Chapter 4 The Deal

Elena did not move.

Adrian stood on the other side of the desk. He was not shouting. He did not even raise his voice. But the whole room felt smaller.

"Who told you about Victor Lane?" he asked again.

Her mouth was dry. She could say a friend. She could say she had read it somewhere. But he would see through any lie, and she knew it. Men like him always did.

"Nobody told me," she said.

"Then how do you know?"

"I can't tell you."

"Can't," Adrian said. "Or won't."

"Both."

He walked around the desk slowly. He stopped a few steps from her and looked down. His face showed nothing. She had seen that face once at a funeral, and she had never forgotten it.

"Miss Hart, I run a company with eleven thousand workers. People lie to me every day. You are the first one who told me she is lying and still sat down."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. Be clear."

Elena stood up. Her knees were weak, but she made them hold.

"I can't explain it yet," she said. "Maybe I never can. But I am not your enemy. I don't want your money. I don't want your name. I only want to stand where you stand, and I want to see him coming before he reaches you."

"Why would you care what happens to me?"

Because you were kind to me once, she thought. And you do not even know it.

"Because I think you are a good man," she said instead. "And good men get hurt in this world."

Adrian stared at her. Something moved behind his eyes, small and quick, like a door opening and closing.

"Nobody has ever called me that," he said.

"Then they were wrong."

Silence. The city hummed behind the window.

Finally, he turned and walked back to the desk. He sat down, picked up the same pen, and started to write something on a piece of paper.

"Here is my condition," he said without looking up. "I will ask you questions. Many of them. Over many days. You will answer honestly, even when it is hard. If I catch you in one more lie, I will end this and tell my brother everything."

"Okay."

"You do not get to choose which questions."

"Okay."

"And tonight." He finally looked at her. "Tonight both families are having dinner to talk about the wedding. If you are serious, you will say it in front of everyone. You will not hide behind a letter or a phone call. You will say it to your father's face."

Elena's stomach dropped. In her first life, she had never once spoken against her father at that table.

"I will say it," she said.

"We will see."

He went back to his file. The meeting was over.

At the door, she stopped. She did not know why. Maybe because she was tired of being afraid.

"Mr. Cole."

"Yes?"

"Thank you for seeing me."

He did not answer. But as she left, she thought she saw his pen go still.

---

The dinner was at the Hart house. The same long table. The same white flowers. The same fake smiles.

Elena sat between her mother and Elise. Across from her sat Damien, in a dark blue shirt, looking at his plate. His parents sat beside him. At the far end sat Adrian, quiet and straight, a glass of water in front of him.

He had not looked at her once.

Her father spoke first. Mr. Hart loved long speeches.

"Today is a great day for both our families," he said. "In three days, we will sign the agreement. Elena and Damien, two children who grew up together, will begin a life together. It is what everyone has wanted."

Everyone clapped. Elise squeezed Elena's hand under the table. It was a warm, nervous squeeze. Elena almost felt bad.

Almost.

"Father," Elena said.

Her voice was small, but it carried. The clapping stopped.

"Yes, dear?"

She put down her fork. She stood up.

Her heart was hitting her chest so hard she could hear it in her ears. Twenty-three years of being quiet. Seventeen years of loving one man. All of it was sitting on her shoulders.

She thought of the hospital ceiling. The white light.

Okay, Damien. I won't.

"I cannot marry Damien," she said.

Nobody moved. A glass tipped over somewhere and rolled across the table.

"I am sorry," Elena said. "But I will not do it. I will marry Adrian Cole instead."

For one second, the room was completely silent. Then everything broke at once.

"What did you say?" her mother gasped.

"Are you out of your mind?" her father shouted, standing so fast his chair fell back. "Sit down. Sit down right now."

"Elena," Damien said. It was almost a whisper. His face had gone pale. "What are you talking about?"

Elise did not speak. But her eyes lit up, quick and bright. She thought she had won. She thought Elena was giving Damien to her on a plate.

You think you know everything, Elena thought. You have no idea.

"Is this a joke?" Damien's mother said sharply. "In front of both families?"

"I do not joke about marriage," Elena said.

"Then you are insulting us!"

"Auntie Lin." Elena turned to the woman. A sharp-faced relative from the Cole side, with too much perfume. "I do not mean to insult anyone."

"You think you can just choose a brother like picking fruit?" Auntie Lin laughed. It was a nasty laugh. "She loved Damien since she was a baby. Now she wants Adrian? What is this? She heard he is richer?"

Some people nodded. Elena felt the heat rise in her face. Her hands shook. She was about to answer, but then a chair scraped.

Everyone turned.

Adrian stood up at the end of the table. He did not rush. He wiped his fingers with a napkin and set it down.

"Auntie Lin," he said. "Sit down."

His voice was flat and quiet. But something in it made the whole table shrink.

"Adrian, I only meant—"

"I know what you meant." He looked around the room. "Miss Hart came to my office this afternoon. She told me she wished to marry me. I listened. And I accepted."

Elena's breath stopped.

"Accepted?" Damien's father said. "You did not tell us."

"I am telling you now."

"But Damien—"

"Damien has never said a word to her about love," Adrian said calmly. "Not once. Everyone here knows it. If he had, perhaps this would be different."

Damien flinched. It was small, but Elena saw it.

Adrian's eyes moved to Elena. Just for a second. They were steady and dark, and they asked a question she could not read.

Then he gave one small nod.

It was almost nothing. But Elena felt her shoulders loosen, like someone had lifted a stone off her back.

"The meeting is over," Adrian said. "We will talk again tomorrow, as families. Tonight, let everyone eat in peace."

He sat down. Nobody spoke. Nobody ate.

---

Later, when the guests had gone and the house was dim, Elena stood alone on the back porch. The air smelled like wet grass. Her hands were still shaking, so she held onto the railing.

She had done it. She had really done it.

The door opened behind her.

"Elena."

She did not need to turn. She knew those footsteps.

Damien came to stand beside her. He did not touch her. He looked at the dark garden for a long time, as if it might give him the words.

"You never told me," he said at last.

"Told you what?"

"That you wanted this. That you didn't want me."

"I never said I didn't want you."

"Then why?"

She almost laughed. It was so ridiculous. He had asked her to leave him in his last breath, and now he was asking why she had left.

"I got tired," she said.

"You never get tired." His voice cracked. "You have never given up on me before. Not once. Not when I was stupid. Not when I forgot your birthday. Not even when my father said you were not good enough."

Elena turned and looked at him.

Twenty-three years old. His eyes were red. He looked like a little boy who had lost something in a crowd.

She felt her heart twist. Just once. Just a little.

Then she remembered the sticky blood on her wrist. The flat sound of the machine.

"I know," she said softly. "That's why I'm doing it now."

She walked past him and went inside.

Damien stood very still on the porch.

The wind moved the leaves. A dog barked far away. He did not know why his chest felt so heavy, as if something had been taken from him that he did not remember owning.

Then he lifted a hand to his cheek.

It was wet.

He was crying.

And he had no idea why.