Chapter 3 - The Contract
At 7:30 a.m. Friday, I arrived back at Ethan’s estate.
My eyes were dark and swollen from a night spent staring at the ceiling, checking the lock on my apartment door every twenty minutes, terrified that Beto’s dangerous loan-shark friends would show up.
When I unlocked the back kitchen door, Ethan was already sitting at the long oak island. He wasn't wearing his usual crisp suit; he wore a gray cashmere sweater, his sleeves pushed up to his elbows, a steaming mug of coffee sitting beside a stack of legal documents.
"Good morning, Mr. Parker," I said quietly, tying my apron around my waist with trembling fingers.
"Sit down, Maya," Ethan said.
I froze. "I have to prep the breakfast fruits—"
"Sit down," he repeated gently, pointing to the leather stool across from him.
I walked over slowly and sat on the edge of the seat, keeping my hands folded in my lap.
Ethan pushed a stapled document across the polished wood toward me.
"What is this?" I asked.
"That," Ethan said, "is a full-time, salaried employment contract for the position of Estate Operations Manager."
I blinked, confused. "Estate... Operations Manager? I’m the housekeeper."
"Not anymore," Ethan said clearly. "As of this morning, your salary is set at eighty-five thousand dollars a year, with full medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and Santi. Paid time off, a five-thousand-dollar relocation stipend, and a company vehicle."
My jaw dropped. The room seemed to tilt. "Eighty-five... thousand?"
"I ran the numbers," Ethan said, leaning back, his expression entirely businesslike. "You’ve been managing the logistics of this fifteen-thousand-square-foot house, coordinating vendors, maintaining inventory, and commuting three hours a day for forty-two thousand a year. You were vastly underpaid. This contract adjusts your compensation to market value for an estate of this size."
Tears sprang to my eyes, hot and overwhelming. "Mr. Parker... you don't have to do this because of what Regina said. I don't want charity—"
"It’s not charity," Ethan interrupted firmly, his eyes holding mine with an intensity that made my heart skip a beat. "It’s a strategic decision. Regina Hale and her husband are going to try to squeeze me through the board. They are going to use your financial instability and your brother’s behavior as leverage to claim I have security vulnerabilities in my personal life."
He pointed to the contract.
"If you sign that, you become a key, salaried executive employee of Parker Global’s residential branch. You get legal representation through my personal attorneys. And your brother will be served with a permanent, legally binding restraining order that carries immediate arrest if he steps within five hundred feet of you, Santi, or this property."
I looked at the paper, then up at Ethan.
"Why are you doing this for me?" I whispered, my voice breaking. "You barely know me."
Ethan was silent for a long moment. He looked down at his coffee mug, his thumb tracing the rim.
"When I was seven years old," Ethan said softly, his voice carrying a quiet, distant pain, "my father lost his factory business. We were evicted in the middle of winter. My mother sat on the curb in Chicago holding my sister, begging a landlord for three more days so she could buy milk. He threw our boxes into the snow anyway."
He looked back up at me, his dark eyes fierce and clear.
May you like
"I swore when I grew up that if I ever had the power to stop a mother from crying over a can of milk, I would use every dollar I had to do it. You’re a good mother, Maya. You work yourself to the bone. You don't deserve to be broken by bad men or arrogant rich women."
A tear slipped down my cheek. I picked up the pen sitting on the counter, flipped to the last page, and signed my name on the line.
