November 1911, Evelyn Walsh Mlan stands alone in the drawing room of her Washington mansion. A velvet box open in her hands. Inside lies the Hope diamond, 45 karat of blue stone with a documented trail of dead owners. The jeweler had warned her. Her friends had warned her. She fastens it around her neck…
On February 18th, 1922, St. Margaret’s Westminster, filled with 2,000 guests who had come to witness what the newspapers called the wedding of the year. Edwina Ashley, 20 years old, descended from her grandfather’s fortune, walked toward Louis Mountbatton, a naval officer descended from European royalty, but carrying almost nothing else. The ceremony cost what…
He can’t even stand anymore. Take the baby and leave him. Those words cut through the hospital hallway like a knife the night Daniel Cross lost everything. Once a powerful millionaire, Daniel now lay paralyzed from the waist down. After a brutal accident, his fortune stolen while he was unconscious, his mansion seized his name,…
Vienna, March 1854. A 16-year-old girl stands in the Augustina Kersha wearing a silver brocade gown that weighs more than any dress she has ever worn. Empress Elizabeth of Austria, married less than an hour, kneels beside her husband during the wedding mass while his mother, Arch Duchess Sophie, watches from the front pew. The…
In the autumn of 1866, a young woman stood on the deck of a ship bound for Europe, leaving behind the crumbling empire she had tried to save. She was 26 years old. She wore black. Her husband, the emperor, remained in Mexico, surrounded by forces that would soon execute him. She did not know…
Washington, February 1906. The East Room of the White House fills with 800 guests for what newspapers will call the social event of the decade. Alice Roosevelt, 22 years old, descends the staircase in a gown that cost more than most American families earn in 5 years. Photographers crowd the doorway. Her father, the president,…
By the middle of the 1970s, the Chicago outfit was pulling millions of dollars a year out of Las Vegas casinos, and almost nobody in law enforcement knew how. The money never appeared on any ledger. It never crossed a bank counter. It moved in paper bags and briefcases from the Nevada desert to the…
Allan had not spoken since surviving the fire, and by the time his parents brought him to that shelter, they were not expecting a miracle anymore. Then he walked past every happy, friendly dog in the building and stopped at the one nobody wanted. A starving Australian Shepherd so shut down she would not even…
Chicago 1960. While Al Capone rotted in prison from syphilis while Tony Aardo hid in his mansion while Sam Gianana faced congressional hearings on national television, Murray Humphre walked out of federal court a free man. Again, the cameras did not chase him. The reporters did not know his name. And that is exactly how…
Wendy had no idea the most violent kitten in that shelter was about to choose her back. Luna was a rare abbisoncinian, the kind of cat people usually pay thousands for. But inside that shelter, she was known for something else. >> It’s all right, sweetheart. Sorry. Oh, [clears throat] sorry. I’ll give you some…
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