Chapter 2 - The Price of a FavorBy late afternoon, the panic had settled into a humming, hyper-aware paranoia. Every time the front door chimed, Harper jumped, half expecting Damian’s heavy-set enforcer to walk back in with a demand she couldn't refuse.
Instead, the bell rang at 4:15 p.m., and a terrified-looking delivery driver pushed a massive, rolling rack of imported Dutch orchids inside.
"Delivery for Bennett Blooms," the kid stammered, practically throwing the clipboard at Maya to sign and bolting out the door before anyone could ask questions.
Maya approached the rack slowly, her mouth hanging open. There must have been fifty pots of deep purple, rare orchids—each one easily worth a hundred dollars at wholesale. Tucked into the center arrangement was a small black envelope sealed with a drop of black wax bearing the exact same serpent crest from the lighter.
"Open it," Maya breathed, her eyes darting toward the street outside as if expecting black sedans to descend from the sky. "Harper, I swear to God, if you brought a mob war into my place of employment, I am quitting and moving to Vermont."
Harper carefully picked up the envelope, slit open the wax seal with her thumb, and pulled out a heavy card stock note.
Written in clean, sharp, precise fountain-pen ink were two sentences:
Your shop lease is held by Vanguard Holdings. Vanguard Holdings belongs to me. Consider your rent paid for the next ten years.
— D.
Harper dropped the card onto the counter as if it had burned her fingers.
"What does it say?" Maya asked, leaning over.
"He... he paid my rent," Harper whispered, her chest tightening. "Ten years of it. Do you know how much this building costs? The mortgage alone was eating half my revenue every month."
"Ten years?!" Maya snatched the card, her jaw dropping. "Harper, that’s hundreds of thousands of dollars! Men like Damian Vale don't just hand out real estate portfolios because someone gave them a friendly smooch in an alleyway! This is leverage. This is an anchor wrapped around your ankle!"
"I know that!" Harper snapped, pacing behind the counter, her hands tangled in her hair. "What am I supposed to do? Walk down to his office, slam a check down, and tell him I don't want his charity? Do you have any idea where his office even is?"
"Nobody knows where his office is!" Maya cried. "Some people say it's the top floor of the Vale Maritime Tower. Others say he doesn't have an office, he just moves through the city like a ghost. Harper, you need to return those orchids. Right now. Call a truck, load them up, and get them out of here before the police—or worse, his guys—think you're taking tribute!"
Harper stared at the sea of deep purple blossoms. They were breathtaking. They were also a very clear, unmistakable message: You belong to me now.
Before she could formulate a plan, the lights in the flower shop flickered.
Once. Twice.
Then the overhead fluorescent bulbs died completely, plunging the front of the shop into shadow, save for the warm amber glow of the streetlamps filtering through the glass.
The bell chimed.
No footsteps followed. Just a heavy, suffocating silence that rolled through the doorway like an incoming tide.
May you like
From the shadows of the vestibule, a tall silhouette emerged. The broad shoulders, the charcoal coat, the silver hair at the temples catching the street light.
Damian Vale had come to collect.
