"Please don't feel bad about my job, Mr. Vance," Isabella whispered as the security guards dumped me unceremoniously onto the freezing wet concrete beneath the hotel’s side awning on 58th Street, right next to the overflowing recycling bins.
The October wind whipped cold rain beneath the canvas canopy, soaking through my already damp tuxedo shirt. Isabella didn't run for the subway even though she was only wearing a thin black blouse with a torn collar. Instead, she unzipped her faded canvas backpack, pulled out an oversized gray wool cardigan that smelled faintly of lavender detergent, and draped it over my shivering shoulders.
"You lost your paycheck because of me," I said, looking up at her under the flickering yellow streetlamp. "And that manager stole two hundred and fifty dollars out of your check for a glass my ex-fiancée smashed."
Isabella forced a brave smile, though her lower lip quivered. "Marcus was looking for an excuse to fire me anyway because I refused to falsify the overtime logs for his kitchen staff last week. The only reason it hurts tonight is because my little brother, Leo, has Type 1 diabetes, and his insulin pump co-pay went up to three hundred and eighty dollars at CVS this month because our insurance switched tiers. But I’ll pick up a double shift at my aunt’s diner in Astoria tomorrow. I’ll figure it out. I always do."
I memorized every single word she said—Marcus falsifying overtime logs, Astoria, little brother Leo, CVS co-pay.
Before I could ask for her last name and phone number, the heavy brass revolving doors of the main VIP entrance twenty yards away spun open, spilling golden light and loud laughter onto the sidewalk.
Brooke walked out first, flanked by Chad and her mother, Evelyn—a woman who had spent the last three years living rent-free in a luxury condo I owned in Boca Raton while complaining that the HOA didn't heat the saltwater pool to eighty-four degrees. Evelyn was wrapped in a floor-length Russian sable fur coat that looked sickeningly familiar. It had belonged to my late mother, Eleanor Vance, and had been stored in a climate-controlled vault at Madame Paulette’s on Second Avenue.
"Oh, look, Brooke, the charity case is still waiting for the Access-A-Ride van!" Evelyn cackled, adjusting the fur collar around her Botox-frozen neck as she spotted me by the service curb. "Ethan, darling, I hope you don't mind that Brooke signed the release slip at the furrier last Tuesday. Honestly, what’s a man in a wheelchair going to do with vintage sable? Besides, your mother was five-foot-four—it looks much more regal on someone with actual posture."
My jaw clenched so hard I tasted blood on the inside of my cheek. "That coat was bequeathed to my future daughter in my mother’s probated will, Evelyn. Removing it from Madame Paulette’s without the executor’s signature is grand larceny."
Chad strolled over to the valet stand, flipping a twenty-dollar bill at the attendant as the roaring flat-six engine of a 2024 Porsche 911 GT3 Touring echoed up the ramp from the underground garage. It was my car—custom Paint-to-Sample British Racing Green with cognac leather seats, ordered eighteen months ago and paid for in full via wire transfer from my personal checking account.
Except as the valet pulled it up to the curb, I saw the new New York vanity license plate bolted to the rear bumper: STERLNG1.
"Grand larceny is a big word for a guy who can't afford a ten-dollar Uber back to his nursing home," Chad laughed, popping the driver’s door open for Brooke while the rain pelted my face. "By the way, Ethan, since you’re so worried about your mom’s estate, you should probably know that Brooke and I closed on the Greenwich lake house this afternoon. We’re bulldozing that hideous 1920s cottage on Wednesday morning to put in a six-car subterranean garage and a pickleball court."
Brooke paused with one Louboutin heel inside my Porsche, looking back at me with dead, icy eyes. "Oh, and Ethan? Don't bother calling Arthur Pendelton to file an injunction on Monday. We already know why your old lawyer hasn't returned your calls since Tuesday—because Chad’s people visited his office on Lexington Avenue, and Arthur isn't going to be practicing law anymore."
