Victor sucked in a sharp breath, turning pale as he looked at Richard Vance. Losing a forty-million-dollar client dinner in his VIP room meant Victor’s own job would be gone by morning.
“Maya, you’re done here,” Victor said, his voice trembling with panic and anger. “Get your coat and leave the building. Don’t bother coming in tomorrow.”
At the table, Arthur Pendelton nodded quickly. “Richard, for God’s sake, apologize to the Chairman. Let the girl go.”
Richard Vance looked at the open contract folder resting on the walnut wood between them. Noticeably, the heavy gold Montblanc pen beside Takahashi’s teacup hadn’t been uncapped all evening. In fact, right before Takahashi had stood up and screamed about his watch, the older man had been staring silently at Page 18 of the agreement for nearly four minutes without turning the page.
Slowly, Richard Vance inhaled and opened his mouth to speak the words that would end Maya’s employment and save the forty-million-dollar deal.
Before Richard could utter a syllable, Maya looked past the furious restaurant manager, locked eyes with the trembling young secretary behind Takahashi’s chair, and spoke one quiet sentence in flawless, formal Japanese.
“Sato-san,” Maya said softly, “if the Chairman needed an excuse to walk out of this room without signing Clause Fourteen on page eighteen, why is your name printed on the verification line at the bottom of the Osaka asset sheet?”
At Maya’s quiet words in Japanese, Kenji’s head snapped up so fast his wire-rimmed glasses slipped down the bridge of his nose. Beside the cedar sliding door, floor manager Victor reached out to pull Maya into the corridor, while Richard Vance cleared his throat to offer an apology to his furious guest. Instead of retreating, Maya stood her ground beside the bamboo screen and looked straight at the youngest American partner, Daniel Brooks.
“Wait,” Daniel said sharply, raising a hand before Victor could touch Maya’s elbow.
Victor stopped, his chest heaving under his charcoal vest. “Mr. Brooks, please, I’ll handle this quietly in my office—”
“Don’t touch her, Victor,” Daniel said. He leaned forward over the walnut table, his eyes flicking from the sweating young secretary back to Maya. “What did you just say to Mr. Sato?”
“Do not indulge this circus!” Takahashi roared, his palm striking the back of his leather chair. “Richard, I gave you sixty seconds! Forty-five of them are gone!”
Richard Vance didn’t look at his watch. He was staring at Kenji Sato.
The thirty-five-year-old secretary wasn’t looking at his boss anymore. He had taken half a step back toward the corner of the room, both arms wrapped tightly around a slim black leather briefcase pressed against his chest. His face had gone the color of wet parchment.
“Tell me what you said to him,” Richard Vance commanded, his deep boardroom baritone cutting through the room. “In English.”
Maya kept her posture straight, her hands still resting neatly over her black apron. “I asked Mr. Sato why his name is printed at the bottom of the Osaka asset verification sheet if Chairman Takahashi is the one trying to walk out of this room without signing Clause Fourteen.”
Around the table, the three older American partners froze.
Greg Miller blinked rapidly. “Clause Fourteen? How the hell does a waitress know what’s on page eighteen of our merger agreement?”
“She’s been spying on our table!” Arthur Pendelton blurted out, slapping his hand down beside his water glass. “Victor, who hired this woman? Is she working for a rival fund?”
“I’m not working for a rival fund, Mr. Pendelton,” Maya replied evenly. “Until fourteen months ago, I spent four years as a senior bilingual compliance paralegal at Morrison & Foerster’s Tokyo and New York offices.”
Victor stared at her as if she had just grown a second head. “Wait—you told me when I hired you that you only needed late-shift serving hours.”
“My mother is undergoing stage-three lymphoma treatments at Memorial Sloan Kettering,” Maya said quietly, without a trace of self-pity in her voice. “Her daytime infusion schedule made eighty-hour law firm weeks impossible, and medical copays don’t wait. Taking evening shifts in private dining rooms paid the bills while let me sit with her during the day.”
A heavy, uncomfortable silence settled over the American side of the table. Daniel Brooks looked at her crisp white collar and neatly pinned hair with an entirely new expression.