After His Betrayal, I Became the Woman He Couldn't Afford novel · Chapter 10 of 24

Chapter 10: Nothing Left

I did not sleep.

At seven the next morning I was in the back room of the warehouse, with the prenup spread across a pallet of paper napkins.

Rafe sat on the crate Bea had used, with his sleeves rolled up.

My father stood in the doorway with a coffee he had not drunk.

"Read me page fourteen," Rafe said.

I found it.

I had skimmed it a hundred times, because it was in the part the lawyers always say nobody reads.

"Section nine," I read. "Marital and family assets may be pledged by either party's family against obligations of the other."

"Again, slower."

"If Brooks and I married, anything my family owned could be used to pay anything his family owed."

"Anything," Rafe said.

I put the page down.

"His side of the schedule is blank," I said. "Because there's nothing on it. There's only debt."

"Eleven million dollars of it. Plus a bank loan on every hotel, plus a second mortgage on the flagship."

"His family owns fourteen hotels."

"His family owes fourteen hotels." He leaned forward. "The Kingsburys have been selling rooms for two years to pay the interest. Their last three quarters were fiction. The only way they survive the thirtieth is a fresh pile of cash and someone to guarantee it."

I looked at my father.

He had set the coffee down on the nearest pallet.

"Dad," I said. "Is there anything about the warehouse sale you haven't told me?"

His shoulders sagged.

"The offer came in the week you got engaged," he said. "Nine million, for the old lot. Brooks's father brought the buyer himself. A friend of the family."

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