The Billionaire's Pretend Wife (Isabella)
Chapter 49 Forty Nine

Isabelle shut the refrigerator door and turned to Jacob, a confused look on her face. Lifting her hand, she gave a look at the ring on her finger, and then looked at Jacob's stoic face. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

She understood that the ring looked a bit different after she had it cleaned and polished, but did it look so different that he wouldn't be able to recognise it? She was about to tell him about the maintenance service when he reached for her hand.

Jacob took her hand in his and took off the ring from her finger. Turning the band of the ring, he showed her the inside of the metallic surface. "The ring I gave you had my mother's initials," he told her, pinning her with a glare. "This one has none."

Isabelle frowned and took a look. It was true, there was no engraving on the inside of the ring.

"The ring I gave you has been in my mother's family for ages," he told her. "It's an antique, and this one is obviously a counterfeit. I could tell with just a single look."

Isabelle worried her bottom lip with her teeth as her heart sank. If what he was saying was true, then it meant that the pawnshop owner had exchanged her real ring with a fake one. Had she known that the ring Jacob gave her had an engraving, she would have checked it before leaving the shop. But, other than expressing her desire for the ring, the owner had sounded sincere when offering to carry out the maintenance service.

Isabelle felt like slapping herself for her naiveness. Of course the owner had sounded nice and concerned when offering to clean the ring. It was the only way to get rid of Isabelle's fear about giving her the ring. During the time Isabelle thought she was servicing the ring, she must have been busy looking for the fake replacement.

While Isabelle made sense of things in her mind, Jacob took her silence to mean guilt. If she had nothing to say for herself, that meant that she really hadn't expected him to notice that she had exchanged the ring. And now that he had, she was struck speechless. Maybe it had been a good thing that he hadn't pointed out the ring's history when he had given it to her. She probably would have faked the initials to deceive him further.

"Did you think that if you sold the real one and replaced it with a fake, I wouldn't realise?" Jacob demanded, his eyes glaring at her. His jaw ticked as he grind his teeth together, angered. Now, he felt stupid for giving her the ring in the first place.

She wasn't even his real wife, but he had given her the ring that had belonged to his late mother. The only woman who should wear that ring was one he loved and wanted to spend his life with. Definitely not someone who saw the ring and started thinking about how much money it could get her.

If it were not for him feeling jealous about other men hitting on her...

"Of course not," Isabelle replied, feeling wronged that he would think she would do that. "Are you accusing me of exchanging your mother's valuables for money?"

Had the ring been hers from the beginning, Isabelle wouldn't have thought twice about exchanging it for money to pay off Ruth's bill. But even knowing how much it was worth, she had refrained from doing so because she had known it would be wrong to sell it after he gave it to her as a gift. It hurt that he didn't bother asking her explanation before accusing her of exchanging it for money. Did he think she was that kind of person?

Or did she look that desperate to him? It was true that she was badly in need of money, but that didn't mean she would sacrifice her values for it.

Jacob stared at her, the anger in his eyes not abating.

What did she want him to think? He had given her his mother's ring the day before, and today, she was wearing a fake one. Who else could have exchanged it, if not her? If one thing was clear, it was that she was short on money. She had told him as much, and that fight with her sister at the restaurant had hinted at more money problems than she was willing to admit.

Before they got married, he had received information that the Cruzes' first daughter enjoyed a luxurious lifestyle. It was the reason why he had posed as a poor man, hoping to displease her so that she would ask to cancel the marriage when she saw that he couldn't support her lifestyle. So far, she had been proving his informant wrong, but...

What if she was finally showing her true colours? From the fight with her sister, he guessed that her parents must owe her a lot of money. They must also have cut her off. For someone used to living a life of luxury, she would eventually resort to whatever means to get money.

The longer Jacob stared at her and refused to answer her question, the more Isabelle's heart ached. She hadn't thought that him not trusting her would mean so much to her. They had been getting along pretty well recently, and she had foolishly thought that they were getting to know each other. But no, it appeared he still held onto his preconceived ideas about her personality. His silence meant that yes, he thought her capable of exchanging the ring and trying to deceive him about it.

It was ridiculous that she had actually thought that he would give her the benefit of doubt and let her explain.

"Just so you know," she said, steeling her resolve as she gazed back into his eyes, "I would rather beg than sell an heriloom from your mother."

Instead of deceiving him any further than she already was, she would rather go back to her adoptive parents' house to cause trouble if need be and demand for money. But he didn't know that, did he? Hell, she would wash Naomi's car as she had offered that one time if it was what it took to make them give her the money they owed her.

"You didn't know it was from my mother," he countered, his eyes narrowing. "You also didn't know it had the initials. Maybe that's why you thought it would be easy to trick me, right?"

She grind her teeth together and refused to let it show how much his accusation tore through her. He had made it clear that he didn't trust her a bit, and he clearly didn't have a problem calling her a thief. "I'll replace the ring and give it back to you," she told him, her hands folding into fists at her side. She regretted ever trusting that pawnshop owner. She should have checked the surveillance tape before leaving. But it was no matter. She would go back and claim her ring back. And then she would give it back to Jacob, and make a note of telling him to never give her anything of value again if he didn't trust her at all. "And if I can't get it back," she told him, "I'll be sure to compensate you."

She had no idea how she was going to compensate such an expensive ring, but she would worry about that if it came to it. For now, she needed to get back to the pawnshop and demand the ring back. Walking past Jacob, she made a beeline for the front door, determined to set things straight right away.