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I was awoken by the sounds of yelling out on the street. I looked at the clock on my bedside table and it was 3 am. Who the fuck is yelling at this time.
I got out of bed and looked out the window and that's when I saw them pulling a man out of the house just across the road from me. I ran downstairs and out the front door, running towards the man who looks like he needs help.
"Get the fuck off him," I yelled pulling at one of the guys dragging my neighbor by his arms. The guy shoved me back hard enough I hit the pavement. My palms scraped concrete and my vision went white for a second.
Then someone grabbed my wrist and hauled me up. Not gentle. I knew that grip.
"Charlotte Lane." Viktor Crow didn't let go. His thumb pressed right over my pulse like he was checking if I was stupid enough to run. "You're up early."
"It's my street." I yanked my arm but he held on. Across from us my neighbor was getting zip-tied and shoved into a black sedan. No plates. No one else's lights came on. Everyone on this block knew better. "What did he do?"
"Borrowed money. Didn't pay it back." Viktor finally let go. He pulled a handkerchief out of his coat pocket and wiped his fingers like I'd gotten something on him. "Sound familiar?"
I didn't answer. My hands were still bleeding.
"Go back inside, Charlotte. This doesn't concern you."
"You're doing this in front of my apartment."
"I own your apartment." He smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. Viktor never smiled with his eyes. "I own your bar tab. I own the debt your mother left when she drank herself to death in my casino. You want to make this about geography?"
I should've gone inside. I should've kept my mouth shut and my head down like I'd been doing for the last two years. But I was tired and my hands hurt and I could still see the guy's face when they shoved him in the car. He looked like Mara did, right before she disappeared.
"I'm paying you back," I said. "Every month. I haven't missed one."
"You're paying interest." Viktor tilted his head. "The principal? That's going to take you about fifteen years at your current rate. You're what, twenty-six? You'll be over forty by the time you're clear. If you don't miss a single payment. If I don't raise the rate."
The sedan pulled away. Viktor's guys got into a second car and followed. It was just the two of us now on the empty street. Streetlight buzzing overhead. Blood dripping off my palm onto the sidewalk.
"I'll pick up more shifts," I said.
"You're already working six nights a week at my brother's bar. You want to add days? Who's going to hire you?" He stepped closer. "You've got my name on your credit report, Charlotte. You've got my money in your veins. No one in this city touches you without my permission."
I knew that. I'd known that since I was nineteen and stupid enough to co-sign my mother's loan because she said it was for rehab. It wasn't for rehab.
"What do you want?" My voice came out steadier than I felt.
"Now that's a better question." Viktor pulled a folded piece of paper out of his jacket. He opened it slowly. I recognized my own handwriting. The payment plan I'd drafted two years ago when I begged him not to take my dad's house. "You wrote this on a cocktail napkin. You remember?"
I remembered. I'd been crying so hard I could barely see. He'd made me rewrite it three times until it was legible.
"You promised me ten percent of your income until the debt was cleared. You signed it." He held it up to the streetlight. "You know what this is worth in court?"
"Nothing," I said. "It's a napkin."
"Exactly." He tore it in half. Then in half again. He let the pieces fall. "I'm tired of waiting, Charlotte. I'm tired of watching you pour drinks for drunks and thinking that's going to square us. It's not."
I watched the paper hit the ground. My chest felt too tight. "Then what?"
He pulled something else out. A manila folder this time. He opened it and slid out a single sheet of paper. Official looking. I saw the word MARRIAGE in capital letters at the top.
"You're going to marry my brother," Viktor said. "You do that, your debt's cleared. All of it. You walk away free."
I stared at him. I waited for the punchline. It didn't come.
"You're insane."
"I'm practical." He held the paper out to me. "Ethan needs a wife. You need a way out. This solves both problems."
"I don't even know your brother." That wasn't quite true. I'd seen him a handful of times. Quiet guy. Worked nights at the ER across town. He'd come into the bar maybe twice in two years and both times he sat in the corner and didn't talk to anyone. "Why would he want to marry me?"
"He doesn't. But he'll do what I tell him." Viktor's smile came back. "Family obligation. You understand."
I understood debt. I understood being owned. I didn't understand this.
"What's the catch?"
"No catch. You sign the license. You show up for the ceremony. You stay married for one year. After that you can file for divorce and walk away. I'll even pay for the lawyer."
"Bullshit." I looked at the paper. It was a real marriage license. Blank except for the names. Charlotte Marie Lane. And on the groom line, already signed in black ink: Ethan Crow. "Why?"
"That's not your business."
"You're asking me to marry a stranger. It's my business."
Viktor folded the paper back up. He tucked it into my jacket pocket. I felt it there like a stone. "You've got forty-eight hours to decide. You sign, you're free. You don't, I'm going to start collecting in other ways. And Charlotte?" He leaned in close enough I could smell his cologne. Expensive. "You don't want me to get creative."
He walked away. Got into his car. Drove off like he hadn't just blown my life into a different shape.
I stood there until my hands stopped shaking. Then I went inside. I pulled the paper out of my pocket and smoothed it flat on my kitchen counter.
The signature on the groom line was already dry. Ethan Crow. I'd seen him sign receipts at the bar. This was his handwriting.
He'd already agreed.
I looked at the blank line waiting for my name. I thought about fifteen more years of pouring drinks and sleeping three hours a night and jumping every time a black car slowed down on my street. I thought about my neighbor's face when they dragged him out of his house.
I thought about Mara. She'd been gone for three years. The police said she ran off. I knew better. She'd been asking questions about the wrong people. She'd been following men in black cars. Then one day she wasn't answering her phone and her apartment was cleaned out like she'd never lived there at all.
I'd found one thing they missed. Her bracelet. The silver one with the little moon charm. It had been under the radiator in her bedroom. I'd kept it. I'd been trying to find out what happened to her ever since. But every lead went cold. Every person who might've known something suddenly didn't want to talk to me.
Viktor Crow's name came up a lot in those dead-end conversations.
So did his brother's.
I picked up a pen. I looked at the empty line. I thought about what you could learn about someone if you were living in their house. If you were married to them. If they thought you were just another debt getting paid off and not someone who'd spent three years looking for her best friend.
I signed my name.
Charlotte Marie Lane.
The ink was still wet when my phone buzzed. Unknown number. I answered.
"Tomorrow night. Eight pm. Courthouse downtown. Don't be late." Ethan Crow's voice. I'd only heard it a couple times. Low and flat like he was reading off a grocery list. "Bring an ID."
He hung up.
I looked at the paper. At his signature and mine. At the forty-eight hours Viktor gave me that just turned into twenty-four.
I went to my bedroom. I pulled the shoebox out from under my bed. Inside was everything I had on Mara. Photos. Receipts. The bracelet. And one other thing. A photo I'd taken outside the ER four months ago. Ethan Crow getting into a black sedan. Same kind of car they'd used tonight. No plates.
Mara's last text to me had been a photo too. A blurry shot of a man getting into a car. She'd written: Found him. Tell you tomorrow.
She never got a tomorrow.
I held the two photos side by side. Different cars. Different angles. But I knew the shape of that sedan. I knew the way they never parked under streetlights.
I was going to marry Ethan Crow.
And I was going to find out what the fuck he did to my best friend.