Gwen sensed Liam beginning to bristle and rushed to avoid conflict. Smoothing a welcoming expression on her face, she took Patrick’s arm. “Poppy, this is the man I was telling you about the day you showed us the nursery.”
Oscar looked suspicious as she performed the introductions, but Patrick behaved perfectly, offering a generous smile, a handshake, and even a friendly wink at Natalia.
“So you’re the man who has finally coaxed Gwen out of lonely widowhood,” Poppy said. “She always has such an open mind when it comes to standards.”
Her tone was gracious, but everyone heard the insult. If Gwen didn’t snip Poppy’s rudeness quickly, it would run rampant. She kept a serene smile but met Poppy’s gaze squarely. “Darling, my open mind is the only way I’ve been able to tolerate you all these years.”
Natalia stifled a laugh, but Oscar changed the subject as he joined his wife at the breakfast table.
“Enough pointless chatter,” he said, swiveling his attention to Liam. “Tell me about yourself. I gather you’ve had an interesting life.”
Liam shook his head. “Not until lately. I was just an ordinary welder until last month when someone stabbed me in the gut and turned my life upside down.”
“Stabbed?” Poppy gasped. “Like with a knife?”
“Like with a knife,” Liam confirmed. “We still haven’t figured out who did it, but I’m on the lookout, because you never know what sort of scoundrels are lurking nearby.”
“Who on earth would do such a thing?” Poppy asked, her voice filled with appalled wonder.
Liam swiveled his gaze to Oscar. “I don’t know. The only enemy I’ve ever had was Ira Horowitz. I stole his girl in the eighth grade, and he put tacks on my chair to get back at me. That was twenty years ago. Then last month, three guys show up at my door and try to slice up my liver. Weird.”
Gwen held her breath, watching Oscar carefully. He showed no sign of a guilty conscience as he adjusted the patch over his eye. “I had someone lob a bomb at me when I was leaving the bank one evening,” he said calmly. “Powerful men often make enemies.”
“Except last month I wasn’t a powerful man, I was just an ordinary welder from Philly.”
Then Oscar calmly said the last thing Gwen expected. “Gwen is the only one who’d stand to gain by your death,” he said casually. “Gwen, did you have anything to do with the shameful assault on Mr. Malone?”
“I did not!”
“It must have been the eighth-grade romantic rival,” Oscar said, but Liam wouldn’t let the topic drop.
“I think you’re wrong about Gwen being the only one who’d lose anything by my showing back up on the scene. Something about half your voting shares being up for grabs? And it might affect the merger with Carnegie Steel?”
Natalia choked on her muffin. It took a few moments to clear her throat, and she took a long drink of water before slamming her glass down to glare at her grandfather. “Are you going to let him have those shares?” she demanded. “A man who shows up out of the blue? We don’t know the first thing about Liam Malone other than that he is a man. At least I would know what to do with those votes. I’ve earned the right to have a say in the bank.”
“That’s not how the game is played,” Frederick said.
“Yes, I know,” Natalia snapped. “If Poppy produces the golden male child, the newborn will leapfrog right past me into a top place at the bank.”
“He won’t leapfrog past me,” Liam said. “Half of Oscar’s shares came from my father, and I want them back.”
“Liam, have you learned nothing since you’ve been here?” Frederick said from the head of the table. “You’re getting ahead of yourself.”
“Indeed,” Oscar said. “Even if you got those shares, it won’t make any difference. I will have unanimous consent from the rest of the shareholders to support the merger, so your ten percent won’t matter.”
Natalia still seemed annoyed. Gwen had never had any interest in the bank, but Natalia loved it. Watching Liam or a newborn child have the doors opened to them just because they were male must be galling.
Natalia looked at Frederick. “Is he right? Are you still firm in your decision to support the steel merger?”
Tension mounted as Frederick met her question with a gleam in his eye that seemed unnervingly ominous. “The chess pieces are moving,” he said. “The world is changing. Power is shifting. I will be very interested to see what happens next.”
Patrick sat on the back porch of the house with Gwen and Liam, watching more members of the Blackstone family disembark from various yachts and ferries all afternoon. Liam held a pair of binoculars to his face while Gwen provided insight into each group of people heading up from the boathouse.
“That’s Bertie,” she said, nodding to a portly man with a huge walrus mustache. “Don’t mention golf, or he will talk your ear off, but he is hysterically funny. He can burp ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’”
“Does he have a job?” Patrick asked.
Gwen thought for a moment. “I don’t think so. Neither does his son, Chester, who spends most of his time at the horse races.”
