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“You’re such a buzzkill,” he teased on the way in. “Let me have my fun.” He pulled out a chair at the six-seater table in the center of the room and sat down. “All right, let’s hear this plan of yours, and we’ll see what kind of help I can offer.”

I grabbed my lunch out of my locker and dropped down into a seat across from him. “It’s been hard to come up with much of a plan when Emerson won’t tell us what’s going on, but I know money is tight. So, I figured if we could do a fundraiser, maybe a dinner or a gala or something, sold tickets and invited some big names, asked for donations, maybe we could at least buy Emerson some more time.”

Sawyer’s smile dimmed, and he shook his head. “Money is not the only problem, and I’m afraid we might already be out of time.”

“I refuse to believe that,” I growled. “Talk about a buzzkill. If your suggestion is that it’s too late to try, then you can fuck right off right now.”

“No, no!” He held his palms up in surrender. “It’s worth trying. I’m just warning you that it might not do any good. Prepare yourself for the worst because… Eva Ward is connected with the mafia.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, I’d already guessed as much.”

“Oh.” He frowned. “And you still want to go ahead with this? It could be dangerous.”

“If the alternative is having her force Emerson into marriage, then it’s worth the risk.” I placed my palm over my abdomen. My baby—Emerson’s baby—needed me to be brave.

He focused his steady gaze on me, and I wondered what he saw. Finally, he nodded slowly. “Okay. Then we’ll need to move fast. Think we can get this organized by next weekend?”

“Well, we already have the venue and food taken care of, obviously.” I gestured to the hotel, which came fully prepared to handle any event. “Patrick—from housekeeping? Anyway, he’s also an author on the side, and he happens to know Jordan Kepler.”

“Like, the bestselling romance author?” Sawyer seemed impressed.

“Yeah, and Gerald, the night doorman, he says can get Max Shepherd here too. Yes, the actor,” I answered before Sawyer could ask.

Sawyer leaned back in his chair, his gaze distant. “Well, damn, Roland. You’re more prepared than I thought you would be.” He shook his head and chuckled. “I told myself I wouldn’t get my hopes up, but… what if we actually manage to raise enough money? What if we can save the hotel?”

It wasn’t the hotel I was worried about. What if I could save Emerson? Our baby needed me to try.

16

Emerson

I had always been a straightforward kind of guy. What you see is what you get. But now I found myself forced to be sneaky. Like, full-on tiptoeing down hallways and eavesdropping on private conversations. It didn’t come naturally to me, and it honestly made me feel kind of… icky, but I saw no other way around it. My staff were keeping secrets from me, and there was a very good chance it could put their lives in danger. I wanted to believe that their sense of self-preservation would kick in, but they didn’t seem to care at all. They were like lemmings leaping headfirst over a cliff.

What was going on around here?! I had lost all control of the hotel and my employees, and I did not enjoy this feeling of helplessness. Couldn’t they see I was trying to help them? They needed to let me handle things!

I never would’ve guessed how hard it was to look inconspicuous, while also trying to walk lightly and sidle up to doorways without being seen. There was nothing discreet about what I was doing. I was just inching toward the staff room, where I could hear the murmur of voices, when the door unexpectedly swung inward, and Benny stepped out.

We both froze, locked in a standoff. I was just about to come up with some lame-ass excuse for why I was creeping around when he blurted, “I was going to get a haircut this weekend, I swear. I’ve just been… really busy.” His bangs were long enough to hang past his eyebrows, which normally would’ve irritated the hell out of me, but I hadn’t even noticed.

“Uh, yes. Be sure that you do,” I told him as sternly as I could manage while sweat slicked my palms, adrenaline leaving my skin prickly. I gave him a sharp nod of dismissal, and he scurried off toward the kitchen where his serving shift was about to start.

I sagged against the wall, blowing out a sigh. I wasn’t cut out for this spying crap.

I was about to give up and find some real work to do, when I caught a tendril of conversation. “I don’t know why Roland thinks this is going to work.” It sounded like Joseph, a serious alpha who worked in room service.

A melodic voice I recognized as Delia replied, “Are you kidding? Even if it didn’t appeal to people’s conscience about saving a piece of our city’s history, everyone loves an underdog story. And besides, a grand romantic gesture like this? Epic.”

Joseph scoffed. “Did Roland admit to anyone that this fundraiser had anything to do with his feelings for Monsieur Holland?”

“No, obviously, but nobody is blind to his real motivation. He wouldn’t go through all this trouble for just anyone.”

My heart was thrumming inside my chest, and when I closed my eyes, I saw Roland’s face printed on the backs of my eyelids. What the hell has he done? A fundraiser?

“I just think it’s pointless,” Joseph was saying. “The kind of money we’ll need to raise to keep this place afloat? Never gonna happen.”

“Just wait, you’ll see.” Delia sounded so optimistic, I almost believed her myself.

Before they could come out and find me spying, I turned on my heel and hurried in the opposite direction, through the warren of hallways that crisscrossed behind the scenes of the hotel. I wasn’t exactly running, because that would cause a scene, but it was at the very least a quick jog. I needed to find Roland—now. He had to cancel this fundraiser, whatever the hell it was he was planning. If Eva decided he was a threat to her plans, she might do something to get him out of her way. My knowledge of what the mafia did to eliminate problems was limited to what I’d seen on movies like Goodfellas, but I’d seen the news articles about Bruno Santana, and I’d done some research into Barbieri after my dad mentioned the name. The mafia didn’t mess around. I had no doubt in my mind what would happen to Roland if he became troublesome.

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