Debt

"Prue..." my father hissed.

I turned to him, shrugging a shoulder. "You know it's the only way."

"No, honey. We will figure out..."

"Tick tock," Mr. St. James' voice called out, making me shoot a scathing glance at him.

"If there was another option, Dad, trust me, I'd be all over it. But it's either you die or I become chattel to some egomaniac." I heard a snort from St. James and rolled my eyes at him. "He said he won't hurt me."

"Honey, you don't know what he..."

"Nuh-uh-uh," St. James' voice broke in, drawing our attention. "No spoilers, Mack," he added and my father sighed.

"This isn't a movie; it's my life," I shot back at him.

"Not anymore."

That cut off the words on the tip of my tongue as I stood there and bit into my cheek. Because that was true. It wouldn't be my life anymore. I was right when I referred to myself as chattel. That was exactly what I was. I belonged to him. And, what's worse, I had no idea what that even meant.

But because he seemed like a bastard and his house had all the warmth of a glacier in the arctic, I didn't imagine my life would involve my usual trips to the coffee shop in the morning and my long, boring day at the bank, or going home to my economical, but cozy apartment where I would cook when I felt like it, order in when I didn't, and bake until my counters had no space left and I needed to start knocking on neighbors' doors to unload some of the sugary goodness.

Hell, I wouldn't exactly have been surprised if the jerk put a freaking chain on my ankle.

"Honey..." my dad said, reaching for my hands as he shook his head.

"She already made the deal, Mack," St. James cut in, drawing my attention to find his dark eyes on me. "She's going to clean up your mess as I imagine she has had to do quite a bit in her life already. You want this to be the last hard lesson she has to learn on your behalf, shape the fuck up. Miss. Marlow," he said, addressing me though his gaze literally hadn't left mine the whole time he was speaking to my father, "you have until ten a.m. tomorrow morning to get your affairs and order and report here."

He said it as he flicked a hand and turned away from us like it was the end of the discussion.

"Ah, Mr. St James?" I prompted, feeling my father squeeze my hand like he was trying to shut me up.

"What?" he barked, lifting his head with the gun in his hand, everything about his body language implying that he was annoyed by me. Why, then, he wanted me to work for him or something when he obviously wanted nothing to do with me was completely beyond me.

"I'm going to need more clarification about what..."

"You're going to go home, pack up the shit you need day-to-day, quit your job, sublet your apartment if necessary, throw out all your food and shit, say goodbye to your father, get some sleep, get your ass up bright and early and get the fuck back here by ten tomorrow morning. Do I need to be more clear than that?"

Quit my job? Sublet my apartment? Pack my shit?

What the hell?

"Quit my job?" I went with, my voice a weird whisper-sound.

"Yes. Quit your job. You work for me now."

Okay. Alright. I took a deep breath, trying to calm my pounding pulse and the swirling feeling in my stomach. It was just a job. A bank job. It was nothing. True, I had worked there for a couple years and I had a lot of respect from my managers, but I could work at another bank at anytime. I could even save face by claiming a family emergency for the reason I had to quit. They knew nothing of my personal life because, well, who wanted to hire a bank employee who existed around huge sums of money when they had a shameless gambler as a close relative? If anything, my managers would probably be worried for me and tell me that they'd try to save my job for me when I sorted things out.

I could live with that.

"Okay. But... sublet my apartment and pack my things?" I pressed, always being the kind of person who clarified every small detail to the point of it almost seeming obsessive-compulsive and anal. But, what could I say? When you grew up with a man who would say things like 'I'm going to go out for a bit' and I didn't press for how long, I learned it meant that he would be gone for three days straight God-knew where doing God-knew what while I lied to my neighbors and told them he was sick with the flu so no one got the idea to call child services because I was home alone at eleven.