Chapter 1 - THE PRICE OF SILENCE
Maeve’s fingers tightened around the basket of folded linens.
Margaret Ashford stopped directly in front of her.
“Your brother is scheduled for surgery in six weeks, isn’t he?”
Maeve’s face lost its color.
“You leave Finn out of this.”
Margaret’s smile barely moved.
“I am trying to help Finn.”
Sienna folded her arms across her chest.
“Mother, what exactly are you suggesting?”
Margaret looked from her daughter to the frightened housekeeper.
“I am suggesting that Elias Marchetti does not need to know immediately that Sienna has reconsidered.”
Maeve stared at her.
“That makes no sense.”
“It will.”
Margaret took the linen basket from Maeve’s hands and placed it on the kitchen island.
“The Marchetti family has spent months keeping the engagement private enough that most photographs of Sienna are from a distance.”
Sienna’s eyes narrowed.
“You cannot possibly be serious.”
“You have worn wigs for charity galas before.”
“That is not the same thing as becoming another person.”
Margaret ignored her.
She turned toward Maeve.
“You are approximately Sienna’s height.”
“No.”
“You have similar coloring.”
“No.”
“You are young enough to pass for her in a household where the groom has spent only limited time with his fiancée because of security.”
Maeve backed away.
“I said no.”
Margaret’s expression hardened.
“Finn’s surgery deposit is seventy-eight thousand dollars.”
Maeve stopped moving.
Her younger brother had been born with a heart condition that had worsened during the previous year.
Insurance had covered part of the procedure.
Not enough.
Maeve had taken double shifts, sold their mother’s jewelry, and borrowed against three years of wages.
She was still short.
Margaret knew every number.
Of course she did.
Margaret Ashford knew the price of every vulnerable person in her house.
“I can pay the hospital tomorrow,” Margaret said.
Maeve’s throat tightened.
“And if I refuse?”
Margaret gave her a calm look.
“You may continue trying to raise the money yourself.”
Sienna finally stepped closer.
“This is insane.”
“You asked me to find a way out.”
“I meant postpone the wedding.”
“And explain what?”
Margaret snapped.
“That you loved Elias when he could stand but stopped loving him when he could not?”
Sienna looked away.
Margaret lowered her voice.
“You think his family will accept humiliation?”
Sienna said nothing.
“You think men like Elias Marchetti simply forgive people who publicly abandon them after an assassination attempt?”
Maeve’s stomach twisted.
She had heard enough about Elias to know Margaret’s fear was not entirely imagined.
Margaret leaned toward her.
“You marry him under Sienna’s name.”
Maeve stared at her in disbelief.
“You remain until we arrange a respectable separation.”
“How long?”
“Three months.”
Maeve laughed once.
It came out broken.
“You want me to marry the most dangerous man in Chicago and lie to his face for three months?”
“You will have your own room.”
Sienna spoke quickly.
“You won’t have to be a real wife.”
Maeve looked at her.
“You don’t know that.”
For the first time, Sienna looked uncomfortable.
Margaret stepped between them.
“Finn lives.”
The kitchen went silent.
Maeve closed her eyes.
She could see her brother at eighteen.
Too thin.
Too proud.
Pretending he was not afraid.
Telling her he could wait another year.
The cardiologist had said he could not.
Maeve opened her eyes again.
“If I do this, you pay the hospital directly.”
“Yes.”
“And his rehabilitation.”
“Yes.”
“And you never threaten him again.”
Margaret smiled.
“Agreed.”
Maeve looked toward Sienna.
The woman whose dresses she had steamed.
Whose shoes she had polished.
Whose secrets she had carried quietly through seven years of service.
Sienna could not meet her eyes.
Maeve whispered, “What happens when Elias discovers the truth?”
Margaret picked up her wineglass.
“He won’t.”
Maeve looked at the enormous Ashford kitchen.
At the marble.
At the silver fixtures.
At all the things money could buy.
Then she thought about Finn.
“All right.”
Sienna exhaled.
Margaret lifted her glass.
May you like
And somewhere across the city, Elias Marchetti turned the black onyx ring around his little finger and waited to discover whether the woman he intended to marry would come back.
He had no idea that when she did, she would have completely different eyes.
