I knew I had not been a good husband.
The thought pressed down on me as I leaned back in my leather chair, staring at the papers scattered neatly across my desk. The office was not just my workplace anymore. It had swallowed me whole. Somewhere along the way, it became my home, my comfort, my cage. Rose had been pushed to the sidelines while I drowned in deadlines, contracts, and strategies.
And today of all days, I felt the weight of it most. Her birthday.
I should have been with her. I should have spent the entire week planning something special, something worthy of the woman she was. Instead, I had only managed flowers. Blue roses, her favorite. With them, a card in my own handwriting: Dinner tonight. Just the two of us. I love you.
It was not enough. I knew it. But it was something. A promise.
A knock on the door broke my thoughts. My secretary's calm voice followed.
"Sir, your lawyer is here."
I straightened in my chair. "Send him in."
Jordan Cole walked into the room. He was tall, confident, and carried himself with the kind of authority that never had to be announced. His eyes were sharp, his movements precise. He had fought through a world determined to hold him back, and now he was untouchable. More importantly, he was the only man I trusted to fight for me.
"Max," Jordan said as he sat down opposite me. His tone was serious, too serious. "We need to talk about your uncles."
My chest tightened. "What now?"
He slid a folder across my desk. "They are getting bold. Meeting shareholders, stirring doubts, whispering that you are too unstable to lead. They want control of the company, and they are willing to drag your name through the mud to get it."
My jaw hardened. I had known this was coming, but it still burned like fresh fire. My uncles had despised me from the moment my father died. To them, I was the undeserving heir, the boy who had been handed the keys to an empire that they believed should have been theirs.
But I knew the truth.
This company was not built by them.
It was built by my grandfather, a man who worked until his hands bled, who gave his life to create something from nothing. My father had carried it forward, giving up nights, sweat, and years that should have been his own. They sacrificed. They built. They held everything together.
And while they did that, my uncles partied. They drank, they gambled, they wasted money like water. They lived off the name without ever lifting a finger to honor it. They were parasites feeding on a legacy they never built.
And now, when both my grandfather and father were gone, they wanted to swoop in and take what was never theirs.
"I have been breaking myself to keep this empire alive," I muttered, my voice low and bitter. "I have given it everything. Every hour, every thought. And still, they act like I am the problem."
Jordan leaned forward, his gaze steady. "They are counting on that. They want you tired. They want you stretched so thin that you make mistakes. That way they can point and say you are unfit. Maxwell, listen to me. Your health is cracking. If you fall apart, they will not need to fight you. You will hand them victory yourself."
I turned my head, staring at the city lights outside the wide window. He was not wrong. The constant chest aches, the late nights, the missed meals, I ignored them all. Because how could I stop? If I stopped, if I faltered for even a moment, they would win. And if they won, my father's work, my grandfather's dream, everything they bled for would be stolen by men who had never worked a day in their lives.
Jordan's voice softened, but his words were sharp. "I will handle them. I will drag them to court if I must. But you need to keep your head straight. If you keep running like this, you will not just lose the company. You will lose everything else too."
Everything else.
I did not have to ask what he meant. Rose's face flashed in my mind. The softness of her smile. The disappointment in her eyes when I broke another promise.
Tonight. I promised myself. Tonight I would make it up to her. Dinner. Just the two of us.
Hours later, my driver dropped me at the Midtown Club. A client was waiting. Not just any client, a man with the kind of influence and capital that could keep my uncles from tightening their grip. His investment could mean expansion, stability, strength.
He had asked me for a game of indoor golf, half sport, half negotiation. I told myself I would stay for just one hour. Just long enough to shake hands, to show I was committed.
But business never ended in one hour.
Every swing of the club, every sip of whiskey was more than small talk. It was testing, measuring, building trust. I laughed when he laughed, leaned in when he spoke. This was not a game of golf. This was war disguised as leisure. If I walked away too soon, if I showed disinterest, he could be lost. And if I lost him, my uncles would find him. They would take him from me, and with him, the power he carried.
I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. I did not pull it out. I knew it was her.
One more swing, I told myself. One more round, then I will leave.
But time is cruel when you are not watching. Nine slipped into ten. Ten into eleven. The laughter around me drowned out the voice in my head. I told myself it was worth it. That Rose would understand once she saw the bigger picture. That missing one dinner, even her birthday dinner, was the price of survival.
By the time the game ended and the final handshake was sealed, it was done. I had won. The client was with me. My uncles had lost this round.
But as I pulled out my phone, the victory tasted bitter.
Midnight.
The dinner was gone. The restaurant closed. The table where she had been waiting empty now, the candles melted down, the food cleared away. She had waited. I knew she had waited. And then she had realized.
He is not coming.
Not tonight.
Not even on her birthday.
I leaned back in the leather seat of the car as it rolled through the sleeping city. My chest was heavy, guilt pressing down, but my mind clung to its last defense. If I had not gone tonight, I would have lost him. And if I lose investors, I lose ground. If I lose ground, my uncles win. I cannot let that happen.
It was survival. That was the truth I told myself.
But deep inside, another truth whispered louder. No matter how much I justified it, I had failed her again.
And the bouquet of blue roses waiting at home felt like nothing more than an apology written in ink that would never be enough.