Chapter 2 - The Pocket Square
Jennifer stared at Gabriel as though he had begun speaking another language.
“You cannot be serious.”
Gabriel did not blink.
Ava remained frozen beside the table, pulse hammering in her ears. Somewhere behind her, a fork slipped from someone’s fingers and struck porcelain. Nobody bent to retrieve it.
“I said apologize.”
Jennifer’s humiliation hardened into fury.
“To a waitress?”
Something changed in Gabriel’s expression.
Not anger.
Disappointment.
It somehow looked worse.
“A woman,” he corrected. “You’re apologizing to a woman.”
Jennifer laughed once, sharply. “She hit me.”
“After you hooked your heel around her ankle.”
Ava looked at him.
He had seen it.
Until that second, she had assumed no one had.
Jennifer had deliberately extended one jeweled shoe as Ava passed. Ava had stumbled, the wine tray tilting dangerously. She had managed to catch it, but a splash of Bordeaux landed across Gabriel’s jacket.
Jennifer had laughed.
Then she had taken Gabriel’s burgundy silk pocket square and tossed it onto the floor beside Ava.
“Clean it.”
Ava had bent to pick it up.
Jennifer had placed her heel over it.
When Ava reached again, Jennifer had whispered, “People like you should learn where they belong.”
Ava could have endured that.
She had endured worse.
Then Jennifer noticed the tiny silver pendant beneath Ava’s collar.
A cheap oval locket.
Her mother’s.
Jennifer had tugged it free with one finger and said, “Even your jewelry looks poor.”
The chain snapped.
Something inside Ava snapped with it.
Now the broken chain lay against her collarbone.
Gabriel looked at it.
Then at Jennifer.
“Apologize.”
Jennifer’s jaw tightened.
“I’m sorry,” she said through clenched teeth.
Ava almost laughed.
“That sounded painful.”
Several guests gasped.
Gabriel’s mouth twitched.
Jennifer noticed.
“You think this is funny?”
“No.”
But Gabriel was almost smiling.
That terrified the room more than anger would have.
Jennifer grabbed her clutch.
“My father will hear about this.”
“I’m sure he will.”
“And our engagement?”
Gabriel removed the ring from Jennifer’s hand before anyone fully understood he had moved.
She stared down at her bare finger.
Gabriel placed the diamond on the table.
“Our engagement,” he said, “just became considerably less useful.”
Jennifer went white.
“You’ll regret humiliating me.”
Gabriel’s gaze sharpened.
“You humiliated yourself.”
Jennifer stormed toward the entrance.
Nobody stopped her.
When the doors slammed behind her, conversation did not resume.
Gabriel turned toward Ava.
She squared her shoulders.
“If you’re going to fire me, Mr. Reed, Mr. Strauss can do it.”
Mr. Strauss made a strangled sound from across the room.
Gabriel glanced toward him.
“Were you planning to fire her?”
Strauss swallowed.
“No, sir.”
“You were.”
“No.”
“You’re sweating.”
“I run warm.”
Ava almost smiled despite herself.
Gabriel extended his hand.
“Pocket square.”
She looked down.
During the chaos she had apparently clenched the burgundy silk square in her fist.
She gave it back.
Their fingers touched.
Gabriel paused.
Ava pulled away first.
“Anything else?”
“Yes.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What?”
“Why did you recognize the embroidery?”
Ava stopped breathing.
There was a tiny black symbol stitched into one corner of the silk: a serpent wrapped around a key.
She had seen it before.
Not on Gabriel.
In her mother’s belongings.
Ava looked up slowly.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You stared at it before Jennifer tripped you.”
“I was serving wine.”
“You went pale.”
“I’m tired.”
“You whispered a name.”
Ava’s blood chilled.
Gabriel leaned slightly closer.
“Who is Daniel Reed?”
The restaurant disappeared around her.
Her mother had spoken that name only once.
Two nights before she died.
Ava had been twenty-three. Her mother, Mei Lo, had been fading in a hospital bed, weakened by cancer and medication. For hours she had drifted between sleep and confusion.
Then she had grabbed Ava’s wrist with startling strength.
“If anything happens to Dylan,” she whispered, “find Daniel Reed.”
Ava had assumed the drugs were talking.
Daniel Reed had been dead for seven years.
Gabriel’s father.
Ava looked toward the restaurant windows.
Rain streaked the glass.
“I need to get back to work.”
Gabriel caught neither her arm nor her wrist. He simply stepped into her path.
“My father died seven years ago.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Everyone knows.”
“No. Most people know Daniel Reed died. They don’t know enough to react to his crest.”
Ava looked at the embroidered serpent.
“My mother had one.”
For the first time that evening, Gabriel Reed lost his composure.
Only for a second.
But Ava saw it.
“Your mother’s name?”
“Mei Lo.”
Gabriel went completely still.
A chair scraped behind them.
One of Gabriel’s men moved closer.
Gabriel lifted one finger.
The man stopped.
“How do you know my mother?”
Gabriel’s eyes had gone distant.
“I don’t.”
“Then why do you look like that?”
“Because three days before my father died, he transferred two million dollars to an account belonging to a woman named Mei Lo.”
Ava stared at him.
“That’s impossible.”
“I spent seven years trying to discover why.”
“My mother died owing the hospital forty-eight thousand dollars.”
“Then someone took the money.”
Ava felt suddenly unsteady.
Gabriel noticed.
He pulled out a chair.
“I don’t need to sit.”
“That wasn’t a request.”
“See, that attitude is probably why people dislike you.”
His eyebrow lifted.
“You slapped my fiancée ten minutes ago.”
“Former fiancée.”
The corner of his mouth moved again.
Then Ava saw Mr. Strauss approaching, looking sick.
“Ava,” he whispered. “There are two detectives outside asking for you.”
Her stomach dropped.
Jennifer.
Of course.
Assault charges.
Gabriel looked toward the entrance.
But the men entering were not uniformed police officers.
They wore dark coats.
One flashed a badge too quickly.
Gabriel’s face changed.
His hand closed around Ava’s elbow.
“Behind me.”
“What?”
“Now.”
The nearest stranger reached inside his coat.
Gabriel overturned the table.
Glass exploded across the floor.
Guests screamed.
His security men surged forward as Gabriel dragged Ava behind a marble column.
A gunshot cracked through the restaurant.
Then another.
Chandeliers trembled.
Ava crouched against Gabriel as chaos erupted.
“Those aren’t detectives,” she whispered.
“No.”
“Are they here for you?”
Gabriel looked at her.
Another bullet shattered a wineglass above them.
“No, Ava.”
May you like
His expression had become terrifyingly calm.
“They looked directly at you.”
