Chapter 11 - The Black Gardenia
Three weeks after my wedding, I learned that happy endings could still receive threats before breakfast.
I was standing barefoot in the kitchen of our Lake Michigan house, wearing one of Massimo’s white shirts and trying to make pancakes without burning them, when his phone began vibrating across the marble island.
He glanced at the screen.
The softness disappeared from his face.
“What happened?” I asked.
Massimo didn’t answer immediately. He listened to whoever was speaking, his jaw tightening until the muscle near his cheek began to pulse.
Then he ended the call.
“Our West Loop conservatory caught fire at four sixteen this morning.”
The spatula slipped from my hand.
“Was anyone inside?”
“Two night employees. Both escaped.”
Relief hit first.
Then fear.
Miller Floral Design had opened its West Loop conservatory only five months earlier. It employed thirty-two people, including women graduating from the horticultural training program we had created after the Vitali scandal.
“Electrical?” I asked.
Massimo’s silence answered me.
He crossed the kitchen and picked up his jacket.
“I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
I stared at him.
He stared back.
We had been married for twenty-three days, and apparently that had been enough time for my husband to forget what kind of woman he had married.
“Try that again,” I said.
“Sophie.”
“Massimo.”
His nostrils flared.
Ten minutes later, I was dressed and sitting beside him in the back of an armored SUV.
Marriage was about compromise.
Sometimes.
The conservatory looked like a wounded glass cathedral when we arrived.
One wall had blackened from smoke, several windows had shattered, and firefighters were rolling hoses across the wet pavement. Employees stood wrapped in blankets near ambulances.
I ran toward them.
“Everyone accounted for?”
My operations manager, Marisol Vega, nodded quickly.
“Everybody’s safe. The sprinkler system kicked in before the fire reached the main greenhouse.”
I hugged her.
That was when I noticed the small wooden box sitting on the hood of my delivery van.
No soot.
No water.
Perfectly dry.
“Massimo.”
He saw it too.
Within seconds, two security officers surrounded the vehicle.
One opened the box carefully.
Inside lay a single black gardenia.
Not dark purple.
Not painted.
Black.
A folded card rested beneath it.
Massimo reached for the note.
I stopped him.
“It was sent to me.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Sophie.”
“If somebody wanted you to read it, they would have addressed it to you.”
I unfolded the card.
Four words were written in elegant black ink.
YOUR ROOTS ARE BORROWED.
My stomach tightened.
Massimo took the card from my fingers.
“Whoever sent this is trying to scare you.”
“No.”
I turned toward the damaged conservatory.
“They’re trying to tell me something.”
The fire marshal approached us.
“Mrs. Romano?”
“Yes?”
“We found the origin point.”
Massimo immediately stepped closer.
The marshal removed his helmet.
“Storage room beneath the west greenhouse. Someone poured accelerant around one specific filing cabinet.”
“What was inside it?” I asked.
Marisol answered before anyone else could.
“Property records.”
My pulse stumbled.
“Which property records?”
“All of them.”
Massimo looked toward his security chief.
“Pull digital backups.”
Marisol’s expression became uncertain.
“We have backups for business operations, payroll, suppliers, licensing. But the original property acquisition documents were placed in that cabinet after the bank requested hard copies last year.”
“Why would someone burn real-estate records?” I whispered.
Massimo stared at the black gardenia.
“To destroy evidence.”
“Evidence of what?”
Nobody answered.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
Massimo shook his head.
I answered anyway.
“Hello?”
A calm male voice spoke.
“Congratulations on your marriage, Mrs. Romano.”
Every hair on my arms lifted.
“Who is this?”
“You should ask your husband why his family never actually owned the land beneath your first flower shop.”
I looked at Massimo.
His face changed.
Not fear.
Recognition.
The voice continued.
“You married a king, Sophie. Unfortunately, his kingdom was mortgaged long before you walked into his bedroom.”
The call disconnected.
Massimo took the phone from my hand.
“You know what he meant,” I said.
“No.”
“You recognized something.”
Massimo looked toward the firefighters, employees, cameras, and blackened glass.
Then he lowered his voice.
“My father used to say there were certain Romano debts that could never be paid with money.”
A cold breeze swept through the broken conservatory.
I looked at the burned filing room.
The black flower.
The four-word warning.
And for the first time since our wedding, I felt the old sensation return.
The feeling that the floor beneath me wasn’t solid.
“What debts?”
May you like
Massimo’s eyes met mine.
“The kind my grandmother made me promise never to investigate.”
