Chapter 1 - The Breakfast That Made Roman Stand Still
At 7:08 a.m., Roman Falcone walked into the kitchen and stopped.
Declan nearly ran into his back.
Gabriel, still buttoning a black shirt, leaned around both of them and went silent too.
Maeve stood at the stove with her hair twisted into a messy knot, one sleeve rolled higher than the other, and flour streaked across her cheek. She had no idea the three most feared men in the house were watching her.
She was too busy rescuing biscuits.
“Don’t open the oven,” she muttered to herself. “Not yet.”
Roman smelled bacon first.
Then butter.
Then black pepper and browned potatoes.
But beneath all of it was something impossible.
Rosemary.
Not much.
Just enough crushed between the fingers and folded into the potatoes at the end.
His mother had done that.
Nobody else.
Not the chefs his father hired after she died.
Not the women who had spent years trying to reproduce her food from memory.
Roman had not smelled that exact breakfast since he was fourteen.
Maeve turned and nearly dropped the skillet.
“You people walk like ghosts.”
Declan looked at the table.
“You cooked?”
“The emergency chef didn’t show.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
Maeve put the skillet down.
“Yes, Declan. The eggs arranged themselves.”
Gabriel stared at the biscuits.
“Are those…”
“Biscuits.”
“I know what biscuits are.”
“Congratulations.”
Roman walked to the table.
Maeve noticed something different in his face.
Not anger.
Not another test.
Something almost frightened.
She set a plate in front of him.
Crisp potatoes.
Two eggs.
Bacon.
A biscuit split with butter.
“Eat before it gets cold.”
Roman picked up the biscuit.
Maeve returned to the stove.
He broke it open.
Steam rose.
He tasted one bite.
His fingers stopped.
Declan saw it.
“What?”
Roman looked at Maeve.
“Who taught you to make these?”
She frowned.
“My mother.”
“What was her name?”
Maeve’s shoulders stiffened.
“Why?”
Roman’s voice became quieter.
“Because my mother made biscuits exactly like this.”
“Lots of people make biscuits.”
“Not like this.”
He turned the half-biscuit in his hand.
“Bacon fat brushed over the tops after baking. Black pepper in the dough. Two folds, never three.”
Maeve stared.
Her mother had said the exact same thing.
Three folds makes them proud. Two keeps them honest.
She had heard that sentence since childhood.
“What was your mother’s name?” Roman asked again.
Maeve wiped her hands on a towel.
“Kathleen Donnelly.”
Declan dropped his fork.
Gabriel’s face emptied.
Roman stood.
Maeve stepped back instinctively.
“What?”
Declan looked at Roman.
“No.”
Gabriel whispered, “That’s not possible.”
Maeve’s heartbeat quickened.
“What isn’t possible?”
Roman walked toward the far pantry.
He opened a narrow cabinet above the flour bins.
Inside, behind expensive olive oil nobody used, sat an old tin biscuit box.
Maeve stared at it.
The paint had faded.
Blue flowers.
A dent in one corner.
Her mother had owned one exactly like it.
Roman brought it to the island.
He opened the lid.
Inside lay three photographs.
The first showed three identical boys around nine years old, covered in flour.
The second showed a beautiful dark-haired woman laughing beside a kitchen table.
The third made Maeve stop breathing.
Her mother.
Younger.
Smiling.
Standing beside the woman.
Kathleen Donnelly had one arm around Sofia Falcone’s waist.
Sofia held a tray of biscuits.
On the back, in blue ink:
KATHLEEN SAYS THREE FOLDS MAKES THEM PROUD. TWO KEEPS THEM HONEST.
Maeve sat down because her knees stopped working.
“My mother never told me she worked here.”
Roman looked at the photograph.
“She didn’t work here.”
Maeve looked up.
“What?”
“My mother called her family.”
Declan pushed away from the table.
Gabriel stared at the floor.
Roman’s voice changed.
“When our mother died, your mother disappeared the same night.”
Maeve went cold.
“She didn’t disappear.”
Roman looked at her.
“She came home to us.”
All three brothers looked at Maeve.
She swallowed.
“She raised me and my sister for seven more years.”
Roman’s face lost color.
“That’s impossible.”
“No.”
Maeve stared at him.
“She died in a car accident when I was seventeen.”
Silence.
Then Gabriel asked the question nobody wanted.
“What did she tell you about this house?”
“Nothing.”
“About Sofia?”
“Nothing.”
“About us?”
“Nothing.”
Maeve’s anger rose.
“Why are you asking me like my mother committed a crime?”
Roman closed his eyes briefly.
When he opened them, he said, “Because for fourteen years, we were told Kathleen Donnelly poisoned our mother.”
Maeve stood so fast the chair scraped backward.
“No.”
Declan looked away.
“That’s what our father believed.”
“My mother would never—”
“I know what we were told.”
Roman did not raise his voice.
That made it worse.
Maeve’s hands shook.
“My mother spent the last years of her life working two jobs and taking care of two girls. She died owing money on a twelve-year-old Honda.”
Gabriel’s eyes narrowed.
“Owing money?”
“Yes.”
“What about the Falcone trust?”
Maeve froze.
“What trust?”
Now it was the brothers’ turn to go silent.
Roman looked at Gabriel.
Gabriel looked suddenly sick.
Maeve stepped closer.
“What trust?”
Roman answered.
“My mother created a medical and education trust for Kathleen’s family.”
Maeve laughed once.
A broken sound.
“My sister owes twelve thousand dollars for dialysis.”
No one moved.
Roman looked toward the photograph.
Then at Maeve’s worn boots.
Then at the cracked skin around her hands.
Something cold entered his face.
Not toward her.
Toward someone else.
“Gabriel.”
“I’m already checking.”
Gabriel took out his phone.
Maeve said, “Check what?”
Roman turned the photograph over again.
“At some point, someone decided Kathleen Donnelly was our mother’s murderer.”
His eyes met Maeve’s.
“And at some point, someone made sure the woman Sofia Falcone loved like a sister disappeared from our family records.”
Maeve looked at the breakfast table.
Forty-eight hours.
That was all the staffing agency thought she would survive.
She had survived because she needed a paycheck.
Now one plate of eggs, bacon, and biscuits had opened a door her mother had kept closed for half Maeve’s life.
Roman picked up the photograph.
“Breakfast is over.”
Maeve stared.
“Why?”
May you like
His voice dropped.
“Because we’re going to find out who stole your mother’s name.”
