I kept my hands steady.
“That sounds terrible.”
Victoria shook her head.
“She said the daughter was too unreliable to hold a real job. Same last name as you, actually. Sullivan.”
I did not reveal myself to Victoria that night.
Not yet.
I sat across from her at the resort restaurant, listened as she described the disaster at my parents’ house, and let the truth wait until it could no longer be mistaken for coincidence.
Victoria Chen was brilliant, direct, and impossible to impress with social performance.
That was why I respected her.
She told me my mother had spent the party blaming her “unreliable older daughter” while Sarah tried to pitch PR services between slices of delivery pizza.
“Your younger daughter kept trying to salvage the evening,” Victoria said, opening her menu. “But it was painful. She pitched me while serving Papa John’s on china that probably cost more than my first car.”
“That must have been awkward.”
“Awkward is polite.” Victoria shook her head. “Unprofessional is closer.”
Then she smiled.
“Anyway, let’s talk about something better. Your company.”
For the next two hours, we discussed Stellar Events.
The Florida expansion.
The staffing model.
The menu systems.
The resort integration plan.
Victoria asked sharp questions, and I answered every one because I knew my company down to the bones.
This was not a hobby.
This was not a fantasy.
This was my life’s work.
The next morning, December 26, I stood in Pinnacle’s boardroom wearing my best suit, with the two-million-dollar contract on the table and Victoria’s executive team seated around us.
Everything was going perfectly.
Then her assistant walked in holding an iPad.
“Ms. Chen, you need to see this. A photo from that Connecticut party is going viral on LinkedIn.”
Victoria took the tablet.
I watched her expression change.
Curiosity.
Confusion.
Then shock.
She looked at the screen.
Then at me.
Then back at the screen.
“Lily,” she said slowly, “this photo from the Sullivan house in Connecticut.”