Chapter 7 – THE PRICE OF BEING CHOSEN
“Yes,” Bianca said.
The answer was so quiet that I almost missed it.
Anna stood beside the dining table, holding Marco’s letter.
“Yes, what?” Marco asked.
Bianca looked at him.
“Yes, I knew you were planning to give Anna the house.”
Anna slowly lowered the letter.
“Then why did you ask me to sign?”
“Because I thought you were making a mistake.”
Marco stared at her.
“A mistake?”
“Giving away a valuable property without considering what it would mean for our future.”
“My mother’s house belongs to my sister as much as it belongs to me.”
“And you were going to give her the rest.”
“Yes.”
Bianca turned away.
“You don’t even hear yourself.”
Marco looked bewildered.
“What am I supposed to hear?”
“That you made a decision about a substantial part of your estate without once discussing it with the woman you’re marrying.”
Anna flinched.
“I didn’t ask him for the house.”
“I know that.”
“Then stop talking like I did.”
Bianca looked at her.
“You may not ask for things, Anna, but somehow Marco always ends up giving them.”
The words landed painfully.
I saw Anna’s expression change.
Not because she believed them.
Because they sounded like something she’d spent ten years trying not to believe about herself.
Marco stepped between them.
“Enough.”
Bianca looked up at him.
“I know you think I’m cruel. Maybe I have been. But I built my business before you ever met me. I’ve worked fifteen years to have something that’s mine.”
“Then why were you using my family’s property?”
“Because I believed there was a better opportunity than letting that house sit empty.”
Marco pointed toward the documents.
“You could have brought us a proposal. We could have discussed it.”
“And if Anna said no?”
“Then it was no.”
Bianca gave a bitter laugh.
“Exactly.”
Anna put Marco’s letter down.
“So that’s what this was about. You wanted my permission, but only if I gave the answer you wanted.”
Bianca didn’t respond.
Marco opened the business folder again.
“Westbridge paid Romano Events ninety-five thousand dollars. For what, specifically?”
“Consulting work.”
“Show me the agreement.”
Bianca stared at him.
“It’s almost four in the morning.”
“Then it’ll be almost four when I read it.”
She studied his face.
Whatever she saw there finally persuaded her.
She returned to the office.
Anna sat down heavily.
I brought her fresh tea.
She looked at the old blue envelope, the bronze coin, and her mother’s brass key.
Three small things.
Each represented a part of her life someone else had tried to control.
“I’m tired,” she said.
Marco touched the back of her chair.
“Do you want to go home?”
She looked up.
“Do you mean my apartment or Mom’s house?”
He hesitated.
She gave him a sad smile.
“That’s what I thought.”
He pulled up a chair.
“Annie, I meant wherever you feel comfortable.”
“I know.”
He looked down.
“I haven’t been very good at knowing what that is.”
“No,” she answered. “You haven’t.”
But she reached for his hand.
It wasn’t forgiveness.
Not yet.
It was an invitation to stop pretending.
Bianca returned with a thick black binder.
She placed it on the table without sitting.
Marco opened it.
The first pages contained architectural concepts and projected renovation costs.
The next section described an exclusive opportunity for Westbridge to negotiate a purchase of the property.
Then came a consulting agreement.
Marco read the payment terms.
The ninety-five thousand dollars was an advance against fees payable to Romano Events if the property transaction proceeded.
If the required owner authorizations weren’t obtained by the agreed deadline, the advance could be reclaimed under the contract.
Marco looked up.
“When is the deadline?”
Bianca swallowed.
“Thursday.”
Anna stared at her.
“My anniversary.”
Bianca said nothing.
“That’s why you wanted me to sign last month.”
“I needed enough time to finalize the documentation.”
“Before Thursday,” Anna said.
Marco turned another page.
His name appeared on a copy of the property appraisal authorization.
Attached beneath it was a note presenting Bianca as the representative coordinating the owners’ participation.
He read the wording carefully.
Then he looked at his fiancée.
“You used my approval for an appraisal to make it look as though I supported a sale.”
“I believed you’d agree once you saw the offer.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“You were planning to give the whole house away.”
“It wasn’t yours to trade.”
Bianca’s composure cracked.
“Do you think I don’t know that?”
Her voice rose, then softened.
“Do you think I haven’t spent years being reminded that everything here belongs to somebody else?”
Marco stared at her.
“I never treated you like that.”
“No,” she said. “You just never noticed how often other people did.”
There was something painfully genuine in her voice.
I remembered how carefully she’d corrected staff who referred to the house as Marco’s rather than theirs.
How she’d insisted on paying for certain things herself, even when he offered.
How she never allowed a dinner bill to sit on the table long enough for someone to see which account covered it.
Pride could be a form of dignity.
But it could also become a terrible kind of fear.
Marco closed the binder.
“Whatever you’ve been through, you don’t get to build your security by taking Anna’s.”
Bianca’s eyes filled.
She looked at Anna.
“I thought the house would be more useful sold.”
“To whom?” Anna asked.
“To someone who could afford to do something with it.”
“I could have done something with it.”
“You have a librarian’s salary.”
“And a brother who was offering to help,” Anna replied. “You never let me know I had either choice.”
Bianca sat down.
For the first time, she looked defeated.
Marco turned to the last section of the agreement.
It contained the financial obligations.
He frowned.
“Bianca, where is the advance now?”
She didn’t answer.
“Is it still in your company account?”
Her eyes filled.
Marco leaned forward.
“Did you spend the ninety-five thousand dollars?”
Bianca covered her face.
When she finally answered, her voice was barely audible.
“All of it.”
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