The Mafia Boss Was Dumped in Her Flower Shop—Then She Said, “You Still Have to Pay for the Roses”

By Friday night at 5:00 PM, the rain had returned to Chicago with a vengeance, turning the iron girders of the Elevated train tracks into dripping dark bridges over the streets.

The Grand Ballroom on Twenty-Second Street was an old limestone relic built during the late 1920s—a place of high ceilings, faded gilded mirrors, heavy velvet drapes, and thick dark walnut paneling that absorbed light like a sponge.

Maggie stood in the center of the main hall, surrounded by sixteen massive brass urns. Her hands were raw, her fingers stained deep green from crushed stem sap, and her dark hair was pinned back into a messy knot that was slowly unspooling near her neck.

She had been working since three in the morning.

The arrangements were spectacular. She had used deep burgundy dahlias, dark purple calla lilies, black baccara roses, weeping amaranthus, and trailing spires of dark blue delphinium. It was rich, solemn, quiet, and possessed a dramatic, imposing elegance that suited the cavernous room perfectly.

The heavy oak double doors at the front of the ballroom clicked open.

Vincent Moretti walked in.

He was wearing a black tuxedo today—no tie, his top shirt button undone, his black wool coat draped over his broad shoulders like a cape. Behind him walked three men in identical dark suits, their hands folded neatly across their waistlines, their eyes constantly moving across the high balconies of the room.

Vincent stopped in the center aisle. He looked at the brass urns, his eyes trailing up the long, dramatic arches of the dark red amaranthus down to the base of the table centerpieces.

He didn't say anything for nearly a minute.

Maggie wiped her forehead with the back of her wrist, holding a pair of heavy wire cutters in her right hand. "Well?" she asked, her voice dry. "Too solemn?"

Vincent walked slowly toward the head table. He reached out one long finger, touching the thick, velvety petal of a black baccara rose.

"It looks like a place where important decisions are made," Vincent said softly.

"That was the goal," Maggie said. "You said dark colors. I gave you dark colors."

"It's exceptional, Maggie," Vincent said.

It was the first time he had used her first name. It sounded strange in his heavy baritone voice—far too intimate for a ballroom full of empty tables and heavy oak paneling.

Maggie turned away slightly, picking up an empty plastic flower bucket to hide the sudden, strange warmth that flared in her cheeks. "The bill is on the head table. I included the emergency freight delivery charge from O'Hare."

"Daniel already paid it," Vincent said, gesturing toward one of the men in suits standing near the door. "With a thirty percent tip."

Maggie stopped. She looked at the man named Daniel, who gave her a short, respectful nod.

"Thirty percent is too much," Maggie said, turning back to Vincent. "My rates are already fair."

"I decide what my time and my peace of mind are worth," Vincent said calmly. He walked closer to her, his shadow falling across the wooden floor. "You worked fourteen hours today."

"Fifteen," Maggie corrected automatically.

Vincent reached into his coat, pulled out a clean white silk handkerchief, and held it out to her.

Maggie looked at it. "What's this for?"

"You have green sap on your cheek," Vincent said.

Maggie took the handkerchief. It was soft, expensive, and smelled of his clean sandalwood soap. She rubbed her cheek with it, looking down at the pale silk, which was now stained with a bright green streak of chlorophyll.

"Sorry," she muttered, holding the ruined handkerchief back out to him. "I ruined it."

"Keep it," Vincent said. He looked at her boots—waterproof rubber work boots covered in crushed stems and fallen leaves—and then looked up into her grey eyes. "Have you eaten today?"

Maggie blinked. "I had an apple at ten in the morning."

Vincent turned his head toward the front door. "Daniel."

"Yes, Boss?"

"Bring the car around to the side entrance," Vincent commanded smoothly. "Miss Sullivan is finished for the evening."

"Wait a second," Maggie said, holding up her wire cutters like a defensive weapon. "I have to load my van. I have twelve empty crates and three rolling racks in the alley."

"Daniel will load your van," Vincent said, without turning around. "And Sam will drive it back to your shop. You are coming with me."

Maggie’s eyes narrowed into sharp grey slits. "Mr. Moretti, I am an independent business owner, not one of your political associates. You don't order me into cars."

Vincent stopped. He turned back to look at her, his expression unreadable, his dark eyes fixing on her face with a heavy, quiet intensity that made the large room feel suddenly very small.

"I am offering you dinner, Miss Sullivan," Vincent said softly. "Because you look like you are about to collapse, because you made my mother's memorial service look magnificent, and because I suspect if I leave you here, you will try to carry those brass urns by yourself."

Maggie froze.

His mother’s memorial service.

She looked at the dark burgundy dahlias, the deep purple lilies, and the quiet, solemn beauty of the room. She looked at the broad shoulders of the man standing in front of her—a man who had lost his mother, been dumped by his fiancée in a flower shop, and spent his afternoon delivering red roses to an eighty-four-year-old woman in a nursing home.

Maggie lowered her wire cutters.

"Is there pasta?" she asked quietly.