chapter 1

“No, no, no, I said shouting at the top of my lungs. I will not marry him.

I refuse to, I will not marry Tate Brown, he has a bad reputation”, I said, shouting and pleading with my eyes with tears rolling down my eyes.

“Kiana Elizabeth James”, called my mother ‘Lana James’.

“Please baby just do as your father says”, she pleaded.

“You can’t just marry me off like that. I’m not some cattle or property to be sold to the highest bidder”. You are not a cattle neither are you property. My mother said.

“I don’t think you guys love me at all, cause if you do you would at least consider my feelings and not force me to marry that evil bastard”, I said tearfully.

“Please my love, you are not just doing this for us, you are also doing this for the family, your baby brother”.

“Kiana” called my father, “please calm down, lets go to my study room to talk more on this”.

“No, I’m not going anywhere with you” I busted out.

“I know you guys are doing this for you own selfish reasons and are not thinking about me”.

No, my baby, no, that’s not the reason at all, please my dear, just calm down, lets talk like mature adults that we are.

“If not so, why do you want to marry off your barely twenty-four year old daughter to a man you don’t know well other than the fact he’s dad’s ‘work friend’, I said, using my fingers to make air quotes.

“I refuse to be a pawn in one of your stupid little games”.

“Kiana”, my father shouted in a very loud tone and I recoiled a bit, shocked.

“Lets discuss more on this matter in my study room”.

This was one of the very few times my father ever raised his voice at me.

I looked at his face and saw anger in my father’s face, not wanting to hear anymore I ran towards the door, opening it and shutting it with a loud bang.

“Whats wrong dear”, Mr Beagle called from the driveway, leaning on my fathers black car.

Mr Beagle was my father’s personal driver, who had been with us since I was seven.

He was basically like my second father since my father was not at home all the time. “Why are you crying dear”?

“Come, come, sit here”, he said while tapping at the hood of the car.

“What happened?”. I sat down on the hood of the car, and with tears rolling down my chin, I began explaining my predicament to him.

By the time I was done explaining, he was mortified. “I don’t understand how your father can basically sell his daughter out just to save his business”.

“I understand that the business is very bad right now and sympathize with him, hell, even I know that I will soon be fired from my job”.

“But I cant just see the meaning behind his thought process or his reasoning”.

“I am really disappointed, all the respect I have for him, in relation to his family is gone, like puff, and here I was thinking that he loved you guys so much and this is how he treats you guys when he reaches one of his lowest point in life”.

“I don’t know what to say. Do you think you can do it?. I am just asking because I don’t know if you are crying out of frustration or out of disappointment”. He said.

I looked at him with disdain, like he had suddenly grown two heads.

He saw the look on my face and panicked rushing to correct himself. “No, I mean, are you going to accept the proposal, because I know you, you’re obedient to a fault or are you going to disobey and not marry him?”

“I will say choose the latter choice but its still your life at the end of the day, so whatever you choose I will support you”.

“I don’t know yet” I said sniffing. “On one hand I want to rebel but on the other had I know what will happen if I don’t agree to this marriage”.

“The banks will probably foreclose our home, my father will probably arrested and sent to jail because I know he did some shady dealings, while my mum and my brother will basically have no place to go to”.

“As you know my mum literally has no one, and my fathers side of the family wants nothing to do with us and has promised to not help us in any way they can”.

I just don’t want to be the reason this family falls apart.

“Hey!, hey!, hey!, listen to me”, Mr Beagle said, shaking me by my shoulders as if to snap me back to my senses.

“You are not the cause of this predicament, your father is, and so, for that reason alone, should your family fall apart, its all his fault”.

“He was selfish by acting without thinking about the consequences and he failed to protect you guys in the process”.

“So don’t you ever ever feel guilty for something that wasn’t caused by you”. He said in a stern voice.

“Do you understand”, he said while making eye contact with me as if he was daring me to think otherwise.

“To make matters worse, I don’t even know who I’m getting married to”. I said smiling through the pain.

Mr Beagle looked at me with pitiful eyes and shook his head. “So, I can see you’ve already made your choice”.

“If so, then could you ask your father for his name, so that I can ask my daughter who is a computer guru for help”.

“We can tell her to help us find out who he is, what he looks like, what he does, the family he comes from, and other things”, He said smiling, She does that kind of stuff for fun.

I smiled and smiled, “thanks for making me feel better”. And truthfully, I felt at ease after having a chat with Mr Beagle.

Cause, he always does.