Chapter 1 - THE NAME MY FATHER DIDN'T WANT ME TO HEAR
Leo Rossi did not release Maeve’s hand.
He examined the thin cut across her palm, then looked toward the banquet manager.
“First-aid kit.”
The manager moved instantly.
Caroline stared as if the laws of gravity had become negotiable.
Maeve pulled gently against Leo’s grip.
“I’m fine.”
“No.”
His voice was quiet.
“You’re bleeding.”
“It’s a scratch.”
“You always minimize injuries?”
Maeve looked at him.
“Only when strangers start issuing orders.”
Something almost like amusement moved across his face.
Behind them, Richard Sullivan approached.
“Mr. Rossi, there’s no need to involve yourself.”
Leo finally looked at Maeve’s father.
“That’s an interesting sentence.”
Richard stopped.
Maeve noticed it then.
Not respect.
Fear.
Real fear.
Her father had spent her entire life speaking to waiters, drivers, vendors, and employees as though everyone existed half a step below him.
But with Leo Rossi, his shoulders had changed.
His voice had changed.
Even his hands looked uncertain.
Leo turned back to Maeve.
“I need ten minutes.”
“For what?”
“To show you something.”
“No.”
Caroline laughed.
“Maeve, don’t be ridiculous. Mr. Rossi is trying to help you for some reason.”
Leo looked at Caroline.
The laugh died.
Then he said:
“I was not speaking to you.”
Caroline’s face flushed.
Maeve should have enjoyed that more than she did.
Instead, she looked at her father.
“What does he know?”
Richard answered too quickly.
“Nothing that concerns you.”
Leo’s expression hardened.
Maeve felt the old instinct rise.
Avoid conflict.
Let Dad handle it.
Go home.
Fix payroll tomorrow.
Pretend nothing happened.
Then she remembered Caroline’s words.
Nobody wants you.
And her father turning away.
Maeve looked at Leo.
“Ten minutes.”
Richard stepped forward.
“Maeve.”
She turned.
For once, she did not hear concern in his voice.
Only panic.
That decided it.
Leo led her—not by force, but by waiting until she followed—to a private reading room off the ballroom.
His security chief remained outside.
Leo placed a sealed envelope on a mahogany desk.
“Do you recognize this?”
Maeve stared.
Her mother’s handwriting.
ELIZABETH SULLIVAN.
She had not seen it in eleven years.
Her mother died when Maeve was nineteen.
Cancer.
Fast.
Brutal.
“What is this?”
“Something your mother gave mine.”
Maeve looked up.
“You knew my mother?”
“My mother did.”
“Why?”
Leo sat across from her.
“Because Elizabeth Sullivan owned thirty-five percent of Sullivan Floral Distribution.”
Maeve laughed once.
“That’s impossible.”
“My father owns the company.”
“No.”
Leo pushed over a corporate filing.
Elizabeth Sullivan.
Thirty-five percent.
Richard Sullivan.
Thirty-five percent.
Rossi Commercial Holdings.
Thirty percent.
Maeve stopped breathing.
“The Rossis own part of our company?”
“We did.”
“Did?”
“My mother transferred our interest eleven years ago.”
“To who?”
Leo looked directly at her.
“You.”
Maeve stared at him.
“No.”
“Yes.”
Richard had told her she owned nothing.
That she was lucky to have a job.
That Caroline would inherit the company because she “understood people.”
Maeve’s hands began shaking.
Leo continued.
“Your mother instructed my family not to disclose the transfer until one of two conditions occurred.”
“What conditions?”
“You turned thirty.”
Maeve was twenty-nine.
“Or?”
Leo’s eyes shifted toward the ballroom doors.
“Richard tried to sell the company without your consent.”
Maeve felt cold.
“He’s selling?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
May you like
“Tonight.”
And suddenly she understood why her father was terrified Leo had walked directly to her.
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