No hesitation. The offer comes out smooth, rehearsed almost, like he's been holding it in reserve this whole time. No stumbling over the words. No visible guilt.
I wait for the backtrack. The moment where he realizes what he just said and tries to take it back. Because his offer is mad. Ridiculous.
But it doesn't come.
I set the phone down carefully, adjust my cufflinks. "You're telling me that instead of bringing me my money, you want to give me a living and breathing woman."
"She's not just any woman," Adrian says quickly, desperately. "She's loyal. She'll listen. And she's—" He swallows. "She's almost a virgin. Never been with anyone but me. That's worth something, right?"
Marco makes a sound low in his throat, and I don't have to look to know he's disgusted.
I am too.
But I'm also intrigued.
Not because of what Adrian's offering—I'm not some trafficking animal who trades in women like currency. But because this pathetic waste of oxygen just showed me exactly who he is, and in doing so, made me very, very curious about the woman he's throwing away.
"And how exactly do you plan to deliver her?" I ask, circling back to the practical. "What's stopping her from running the moment you bring her to me?"
Adrian's face goes even paler, if that's possible. "She won't run."
"You seem very confident about that."
"I am." He's talking faster now, desperate to close this deal. "I've been paying her mother's medical bills. Cancer. Stage four. Expensive treatment at St. Catherine's. Without me, her mother loses everything—the care, the medication, all of it."
There it is. The leverage.
"So, she's tied to you," I say slowly.
"Exactly. She won't run because she can't afford to. Her mother's life depends on those payments." He's almost smiling now, thinking he's made a brilliant play. "Bring her here, tell her the situation, and she'll cooperate. She has no choice."
I study him for a long moment. The casual way he's using a dying woman as collateral. The ease with which he's manipulating someone who presumably loves him.
He's even more worthless than I thought.
But he's also handed me exactly what I need.
"Here's what's going to happen," I say, my voice flat. "You're going to walk out of here. You're going to go home, pack a bag, and disappear for a while. Maybe leave the state. I don't care. But your debt doesn't disappear with you."
"I know, I?—"
"It transfers to her."
His face pales. "What?"
"You heard me. Bianca now owes me eighty-seven thousand dollars. And since I'm betting she doesn't have that kind of money, she'll be working it off. However, I see fit."
"But—"
"You offered her, Adrian. I'm accepting." I lean forward, let him see the flatness in my stare. "And if you ever come near her again, if you so much as text her, I'll cut off more than a fingernail. We clear?"
He stares at me, mouth opening and closing, the full weight of what he's done finally sinking in.
Too late.
"Sal, cut him loose."
The zip ties snap. Adrian stumbles to his feet, cradling his bleeding hand against his chest. He looks at me, then at the phone still sitting on the table, and for half a second, I think he might actually try to take it back.
