Chapter 5: The meeting
Anneliese's POV
I feel nothing.
Until we get home.
I lock myself in my room and sank on the floor in my heels and dress, just staring at the carpet like it might tell me something, Belinda knocked gently, once.
“Annie?” her voice is soft. “I brought you water.”
I didn't answer….it seems like I lost the ability to talk.
The door creaks open anyway. She walked in, sat beside me, and placed the glass next to my hand. I still didn't move but I'm glad she's here. She didn't push me to talk; age just leaned her head on mine.
“Everything’s weird now,” I whispered finally. “Everything happened so quickly…. like a dream. I have this feeling he's still gonna come back to hug me….”
“I know, I feel that way too” she whispered. “I keep thinking he’ll walk through the door, calling you pumpkin.”
A broken laugh choked out of me, “That nickname…”
Belinda chuckles softly. “You hated it in ninth grade.”
“I hate everything right now.”
She hugged me tighter. I wanted to cry but the tears are stuck behind this heavy, boiling wall in my chest.
Grief?
Shock?
Rage?
I don't know but whatever it is—it’s too big to fit through my throat.
The next morning, I woke up with a pounding head. I hadn’t even realized I fell asleep. Belinda’s still there, curled on the couch in my room, her makeup smudged, her bun half undone.
There’s a knock at the door.
“Anneliese?” It’s my mother’s quiet voice “The lawyer is downstairs. It’s time for the reading.”
The reading.
I sit up slowly, my mouth tastes like cotton and regret. I slipped into a robe and walk down like I’m heading to my own execution.
Mr. Hargrove, our family’s lawyer, is already set up in the dining room. There are papers, a laptop, a folder with my father’s name in gold print.
My stomach turned.
My mother sat at the head of the table, her posture is perfect, but her hands trembled in her lap. She nodded to me and I sat next to her, and Belinda stood standing with her arms crossed.
“I know this is difficult,” Mr. Hargrove said gently. “Your father left very specific instructions. This reading is to be private—no extended relatives. Just you, Mrs. Rowan, and your daughter.”
Belinda made a move to leave, but I grabbed her hand.
“She stays,” I said, my voice came out flat “She’s family.”
“Very well.”Mr. Hargove said
He opens the folder and clears his throat. “I’ll begin with the letter from your father.”
A recording started on the laptop. My father’s voice filled the room.
“If you’re hearing this, it means I’m not there and I’m so sorry, princess. I wanted to be. I wanted to see you start your real life.”
I couldn't breathe, I really wished I can throw my arms around him and bring him out of the laptop screen but it's impossible.
“But I also made a decision a long time ago to protect our family’s future. And now, that decision falls to you. I made a deal with the Maddox family, their heir, Damien Maddox, and you—my daughter—are to be married. The contract was signed eighteen years ago, when you were our baby .”
Everything around me goes still.
“It wasn’t just a business move, it was survival. The Rowans weren’t always rich, that deal saved us. It saved our name..butt it comes with terms and those terms are binding. If you refuse, everything goes and we might get sued….” My mouth went dry and my head spinned.
“I never wanted to do this to you, Annie. I prayed you’d forgive me someday. I did what I thought was right, I love you, and I hope… I hope you’ll understand.”
The recording ended and the silence that follows was deafening.
I stared at the screen like it betrayed me, like it stabbed me in the chest.
My mother reached for my hand, “I tried to stop it. I swear I did.”
“We ate akwaye together mum, why don't you let me know this dreadful fate earlier?” I asked
“I thought…I don't know….nobody expected him to die, we planned to find a way to—”
“A way to what?” I shoot to my feet, my chair scraped the floor with a loud, awful sound. “You sold me. For what? Money? Status? Is that what I am to you?”
“Anneliese—”
“No.” I shook my head, my chest is heaving now. “Dad told me he loved me, he told me I was his princess, his daughter and the whole time I was just a bargaining chip? A pawn in some stupid rich-people contract?”
Hot Tears burn down my cheeks, I can’t hold them back anymore.
“Now I won't be able to live a normal life, I'm getting stuck in a marriage when my life is supposed to begin, all that to you….Mummy you ruined my life. You both did.”
Belinda stepped between me and the table. “Annie, breathe.”
But I can’t, I can’t breathe. The walls are moving, the chandelier was spinning, the room was too bright and too cold and too loud and too silent all at once.
I ran upstairs, slammed my door, locking it at once.
I screamed into my pillow until my throat hurts.
I didn’t come out for hours.
Belinda sneaks in food, she sits with me while I stare at the wall. Sometimes she talks, sometimes she doesn’t but she never leaves. She doesn’t say “you’ll be okay” or “you’re strong” or any of that fake hopeful crap people say when they don’t know what else to say.
She just stayed.
“I used to envy you, you know,” she said quietly one night, sitting cross-legged on my floor. “Perfect life. Perfect parents. Perfect smile.”
I turned, my eyes are really swollen.
“And do you still think the same?”
“No,” she said simply. “Because now I see the truth, your life wasn’t perfect. It was a performance.”
“What?” I blinked.
“Your dad loved you. I know he did. But love shouldn’t come with fine print, you deserved better than secrets and contracts. You still do.”
I stared at her.
And then I sobbed and she wrapped her arms around me
I'm so grateful for her, without her I don't know what I would have done to myself.
By the end of the week, the media already knows. “Rowan Heiress to Marry Maddox Empire Heir.” It’s everywhere.
But no one asks if I’m okay.
They don’t know I’m drowning.
They don’t know I’m breaking.
They just know the headlines.
But I know the truth.
This isn’t a fairy tale.
It’s a trap.
And the worst part?
There’s no way out.