“Maybe,” Danyl replies. “For a while. Maybe longer. You’re not marrying her for love. You’re marrying her because it solves three problems at once. His debt. Your residency. Our reputation in this city.”
He picks up the folder and opens it, flicks through a few pages, then lays it flat in front of me.
There are blank spaces at the bottom of the last page, underneath Danyl’s and her father’s signatures. They’re waiting for mine and hers.
Chains disguised as ink and paper.
“You wanted a legal way to stay,” he says quietly. “This is the way. Unless you’ve grown fond of frozen bank accounts and airport interrogations.”
As I stare at the line where my name will go, the scent of the lemon bars teases my nose. They smell like a childhood I never had. Sugar and citrus, and safety.
My enforcer mind reviews the practicalities of the situation. This is a way to control someone who’s become a liability with minimal bloodshed. It’s a cold but efficient solution.
Something softer protests that she is young and doesn’t deserve her choices to be taken away. Her life must now bend around mine in ways she never imagined.
Guilt flickers in my chest. It’s a small flame, and although I acknowledge it, I do not fan it.
Instead, I reach for the pen.
“When do we present this to her?” I ask.
Danyl smiles, satisfaction cool and bright in his eyes. “Soon,” he says. “Very soon.”
As I sign my name, the guilt settles in, like an old injury aching in bad weather.
But underneath it, something else emerges. Something stronger that overpowers the guilt.
Anticipation.
3. CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS
ROSIE
The car ride is the longest twenty minutes of my life.
The driver is polite and silent. His large hands are clad in gray leather gloves, and he grips the steering wheel with familiar ease. Occasionally, his gaze flicks to the rearview mirror, but never meeting mine. Dad bounces his knee and mutters about traffic, about “just a small talk,” about “nothing you need to worry about.” He’s been saying that since he showed up with this chauffeured town car to pick me up to accompany him to a “business meeting” that required my presence. It’s like he thinks repetition will make me not worry true.
It doesn’t.
I twist the hem of my long--sleeved shirt with my fingers. The fabric crumpling under my grip. I’m wearing slightly nicer jeans than I wear at the bar, a black cardigan over the shirt, and my one pair of real boots, the ones that don’t creak with every step. I did my hair. I brushed my teeth twice. I’m trying to look like someone who isn’t terrified.
Like someone who doesn’t know that whatever this meeting is that I have to attend, it will not bring good news. Like someone who doesn’t know that any business meeting my father makes me go to will ruin my future, financially and emotionally.
But he’s my only family. So, once again, here I am, prepared to bail him out. My mind is running sums as I try to figure out how much in debt he might be. Trying to figure out if there’s anything left for me to sell to get him out of another shady deal. Last time, I sold my car and pawned the last of my mom’s jewelry. Neither had much monetary value, but it hurt to let go of mom’s stuff.
The building we pull up to looks like lawyers or architects work here, not loan sharks. Gray stone, dark windows, a brass sign with a generic company name I don’t recognize and could mean anything. A man in a suit stands at the door, on the phone, then steps aside as the car stops.
The door opens from the outside. I’m expected.
“See?” Dad says as he climbs out. “Professional. Very… professional.”
He’s trying so hard to sound calm. His voice cracks on the last word.
I follow him into the lobby with marble floors and columns. A large, round table of the same material displays a giant glass vase filled with white lilies. That, combined with the climate control system set to freezing, makes me think of a funeral home, and I shudder from more than just the cold air. My boots click loudly against the floor, and the air smells of lemon and metal.
In silence, we ride an elevator several floors up and are then escorted down a hallway, past doors with frosted glass, pastportraits of serious men in suits. My palms are damp. I wipe them on my jeans and tell myself I will not cry. I will not break.
My dad keeps trying to catch my eye, but I can’t look at him. If I do, I’ll either explode from anger or melt in a puddle of angst.
