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his daughter. Like breaking a young woman’s heart could pay
for what he’d done. The dreams he’d shattered. The life he
broke.
Claire toyed with a strand of her near-waist length hair. “I
want her as collateral. As insurance that you won’t stab me in
the back again and mess up our deal. With your daughter
under my care, you have to take care yourself. It’s insurance,
so that every single time you get a stupid idea in your nasty
brain, you think about Haley, and you let that idea go. She’s
the buffer between us. The peace offering. Think about it as an
arranged marriage of sorts, without the ceremony and the
contract and the love or the actual relationship. We’re all in
this together if you take my loan. You tried to get rid of me
once and you succeeded, and then you made your bed, and
now you’re coming to me. Tell me, Robert. How would you
like that crow cooked?”
“That’s enough!” he roared.
Jenny twitched a muscle in the corner again but didn’t
move.
“You’re insulting in every way possible, and you expect me
to sign that agreement?”
Claire studied her nails. She had them painted black. It was
the only color worth wearing. Black on black on black and
more black. It had so many benefits. Her clothes looked tidy.
They were easy to keep clean. Black was the color of power,
she thought, and she liked it very much.
“You’ll sign because if you don’t, you’re out on the street.
Now. I already had people look into Haley. She’s in college,
but she can move to online studies. I want her simply because
she’s yours, and one of the only people you truly care about. I
