * An Identity Reclaimed
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SAN FRANCISCO, 2026
A handwritten request for services is delivered to Claire Duffey, senior designer at Duffey Design & Build. Sealed with wax and tucked inside a polished wood box, it is more suited to another century in another country. It comes from Lorenzo de Córdoba y Vega, who wishes to engage her help in preparing his home for the arrival of his family, scattered across Europe. In three months' time, they will gather to celebrate his ninety-second birthday.
Claire accepts. It's an easy job, simply cosmetic. But there is nothing simple about her new client. When they meet, she learns her firm wasn’t chosen for its five generations shaping San Francisco’s architectural landscape but because her great-grandfather had been instrumental in guiding the man to his fortune.
The revelation moves her, as does the man himself. His warmth and quiet dignity are undeniable, his eyes seeming to hold centuries ofwisdom... and pain. What she does not detect is his new sense of quiet hope—hope for the recovery of
a two-hundred-year-old family heirloom. She is unaware of the plan he's about to set in motion half a world away, and
cannot know that it will end in a shocking event, shattering all plans for any celebration.
