Chapter 1 - THE NAME THAT STOPPED THREE BROTHERS COLD
“My mother’s name was Nora Carter.”
The kitchen changed.
Not physically.
The bacon still hissed inside the cast-iron skillet. Steam still curled above the potatoes. The biscuits still browned behind the oven glass.
But Roman, Declan, and Gabriel stopped breathing.
I knew immediately that I had said something important.
Roman recovered first.
“Carter?”
“Yes.”
“Nora Carter?”
I lowered the spatula.
“That’s what I said.”
Declan stepped into the kitchen.
The blood was gone from his knuckles now, but the bruises remained.
“What did she look like?”
I stared at him.
“That’s a strange question.”
“Maeve.”
Roman’s voice was different.
Not commanding.
Urgent.
I crossed my arms.
“Brown hair. Green eyes. Five-six. Terrible singer. Great cook.”
Gabriel looked away.
Declan whispered something under his breath.
Roman moved toward the stove.
“How did she make the potatoes?”
“With butter.”
“What else?”
“Salt.”
“Maeve.”
I sighed.
“She boiled them first. Roughened the edges in the pot. Fried them with bacon grease and butter. Why?”
Roman’s face had gone pale.
Our mother made them that way.
The thought did not belong to me.
It belonged to him.
I could see it.
“You knew my mom?”
Nobody answered.
I turned off the stove.
“Okay. I’m done cooking until one of you starts explaining.”
Gabriel gave a humorless laugh.
“You really don’t scare easily.”
“I scare constantly. I’m just busy.”
Declan stared at me.
“When did Nora die?”
My throat tightened.
“Six years ago.”
“How?”
“Car accident.”
All three brothers looked at one another.
That frightened me more than anything else.
Roman pulled out a chair.
“Sit down.”
“No.”
“Maeve.”
“I’ve learned that when rich men tell poor women to sit down, something expensive and terrible usually follows.”
Gabriel almost smiled.
Roman didn’t.
“Your mother did not die in an accident.”
My hand went cold around the spatula.
“What?”
Declan stepped closer.
“She worked here.”
I laughed once.
“No. My mother was a hotel cook.”
Roman opened a drawer beside the pantry.
He removed an old photograph.
Four people stood in front of Falcone Manor.
Three teenage boys.
And a woman holding a tray of biscuits.
My mother.
I stared at her face.
The room tilted.
“That’s impossible.”
Roman said quietly:
“She was our mother’s closest friend.”
May you like
Then Gabriel added:
“And the last person to see our mother alive.”
