Chapter 6: You have 24 hours to make a decision
911 Words
OLIVIA’S POV
“So let me understand this correctly.” My voice came out quieter than I intended. “If I agree to marry you, you will pay off every single debt. All of it?”
Jaden looked at me the way someone looks at a question they have already answered.
“Not only that.” He leaned back in his chair, one hand resting casually on the table. “You will move into my home. You will have staff. Everything you need will be handled. No chasing bills. No hospital deadlines. No more sitting in that chair watching your father get worse while you count coins that are never enough.”
He said it all so evenly. No performance. No warmth either. Just facts laid out in a row like he was reading from a report.
“All you have to do,” he continued, “is sign the documents.”
I looked down at the file sitting open in front of me.
The pages were clean and precise. Every clause typed neatly in black ink like this was the most normal thing in the world. Like men asking strangers to marry them over champagne every single day.
I pressed my fingers flat against the edge of the paper.
My father’s face came to me immediately. The way he looked last night reaching for my hand in that hospital bed. The way his voice broke when he said you carry too much alone. The way the monitor beside him beeped steadily like a quiet reminder that time was not standing still for anyone.
And then Adrian came to me too. Uninvited, the way he always did lately.
Six years. Six years and he couldn’t even pick up the phone. Not one call. Not one message. Not even a cowardly text at two in the morning saying I’m sorry, I chose someone else. Nothing. Just silence and a wedding invitation that found its way to the internet before it found its way to me.
I swallowed hard and looked back down at
the terms.
No emotions attached.
No intimacy.
Separate rooms.
No interference in personal matters.
Public appearances maintained.
I read each one slowly. Carefully. Like the words might shift if I stared at them long enough and revealed something kinder underneath.
They didn’t.
“Miss Bennett.”
I looked up.
Jaden was watching me. Not impatiently. Not with pressure exactly. Just watching. The way you watch something you have already decided the outcome of.
“I can see this is difficult for you,” he said. His voice had not changed once since he walked into this room. Still level. Still controlled. “And I can see you are not ready to give me an answer right now.”
He closed his side of the briefcase slowly.
“So I will make this easy for you.” He stood up, straightening his jacket with one hand.
“Walk away. You are free to go.” He gestured toward the door with the kind of calm that made it feel like a dismissal. “I am sure a woman in your position will find another way to raise fifty thousand dollars before the hospital loses patience.”
The words hit differently than he probably intended.
Or maybe exactly as he intended.
Because he was right and he knew it and I knew it and the silence in that room confirmed it loudly.
I didn’t move.
He picked up his briefcase and buttoned his jacket. Unhurried. Like he genuinely did not care either way. Like my answer was interesting to him but not necessary.
That bothered me more than anything else he had said.
“You’re very good at this,” I said quietly.
He paused.
“At what?”
“Making people feel like they have a choice when they don’t.”
Something crossed his face. Too quick to name. Then it was gone.
“Everyone has a choice, Miss Bennett.” He looked at me steadily. “Yours is just more expensive than most.”
He picked up his phone from the table and turned toward the door.
My chest tightened.
I looked down at the file one more time. At the clean black lines and neat clauses. At the two empty champagne glasses that neither of us had touched. At the pen still sitting exactly where he had placed it at the beginning.
Two years.
Just two years.
And my father would be okay.
“Mr. Parker.”
He stopped. Didn’t turn around immediately. Just stopped.
“If I sign this—” My voice caught slightly. I pushed through it. “You pay the hospital bills first. Before anything else. Before I move a single thing out of my apartment. Before any of this becomes real.”
A beat of silence passed.
Then he turned around slowly.
His expression had not changed. But something in his eyes settled.
“Agreed,” he said simply.
I pulled the file closer.
And stared at it for a long moment.
The pen felt heavier than it should have when I picked it up and hesitated again, and I said to him “can I at least sleep on this? It’s a whole lot to think about.” He looked at me and said, you have 24hrs to make a decision, Miss Bennet, until then this meeting is over. He opened the door and left while I sat on the chair confused.
- Writer
