Chapter 6 - The Marriage Built Around a Property
Ethan tried to explain.
“You’re twisting one sentence.”
Maya’s hands stopped trembling.
For the first time all afternoon, her body became still.
“How long?”
“What?”
“How long was this marriage about the house?”
His face hardened.
“It wasn’t.”
She looked at Beatrice.
The older woman said nothing.
Maya repeated:
“How long?”
Beatrice finally answered.
“Your grandfather was irrational.”
“My grandfather?”
“He refused to sell this property to our family.”
“Why would your family want it?”
Nathaniel stepped in.
“The land borders a development parcel owned by Beatrice’s company.”
Mrs. Sterling opened another file.
A map showed the townhouse and neighboring land.
If Ethan gained control of Maya’s property, Beatrice could combine the parcels and sell them to a luxury developer.
The deal was worth more than forty million dollars.
Maya stared at the map.
“You married me for a land deal?”
Ethan’s jaw tightened.
“That is not fair.”
“Fair?”
“We were happy.”
“Were we?”
He looked offended.
As if she had insulted him.
Maya remembered the beginning.
The expensive dates.
The sudden proposal.
Beatrice’s unusual interest in her grandfather’s estate.
The pressure to marry before probate was completed.
Every romantic moment rearranged itself into strategy.
“You knew who I was before we met,” she said.
Ethan did not answer.
Nathaniel placed an old photograph on the table.
Ethan and Beatrice stood beside a planning map.
The date was three months before Ethan claimed they met by accident.
Maya looked at the man she had married.
“You researched me.”
“I was interested in the property.”
“And then in me?”
He paused too long.
Maya understood.
May you like
The love may not have been entirely fake.
But it had never been clean.
