Chapter 6
1268 Words
"Sign here, here, and initial here."
My lawyer slid the document across the conference table. Elena's lawyer — a sharp woman named Carol who had arrived with a briefcase and the expression of someone who ate contracts for sport — was already marking up her copy in red pen. Elena sat beside her and did not look up at me. She had been doing that since she walked in: looking at the document, looking at Carol, looking at the window. Not at me.
It was fine. I was also looking at the document.
"Clause four," Carol said. "The public appearance requirement. It says required events but doesn't define required. My client needs a clear ceiling. She has a business to run."
I looked at my lawyer, Marcus.
"We can add a ceiling," Marcus said. "Twice a week unless there's an agreed exception."
"Once a week," Carol said. "With a seven-day notice period unless it's an emergency."
"Define emergency."
"Events that directly affect the Ashford Hotels brand or your client's public standing."
Marcus looked at me. I nodded.
"Acceptable," he said.
Elena still had not looked up. She was reading clause seven, I could tell by the slight change in her expression — something tightening at the corner of her mouth.
"Clause seven," she said. Her voice was completely even. "The bedroom arrangement."
The room went slightly quiet.
"When his grandmother visits," Carol said, "they'll be expected to share a room. Our concern is the language around what that means. It's too vague."
"It means sharing a room," Marcus said. "Nothing more."
"Then say that clearly in the document." Carol looked at me directly. "My client is not agreeing to anything beyond the legal and social obligations listed in section two."
"Neither is mine," I said.
Elena looked up. It was the first time since she had walked in. Our eyes met for exactly two seconds. Then she looked back down.
"Also," she said, and she reached forward and crossed out a full line of text in clause seven. She rewrote it in the margin in three clean sentences and turned the document to face me.
I read it. She had narrowed the language, cut a vague phrase my lawyers had used to cover a wide range of situations, and replaced it with something tighter. More honest.
It was better than what I had written. Better by a clear margin.
I did not say that out loud.
"Acceptable," I said.
She nodded once and went back to reading.
"Clause twelve," Carol said. "No-emotional-attachment provision."
"Standard for this type of arrangement," Marcus said.
"My client understands that. She wants the language on record."
"It's on record."
"Then we're fine."
The no-emotional-attachment clause. I had put it in myself, the night before, sitting in the Plaza suite after Elena left. It had seemed like the most important thing on the list. A clean line between what this was and what it could not become.
I had turned down women I genuinely liked because they wanted things I couldn't give them. I had chosen control over everything that asked too much. I had watched my parents dismantle each other with the weight of an arrangement they called a marriage, and I had decided at twenty-two that I would never be that man.
So. No emotional attachment. Simple.
"One more thing," Elena said.
She pushed the document toward me and pointed to a section near the bottom.
"The termination clause. If either party ends it early, the fee is halved."
"Yes."
"I want it changed." She folded her hands on the table. "If you end it early, I still get the full amount. If I end it early, it's halved. You approached me. You set the terms. The risk of you changing your mind is not something I should carry."
Carol nodded. Marcus looked at me.
"She's right," I said.
Marcus blinked. He had not expected that.
"Change it," I told him.
Elena said nothing. But I saw it — just at the edge of her mouth, the smallest thing, barely even a movement. She was pleased and she was working not to show it.
I looked back at my copy of the document.
Twenty minutes later we had a signed contract. Elena slid her copy into her bag and stood up and shook Carol's hand and then mine. Her handshake was firm and fast. The handshake of a woman who had just won two out of three clauses and knew it.
"I'll have Maya coordinate the move-in date with your office," she said.
"James will handle my end."
"Right." She picked up her bag. "One more thing."
"Yes?"
She looked at me directly. It was the clearest she had looked at me all afternoon. "Your grandmother. How sick is she, really?"
The question landed flatly. Not as an attack. Just as a straight question that wanted a straight answer.
"The doctors say six months," I said. "Possibly less."
She nodded slowly. Something moved across her face. Not pity. Elena did not do pity — I had worked that out already. Something more like understanding. Like she knew what it felt like to carry a countdown.
"Okay," she said. "Then we don't waste time."
She left.
I sat back in my chair. Marcus started gathering papers. James, who had been sitting in the corner saying nothing for an hour and a half, stood up and stretched.
"She's sharp," James said.
"Yes."
"She won clause nine too, technically. You didn't notice."
I had noticed. I said nothing.
"Three out of three," James said. He was clearly enjoying himself. "You let her win three out of three."
"I accepted the terms that made sense."
"Mm." He picked up his jacket. "The no-emotional-attachment clause."
"What about it?"
"Nothing." He moved toward the door. "I'll call the penthouse. Get the guest room ready."
"Good."
"Should be an interesting year."
"James."
He stopped. Looked back.
"It's a business arrangement," I said.
"Completely," he said. "Very professional. She did win three clauses though."
He left.
I sat alone in the conference room with the signed contract in front of me and the words we don't waste time still moving around in my head. I put it down to the pressure of the last forty-eight hours.
Marcus came back looking faintly uncomfortable.
"What?" I said.
"The reporter from the Times. Her piece is running tonight." He set a printed page in front of me. "We've seen a draft."
I picked it up.
The headline read: ASHFORD HEIR'S SURPRISE WEDDING: LOVE OR STRATEGY?
In the third paragraph, next to a photograph from the reception, was one line that made something go cold in my chest.
Sources close to the Ashford family say the bride was not the woman originally expected at the altar.
I read it three times.
Someone had talked. Someone who had been in that building had given a reporter at the New York Times enough to ask the right questions. The piece didn't have specifics yet. But it wouldn't take long.
I picked up my phone and called Elena.
She answered on the second ring.
"Have you seen the Times piece?" I said.
A pause. Then: "I'm reading it right now."
Another pause, longer.
"Dom," she said. It was the first time she had said my name like that — without the professional distance wrapped around it. "Someone at that wedding knows."
"I know," I said.
"Who would talk?"
I stared at the line in the article. Sources close to the Ashford family.
Close to the family.
"I'm not sure yet," I said. "But I will find out."
- Writer
