The price of Glenroth
EMMA
Azriel Thorne didn't react to my words. If anything, the corner of his mouth lifted in what might have been amusement on a warmer man. On him, it resembled a predator acknowledging worthy prey.
"Direct," he said, stepping over the threshold without being invited. "I appreciate that."
I didn't move aside. We stood inches apart in the doorway, the wind whipping my hair across my face. Up close, he was even more unsettling. Perfect. Every line of him was deliberate—the sharp cut of his jaw, the precise knot of his tie, the way his coat fell without a single wrinkle. He looked like he'd been designed rather than born.
"You're blocking my entrance," he noted, his tone mild but his eyes glacial.
"You're trespassing on my home."
"Technically," he said, pulling a folded document from his inner pocket, "as of three hours ago, I own fifty-one percent of this estate. So I'm trespassing on my own property."
The paper crackled between us like a gunshot. I wanted to rip it from his hands, throw it in the wind, and watch it disappear over the hills. Instead, I stepped back, jaw clenched.
"Please," I said, the word tasting like ash. "Do come in."
He moved past me with the same fluid grace I'd seen through the window. Everything about him was controlled and measured. Even the way he looked around the entrance hall—taking in the faded tapestries, the worn stone, and the portrait of my ancestor in Highland regalia—felt like an appraisal. It was like he was already calculating resale value.
My father emerged from the library, his face pale and anxious. "Mr. Thorne. Welcome. I hope your journey from—"
"Let's skip the pleasantries, Baron MacKinnon." Azriel's voice cut through the space with surgical precision. "We both know why I'm here. The question is whether your daughter has been informed of the arrangement."
"Arrangement." I closed the heavy door, shutting out the wind. "You mean the clause that treats me like a medieval chattel?"
"Emma," my father warned, his voice pleading.
But Azriel turned to me fully, those sea-green eyes pinning me in place. "Not chattel. An investment. There's a significant difference."
"Is there?" I crossed my arms, feeling the dried paint crack on my skin. "From where I'm standing, you've bought a crumbling estate and demanded a wife as part of the package. That sounds remarkably like something from the sixteenth century."
"The sixteenth century didn't have ironclad prenuptial agreements, termination clauses, or financial compensation structures." He slowly removed his gloves, one finger at a time. "This is a business transaction, Miss MacKinnon. Two years of a public marriage. Separate residences. Minimal personal interaction required outside of necessary social appearances. In exchange, Glenroth's debts are cleared, a trust fund is established for ongoing maintenance, and you receive a settlement of five million pounds at the end of the contract."
The number hung in the air like smoke. Five million pounds. Enough to never worry again. Enough to paint without the weight of generations pressing down on my shoulders.
"And what do you get?" I asked quietly.
"Legitimacy." The word was flat and emotionless. "My business ventures in Scotland require a certain… social acceptance. An alliance with one of the oldest families in the Highlands provides that. The marriage makes it palatable. Traditional. Romantic, even, if we play it correctly."
"Romantic," I repeated, tasting the bitterness. "You've clearly never read a romance novel."
"I've read the contract. That's sufficient." He handed the document to my father, who took it with trembling hands. "Your father's signature is already on it. I need yours, Miss MacKinnon. Tonight."
Tonight. The word echoed through the hall, through my chest, through every desperate corner of my mind that searched for another way out.
"And if I refuse?"
Azriel's expression didn't change. "Then the estate defaults. The bank forecloses. Glenroth is auctioned piece by piece. Your father loses everything, including his title. The land is broken up and sold to developers." He paused, letting each word land like a blow. "I've already researched potential buyers. There's particular interest in converting the main house into luxury flats."
I felt my father flinch behind me. The brutal image Azriel painted was strikingly clear. Glenroth, carved up and sold. Strangers walking through these halls. The land, tended by MacKinnons for four hundred years, divided and destroyed.
"You're a bastard," I said softly.
"I'm a businessman." He moved toward the library, clearly familiar with the layout from whatever research he'd done. "And I'm offering you a choice. Two years of inconvenience, or a lifetime of regret. I know which one I'd choose."
I followed him, fury and helplessness battling in my chest. He stood in front of the empty fireplace where my father had been sitting. Somehow, he looked more like the laird than my father ever had. Commanding. Certain.
"I need time," I said. "To read the contract. To consult a lawyer."
"You have until midnight." He checked his watch, a sleek silver thing that probably cost more than our tractor. "I'm staying at the Glenroth Arms. The contract will be delivered to you within the hour. Read it. Sign it. Or don't." He turned to face me, and for a moment, something flickered in his eyes. Not warmth, but curiosity perhaps. "But know this, Emma MacKinnon. I always get what I want. The only variable is how much it costs everyone involved."
He walked past me and my father, toward the door. I should have let him go. Should have stayed silent and dignified. But the artist in me, the part that saw things others missed, caught something in the set of his shoulders. A tension. A crack in the perfect facade.
"Why?" I called out.
He stopped, hand on the door. "Why what?"
"Why marriage? You're a billionaire. You could buy legitimacy in many other ways. Why this? Why me?"
Azriel turned, and in the fading light from the window, his face was half in shadow. When he spoke, his voice was different. Quieter. Almost honest.
"Because marriages end, Miss MacKinnon. Cleanly, legally, with defined terms. But some debts…" He glanced around the hall, at the portraits of my ancestors, at the stone that had stood for centuries. "Some debts never disappear. This way, we both know exactly when we're free."
The door closed behind him with a soft click. The purr of his car faded into the distance. I stood in the hallway, my father's ragged breathing the only sound, and felt the weight of the choice settling onto my shoulders like a yoke.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. A message from an unknown number: Contract attached. Clock is ticking. - AT
I opened the attachment with shaking hands. Page after page of legal text, clauses and sub-clauses, defining every moment of the next two years of my life. My eyes caught on phrases: "conjugal rights expressly waived," "public appearances minimum twelve per annum," "termination penalty clauses."
And there, on page seventeen, a clause that made my blood run cold:
"In the event of pregnancy, all terms are void and custody arrangements default to—"
My father's hand touched my shoulder. "Emma, mo chridhe, I'm so—"
"Don't." I pulled away, scrolling through the document, my heart racing. "There's a pregnancy clause, Dad. He's thought of everything. Even that."
"It's just a precaution. It won't—"
"How do you know?" I spun to face him, seeing him clearly for the first time in years. Not as my father, but as a man who'd gambled everything and lost. "How do you know what this man is capable of?"
He had no answer. Just guilt, heavy and suffocating, filling the space between us.
I looked down at my phone, at the contract that would save everything and cost me something I couldn't yet name. The cursor blinked at the bottom, waiting for my signature.
My hands still smelled like paint and turpentine. Like freedom. Like a life I'd never quite had but always dreamed of.
I thought of Azriel Thorne's words: I always get what I want.
And I wondered, as the Highland darkness fell around Glenroth like a shroud, what would happen when an unyielding billionaire met an unmovable woman who had absolutely nothing left to lose.
My finger hovered over the screen.
Outside, thunder rolled across the hills.
And somewhere in the village below, Azriel Thorne was already planning our wedding.