Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
M onday morning, my ninth day of working straight, I walked from the employee parking lot to Alderton-Du Ponte. I couldn’t shake off the chill as I traced the ridges of my fingers. It wasn’t that cold—mid-forties, pretty good for a March morning—but there was an icy pit in my stomach.
Turn around , the cold feeling said. I should’ve listened to it.
Alderton-Du Ponte’s employee lounge was right off the entryway from the lot, and the second I walked in, I could tell something was wrong. There weren’t even that many employees waiting for the start of their shifts, but the tension was palpable.
Paige, who’d been sitting on a chair near the door, popped up when I walked in. “Did you get one?” she asked in a rush. “Did you get an email?”
“An email?” I unwound my scarf from my throat. “About what?”
“The Christmas bonus!” Paige beamed at me. “I was one of them. Number six! Can you believe it? You’re probably number one, of course, but I mean—out of how many employees?”
“Two-hundred and forty,” one of the other girls, Trisha, said from where she stood at her open cubby. She looked at Paige from the corner of her eye, not even bothering to interject faux happiness into her voice. “Good for you.”
Paige pressed her lips together with wide eyes, looking at me with an oops expression.
So that was where the tension came from. The bonuses.
“They usually do Christmas bonuses and summer bonuses,” I said as I moved past Trisha to get to my cubby. “They’ll do another in July, so it’s a good idea to be on our best behavior for then.”
“Easy for you to say.” Brett, standing near the door, shot me a look. “You get a bonus every time.”
So he didn’t get one either. Awkward.
“Lovey’s been here how long?” Paige piped in, grabbing on my shoulder after I shrugged off my coat. “She knows all the ins and outs—better than any of us. And works her butt off! Of course she’s going to be in the top ten. They don’t call her Alderton Du-Ponte’s Princess for nothing!”
I liked Paige—she was hands-down my favorite coworker since starting here last September—but she didn’t quite know how to read a room. And she didn’t realize that people really only ever called me that as an insult.
“Right.” Brett yanked the door open. “ Princess .”
He left the lounge without another word, and Trisha, after stopping by the computer to clock herself in, also headed toward wherever her station was for the day. It was still ten until eight, but they couldn’t take the atmosphere any longer.
Once all my things were in my locker, I opened my email on my phone, but aside from a coupon for 10% off on Dial I flipped the page.
The print was much smaller. I squinted, leaning closer.
PREMARITAL AGREEMENT DRAFT
This Premarital Agreement (“Agreement”) is made and entered into on [Date], by and between Aaron Astor (“Party A”) and [Future Spouse’s Name] (“Party B”), in contemplation of their upcoming marriage.
Legal jargon went over my head—I was a former musician, not a lawyer—but I could at least understand the first paragraph. Aaron Astor and [Future Spouse’s Name] ? He had a prenup drafted, but hadn’t put in Fiona’s name? Annalise said that Aaron was here to marry, and that he and Fiona were better suited for each other, but were they even that serious? If they’d only started talking in January, then surely not—if so, Mrs. Flannagan would have been bragging up that her daughter was engaged to the son of the biggest travel agency in the country. And why was a prenup attached to an email about his inheritance?
The prenup went on for two more pages, and I skimmed them. When I flipped to the third, I expected another paragraph regarding marital assets, but was instead surprised with the header Segments of your grandmother’s will as it relates to you .
I bequeath the sum of $5 million to my grandson, Aaron James Astor, on the condition that he enters into a lawful marriage by his 26th birthday. Should Aaron fail to marry by this date, this bequest shall lapse, and the funds shall be distributed to the next alternate beneficiary as specified herein.
Oh, no way .
Aaron’s grandmother left him five million dollars, as long as he got married by his 26 th birthday—which was in less than a month.
That was why he was here to get married.
Caroline had been right; it was the Margot situation all over again.
I couldn’t help it. I laughed aloud. What in the soap opera was this?
Really, though, was it worth it to marry her for five million dollars? I mean, sure, Fiona was wealthy in her own right—her parents owned vineyards in France and had dozens of high-end overseas wineries—but she wasn’t exactly a ray of sunshine. Had Aaron fallen for the ditzy charm, or was she just the easiest to convince?
Or manipulate?
When I went to set the papers back down, I noticed that it’d been covering the notepad that accompanied every hotel room. Ink printed its surface by a steady hand, the handwriting cleaner than mine, consistent and crisp enough that it almost looked printed by a copier.
Fiona Flannagan. 27, sole heir of Flannagan Vineyards. Enjoys talking about herself, being complimented. Eagerly talks about marriage. Perfect candidate.
Scrunching my nose, I picked up the notepad, but there was nothing beneath the top page. I’d come this far in snooping; I wouldn’t stop there. I crouched down to peek into the trash, finding neatly creased up pieces in the otherwise empty plastic bin. I unfolded one carefully, finding another paper with that clean scrawl.
Timeline:
Meet – check
Build in person rapport
Physical contact
Propose
I frowned at the rapid evolution of this proposed relationship. The next paper only had one sentence.
Family would finally be impressed.
“Is this place just really that small, or are you following me?”
I practically jumped out of my skin at the sudden voice, jerking my head up to find Aaron Astor standing in his room’s entrance, the door propped open with his foot. He was dressed in far more casual attire than I’d ever seen him in, with a loose gray T-shirt and a pair of black joggers. He hadn’t done anything to his hair, and without product in it, there was a clear wave to the locks as they covered his forehead. His right hand was in his pocket and his left held a to-go cup of steaming coffee from the hotel’s breakfast area.
He took a sip. “Given that you’re crouched over my trash can, I’d say the latter.”
My anger that’d dulled to a simmer earlier lit up at his presence, and I stood. “You can’t naturally be a nice person?” I held up the notes. “You have to write it out first?”
Aaron looked at them blankly for a long moment before his gaze fell to the stapled stack of papers on the desk. His shoulders fell with a slow exhale.
“So you’re at Alderton-Du Ponte for two things.” I crumpled the notes before dropping them in the bin. “To convince the board of directors to keep the music hall, and to convince Fiona to marry you so you’ll get your inheritance before your birthday.”
Aaron’s fingers tightened on his cup of coffee. “You’re truly beginning to get on my nerves, Lovisa.”
“But why Fiona?” I narrowed my eyes a little, trying to piece it together. “Why couldn’t it have been anyone in California?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“Is it because of her money? Because of your financial situation ? Are you broke, Aaron Astor?” I’d just been guessing, but I watched the way he drew in a breath, one that lifted his shoulders almost imperceptibly. I caught it. “You begging your parents not to disown you back in June didn’t work, huh? They cut you off. That’s why Fiona and her parents’ booming business makes them the perfect candidate .”
Aaron looked off to the side of the bedroom, unwilling to hold eye contact. For once, I was the one making him squirm, and I basked in the glee of it—and, of course, the glee of being right. “That’s none of your business.”
“Maybe not.” I gestured toward the trash can. “But does Fiona know you’re marrying her for money? Judging by the googly-eyed look she gave you Saturday, I doubt it.”
“You continue to surprise me, you know.” He walked into the room, and without his shoe propping it open wide, the door fell back against the deadbolt with a bang. “You can stop anytime. It’s becoming annoying.”
I held perfectly still as he came closer. “See, I’m just starting to have fun.”
“I could have fun, too.” He stopped three steps from me. “I could ruin you the way you’re threatening to ruin me.”
“ Right , and how would you do that? No one likes you around here anyway?—”
“I’ll tell them you came on to me while delivering my shirt to my hotel room. It wouldn’t be a big stretch for them, would it? Given your history with club members? Or is that a secret I could spill, too?” Aaron took another small sip from his coffee cup, eyes cutting me across the lid. “Don’t mess with me. I have a lot riding on this, and you don’t want to see me desperate.”
Oh, yeah, the fury I’d possessed when I first walked up here returned in full force. Given your history with club members . Even now, he acted like he had the upper hand, not as though I’d backed him into a corner. “You know, you almost had me,” I said in a low voice. “Pretending to be so much better than others until they actually believe it. You should be an actor, Aaron Astor. I think you would do really well. You have the struggling part down.”
One corner of his mouth tipped up. “You know, you’re so mean to me for no reason. What happened? I thought we had a nice moment by the fire all those months ago. I thought you quite liked me.”
“I did not quite like?—”
“I quite liked you,” he said softly. “I liked how honest you were. I liked watching the way your eyes glittered when you spoke about the cello. Elgar’s Concerto. I liked thinking about what it’d sound like when you played it for me.”
The last sentence unnerved me, because in a ridiculous, mortifying admission, the same thought had occurred to me once or twice. The idea of playing for him. He’d been the one person to awaken that inside me after five years of it being dormant. Even now, all these months later, I could still remember the pure euphoria that’d sparked when he said spiccato .
And it was shameful to even think about now. “I liked you before I knew who you were.”
“Is the name Aaron really that hideous?”
“Not your name. You .” I took another step toward him. Close enough that if I took one more step, we’d be chest to chest. “You pretend that you’re better than others and don’t care about the trouble you cause them. I hate people like you.”
“Perhaps you just don’t know me well enough. Perhaps you’d change your mind if you knew how sad and twisted my insides are.” Aaron gave me a small, boyish smile. “I can show you. If you’d like.”
“You cost me my raise.” My voice shook. “Your stupid little manipulation tactic. Making the ladies at the garden party empathetic so your life would be easier nearly got me fired. So no , I won’t change my mind. And go ahead—tell Mr. Roberts I tried jumping you in your hotel room. I can find a new job.” I eliminated the space between us as my fists shook at my sides. “But I’ll make sure Fiona wouldn’t touch you with a three-foot pole, Aaron Astor, and that’s a promise. And you’ll be broke and alone, and you and I being equals will be satisfying enough.”
In the lingering silence before Aaron replied, I was reminded, inexplicably, of a duet. It was so rare for pieces to jump to the forefront of my mind anymore, but as I stared Aaron down, all I could think of was Samuel Barber’s Cello Sonata, Op. 6. It wasn’t even a piece I’d played before, only one I’d listened to. The intense, fast-paced exchange between the aggressive cello and the abrupt piano hummed in my head now, as if the instruments were arguing, just as Aaron and I were.
I never thought about music—I’d fought hard to silence that side of my mind—but I could hear the notes almost as clearly as if someone were playing them. It only unsettled me further.
“No need to get nasty about it.” Aaron wrinkled his nose, turning away as if suddenly the whole conversation had become nothing more bothersome than a bee buzzing in his face. “Did you ever get that house you wanted?”
I froze. “W-What?”
“That house. Your mother’s dream house.” He gestured at me lazily with his free hand, raising his coffee with the other. “Keep your mouth shut, and I’ll buy it for you.”
I’ll buy it for —I blinked, but the words were still slow to make sense. My lips parted, but I couldn’t speak.
“But only if I get married. Do anything to sabotage it, and we’ll both be empty-handed.”
I held perfectly still under the proposition. My pulse roared in my ears, drumming to the beat of confusion. He was offering to buy the house as long as I kept quiet about his scheme. The flippant offer last June was a real one now.
I wouldn’t have to give up on Mom’s dream. I wouldn’t have to stoop so low to ask Grant. Sure, Mom wouldn’t have probably loved the fact that I extorted someone to get her house, but she wasn’t here to stop me. “It’s—it’s going to auction at the beginning of April. April fifth.”
Aaron thought about it. “I can get the money by then.” Then he scoffed a little. “So it isn’t cheating, accepting my offer now, hmm? Blackmail is easier to swallow?”
It was meant to be a dig, but I ignored it. I should’ve felt hopeful—Aaron was offering me everything I’d spent years chasing. My mother’s dream house, finally within reach. But instead, the pit in my stomach only deepened. The urgency of Samuel Barber’s sonata didn’t come to a satisfying end—it hung there, unfinished, with static in the air. I was making a deal with the devil, threatening him for my own gain, but instead of relief, all I felt was a quiet, creeping dread I couldn’t shake.
“Whatever it is,” I said after a beat, lifting my chin and shoving the sinking feeling away. “It’s a deal.”
“Fantastic. Now, if you don’t mind.” Aaron stepped to the side, near the foot of his bed, and gestured toward his hotel room door. “Kindly get out.”