Chapter 2: Can We Negotiate
The business card felt like it was burning a hole in the pocket of her jeans for three days. Annie carried it with her through every chore, its presence a low, constant hum beneath the sweat and grit. She’d find herself fingering its sharp corner while wrestling a bale of hay, or staring at it where she’d left it on the kitchen counter, next to the jar of bacon grease.
On the fourth morning, after another night of fractured sleep, she’d had enough. The silence was worse than the answer. She washed her hands at the outside pump, the icy water shocking her wrists, and pulled the card out. The number was written in a firm, black script. No name, no company. Just ten digits that felt like a tripwire.
She took her old cordless phone out onto the back porch steps, where the reception was best. She dialed before she could think about it.
It rang once. Twice.
“Levi Barrow.”
His voice was different on the phone. Flatter, all business. It made it easier.
“It’s Annie.” She didn’t say Carol Ann. “Miller.”
A pause. She could picture him in some glass office, turning away from a computer screen. “Annie. I was wondering if you’d call.”
“Cut the crap, Levi.” The words came out rougher than she intended, fueled by a week of sleepless nights. “I’m not made of wife material. You know that. I’m rough. I’m hard. I’m stubborn as a stump. I don’t own a dress that isn’t meant for church, and I haven’t been since Mom died. I smell like manure and diesel half the time. I can’t make small talk to save my life.”
She took a breath, the air smelling of cut grass and damp earth. “But if you’re set on buying a lame horse, I’m not going to stand in your way. I just need to know how this stable is gonna get built. Explain it to me. Plain.”
On the other end, she heard the squeak of a chair, then silence. When he spoke again, the polished edge was gone, replaced by something quieter, more deliberate. “Alright. Plain. I have my lawyer draw up a private contract. Not a prenup, exactly. A binding agreement between us. The terms are simple. We agree to be married, in a legal ceremony, one year from the date the contract is signed. We remain legally married for a minimum of five years after that.”
He spoke slowly, like he was reading from a page. “During that year, and for the duration of the marriage, I cover all your family’s outstanding debts. Medical, agricultural, everything. I establish a line of credit for the farm’s operating costs, managed by you. You hire the help you need. The land title stays solely in your name. It’s never part of my assets.”
Annie’s grip on the phone was tight. It sounded like a fairy tale. A devil’s fairy tale.
“And if I change my mind?” she asked, her voice dry.
“Then the agreement is void.” His tone didn’t change. “All financial support stops immediately. Any debts incurred revert to you. And ownership of the land transfers to me, free and clear, as liquidated damages for breach of contract. No payout. No second chances.”
The words liquidated damages sounded foreign and cruel. He’d take it. If she backed out, he’d just take it. The five-year minimum meant six years total. Six years of being tied to him. Six years of playing wife.
“What does ‘being married’ mean?” The question was blunt, necessary. “You want… kids?”
Another pause, longer this time. “The contract would specify that. It would be a marriage in name and legal standing. A partnership. The physical aspects… would be at your discretion.”
At your discretion. The phrase was so careful it felt like a trap. “My discretion,” she repeated, not a question.
“Yes.” A single word, giving nothing away.
She looked out at the barn, at Jasper’s successor, a young border collie named Pip, chasing his tail in a circle of dust. She thought of her father’s face, pale against the hospital pillow. She thought of the bank man’s smug smile. She thought of six years.
“You’d live here?” The idea was absurd.
“No. My business is in the city. I’d visit. Periodically. We’d need to be seen together sometimes. For appearances.”
A business arrangement. A merger. He got a wife from the land he’d always wanted. She got to keep the land. That was the trade. Her life, her freedom, for the dirt and the trees and the morning light over the fields.
The resignation that settled over her wasn’t peaceful. It was a heavy, smothering blanket. She felt the fight go out of her, not in a surge, but in a slow, cold leak.
“Alright,” she said, the word tasting of ashes.
“Alright?”
“Draw up your paperwork. Bring it by.”
“I can have it ready by the end of the week.”
“Fine.” She was about to hang up.
“Annie.” He stopped her. His voice softened, just a fraction. “It doesn’t have to be a cage.”
“Funny,” she said, no humor in it at all. “That’s exactly what it sounds like.” She pressed the END button and held the phone in her lap for a long time, listening to the bees in the clover.
He came on Friday, just after noon. This time, he wasn’t in the silver sedan. He drove a black truck, new and expensive, but a truck nonetheless. It was a concession, and she hated him for it.
She was in the workshop, welding a broken tine back onto a harrow. The sparks flew in bright, angry arcs. She saw the truck through the open door, killed the torch, and lifted her mask. She didn’t go out to meet him.
He came to the doorway, a slim leather folio in his hand. He was dressed down—dark jeans, a grey button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled. He still looked like he’d never done a real day’s work, but he looked less like a shark. More like a fox.
“Still fixing everything yourself?” he asked, leaning against the doorjamb.
“Until I can’t,” she said, pulling off her thick gloves. She nodded at the folio. “That it?”
“It is.” He stepped inside, his eyes adjusting to the dim light. The workshop was chaos—tools hanging, parts scattered, the air smelling of metal, oil, and old wood. It was the complete opposite of his world. He pulled two folded document sets from the folio, each thick with paper. “Two copies. One for you, one for me. You should have a lawyer look at it.”
“I can’t afford a gallon of milk, Levi. You think I’ve got a lawyer on retainer?” She took the papers. They were heavy. “I’ll read it myself.”
“Suit yourself. The key clauses are highlighted. Page three outlines the financial commitments. Page seven details the land title retention. Page twelve specifies the marriage terms and duration. The breach conditions are on the last page.”
She flipped to the last page, her eyes scanning. The language was dense, legal. But the meaning was clear: …claimant shall forfeit all right, title, and interest in the property described in Exhibit A…
Forfeit. She looked up at him. “You thought of everything.”
“It’s what I do.” He walked over to her old workbench, brushing a layer of dust off the edge before leaning against it. “It’s a good deal, Annie. For both of us. You save your farm. I get…”
“What?” she challenged, putting the papers down on an anvil. “What do you get? A wife who barely knows you? A piece of property you couldn’t buy outright?”
His jaw tightened. The pleasant mask slipped, showing the hard ambition beneath. “I get stability. A rooted life. Something real. You think I like those glass towers? You think I like talking to people who value a stock portfolio over a good harvest? This,” he said, gesturing vaguely toward the fields beyond the shop walls, “this is what’s real. And you’re the realest thing in it.”
Annie looked at him doubtfully, her gaze sharp enough to chip stone. He cleared his throat, adjusting his stance on the dusty bench. “There was one change from when we spoke on the phone,” Levi said, his voice regaining its boardroom evenness. “A practical one. Until the wedding, you’ll have to live in the city. With me.”
A dry, humorless laugh escaped her. “So that’s the play. Get me off my land, get me into your apartment, and then what? Try to get in my pants for a year until you get bored and trigger some fine print to take the farm anyway?”
“No.” The word was quick, firm. “The property transfer clause is only triggered if you call off the arrangement. My expectations are for you to… acclimatize. To learn the life you’ll be expected to lead. It’s part of the deal.”
“Your ‘expectations’,” she echoed, tasting the word. It sounded like a collar. She looked from his unreadable face down to the dense paragraphs of the contract on the anvil. Her future was ink on paper. She picked up a grease-stained pen from a coffee can full of screws.
Without another word, she flipped to the last page. She bent over the anvil, her braid falling over her shoulder, and signed Carol Ann Miller with a slow, deliberate hand that shook only once. She did it again on the second copy. The scratch of the pen was the loudest sound in the world.
She straightened up and pushed both documents toward him. “Wait,” she said, her voice low. “Before you sign those.”
He paused, his own pen poised. She took a step back from the workbench, into a patch of weak light from the high window. The workshop was well-used and dirty, tools and rusted parts scattered like skeletons. Annie had streaks of dirt and grease on her face and arms, her tank top was smudged with oil, and her jeans were frayed at the hem.
“You’re a businessman,” she said, her tone flat, practical. “You should be given the opportunity to inspect the livestock before you purchase it. A vet check. Assess the goods.”
Levi stared, his brow furrowing slightly. “What are you talking about?”
She held his gaze and reached for the hem of her tank top. She pulled it up and over her head in one stiff motion, dropping the stained fabric to the concrete floor. The air in the shop was cool against her skin. “Healthy conformation,” she stated, her voice devoid of emotion. She unclasped her plain bra, letting it fall. “Sound udders. No disease.”
Levi’s breath caught. He didn’t move.
Her hands went to the button of her jeans. The denim was stiff. She shoved them down over her hips, stepping out of them, then hooked her thumbs into the waistband of her cotton briefs. She pushed them down her thighs and kicked them aside. She stood fully nude in the dusty light, motes of sawdust drifting around her like a foul halo. She did not cover herself. Her skin was a map of sun and work, pale where her clothes had been, marked by a fading yellow bruise on her hip from a fencepost.
“Strong legs,” she continued, the auctioneer’s cadence chillingly accurate. “Good bone structure. No permanent defects.” She turned a slow, mechanical quarter-turn, presenting her profile. The calluses on her hands were visible from across the room. She turned back to face him, her face a mask of grim offering. She met his eyes, which had darkened from calculation to something raw and hungry.
“And one final selling point,” Annie said, the clinical tone fracturing for just a second, letting the sheer, terrifying vulnerability beneath show through. “The livestock is still a virgin. Untouched. That’s got to be worth something extra in a deal like this, doesn’t it?”
The words hung in the oily air. Levi slowly placed his pen down on the contract. The sound was final. He pushed the folio aside, his movements deliberate, and took a step toward her. Then another. He stopped an arm’s length away, his eyes traveling over her body not as a lover, but as a man who had just had an asset confirmed.
“It does,” he said, his voice a rough scrape.
He closed the distance. His hands, clean and smooth, came up to frame her face, his thumbs smearing the grease on her cheekbones. He studied her eyes, looking for hesitation, for a lie. She gave him nothing but bleak resolve. He kissed her. It wasn’t gentle. It was a claim. His mouth was hard on hers, demanding entry. She opened for him, tasting coffee and ambition. His tongue pushed into her mouth, and she forced herself not to recoil, to stand there and take it.
One hand slid from her face down the column of her throat, over the ridge of her collarbone, and closed roughly over her breast. He kneaded the firm flesh, his thumb scraping over her nipple until it peaked tight and painful. A sharp gasp escaped her, lost in his mouth. He broke the kiss, his breath hot on her cheek. “You understand this is part of it,” he muttered, not a question. His other hand slid down her back, pressing her pelvis against the growing hardness in his jeans. “The expectations. This is what you’re signing up for.”
“I read the contract,” she managed to say, her voice strained.
He walked her backward until the small of her back hit the cold, rough edge of the heavy workbench. The shock of the cold metal on her skin made her jump. “Hold onto the edge,” he commanded softly.
She gripped the weathered wood, her knuckles whitening. He unbuckled his belt, the rasp of leather and metal loud in the quiet. He unbuttoned his jeans, shoved them down just enough. He was already fully hard, his cock thick and urgent. He spat into his palm, a crude, wet sound, and smoothed it over himself. He didn’t look at her face. His gaze was fixed where their bodies would join.
He hooked his hands under her thighs, lifting her with a grunt of effort. Her back scraped against the bench as he hauled her onto it, her bare ass on the cold, dirty surface. He pushed her legs apart, standing between them. The head of his cock pressed against her, a blunt, insistent pressure where she was untouched and dry.
“This will hurt,” he said, and it was the only warning he gave.
He pushed into her with one relentless thrust.
A white-hot spike of pain tore through her. She cried out, a short, sharp sound that echoed off the tin roof. Her body seized, clamping down in instinctive, fierce rejection. He was buried inside her, a solid, unforgiving invasion. He didn’t move, letting her body struggle to accommodate him, her inner muscles fluttering wildly around his shaft. He dropped his forehead against her shoulder, his breathing ragged.
“Fuck,” he groaned into her skin. “You really were.”
Tears welled in her eyes from the pain and the sheer, shocking fullness. She stared past his head at a rusty chainsaw hanging on the wall. She bit down on her own lip, the metallic taste of blood mixing with the taste of him still in her mouth.
He began to move. Slow, deep, punishing strokes that dragged against her raw, protesting flesh. The burning pain receded slightly, replaced by a deep, bruised aching and a strange, unwanted friction that sparked something low in her belly. She hated it. She hated the slick, wet sound their bodies made. She hated the heat building in her own core, a traitorous response to the rhythmic, claiming push of him.
His pace quickened. His hands gripped her hips hard enough to leave bruises, his fingers digging into the muscle there. The workbench shuddered with each thrust, tools rattling. He fucked her with a focused, intense silence broken only by his grunts and the slap of skin. She felt him swelling inside her, his rhythm becoming erratic, frantic.
“Look at me,” he growled.
She forced her eyes to his. His face was strained, pleasure and something like fury twisting his features. Seeing her look at him seemed to undo him. He slammed into her one last time, his body rigid. A hot, liquid rush flooded her insides as he came with a choked, guttural sound. He held himself there, pulsing, for several long seconds.
Then it was over. He slipped out of her, a sudden emptiness followed by a hot trickle down her thigh. He braced his hands on the bench on either side of her, head hanging, breathing heavily. The smell of sex and sweat and grease filled the space between them.
Slowly, he righted his clothes, tucking himself away with practiced efficiency. He didn’t look at the mess he’d left on her or on the bench. He turned and walked back to the contract. He picked up his pen.
He signed both copies with a swift, decisive signature. He blotted them, slid one set back into the folio, and left the other on the anvil next to her pile of clothes.
“The moving truck will be here Monday,” he said, his voice even again, as if he’d just concluded a standard meeting. He didn’t look back at her as he walked out of the workshop.
Annie didn’t move from the bench. The cold was seeping into her bones. She looked at the contract, then down at the sticky wetness on her inner thigh, at the angry red marks beginning to form on her hips. The deal was sealed. In every possible way.
She slid off the bench, her legs trembling. She dressed slowly, each article of clothing feeling like a shield returning to place over a wound. She picked up her copy of the contract.
It was done. The ink was dry, her body was sore in a new and profound way, and the next three days were a fog of brutal practicality. She told Billy, who just shook his head and spat into the dirt, but stayed. She visited her father, sitting by his bed and holding his limp hand while machines beeped softly. She told him the bank was taken care of, that help was coming, that the farm was safe. She didn’t mention Levi’s name. She couldn’t make her lips form the words.
The reality of leaving hit Sunday night as she stood in her empty-feeling room. Her few good clothes were in a duffel bag, but the rest of her life—her mother’s cookbooks, her father’s fishing trophies, the vast, accumulated weight of home—felt impossible to box up by morning. She felt a sharp, panicky need to exert some control, to prove she wasn’t just being swept away.
She called Levi.
“I can’t,” she said, the words tumbling out fast. “I can’t pack everything by tomorrow. It’s too much. There’s… things. My things. I need more time.”
“Annie.” His voice was calm, a little distracted. She heard the faint clack of a keyboard in the background.“Stop. Don’t worry about packing. Not a single box. I’ve hired a service. They’ll handle everything with an inventory. Your focus needs to be on the farm. Find the right field hands. Interview them. Hire three, like we discussed. That’s your job. Do you understand?”
She stood in her kitchen, the receiver pressed to her ear, her free hand gripping the worn countertop. The order was clear, his assumption of authority absolute. It drained the fight from her, replacing it with a numb efficiency. “Yeah,” she said. “I understand.”
“Good. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She spent Monday morning in the barn with Billy, interviewing local boys and older men looking for steady work. She chose two brothers with solid references and an older fellow named Gus who’d managed a dairy. She gave them instructions, showed them the routines, her voice sounding hollow to her own ears. It felt like handing over her own heartbeat.
At noon, two pristine white vans rolled up the driveway. Eight men in matching polos emerged, moving with a quiet, terrifying efficiency. They laid down cloth runners over her floors. They wrapped each chipped plate, each framed photo, each piece of furniture in crisp white paper. They labeled every box with a neat, printed code. Her life was packaged and carried out in under an hour, the farmhouse stripped to its bones and echoes.
She stood on the porch, feeling like a ghost in her own home, watching the last van pull away. Dust settled in its wake. Then Levi’s black truck appeared, turning in from the main road. It was perfectly timed, as if he’d been waiting just out of sight. He pulled up where the movers had been, got out, and looked at her. He was back in a suit, charcoal grey, the city once again reclaiming him.
“Ready?” he asked. No small talk. No comment on the emptiness behind her.
Annie picked up her duffel bag, the only thing she’d been allowed to touch. She looked back once at the farmhouse, a shell now, then walked to the truck and got in. The leather seat was cool and unfamiliar. The air inside smelled of new car and his cologne. He didn’t speak as they drove. The familiar landscape blurred past, then faded into the stranger, faster roads leading to the city.
Their first stop was not an apartment. It was a building of frosted glass and soft, waterfall sounds. A discreet sign read Solace. Levi led her through the hushed, cool air to a VIP desk of pale maple. A woman with a perfect blonde bun and a face that showed no pores smiled warmly.
“Mr. Barrow. Everything is prepared for Ms.Miller. Your eleven o’clock is waiting at the office.”
“Thank you, Camille.” Levi turned to Annie. His hand came up, not to touch her face, but to briefly tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear. The gesture was possessive, performed for the watching staff. “I have meetings all day. Camille will take excellent care of you. Do everything they recommend. It’s part of the acclimatization.”
He left. Just like that. Camille’s smile never wavered. “Right this way, Ms.Miller. We’re so pleased to have you.”
Annie was led into a soft-lit changing room and given a plush robe and slippers. She was then guided into a series of serene, scented rooms. She was silent throughout, a piece of clay being reshaped. The thick, warm mud of the bath coated her, then was rinsed away by attentive hands she couldn’t see. The massage was deep, skilled fingers kneading out knots of stress and labor she’d carried for years. Her calloused hands were soaked, filed, buffed, until her nails were smooth ovals. The same was done to her feet.
Then came the more intimate appointments. In a sterile, clean room, a polite technician explained the laser process. Annie lay back on a table, the robe open, exposed. The hum of the machine, the sharp, hot pricks of light against her most private skin, felt like a violation of a different kind. It was clinical, painless, and utterly dehumanizing. She stared at a painting of a single orchid, trying to be elsewhere.
Finally, she was seated over a specially designed chair for a vaginal steam. Aromatic herbs billowed up around her, a warm, strange sensation that made her face flush with embarrassment. The attendants moved with gentle, impersonal efficiency, as if tending to a valuable plant. She had never felt so naked in front of anyone, not even during the raw transaction in the workshop. This was worse. This was being remade.
When it was over, she dressed in the simple linen clothes that had been left for her. Her skin felt alien. It was impossibly soft, every surface smoothed and pampered. She ran a finger over her palm—the familiar ridges of hardened skin were gone. Her shoulders felt loose, her back fluid. The deep, perpetual ache of hard work was absent, leaving a strange, floaty vulnerability.
But as she walked out to the lobby to wait for Levi, a new, sharp awareness took its place. The soft fabric of her new panties brushed against her. Every step sent a whisper of sensation across her sensitive, hairless pussy, a constant, maddening reminder of what had been done, of the raw skin beneath that had been steamed and treated. It was a heightened, exposed feeling, a physical fingerprint of the day’s enforced transformation. She stood very still, trying to ignore the intimate friction, waiting for the man who now owned the version of her that stood in this polished, silent room.