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Chapter 3 THE PRICE OF A MARRIAGE
The conference room on the fortieth floor had walls of glass and a table long enough to hold a funeral. Isabella arrived at five minutes to ten in the same grey dress, because it was the only armour she owned. She had not slept. Around four in the morning she had given up, sat on the edge of her narrow bed with the lamp off, and listened to the pipes knock in the wall like something trying to get out. Now her eyes felt full of sand, and her mouth tasted of coffee she had not drunk. Adrian was already there. He sat at the head of the table with his jacket off and his sleeves rolled to the forearm, a bound document squared before him. He did not rise. He looked as though he had not slept either, and it made him worse, somehow, sharper at the edges, like a blade that has been honed all night. "You brought a pen." "You told me to." "Most people forget." "Most people aren't afraid of you." His mouth moved. Not a smile. "Sit." She sat, and he pushed the document across the polished wood. The pages whispered as they slid. She turned back the cover and read the heading, and a small cold stone settled in her stomach. Marriage Agreement. "Page two," Adrian said. "Take your time." She read. She felt him watching her read, felt it on her face like a lamp turned too close. The language was dry and exact, the language of a man who had spent his life making sure no one could cheat him. Term: twelve months from the date of ceremony. The parties shall appear together at all public engagements and conduct themselves as a married couple. The Husband shall provide residence, security, and a monthly allowance of forty thousand pounds. Neither party shall make claim upon the other's emotions. She read the last line again. Her pulse stumbled. "Neither party shall make claim upon the other's emotions," she said aloud. "That's an interesting way of saying don't fall for me." "It's a legal way." "Is there a clause for you falling for me?" "That isn't a risk." "Then you won't mind making it mutual." His eyes lifted. For a second he looked almost surprised, and she took the second like a coin from the street. "I have conditions of my own," Isabella said. She uncapped her pen with a small, decisive click and drew the contract toward her. "First. Neither of us interferes in the other's private affairs. My calls, my letters, how I spend my time. What I do outside your sight stays mine." "No." "Then I won't sign." "You came to me." "And I can leave the same way." Her pulse beat hard in her throat, but she kept her hand loose on the paper. "You told me to bring a pen. You didn't tell me to bring my dignity at the door." The silence stretched. A pipe ticked somewhere in the ceiling. Adrian's fingers drummed once against the table, slow and thoughtful, and she realised with a little shock of dread that he was enjoying this. "Privacy during working hours," he said. "Not in my home." "A lock on my own bedroom door." "Fine." "The allowance goes into an account in my name alone, and you don't see the statements." "Done." "If you end the marriage early for any reason that isn't mine, I'm paid the full twelve months." "Granted." She blinked. He was agreeing too fast, the way a man lets a tide come in when he knows what's at the bottom of it. She pressed her heel against the carpet until the bone ached. Under her smile her mind turned over and over, searching for the trap. "One more thing," she said, and her voice came out quieter than she wanted. She cleared her throat. "Anything my family is owed. Property, papers, money. If I recover it, it stays mine. Nothing in this contract gives you any claim." The air changed. She felt it on her skin before she saw it in his face. Adrian's hand went still on the table. His shoulders, which had been loose, settled into something harder, and the grey in his eyes went flat and bright. "You think you have a claim." "I think I might." "Against whom?" "I haven't decided." She had meant to hide that clause inside the others, a stone among pebbles. Instead she had thrown it at his chest, and it sat between them, enormous, humming like a struck bell. Her palms had gone damp. She pressed them flat against her thighs beneath the table. Adrian looked at her for a long, measuring moment. Then he picked up his pen. He found the clause and wrote a hard, angular initial beside it, the letters leaning forward as though they were already late. "Whatever your family is owed," he said, "is yours. I wouldn't touch it." It was the gentlest thing he had said to her, and it sat in her mouth like a coin she did not trust. She signed. The nib scratched, loud as a saw. Isabella Rose Hart. Her real name in her real hand. She had lied for three years, and she hadn't expected the signature to hurt. Her fingers trembled as she lifted the pen, and she saw him notice, and she saw him decide not to say so. He signed beneath her. The pen made one swift, dark stroke. "Three rules," he said, and ticked them off against the table with one long finger. "Twelve months. No interference. No love." "Of course not." She capped her pen. "Who would be so foolish?" His eyes held hers. For a heartbeat something crossed his face that she could not read, and her breath went shallow, and the room seemed to tilt toward the narrow space between their chairs. Then he looked down, and the moment cracked and fell away. "The wedding is in nine days," he said. "Nine?" "A private ceremony. A photographer I trust. No guests." He stood, and the chair rolled back on its wheels. He crossed to the window, as he always seemed to when a conversation came too near something real. "My assistant will arrange for your things." "I don't own much." "Good." "You haven't asked where I live." "I know where you live." He didn't turn. "A room above a bakery in Peckham, with your aunt on the floor below." Cold ran down her spine, quick and bright. "You looked me up." "I look everyone up. It would be rude not to." She rose. She gathered her bag, her pen, and the copy of the contract he had slid toward her, and she walked to the door on legs that did not feel like hers. She had her hand on the handle when he spoke again. "One more condition." Her fingers tightened. "I thought we'd finished." "You will move into my family home on the day we marry." Now he turned, and the morning light cut across his face and hid his eyes. "Not after. That day. All of it." The floor seemed to drop. Blackwood House. She had seen it in the margins of old financial reports. In the corner of the one photograph her father had kept hidden inside a book. Honey stone, ivy, rows of dark windows. Every answer she had ever wanted, sitting behind a single front door. It was exactly what she had come for. That was why her skin had gone so cold. "Why?" she asked. "I want you where I can reach you." "And if I say no?" "Then you can keep your pen," Adrian said, "and I'll keep your father's letter."
Chapter list
10 chapters total
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