“You’re young,” he continued, his foolish mind working to make sense of the situation. “And I haven’t heard rumors that the business is in trouble. It isn’t as if you’ll be forced to marry an ogre if you don’t marry one of these men.”
Miss Lira, however, said nothing and instead lowered her eyes, tugging at the fingertips of her gloves, and Aaron’s stomach twisted. But how was that possible?
He stepped forward, shaking his head. “But your grandmother loves you and . . .”
“It’s not her. She’d never. Neither would my father if he were alive.” She clasped her hands behind her back. “But if I want to keep the Lira name on the business, be an active part of it and keep my father’s memory and legacy alive, this is my only choice.”
Aaron blinked. Her only choice? What did she mean by that?
“That makes no sense. Is someone threatening you and your family?”
“That’s none of your concern,” she snapped, fire in her dark eyes.
“If it somehow endangers me and my part of the community, it is,” he retorted. “I may be disposable to you, but I’m still a person and I have a brain, and if there is trouble you aren’t telling me about, trouble that could hurt me or this synagogue and the people who attend . . .”
“There’s no danger to you or anyone else in the community.” She inhaled before sighing. “Though I suppose I owe you a bit more than I gave.” She shook her head as she glanced at her perfect jeweled slippers. “And you’re not just an automaton for me to use, even if I hired you for a particular job, which you did accept.” She gave him a rueful tight-lipped smile that did not reach her eyes. “The business doesn’t only belong to our family—well, belong to me and my future husband, as the Lira portion is the bulk of my dowry. Anyway, we have partners. Another family. Three brothers.”
“The men you were speaking with at the festival. The Berabs,” he whispered as the pieces of the puzzle began to fit together in a dreadful way.
“Yes.” She nodded and sighed. “The middle brother, Louis, is a bachelor. And the youngest, Roger, was widowed a short time ago, and he’s already in the market for a wife. If either marries me, David, the eldest, could control two-thirds, with his brothers controlling the rest, effectively making the company no longer Lira & Berab Sureties, but merely Berab. They could bar me from making any decisions, take our name off the letterhead, subsume us. Erase us.”
“They would do that to you?” He stared at her. But . . . they were partners.
“I wouldn’t have thought so before, but . . .” She frowned. “They’ve made it clear they care about themselves, not us—not when we are weak. And our lack of men of prominence and power is what makes us weak. David doesn’t believe I should have any role in the company.” She knotted her bonnet ribbon again. “Thus, his brothers are the last people I should marry, as they will do his bidding, not mine.”
Which made sense. Except . . . Aaron paused for a moment, recalling the night prior. “Even though you and the younger one are—well, seem compatible.”
“I wouldn’t say we’re compatible, but as a person—I don’t dislike Roger. Actually, I’m reasonably fond of him. There was a time, before his wife died, that I minded his children.” Her eyes softened, and a hollowness crept into his gut.
“And I don’t hate his other brothers. Even David, despite the fact he’s thwarted almost everything I’ve done regarding the business since my father died. That was actually an impetus for the festivals.” A sly smile spread over her face. “I needed a way to advertise and ingratiate myself with the gentiles as an individual, without him undermining me. As he’d never do so in public. After all, he does care for the community, and he doesn’t wish us ill, per se. He just cannot stand working with me. Which, again, means I cannot marry any of them.”
Her inhale was audible as her smile vanished. “However, if I don’t marry someone else with power, I will lose as well.” She shook her head. “They can split the business—something they’re threatening to do the day after Shavuot if I don’t find a husband to fill my father’s role. Many of the clients, especially the gentile ones, no matter how charming I am, will not negotiate directly with a woman—Jewish or not. Moreover, such a path would likely cause us to lose social and political power, hurting my grandmother and Pena. We won’t starve, but . . .”
“But if you join with a prominent man who can negotiate where you cannot, combining his skills with your aptitude, that would make you a force that the Berabs could not ignore . . . giving you leverage to keep the business together, with your family name still on the door. Provided that the man you marry is loyal and cannot be persuaded to join the Berabs, which is why the names you gave me come from my part of the community. They are the most likely to not have any preexisting alliances.”Fuck.Her plan made sense.
His heart squeezed at the unfairness of it all. She really did need him to succeed.
He ran a hand through his hair. “Weiss is . . . not a bad man, but he’s hard to read.”
“Isn’t that what I hired you to do?” She moved closer to him, her voice sharp with intent.
Aaron rolled his eyes. No matter how badly he felt for her, she was not going to expand his job, at least not for free. “You wanted blackmail—”
“Leverage,” she corrected, folding her arms with an adorable pout. “And I still do, but could you possibly find out if he has any additional motivations I need to know about?”
“Like what?” He knit his fingers, glancing at her from the corner of his eye.
“Like connections to the Berabs.” She pursed her lips to the side, flashing her rather attractive dimple. Tempting him to neglect more of his duties at the synagogue in exchange for nothing.
“You can’t ask him that yourself?” he countered. After all, this was really something that could be accomplished better by her. “You are considering making him a member of your family, so one would think you two could talk.”
“My interactions with him are too brief to properly charm him.” Another pout drew his gaze to those perfect, plump red lips and twinkling eyes, both of which were definitely chipping at his resolve to do what was right and sensible. “And while a full interrogation would be more efficient, I lack the leverage, especially if I want to get my way in marriage later on.”
Oy. Was she serious? “I didn’t suggest you browbeat the information out of the man. You do have other methods at your disposal for getting information besides brute force or manipulation. Ones to which Weiss would definitely be receptive, given how he behaved last night.”
“Do you mean seduction?” She twisted her hair before placing hands on her hips as he gave her a half nod. His voice felt stuck in his throat. She paced closer, lines marring her brow. “Weiss would be very receptive, I suppose, but only if he thought that would guarantee a marriage, and I’m not ready. At least without the information, so we are at an impasse.”
“I’d want to be seduced for mutual enjoyment, not as tit for tat in separate schemes to gain dominance in a marriage.” A pang gripped his chest, and he shoved his fists in his pockets. “Though, what do I know?”
