Chương 10
“That is not comforting.”
“It was not intended to be.”
Chelsea turned to the business pages. “Can my company support a refinance?”
“Not at the amount you need without a major change.”
“What kind of change?”
“A sustained increase in profit, not revenue. Or a large contribution of cash.”
“I could liquidate investments.”
“You have about one hundred forty thousand accessible without touching retirement accounts and tax obligations.”
“What about selling the business?”
“Under pressure, quickly? You would likely hate the price.”
Chelsea looked toward Priya’s office window. Rain had begun tapping the glass.
“What would you do?”
Priya put her glasses back on.
“I would not give marital advice while billing hourly.”
“I am asking financial advice.”
“Financially, you should sell the house before urgency determines the terms. Personally, you should learn whether the person sitting beside you during the sale is telling the truth.”
Chelsea folded the report.
“Do you think he is?”
Priya glanced at Albert’s notes.
“I think someone in this family has been keeping excellent records of bad decisions.”
Logan’s private lender was named Martin Voss.
He arrived at the house on Saturday morning in a dark blue car and complimented the front steps before Chelsea had offered him coffee. He was fifty, perhaps older, with silver at his temples and a smile that seemed designed to survive refusals.
Martin had known Logan through clients at the firm. He represented a group of private investors willing to lend against high-value residential property.
“We move quickly,” he said at the kitchen table. “We are not bound by the same boxes as a bank.”
Chelsea looked at the proposed term sheet.
The interest rate was more than twice their current mortgage rate. The fees alone exceeded what she paid her junior designer in a year. The loan matured in eighteen months.
“What happens after eighteen months?” she asked.
“You refinance under improved circumstances.”
“What improves?”
Martin smiled. “That is the business plan Logan mentioned.”
Chelsea looked at Logan.
He spoke before she could ask.
“The new platform should be operating by then. My distribution would recover.”
“If it does not?” Chelsea asked.
Martin folded his hands. “The property provides security.”
“So we could lose the house in eighteen months instead of thirty days.”
“You gain time.”
“At what cost?”
“The cost is fully disclosed.”
“Disclosure does not make it sensible.”
Martin’s smile thinned.
Logan leaned toward her. “This pays Dad, consolidates the other debt, and gives us breathing room.”
“It charges us for breathing.”
“We need an option.”
“We have one. Sell.”
Martin looked between them.
“I can give you privacy,” he said. “A sale invites questions. Neighbors. Clients. Professional contacts. People draw conclusions.”
Chelsea turned to him.
He had found the bruise without being shown.
“What conclusions?” she asked.
“Rarely accurate ones.”
“But useful to you.”
“I understand reputation has economic value.”
Chelsea looked around the kitchen. The photographs. The magazine spread framed in the pantry. The view through the glass doors. Martin was not offering money for the house. He was offering money for the right to keep pretending it was theirs.
She pushed the term sheet back.
“No.”
Logan’s expression changed. “We have not finished reviewing it.”
“I have.”
“You cannot reject this alone.”
“I can refuse to sign.”
Martin placed the paper in his folder.
“Take the weekend,” he said. “The terms are valid until Tuesday.”
“They are not valid to me now,” Chelsea said.
Martin looked at Logan, not her.
“I’ll let you two talk.”
After the blue car left, Logan stood in the driveway with his hands in his pockets. Chelsea remained inside the open door.
“He treated me like a problem you would solve after he left,” she said.
“He treated you respectfully.”
“He spoke to you when I answered.”
“He knows me.”
“He knows which one of us he expects to convince.”
Logan came inside and closed the door.
“You embarrassed me.”
“In our own kitchen?”
“He was offering help.”
“He was buying our delay.”
“You are becoming impossible.”
“No. I was easy for a long time.”
Logan walked toward the living room.
Chelsea followed.
“Did you tell him about Albert’s investment portfolio?”
Logan stopped.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Because the proposed loan amount is larger than the house debt. It includes money for your firm.”
“It includes a reserve.”
“How much?”
“Enough to stabilize several obligations.”
“Your obligations.”
“Our future.”
“Did Martin believe your father might invest?”
Logan did not answer.
Chelsea moved around him until she could see his face.
“Did you use Albert’s money again?”
“I told Martin there was a family dispute concerning assets.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the situation could change.”
“Your father said no.”
“People say no while angry.”
“He sent legal notices.”
“That is how he expresses anger.”
Chelsea looked at him for a long time.
“You still think this is a negotiation.”
“Everything is a negotiation.”
“No,” she said. “Some things are consequences.”
Logan’s face tightened.
“You sound exactly like him.”
“I think that is why you hate the sentence.”
He left the house an hour later and did not say where he was going.
Chelsea spent the afternoon preparing the house for photographs.
She had not signed a listing agreement. She had not fully decided to sell. Still, she removed family pictures from the hallway and packed them in a cardboard box. She cleared the bathroom counters. She took half the clothes from each closet to make the rooms appear larger.
In Logan’s closet, behind a row of suits, she found an unopened envelope from Albert dated five months earlier.
She sat on the floor before opening it.
Inside was a one-page letter.
Logan,
I paid the February mortgage shortfall. I will not continue doing this without Chelsea’s knowledge. You have until March 15 to tell her the full extent of the household and business support. If you do not, I will speak to her directly.
I am not asking for your agreement.
May you like
Dad
Chelsea checked the date.
