Page 10 of Billionaire’s Heartbreak

“He did something.” I said quietly.

Not a question. She didn’t answer.

Instead, she turned toward me, her body angled just enough to remind me of the last time we stood this close—the stolen moment, the one I’d taken for myself because I needed something to survive on.

A memory. A goodbye. A promise that I’d never see her again.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“Dannie invited me.”

Her brows pulled together. “To a funeral?”

“Yes.” Too fast. “No—not like that.”

The pause that followed said everything. She didn’t want me here. That made two of us.

“But why?”

“Because I wanted him to.” The voice came from behind us—calm, steady, impossible to ignore.

Dannie.

I looked up slowly. He wasn’t dressed like a grieving grandson. No red eyes. No slumped shoulders. His black suit fit like armor, crisp and deliberate. The white funeral light caught the sharp line of his collar and the silver edge of his cufflink.

The incense smoke drifting between us softened nothing about him. He looked composed, almost untouched by grief—the kind of composure you wore when weakness could get you killed.

“I thought it would be good,” he continued, stepping closer, “for family to be together today.”

Family.

The word sat wrong in my chest.

He reached into the inside pocket of his suit. My shoulders locked. Dave shifted behind me. Across the hall, two of Dannie’s men straightened, their attention snapping toward us.

Not a weapon.

An envelope. Cream. Unmarked. Thick.

He held it out to me.

“I was going to tell you after the ceremony,” he said. “But since you’re already asking questions…”

The air felt thinner. I didn’t want to take it, which meant I had to. My fingers closed around the envelope, its weight strangely heavy in my hand.

“Open it later,” Dannie added. “Not here.”

“What is it?”

“Something that belongs to you.” His eyes never left mine. “Something your mother never told you.”

3

June

* * *

I changed out of the white mourning clothes—the traditional garments reserved for family—and felt an almost desperate need to leave the funeral home.