Vows and Debts

Chapter3:His Terms

The man at the door introduced himself as Renzo. He didn't shake my father's hand.

"You have until tonight to pay what's owed," he said.

My father's voice cracked. "I need more time."

"You've had eleven months."

I stood in the hallway in yesterday's clothes, hair unwashed, listening to two men decide my life three feet away from me. My hands found the doorframe before I even knew I needed to hold onto something.

"Settled how," I said. "What does that mean."

Renzo looked at me . "It means Mr. Sabbatini decides what your father's debt is worth.

"I don't even know who that is."

"You will."

My mother made a small sound behind me. She didn't move toward me. She didn't move at all.

"Pack a bag," Renzo said. "Ten minutes."

I had survived a cheating fiancé. I had survived finding out my own parents knew. I had survived being erased from a wedding photo within twelve hours of it happening. None of that prepared me for being told to pack a bag and hand myself over to a stranger.

My legs carried me up the stairs before my mind caught up with what they were doing. I packed with hands that wouldn't stop shaking. My mother stood in the doorway the entire time and said nothing useful. Not an apology. Not a plan. Just my name, twice.

I didn't answer either time.

The car ride took forty minutes. Black windows. Two men up front who never spoke. The streets got wider and the gates got higher the further we went, and somewhere around the thirty minute mark my hands finally stopped shaking and went numb instead, which felt worse.

The house was enormous when we pulled through the gates. Marble floors. Dark wood. Security cameras tucked into corners.

Renzo led me down a long hallway in silence and knocked once on a set of double doors before opening them.

The man behind the desk didn't look up right away.

He was younger than I expected. Thirty, maybe a little past it. Dark hair, a sharp jaw, a stillness to him that made the room feel colder. When he did look up, his eyes moved over me once, slow, head to feet and back, and didn't blink the entire time.

"Vincent Sabbatini," Renzo said, and left, the doors closing behind him before I could ask him to stay.

I stood there because I didn't know what else to do with myself.

"Sit," Vincent said.

"I'd rather stand."

Something flickered at the corner of his mouth. Not a smile. "Everyone says that the first time."

"What happens the second time."

"They sit anyway."

He stayed behind the desk, watching me, unhurried. My pulse was loud enough that I could feel it in my throat.

"Your father owes me a debt," he said.

"Nobody's told me anything about it yet."

"Then let me be the first." He stood, rounding the desk slowly, and stopped close enough that I had to tilt my head back to keep looking at him. My breath caught somewhere in my chest and refused to move. "I can collect what's owed from your father directly. That ends badly for him. Possibly for your whole family."

"Or."

"Or I collect it from you. A different way."

"What way."

"Marriage."

I laughed once, sharp, before I could stop it. "You're joking."

"I don't joke."

"You don't even know me."

"I know enough." His voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. "You become my wife. The debt disappears. You get my name and my protection. In exchange, you belong to this family now. Not the one that keeps using you."

My hands had curled into fists at my sides without my permission. I made myself unclench them.

"And if I say no."

"Then your father pays the way men like him usually pay." He let that sit for a second before adding, "I don't think you want to watch that happen, no matter how little he deserves your concern right now."

He was right. I hated that he was right.

"You have until sundown," he said, already moving toward the door, the decision apparently made whether I'd agreed to it or not. "After that, I decide for you."

"That's not a choice. That's a threat with a deadline."

He stopped at the door and looked back at me, and for the first time something that might have been respect crossed his face.

"Welcome to my world," he said. "Everything in it works that way."

The doors shut behind him.

I stood alone in a stranger's office with my pulse still slamming in my throat, and somewhere underneath the fear was something else I didn't want to name yet, something that felt dangerously close to curiosity.