The price of a daughter

--

The law office smelled like lemon cleaner, old money, and lies.

“Sign here, Mrs. Reyes. Initial here. And here. And here. One more time, at the bottom.”

The lawyer’s Montblanc pen tapped the contract. _Tap. Tap. Tap._

Each click echoed in Alina’s skull like a countdown.

She wasn’t reading anymore. She’d read it three times in the car. The words were burned behind her eyes anyway: _...in exchange for the sum of two million USD, Party B agrees to provide exclusive companionship to Party A for the duration of one night... non-disclosure clause binding in perpetuity... no further claims, financial or emotional, shall be entertained..._

“Mom.” Alina’s voice was a thread. She didn’t look up. If she looked up, she’d see her mother’s face, and she wasn’t strong enough for that yet. “We can mortgage the house. I can drop out, work three jobs. There are charities, clinical trials—”

“Mija, listen to me.” Carmen Reyes’ voice cracked down the middle. She covered Alina’s hand with her own. Her mother’s hands were always warm. Now they were ice. “We tried. The house is already leveraged. The trials rejected him because of the infection. The charities have six-month waitlists.”

Carmen’s other hand pulled out her phone. The lock screen was a photo of Dad. Not the Dad in ICU with tubes down his throat. Dad from two years ago, at Alina’s college graduation. Healthy. Laughing. His arm slung around Alina’s shoulders, his other hand giving a thumbs-up. He’d been so proud he cried into her cap.

“He has forty-eight hours, Lina,” Carmen whispered. “The doctor called at 6 AM. Without the Kaine Foundation surgery, the transplant won’t matter. His body is shutting down.”

The lawyer cleared his throat. He was maybe forty, wearing a suit that cost more than their car. He hadn’t made eye contact with Alina once. “Miss Reyes, your mother has executed her portion of the agreement. We only require your acknowledgment. Mr. Kaine’s representative is waiting in the lobby.”

Alina finally looked at the last page. Paperclipped to it was a photo.

Damien Kaine.

CEO of Kaine Industries. Thirty-two years old. Never photographed at galas. Never seen with a woman. Rumored to have acquired his own father’s company at twenty-five and gutted the entire board on Christmas Eve. Net worth: _not disclosed_. Reputation: _merciless_.

In the photo, he stared at the camera like it had personally offended him. Gray eyes, like steel in winter. Black hair, combed back without a single strand out of place. Jaw that could cut glass. Mouth set in a flat line that had never formed the word _please_.

He looked like a statue someone had carved out of a glacier and taught how to ruin lives.

“When does he pay?” Alina asked. Her tongue felt too big for her mouth.

“Midnight,” the lawyer said. He finally glanced at her, and there was something like pity there. It was worse than if he’d been cruel. “Immediately upon fulfillment of terms. Mr. Kaine has a documented 100% fulfillment rate on contractual obligations.”

The way he said _documented_ made Alina’s skin crawl. Like she was about to become a data point.

She thought of Dad again. Not ICU Dad. _Real_ Dad. Dad teaching her to ride a bike, his big hands steady on the seat. _“I got you, mija. I’ll always got you.”_ Dad slipping her twenty bucks before her first date. _“You tell that boy if he’s not a gentleman, he’ll deal with me.”_ Dad humming, always off-key, while he made pancakes on Sunday mornings.

Dad, who now weighed 110 pounds and hadn’t opened his eyes in three days.

Alina picked up the pen. It was heavier than it looked.

_Alina Reyes._ The letters wobbled. The _A_ looked like a child’s.

“Good girl,” Carmen breathed. She was crying. “You’re saving him, Lina. You’re saving him.”

Alina wasn’t sure who she was saving. Or what from.

*7:30 PM — Reyes Apartment*

The dress came in a black garment bag. No brand. No tags. No note.

Just a keycard taped to the front: _The Kaine Hotel. Penthouse. 10 PM. Come alone._

Alina held it up. The fabric was red. The color of warning lights. Of blood. Of the exit signs in hospitals.

It was backless. The slit went to her upper thigh. It would fit like a second skin. It probably _was_ measured to her. The thought made her stomach turn.

“Let me see,” Carmen said from the doorway. She’d been hovering for hours, cooking food Alina couldn’t eat, refolding laundry that was already folded.

“No.” Alina shoved the dress back in the closet. “I don’t want you to see me in it.”

“Lina—”

“Did you know?” Alina turned. Her voice was shaking. “When you made the deal, did you know what it meant? That I’d have to—”

“I knew it meant your father would live.” Carmen’s face crumpled. “That’s all I knew. That’s all that mattered.”

Alina wanted to scream. Instead, she went to the tiny desk in the corner. Her dad’s desk. Where he used to pay bills and help her with calculus. She opened the bottom drawer.

Inside was a photo. Her, age seven, on Dad’s shoulders at the county fair. He was holding her ankles, and she was holding a giant pink cotton candy, grinning so hard her cheeks hurt. _“Highest girl in the world!”_ he’d yelled.

She took the photo. Slipped it into her purse. If she was going to hell, she was taking a piece of him with her.

*9:58 PM — The Kaine Hotel*

The lobby was all black marble and quiet judgment. The concierge didn’t ask her name. He just saw the dress, saw her face, and handed her a private elevator key.

“Penthouse,” he said. Not a question.

The elevator had no music. Just her breathing and the sound of the 80 floors ticking by. 47. 48. 49.

At 80, the doors opened into silence.

The penthouse wasn’t a room. It was a kingdom. Floor-to-ceiling windows showing off the city like it was a collection. Furniture that looked like it had never been sat on. A bar with bottles that probably cost more than her tuition. Everything in shades of black, gray, and white. No color. No life.

Alina didn’t sit. She didn’t touch anything. She walked to the window. The city spread below her, 1,847 lights that she counted once. Then twice. Counting meant she wasn’t thinking about the time. About midnight.

She was on 1,925 when she heard it.

The door.

No knock. Just the quiet, confident _click_ of someone who owned the lock.

Damien Kaine stepped inside.

He was taller than his photo. Broader. Real in a way that made the room smaller. He dropped his keycard on a glass table without looking at it. His tie was already loosened, the top button of his shirt undone. Like he was undressing for a fight, not... this.

He didn’t say hello. He didn’t smile. He just looked at her.

And Alina understood, in that moment, why people signed companies over to him without a lawsuit. His eyes weren’t just gray. They were empty. Like a winter sky before a blizzard. Like he’d looked at the world, found it wanting, and decided to buy it instead.

“Alina Reyes.” His voice was deep. Calm. The kind of calm that comes before something breaks.

“Mr. Kaine.” Her voice betrayed her. It shook.

He moved to the bar. No hurry. Every movement was economical, controlled. He poured two fingers of something amber into a crystal glass. He didn’t offer her one.

“Your mother was very... thorough... in her description of your willingness,” he said. He didn’t face her when he said it.

“My father is dying,” Alina said. The words came out flat. Dead. “That’s the only reason I’m here.”

“Clarity is important.” He turned. Finally. And his eyes did that thing again. The slow, clinical inventory. From her face, down her throat, over the curve of her waist, to the slit in her dress that showed too much leg. Then back up.

It wasn’t desire. There was no heat in it. It was assessment. Like he was appraising a painting he’d already purchased and was checking for damage.

“Then we understand each other,” he said. “The transfer processes at midnight. After the terms are fulfilled.”

_After._

The word landed in the middle of the room like a stone thrown into still water.

Alina’s hands were shaking. She hid them behind her back. “Can we just—” _Get it over with. Please, God, just get it over with._ She couldn’t say it. The words were too ugly.

“Get it over with?” He finished for her. One corner of his mouth almost moved. Not a smile. The ghost of one. “Impatient to be paid, Miss Reyes?”

He set his glass down. No coaster. No sound. He crossed the room.

One step. Two. Three.

He stopped in front of her. Too close. He smelled like cedar and cold air and something expensive that had no name. There was no warmth coming off him. Nothing human.

“Let me explain why I agreed to this,” he said. His voice dropped. It was quiet. The kind of quiet that makes you stop breathing. “It isn’t because you’re beautiful.”

His eyes flicked over her face. “Though you are. Inconveniently so.”

His hand came up. Cold fingers. They caught her chin, tilting her face up to his. He wasn’t gentle, but he wasn’t rough. He was _precise_. Like this was a step in a process.

“I agreed because your mother was desperate enough to put her daughter on a contract.” His thumb brushed her lower lip. Alina shuddered. She couldn’t help it. “And desperate people don’t negotiate terms, Miss Reyes.”

His thumb pressed down, just a little. Just enough to make her lips part.

“They obey.”

The rage was sudden and hot. It burned through the fear. She wanted to bite him. To slap him. To scream that her father was a good man who didn’t deserve this, who’d worked double shifts his whole life and still made time for her science fairs.

Instead, she saw the machines. The tubes. The doctor’s face that morning. _Forty-eight hours._

So she closed her eyes.

She didn’t obey. She _endured_.

She told herself she was somewhere else. On Dad’s shoulders at the fair. Eating pancakes. Anywhere but here.

His mouth was cold when it met hers. Then it wasn’t.

*5:58 AM*

The first thing Alina registered was light. Too much of it.

The second was emptiness.

She was alone in a bed that could fit four of her. The sheets were silk and smelled like him. The ache in her body was a brand. A reminder.

She sat up. The room was exactly as it had been, except for one thing.

On the nightstand, next to a glass with one amber sip left, was a black American Express. No name. No note. No explanation.

Just a card.

Like she was a tab he’d left open and forgotten to close.

Her phone was vibrating on the other nightstand. She almost didn’t want to look. Looking made it real.

Mom. 61 missed calls. 14 voicemails. 22 texts.

The most recent text made her blood run cold: _LINA HE CRASHED AT 2AM CALL ME CALL ME_

Her hands shook so badly she nearly dropped the phone. She pressed call.

“Mom?” Her voice was a broken thing. “Did it go through? Is Dad—”

“Lina!” Carmen’s scream was a raw, wet sound. “He crashed, baby! His heart, the infection, they said the treatment failed! They said if we don’t get him into the Kaine Foundation cardiac unit in the next six hours he won’t make it to sunset!”

The room tilted. “The... the money. The transfer. Did he—”

“THERE IS NO MONEY!” Carmen was hysterical. “The account is empty! I called the lawyer, I called the bank, I called everyone! There’s nothing! Nothing, Lina! What did you do? Did you not—”

The door opened.

Damien Kaine walked in.

He was wearing a different suit. Charcoal. Pristine. His hair was damp from a shower, combed back perfectly. He looked like he’d gotten twelve hours of sleep and closed a billion-dollar deal before breakfast.

He looked _untouched_. Like last night hadn’t happened. Like she hadn’t happened.

He saw her. Sitting in his bed, sheet clutched to her chest, phone to her ear, face the color of the sheets.

He saw the Amex she hadn’t touched.

He saw the tears she was too furious to shed.

His expression didn’t change. Not a flicker of guilt. Not a hint of satisfaction. Not even annoyance.

Just blank, gray, bottomless calculation. Like he was looking at a spreadsheet and she was a number that didn’t add up.

He put his hands in his pockets. And he said four words.

Four words that would echo in Alina’s nightmares for the rest of her life, however long or short that was:

“We need to talk.”

*To Be Continued...*

*Author’s Note*: HE DIDN’T PAY?! HE TOOK HER AND LEFT HER DAD TO DIE?! What kind of monster IS Damien Kaine? Ep 2 drops Wednesday — add to library NOW so you don’t miss Alina’s revenge. Comment “BURN HIM” if you’re ready to watch her destroy him.

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