Chapter 15

FIFTEEN

BASH

“P-pardon?” Rowe stammered.

From the moment Austin had told his sad story—a story suspiciously like Rowe’s, with all the supporting documentation conveniently missing—I’d known this was coming. But until Rowe spoke, I hadn’t realized I’d been holding on to a sliver of hope that, despite all the circumstantial evidence, this might just be a coincidence. That Rowe’s project might turn out to be a jewel-matching game, or a dating app, or… Christ, anything but what it was.

Earlier, I’d focused on my need to hurry downstairs and find Rowe—to set eyes and hands on him again—and I’d let that distract me from the enormous potential fallout of this situation. If Rowe’s project really was exactly like the one Austin was taking credit for, I didn’t know what it meant for Sterling Chase, or for me, or for Rowe himself.

Legal and HR would need to conduct a huge internal investigation, for sure. We’d have to comb through every contract Austin had ever signed—every emailed meeting request he’d ever received—to see if this was an isolated incident. There could be press releases and media scrutiny on the company that would set us right in the public eye—which was the last thing any member of my brotherhood wanted…

You should probably get more information before jumping to conclusions, Dayne.

Right .

I blew out a breath and summoned a smile. “Sorry,” I told Rowe. “I was just startled. Keep going. How’d you come up with the idea?”

Rowe looked confused for a moment before he recovered. “Okay, um. I told you how Daisy died—”

“You did. A softball to the chest,” I said gently, playing with his fingers. My heart hurt for him. I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for him to experience such a traumatic loss.

He nodded and ran a hand through his hair, sending his adorable curls tumbling around his face. “The technical name for what happened is commotio cordis. It’s when a blow to the chest disrupts the heart rhythm. It’s pretty rare for someone to die of it because usually when someone performs CPR or the paramedics bring a defibrillator, they can get the heart back into normal rhythm. But that didn’t work with Daisy. We found out later she had a heart defect called dextrocardia—her heart was on the right side of her chest instead of the left. If the EMTs had known about it, they could have adapted the typical CPR position to accommodate that—”

“And they could have saved her?”

“I don’t know,” Rowe admitted. “Maybe? But better trauma response could save someone . There are a ton of emergency response situations that would benefit from a real-time assessment communication tool. If EMTs and physicians could communicate during the initial response and that critical time be used to make decisions about where to route a patient, imagine how much better the outcomes would be.”

“I can imagine,” I said grimly. It was one of the reasons I’d been so excited about the MRO project when Austin had first brought it to Sterling Chase. “Go on.”

“So, I was watching a rerun of an old medical drama about a similar situation when the idea came to me that there could be a data-secure mobile device— but maybe with a satellite connection, which would make it more useful in rural places like Linden that don’t have a lot of cell towers—that EMTs could use to access medical records but also communicate with the hospital in real time during the initial trauma response. And at first, I figured there had to be some reason that wouldn’t work because otherwise, someone else would’ve come up with the idea before I did, right? But then… well, I told you, I heard Daisy’s voice in my head, and I… I decided to look into it more. To develop it into an actual business plan.”

“Whoa. I know you said you had to teach yourself all kinds of stuff to get your project off the ground, but…” I shook my head in disbelief. “With no science background, no business background… The kind of process you’re talking about requires extensive research and knowledge of emergency response protocol, patient medical record data security, not to mention the GPS and mobile software integrations needed—”

“No shit.” Rowe’s ears were already red, and now the blush spread to his cheeks. “I didn’t do great in school—partly because of what happened with Daisy and partly because it just wasn’t my thing. But that doesn’t mean I’m stupid. When I’m passionate about something, I go all in, whether it’s interior design or reading dry medical journals with a dictionary app open on my phone.”

“You got caught up,” I whispered.

“Yeah, and I guess it’s not always a bad thing,” he said with a little smile. He pushed his free hand through his curls. “But, yes, I was way out of my comfort zone on this, and everyone I talked to knew it. Took me ages to get people to take me seriously because no one wanted to waste their time on what they figured was the equivalent of a little kid working on a science project.” He picked at the silver-studded side seam of his black uniform pants. “Eventually, though, I got through. I interviewed EMTs, firefighters, and dispatchers. I researched the existing dispatch software and the other technologies used in emergency response. I had sit-down meetings with emergency room administrators at two area hospitals and brought lunch to a group of trauma specialists to beg their thoughts and ideas on a system like this.”

I was impressed. The report Kenji had pulled together on Rowe Prince had indicated he’d been a mediocre high school student who hadn’t been on a college track, but I’d known already that was bullshit. Academic success wasn’t an indicator of career success… and I knew plenty of underemployed Yale grads to prove it.

“What did you come up with? A process or a software system?” The idea Austin brought to Sterling Chase had been both.

He stopped picking at the seam on his pants and leaned forward. The light from the window danced through his hair and lit up one side of his face as much as his passion for the subject lit up his eyes.

“It’s actually got three key components.” He pulled his hand away from mine so he could count them off on his fingers. “First, communication from dispatch, which begins with emergency response. Then, using an app to access medical records and track critical data like vitals, medical history, and preliminary treatment, which will then be sent to the nearest trauma centers. And finally, coordinating through the app between the EMTs and the trauma centers to create a care plan for the patient based on which center has the right staffing and resources and how long it will take to get there, because it doesn’t matter that the hospital in Timbuktu has the best resources if you’re gonna die before they can get you there. Once they have the plan, the EMTs can begin treatment in the field. The parts connect and build on each other, you see? Like a…”

“A daisy chain,” he and I finished together.

“Yeah.” Rowe’s brilliant smile broke out, warmer than the sunlight. “It fits, right?”

“It definitely does.” And wiped away any lingering doubts I might have had about whether Rowe had authored this plan.

“I know this all probably seems pie-in-the-sky,” he went on. “I’ve already heard that from my parents and the Tech Barn guys from day one. My mom says it’s not healthy for me to be so obsessed. She’d like me to forget all about this and just find someone nice to settle down with. My dad says it’s irresponsible of me to devote so much time and money to this when I need a new car and when I’m leaving Bobby short an employee by ‘traipsing off to New York.’ And I know it’s gonna take a lot of work to make it marketable and profitable, but it can be, Bash. I really think it can, if I can get someone else to be passionate about it.”

“I know,” I agreed. “But, Rowe—”

“A-and I’m not asking for a lot of money. I just want to get this out there in the world.” His excitement drained away, and he straightened in his seat, like he was trying to appear more professional. “When I sign a contract, I’m going to insist on the kind that guarantees the company will produce a working product within a certain timeframe, or the rights will revert to me. That way, I can make sure there’s forward progress. And if I can eventually get back the money I spent so I can get a car, I’d really like that also.” He chewed his lip uncertainly. “I… I guess I did get a little pitch-y there at the end. Sorry about that.”

Oh, god, he was planning to give the idea away? The man had no idea just how profitable this idea was going to be. None whatsoever.

I stared at him for a long moment, not sure how the hell I was supposed to tell him what had been going on behind the scenes. And as I stared, his face fell further.

“Crap. Is it… terrible? Like, no hope at all?” he asked in a small voice. “Maybe I’m just not explaining it well. If you let me get my PowerPoint— I have charts . Data I’ve collected. Screenshots from the app I built, which are pretty trash right now, but… Just… shit, Bash, say something. Tell me what you’re thinking. Don’t sugarcoat it.”

“What I think,” I said slowly, “is that you are amazing. Inspiring. And a little bit brilliant.”

Rowe’s cheeks flushed, and his eyes went shiny. “Really? Oh, shit. Wow. Okay.”

“I think Project Daisy Chain is amazing, too.” I set my jaw. “And that’s exactly what I thought the first time I heard it… When someone else presented it to me.”

“The same idea?” Rowe stared at me in shock, and his brown eyes filled with tears. “What?”

I was a man who’d never had a Kryptonite, an Achilles heel. There’d never been a button anyone could push to bring me crashing to my knees in despair… until now, apparently, because seeing Rowe so upset made me want to burn the fucking world down.

Hearing his project pitch, knowing just how much effort—how much of his heart and soul—he’d poured into the concept for Project Daisy Chain, had made me ready to sign my fortune over to him if that was what it would take to take the look of desperation off his sweet face. Now, seeing his entire face crumple in confusion made me want to go downstairs, find Austin Purcell, and assault him… possibly with a burrito.

“I don’t understand how this is possible. I swear, Bash, this was my idea. I know I lied before—about being Sterling, and playing polo, and… and… Bubbles —but I’m telling the truth now.”

“I believe you.”

Rowe didn’t seem to hear me. He jumped to his feet and began pacing, swiping an impatient hand under his eyes. “I have every bit of my research, starting with the first scribbles in my design notebook. I even wrote down the episode of the show I was watching when the idea first came to me.” He patted his pockets and seemed distraught to find that he didn’t have his notebook on hand.

“Rowe, I believe you.”

“And you can ask anyone. I have witnesses. My parents will confirm it.” He paced as far as the window and turned back. “I mean, granted, they have no freaking clue what I was actually doing since they never really paid attention, and I guess they’re not great witnesses since they’re my parents and not exactly impartial, which is the same reason Joey wouldn’t be a good witness either, but— Oh! Bobby and the guys at the Tech Barn! They could vouch for me, at least partly. And one of the hospital administrators—her name’s Tracey, and we got to be friendly when we talked about her office redesign—she could tell you—”

I stood up, blocking his path, and grabbed both of his biceps as he prepared to turn toward the window again. “Rowe. I believe you. I don’t need to talk to any of them.”

Though our corporate lawyers certainly would. They’d want every scrap of evidence they could get their hands on.

Rowe looked horrified by my response. “But you shouldn’t just believe me, Bash. You should demand proof.” He shook his head like he was the old and wise one of the two of us and I was hopelessly naive. “You’re so kind, and I lo—like that about you, but you really need to stop letting people take advantage of your generosity. You know?”

I opened my mouth, then shut it again. It was a novel thing to have someone be protective of me that way, but I kind of liked it… even though it was wholly unnecessary. It was true that I was generous when it came to money, but only because I had more than I could use in several lifetimes. With other things, though—with my time, with my effort, with my true feelings—no. There were very few people I would give those to unreservedly, and even my own parents didn’t make the cut. The short list included Silas, Dev, Landry, Zane, Kenji…

And now, it seemed, Rowe Prince.

The realization made me a little light-headed.

I was a risk-taker by nature, but usually, those risks were carefully calculated based on my own knowledge and experience. This thing with Rowe was like nothing I’d ever experienced before, and there was a cacophony of voices in my head—voices that sounded like Kenji and Silas, mostly—reminding me that I should pull back now , but… I didn’t want to.

Scary as it was to feel this way, it had been scarier still when I’d thought Rowe had walked away from me for good. I wanted a chance with him. A chance to get to know him for more than two quick days. To see if this instant chemistry and attraction—this potential —between us could actually develop into something real.

Landry had reminded me that I had good instincts. It was time I trusted them.

“Come here.” I led Rowe to the sofa and sat down beside him. I wanted to pull him in my arms, but I also knew that once I did, I wouldn’t be letting him go, and we still had a lot more to talk about.

Of course, because he was Rowe, in spite of the seriousness of the situation, he couldn’t help running a hand over the cushion like he was admiring the lines of the furniture. “This is really nice. And I love the color. Someone who really knows your style picked it out. Was it you?”

I shook my head, amused despite myself. “No, Kenji.”

He nodded, then frowned as a thought occurred to him. “Do all the board members have offices here in the building? Is that common?”

Not unless you were more than simply a board member. “No. Only Silas and me, though Silas doesn’t spend much time here these days. Look, Rowe—”

“I’m gonna get my notes and send them to you,” he interrupted. “It’s important to me that you know for a fact I’m not lying, in case later you start to wonder. I… it’s stupid, maybe, but I don’t want you to remember me that way… after.”

“After,” I repeated, not understanding. “After what?”

“After I’m back in Indiana.” He folded his hands primly in his lap and kept his gaze fixed on them. “I mean, if you’re saying someone’s already working on an idea like this… then that’s great. That’s all I really wanted, you know? To have someone care about this and take the time to improve the system. And since there’s no sense in me bringing it to Jus—uh, to anyone else—if Sterling Chase is already taking care of it, then I don’t need to stick around New York anymore.” He shrugged. “It’s not the way I expected things to go, but my parents and Bobby will be thrilled I’ll be home sooner than I planned, and I… I’ll be content.”

“Well, I fucking won’t.” Not with any of it. Not with someone else taking credit for Rowe’s brilliance, and sure as hell not with Rowe being a thousand miles away from me.

His gaze flew to mine. “But—”

“That is not how this ends, Rowe.” I gripped his chin firmly so he couldn’t look away. “Before, you told me that you wanted more time with me—more time to get your project seen—before you turned back into a pumpkin. But you’ve gotten it all wrong from the very beginning. You’re not the fucking pumpkin of this story. You’re the Prince . And you’re not going to fade back into obscurity in Linden and take all your beauty and intelligence and light with you. I won’t let that happen. Do you hear me?”

He shook his head. “Bash, there’s no sense in—”

“There is every sense. Because you deserve better, Rowe. Not for Daisy. Not for your parents. For yourself . It’s time that both of us stop worrying about what the world wants and expects from us and start thinking about what we want for ourselves. You only get one life, and if fear holds you back from living it the way you want, you’re wasting it . Isn’t that what Daisy said?”

“Y-yes. And I want to believe that. But Bash… how am I supposed to fight this?” He threw up his hands in frustration. “Proving to you that I’m telling the truth is one thing. Proving it to everyone else in the world? Proving it to people who’ll take one look at my resume and know how unlikely it is that a guy like me could come up with an idea like this? That’s gonna require lawyers, and money, and time… all things I don’t have. I’m just… one person.”

“You aren’t.” I shifted closer, cupping his jaw with both hands. “Not if you don’t want to be. You don’t have to do any of this alone.”

I could see the hesitation in his eyes, and it nearly killed me, but I understood it. It was too much to expect him to have faith in me this quickly. Not when it seemed like he hadn’t had anyone who believed in him for a long while. But I would show him.

“Start with this,” I said, sitting back just a little but setting a hand on his knee because I couldn’t stand to break our connection entirely. “Tell me who else knows about your project.”

Rowe ran a hand over his forehead, disordering his curls again. “I guess… a lot of people know about it. Know the general gist of it. Like I said, I’ve talked to my parents about the research, but they don’t really get it. Same with Joey and his parents. Uh. Bobby’s helped me out a little bit with the app-coding aspect, but we never really discussed the process part. And the medical people I talked to know about the research and maybe some of my ideas about the process, but not about the app, so… I don’t think anyone back home really knows about the whole thing. Definitely not enough to steal the idea.”

I nodded. “That’s what I figured from what you explained so far.” And it was too bad because it would have been convenient if there’d been a plausible explanation for how Austin had gotten the idea that wouldn’t mean someone on my team—a person I’d trusted —had masterminded the theft of intellectual property. “Who have you shared your research with? I know you said you sent out a lot of meeting requests. Maybe you don’t remember all of them—”

“Oh, no, believe me, I remember each and every one. It’s almost embarrassing to admit this, but I was so new to the process that, at first, I was sending out letters one at a time, like otherwise there might be this mad stampede of people clamoring to get at this project—”

“That’s not impossible. It does occasionally happen. But with Sterling and our competitors, there’s a certain level of professional courtesy, mostly because it’s good business strategy. If one company has already studied the feasibility of a concept with an eye toward getting a patent, it’s rare that another company will pursue the same idea since that would result in a lot of legal wrangling.”

“So I accidentally did the right thing? That’s comforting, I guess.” He rolled his eyes. “So, the first request I sent was to Sterling Chase a while ago, specifically to Austin Purcell since he’s the head of development. I waited about a week, and when I hadn’t heard anything back, I sent a second letter. A whole big packet of information this time, with some background on the project and a heartfelt letter.” Rowe groaned. “If only I’d known at the time that Austin was the kind of entitled asshole who’d threaten to withhold a burrito delivery person’s tip if the delivery guy didn’t give him personally identifying information. Anyway, then—”

“Wait, hold up. Austin did that. Just now?” My voice vibrated with outrage.

“Yeah, downstairs. I think your guy needs some sensitivity training.”

Oh, Austin certainly needed something. I added a large black mark to my mental tally of his offenses.

“Go on,” I all but growled.

“Uh… okay. Well, three days later, I got a form-letter rejection. Dear Mr. Prince, blah blah blah, we do not feel that your ‘Project Daisy Chain’ merits further development by our company at this time. It was disappointing, but I figured— ow !” Rowe winced and pushed at my hand. “Bash, I’m gonna need this knee later.”

I realized too late that I’d been squeezing Rowe’s leg with possibly bruising force. I instantly snatched my hand away. “Christ, I’m so sorry.”

“What’s up with you? You were okay, and then I quoted the rejection letter, and your face just got all…” He blinked. “Oh. Fuck. It’s Austin Purcell, isn’t it? He’s the one who had a similar idea to Daisy Chain? Do you think that’s why he rejected me?”

Rowe was so fucking sweet. Instead of immediately jumping to the conclusion that someone had stolen his idea and passed it off as their own, he was giving Austin the benefit of the doubt.

I was way past that.

Still, though, I tried to speak diplomatically. “I’m concerned that it’s a bit… worse than that.”

“You think he stole it.”

Okay, so maybe I hadn’t spoken as diplomatically as I’d thought.

“Yeah,” I admitted. “That’s exactly what I think. I think he’s passing your idea off as his own.”

“But… why?”

“Rowe, sweetheart.” I huffed out a laugh and cupped his cheek. “You really don’t know much about profitability, do you?” I smiled to take the sting out of my words. “MRO or Medical Response Optimization—what we’ve been calling the project in-house—was going to make a ton of money, and Austin was going to own the patents.”

“Was?”

“Yes. Was . I already told Kenji we were putting the project on hold the minute I first suspected what was happening. There’s no way I’m profiting off anyone’s stolen idea. It’s going to take some work to get to the bottom of everything, but we will. And Austin doesn’t know it, but he made a huge fucking error when he targeted you— ooof .”

This time, it was Rowe who kissed me—kissed me with utter abandon, locking his arms around my neck and throwing himself bodily against me. His kiss, like so much about him, was artless and enthusiastic… and utterly devastating. I gave up the rest of my self-control and pulled him onto my lap, holding him against me and breathing him in.

The person I’d been just a week ago would have been shocked to see me now, grabbing onto the liar from the gala with both arms, embracing the chaos my life had become. But as long as I had Rowe in my arms… I didn’t give a shit.