Chapter 27 Seamus
Chapter twenty-seven
Seamus
The conference room has floor-to-ceiling windows, and on clear days like this, you can see for miles.
I've always found something reassuring about this view—how it makes everything below look manageable. Problems look smaller from up here. Decisions feel cleaner.
But today, all I can see is Heritage Street somewhere in that grid—and the knowledge that in twenty minutes, the board will vote to break whatever fragile thing Rosanna and I have been building.
Graham is already holding court at the head of the table when I arrive, Malcolm beside him with that expression of patient certainty he wears when he's already decided how a meeting will end.
The other board members are settling in—Talia with her tablet full of market analyses, Robert reviewing his notes, Chen looking through the acquisition documents with the careful attention he brings to everything.
"Seamus." Graham gestures to my seat. "Good. We can get started. I know everyone's busy, so let's keep this efficient."
The irony isn’t lost on me. Graham calling for efficiency while we spend an hour discussing a property worth less than this meeting’s billable hours.
But it's not really about the building.
It hasn't been about the building for months.
It’s about reminding me I’m the CEO they allow to implement their decisions.
"First item," Graham continues, pulling up a presentation on the main screen. "Heritage Street acquisition timeline. Malcolm, you want to walk us through the updated projections?"
Malcolm stands, and his presentation is everything I've come to expect—polished, thorough, framing the demolition of a century-old community landmark as responsible corporate leadership.
He talks about market opportunities and development timelines, about investor confidence and competitive positioning.
The building becomes "underutilized commercial space."
The community opposition becomes "manageable public relations considerations."
"The window for acquisition is narrowing," Malcolm says, clicking to a slide that shows competing bids and zoning timelines. "The other interested party has applied for historical designation, which could complicate our timeline significantly if approved."
"You mean my wife?"
Malcolm doesn’t miss a beat. "The question isn’t whether people like the building, Seamus. It’s whether the site can generate sustainable income."
Rosanna is in my penthouse right now, probably sketching in the studio—while I sit in this boardroom discussing how to outmaneuver her.
"The good news," Malcolm continues, "is that we have the resources to move faster. If we increase our offer, it will accelerate the approval process. We can have this locked down before any historical designation goes through. Clean. Efficient. Irreversible."
"And the community pushback?" Talia asks. "We've seen some press coverage. Local advocacy groups getting involved."
Graham waves a dismissive hand. "Nostalgia and sentiment. The usual resistance to progress. Once we break ground on the larger development, people will see the value—jobs, modernization, economic growth. The opposition will quiet down once they realize we're serious."
I should speak up.
I should tell them that the opposition isn't just sentiment, that there are real people with real attachment to that space, that my wife is one of them.
But the words stick in my throat, and Malcolm is already moving to the next slide.
"There’s also the optics with your wife," Graham says carefully.
He folds his hands on the table. "Which is exactly why we’re trying to keep this clean for you, Seamus. No one here wants you caught between personal matters and company decisions."
"I'm recommending we finalize terms internally this week," Malcolm says. "Then hold the formal vote with the board."
He glances toward me.
"That way the details are settled. Cleaner process."
***
After the meeting, I return to my office and the retainer paperwork is still sitting where I left it this morning—right in the center of my desk, impossible to ignore.
My lawyers sent it over yesterday with a note: Ready for your signature. Advocacy group checks out. Standard language attached.
It's everything Rosanna asked for. The funding she needs to fight the Heritage Street acquisition. The legal support that could slow down or maybe even stop the board's timeline.
All it requires is my signature and a wire transfer.
Except signing it means funding opposition to my own project—choosing Rosanna over the board’s plan.
I pick up the pen, and my hand hovers over the signature line.
I think about Rosanna's face when she asked me for this—the hope in her eyes, the trust that I would understand why it mattered.
I think about how that hope died when I started talking about NDAs and oversight committees, when I made it clear that I saw her request as a liability to be managed rather than a partnership to be honored.
Are you sure there's a difference? The memory makes me flinch.
I should sign this. Fund the advocacy group. Tell the board to find another property.
But I can't make my hand move. Because signing this doesn't just mean going against the board—it means admitting that I value my personal life over my professional obligations.
That kind of sentimentality can ruin a man in my position.
It means proving that the board was right to worry about me as CEO.
I set down the pen and open my desk drawer instead. The paperwork slides inside, and I close it carefully. Delaying—waiting for clarity I know isn’t coming.
***
The penthouse feels different when I get home that evening—quieter, the silence heavy with things unsaid. Rosanna's studio door is closed, and I can see light underneath it but no sound.
She's working, or pretending to work, or just avoiding me. All equally likely after this morning's disaster.
I stand in the hallway for a long moment, trying to figure out how to bridge the distance I created.
An apology seems inadequate. Flowers feel like an insult—like I'm trying to buy my way out of the hurt I caused.
What I need is something that shows I'm trying, that I understand I handled this wrong, that I want to fix it.
A date.
Something special, away from the penthouse and the offices and all the spaces where we keep hurting each other. Somewhere we can just be Seamus and Rosanna instead of CEO and wife, billionaire and artist, damaged man and woman he's too afraid to trust.
I pull out my phone and start searching.
A picnic date. Somewhere quiet enough to talk without the weight of contracts and board meetings pressing down on us.
But even as I'm planning, I can feel the pen-pal secret sitting like a stone in my chest.
Because how can I take her on a date and look her in the eye when I'm still hiding who I am?
When I'm still writing to her as Shay, still maintaining that separate connection because I'm too afraid to merge them into one honest relationship?
I've been telling myself I'll reveal it when the time is right, when things are stable, when I've proven that I can be trusted.
But the truth is there will never be a right time.
The longer I wait, the worse it gets. Every email I send as Shay is another layer of deception, another reason for her to question whether anything between us is real.
I need to tell her. Explain everything—about being Shay, about the board vote on Friday, about how completely I've mishandled this entire situation.
But what if she leaves?
What if I tell her the truth and she realizes that I've been lying to her?
That the one relationship she thought was honest and uncomplicated—her pen-pal friendship with Shay—was actually just another version of me, watching her, learning her, using that knowledge to... what? Manipulate her? Protect myself?
I don't even know anymore.
My phone buzzes with an email from Malcolm.
Board vote confirmed: Friday, 2 PM. Please attend. We’ll finalize terms and proceed with the accelerated timeline.
Less than forty-eight hours from now.
I stare at the email.
Friday is coming.
I need one last chance to show her I’m trying.
My phone buzzes again. It's an email notification, and when I check it, I see it's a response from Rosanna—to Shay.
She's writing to me about me, and she doesn't even know it.
Her words cut through me like glass. She's hurting, and it's my fault.
She’s questioning everything we’ve built. Reaching out to Shay for comfort instead of me.
Friday is two days away. The board vote is happening whether I'm ready or not. Rosanna is going to find out—if not from me, then from the press.
And when she does, she's going to realize that I've been sitting on this information while she poured her heart out to me, both as her husband and as Shay.
I'm out of time.
Out of ways to avoid the reckoning that's coming. And I have no idea how to tell the woman I love that I've failed her in every possible way—as a husband, as a pen pal, as a person she trusted to choose her when it mattered.
The penthouse is silent around me, and somewhere beyond that closed studio door, Rosanna is working on illustrations of impossible gardens. And I'm standing here with unsigned paperwork, and a board vote scheduled for Friday.
I stand in the hallway and listen to the silence, trying to figure out how to survive the next seventy-two hours.