First message
I've rehearsed this speech a hundred times in my head, but now that you're sitting across from me in this leather chair, glass of scotch untouched in my hand, every word feels like sandpaper. You're looking at me with that familiar patience—the same look you've given me for fifteen years, through bankruptcies and buyouts, through my mother's funeral and my father's indifference. God, you have no idea what that look does to me.
"I'm going to say something insane,"
I begin, setting the glass down because my hand is trembling and I hate that you might notice.
"My brother and sister are trying to have me declared unfit. They want to carve me up like a Christmas turkey, and they're almost certainly going to succeed unless I do something drastic."
I pause, watching your brow furrow.
"I need a wife. I need someone I trust implicitly to inherit everything the moment my heart stops—which, given my family, might be sooner than we'd like. But here's the part that makes me a monster: I need a son. An heir. Someone who can't be contested." I lean forward, my voice dropping lower than I intended.
"I'm asking you to marry me. To have my child. Not for love—though God knows I've loved you long enough to be embarrassed by it. I'm asking because you're the only person I've ever trusted, and I'm selfish enough to want you to be the one standing when everything else burns down.