Page 3 of Worth the Risk (Worth It All #1)

There it is. My father’s ghost, summoned to end the argument.

Maxwell Pierce—the man who built an empire through ruthless efficiency and calculated distance from the communities his developments displaced.

The man whose shadow still shapes every board meeting, every strategic decision, every moment Harrison thinks I’m being too soft for the family business.

“My father also didn’t have to deal with social media and community organizing,” I say carefully. “Times change, Harrison. Our approaches should change with them.”

“Some principles don’t change.” Harrison moves toward the door, then pauses. “Like the difference between running a business and running a charity. Like understanding that every dollar we spend on community relations is a dollar that doesn’t go to shareholders or company growth.”

I think about Maya’s folder of signatures, her father’s incorporation papers scattered on my office floor. “What if treating Highland as a charity case creates more expensive problems than treating them as stakeholders?”

Harrison’s expression hardens. “Then we handle problems as they arise. We don’t prevent them by encouraging every community group to think they deserve corporate welfare.”

“Community welfare?” My voice rises despite my efforts to stay controlled. “Harrison, Highland serves three thousand people. Their annual budget is less than my entertainment expenses. We’re not talking about welfare—we’re talking about basic human decency.”

“Human decency doesn’t pay dividends.” Harrison’s tone grows colder. “And it certainly doesn’t justify the precedent you’d set by giving special treatment to every organization that comes crying to our offices.”

“Maya Navarro wasn’t crying. She was fighting for her community.”

“Same difference. Both emotional responses that have no place in business strategy.” Harrison adjusts his tie again. “Declan, I need to know that you understand the distinction between effective leadership and sentimental decision-making. Your father never would have made that mistake.”

The words hit like a physical blow. Harrison knows exactly which buttons to push—my father’s memory, my leadership credibility, the fear that I’m not ruthless enough to run Pierce Enterprises successfully.

“Maybe Maxwell was wrong about some things.”

The silence that follows is deafening. Harrison’s expression shifts from paternal authority to something approaching alarm.

“Be very careful, son.” His voice drops to barely above a whisper. “Your father built this company on principles that work. Principles that created the wealth and influence you inherited. I won’t watch you destroy his legacy because some community activist got under your skin.”

Some community activist. As if Maya Navarro is just another obstacle to be cleared rather than someone fighting to honor her dead father’s dream.

“This conversation isn’t over,” I say.

“Yes, it is.” Harrison straightens his suit jacket with finality.

“I’ve been protecting this company—and you—from exactly these kinds of emotional decisions since Maxwell died.

Don’t make me question whether you’re ready to lead Pierce Enterprises, or whether the board needs to reconsider your authority over community relations decisions. ”

The threat hangs in the air like smoke. Harrison controls the board through decades of relationships and Maxwell’s enduring influence.

Harrison speaks with my father’s authority, wields my father’s methods, and can make my leadership very difficult if I don’t fall in line with the Pierce Enterprises way of doing business.

After he leaves, silence settles around me like a burial shroud, the weight of the conversation settling on my shoulders. Three years of trying to modernize this company, and Harrison has been systematically undermining my efforts with cases like Highland.

How many other community organizations have been stonewalled? How many other Maya Navarros have given up fighting because Pierce Enterprises made engagement impossible?

I pull up Highland’s file on my computer, hoping for more documentation.

Two documents in an otherwise empty folder—a lease non-renewal notice dated six months ago, and the legal demolition notice sent this week.

No follow-up communication between Pierce and Highland.

No assistance offers. No acknowledgment that Highland serves families who’ve depended on their programs for decades.

Just as Harrison described—legal obligations met, human obligations ignored completely.

My phone buzzes with a text from Elliot Walker, my best friend and VP of development:

Heard you met the infamous Maya Navarro. How’d that go?

I stare at the message, thinking about Maya’s amber-flecked eyes and Harrison’s systematic stonewalling.

About the way her voice cracked when she talked about her father’s twenty-seven dollars and twenty-year dream.

About the incorporation papers scattered on my floor like fallen soldiers in a war she didn’t even know she was fighting.

Declan: Complicated. But educational.

Elliot: Good complicated or bad complicated?

Declan: The kind that makes me question how we’ve been handling community relations.

Elliot: Uh oh. That sounds like the beginning of a very expensive educational process.

Declan: Maybe. But maybe some things are worth the investment.

I set down my phone and lean back in my chair.

Harrison thinks he’s protecting the company—and my father’s legacy—by treating communities like obstacles to be cleared rather than stakeholders to be managed.

But Maya just proved that approach creates exactly the kind of opposition that threatens business success.

More than that, it makes us the villains in our own story. The corporate bulldozer she accused us of being.

The intercom buzzes. “Mr. Pierce? Your two-thirty with the Westside Development team is here.”

“Give me ten minutes.”

I close Maya’s emails, but her words linger like accusations in the air.

The way she said “you people” with such controlled fury.

The tremor in her voice when she mentioned families depending on Highland’s after-school programs. The way she clutched those petition signatures like armor against corporate indifference.

The Anderson Project represents a forty-million-dollar investment opportunity. I can’t let one community advocate derail the entire development. But maybe I can change how we approach it.

Harrison wants to manage opposition with legal teams and security contractors—my father’s old playbook for dealing with community resistance.

But what if we managed resistance with partnership instead of intimidation?

What if we gave Maya Navarro exactly what she’s been asking for six months—a seat at the table, a voice in Highland’s future, a real chance to save what her father built?

Not charity. Strategy.

Highland serves three thousand people in the heart of downtown LA.

Those three thousand people have friends, families, social networks that extend throughout the city.

They vote in local elections, participate in community organizations, influence neighborhood dynamics that can make or break development projects.

Maya organized eight hundred and forty-three signatures in six months while being systematically ignored. Imagine what she could accomplish with actual support, with Pierce Enterprises as a partner rather than an adversary.

Harrison won’t like it. The board might question it. My father’s ghost will certainly disapprove. But as I straighten my tie and prepare for my next meeting, one thing becomes crystal clear: I’d rather deal with their disapproval than become the kind of man Maya thinks I am.

The kind of man my father apparently was.