The Wrong Vow, My Perfect Match

Chapter 10

Evelyn

I woke up to the smell of fresh roses.

Apparently Julian had left a surprise bouquet with gifts on my dresser sometime before I woke up, a handwritten card propped against the vase that read: Get dressed, Laurel Classics, ten o'clock, do not be late.

I picked up the card, read it twice and smiled to myself, setting it back down against the flowers.

What was Julian up to now, I wondered, did he want to get me another expensive bag, did he think I needed convincing into one of those boutiques he liked pretending he did not enjoy as much as I did.

I hummed softly under my breath as I padded down the hallway.

“If you say you love me, you're gonna put me in Chanel,” because that was exactly the energy of this morning and I was not apologizing for it.

I pushed Leo's door open gently. "Hey boo boo."

He stirred, pulling the covers tighter.

"Wake up, sweetie," I murmured, sitting on the edge of his bed and rubbing his back.

He rolled over slowly, blinking at me with those devastating blue eyes. "Good morning, mama."

"Good morning, my love, up we go, let us go brush our teeth."

He groaned the way only a four year old who considered sleep a serious commitment could groan, but he sat up anyway and reached for my hand. I walked him to the bathroom, squeezed the toothpaste onto his brush and stood beside him while we brushed together. He met me in the mirror and copied every movement like it was a game we had invented.

By the time Amanda had taken over Leo's bath and I had showered, dressed and checked my reflection one final time, the car Julian had arranged was already waiting at the front. I kissed Leo on the forehead, told Amanda not to let him convince her that three cartoon episodes counted as two and stepped outside into the morning.

Laurel Classics was exactly the kind of boutique that did not need to advertise itself. I spotted Julian the moment I walked in, standing near the back wall with his hands in his pockets, looking entirely too comfortable for a man who claimed shopping was not his thing.

I smirked as I approached him. "You planned a whole morning just to get me in here."

"I planned a whole morning because you have a board meeting next week and you have been carrying the same bag for three months," he replied smoothly, already gesturing toward the new arrivals display.

"I carry it because I love it," I told him, running my fingers along the edge of a structured tote that immediately had my attention.

"You carry it because you are stubborn," he replied.

We moved through the boutique easily, the way people do when they have spent enough time together that silence is comfortable and conversation comes without effort. I was turning over a deep burgundy bag with gold hardware when the thought arrived quietly, the way thoughts about home always did, uninvited and persistent.

"I wonder what my parents are up to," I murmured, more to the bag than to Julian, "where they are, whether they are still at the estate."

Julian glanced at me. "You want to see them."

"Maybe," I admitted.

"That is a bad idea," he replied evenly, setting down the bag he had been examining, "why would you want to surface before you are ready, what if they find out about Leo, Evelyn, remember what they did, remember how they handed you to Charlie without a second thought, how they stood in that room and told you it was a small price to pay, their own daughter."

I said nothing because there was nothing to say to that, he was not wrong and we both knew it.

Julian was quiet for a moment, then he looked at me with a different expression, careful and measured. "Evey, they are not at that house anymore."

I turned to look at him fully. "What?"

"They are planning to sell it," he replied, "to clear a debt, from what I understand it is substantial and the house is the only asset left that covers it."

I stared at him and something moved through my chest that I refused to identify as sympathy. "How do you know this?"

"Because I know people," he replied simply, "and one of them is directly connected to the representative handling the sale, I can take you to meet him today if you want."

I set the burgundy bag down on the display counter and straightened up.

My parents had stood in that room five years ago and told me I was a small price to pay for Serena's happiness, my father's exact words delivered with the calm of a man making a business decision, not a father looking at his child. They had watched Charlie break me year after year and called it necessary. They had sacrificed me on the altar of their ambitions and slept comfortably afterward.

And now they needed to sell their house.

"Take me to your friend," I replied.

Julian's contact was a man of very few words, which I respected immediately. He slid a folder across the table without preamble, tapped the first page and leaned back in his chair.

"Total debt outstanding, page one," he told me, "asking price, page two, timeline for the sale, page three."

I opened the folder and read. The debt figure sat at the top of the first page in clean bold print and I looked at it without flinching, then turned to page two and did the same. Julian watched me from across the table and said nothing.

"What is the current position of the buyers," I asked, flipping to page three.

"Two interested parties," the man replied, "neither has committed, one pulled back last week over the timeline, the other is still in conversation but their financing is uncertain."

"And the sellers, how urgent is their position."

He folded his hands on the table. "They need this concluded within thirty days or the debt goes to the courts."

I closed the folder and set it flat on the table. Thirty days, two uncommitted buyers and parents who had no idea their daughter was sitting across from the man handling the sale of everything they had left.

"I will take it," I told him, "full asking price, cash, and I want it concluded in two weeks not thirty days."

He blinked, just once. "Two weeks is aggressive."

"I am aware," I replied, "can it be done."

He looked at Julian briefly, then back at me. "It can be done."

"Then we have an agreement," I replied, closing my bag and standing up.

By the time Julian and I stepped back outside, the house belonged to me.

I did not feel triumph exactly, it was something quieter than that, something that settled rather than exploded, the particular satisfaction of a plan clicking into place.

"All done," Julian remarked beside me.

"All done," I agreed, sliding my new burgundy bag onto my arm as we walked to the car.

One house down, Charlie and Serena were next.