A Contract Marriage With The Billionaire's Mad Son Free Preview

Once upon a time on a crisp November morning, late summer in Rio Hondo, at the Fanny’s Villa, bottles of beer, rum and cigars were seen littered all over the table. And carelessly scattered on the floor were G-string, pants, sleeves and dress. In the other corner the bed was creaking hugely under the weight of two figures. A sonorous moan blared and hung over them. Like a trumpet, the female voice amplified the most out of the window, while the male voice groaned and grunted at a terribly disturbing way.

Opula was bouncing and having her fragile, slender waist astride the legs of Ken, whose mouth was gaping, and hands infinitely stroking and fondling her fragile small breasts.

“You…you are not doing badly today,” Ken stuttered under her weight and squeezed her tapering waist.

She shut her eyes and breathed hard. “Yesterday’s sex was horrendous,” she sounded through moan and clenched her teeth to pound harder. “I am going to give it to you hot!” she managed to say in a breath.

Neither of them spoke again. A hush of silence would have hung over them except for the bed that creaked under their weight and the slap-slap sound of her thighs against his.

Hastily, Ken swung her over the bed and got on top of her. He pinned her soft palms to the bedspread, shot his groovy eyes into hers and slammed a little more into her, before he began to jerk uncontrollably.

“Oh, not yet,” she nagged, and dragged a furrowed brow while she vibrated under him.

Ken gripped her blonde, lush hair, gritted, and frowned at his face while he jerked without end. His body stilled and suddenly relaxed, before his face fell on her neck and started burning her with his warm breath.

She pushed him aside.

“You are a two-second husband. You are horrible in bed,” she cursed, and grabbed the duvet to cover her nakedness. She sighed.

Ken held his breath.

“This is not an orgy. I am having my wife,” he groaned and stroked his ponytail.

He was the husband to Opula, first daughter of Fanny’s. Ken was tall, well-built with strong facial features. He was a live-in husband, just like the other husbands, who found no fault in being taken care of by their billionaire father-in-law.

“Same story every day. Opula is not enjoying it anymore,” she glowered, snorted, nagged and added, “You are always impossible.” Her nostrils flared and eyes lined with insatiability.

Ken’s jaw sagged in rage. He didn’t want to tell her he found it awkward. But he was going to say his fury in any way he could.

“Well, I am not as impossible as your mad brother who set my most expensive tuxedo on fire,” he replied without remorse.

Her eyes flinted with anger and her face went crimson, before her nose wrinkled “How dare you call my brother mad!” she snapped and widened her gaze at him.

He sat up. “But he …..” Ken couldn’t complete his grievance.

Pa!

A slap interposed him, and he paused, lowered his gaze, brought his palms on his chin to nurse his pain.

She crawled out of bed, advanced to the door and yanked it open.

“Leave my chamber this minute!” she ordered and watched as Ken’s hand nursed his itchy cheeks.

“You raised your hands on me?” He sounded calm, and stared at her with his watery green eyes burning with fury.

“And I will do it over and over again if you ever call my brother mad and insult him the way you just did!” she echoed.

“But he is mad, and he ruined my tuxedo,” he barked and slammed his hand on the bed in revenge.

His response infuriated her even the more.

“You dumb ass grouch! Leave my chamber!” she commanded yet again and pointed at the door impatiently.

“Your Chamber?” he asked with a shrug.

“Yes, my chamber. This villa belongs to my father, who feeds you, shelters you and clothes you. Now leave!” She gestured at the door in a final decision.

Feeling disgruntled, Ken’s lips curled as he squeezed into his pair of pants, grabbed his shirt and left like thunder.

The door slammed!

Meet Opula, the eldest daughter of the richest man in Rio Hondo. She was arrogant, eclectic, with a curvaceous body. Her hair was brunette and her height towering. And not only was she overprotective, but also believed in respect, loyalty and dominance. Her family was her priority. Her prodigy, who called her only brother mad and maltreated him, got bullied and hated for life. Just as she believed in the affluence and wealth of her father, she certainly believed someday she would be made heiress to the multibillion dollar Fanny Group, since their only heir had lost his sanity.

With his hand still on his cheeks, and his expression hardened, Ken walked past a couple of maids, sneered and pushed away the ones that came in his way and barged into his chamber.

Once he was out of sight, Salsa, the chief maid of Fanny’s, laughed tauntingly as she tucked to the corner with the rest of the maids.

“What could be the problem now?” she asked a junior maid who peered at her for gossip.

“I overheard a sensual moan from their chamber …” Another maid interrupted, “I think he got bashed for disappointing Opula in bed again,” she mumbled, gagging her mouth with her hands as she glared around for any onlooker.

Salsa’s finger was on her lips. “Shhh!” She glared around before adding, “Return to your duty post,” she ordered.

They dispersed, and their high-heels knocked innumerably on the floor as they left.

Salsa was about to advance to Opula’s chamber, when Opula’s worried, feline face came through the door.

“Get Brian ready for dinner with my father,” her voice beamed.

“Yes ma’am,” Salsa responded, bowed and left to do her bidding.

At a later time, Salsa ran back to Opula’s chamber and was howling deep down her lungs.

“What is the problem?” Opula queried, and shot her oval disturbing looks at her. “Chin up and talk to me!” she barked. “What is the problem?”

Salsa was huffing and puffing to say a word.

“What is it? Speak!” Opula snapped yet further.

Salsa flinched.

“I… I went to Brian’s room, and he wasn’t in. I searched the whole villa and couldn’t find him. I could only find his clothes in the garden. I think he has gone out onto the street as usual,” She wailed as she raised the clothes.

“Why did you leave someone kept under your care? Now listen, you dope,” she gripped her ears and squeezed them.

Salsa grinned in pain.

“If anything should happen to my brother, you are as good as dead. Go and find him now!”she beamed.

Indigenes of Rio Hondo often referred to me as the poorest, ragged girl, but I could barely fight anyone over it or prove them wrong in any pragmatic way because, literally, I was poor.

My poor father died when I was six. Mother said he died mysteriously, but whenever she mentioned that I often understood her empathy, after she must have elaborated, he died out of the depression of poverty. With nothing to fall back on, we relocated to our grandpa’s house to perch with him. Not that he was richer, but he was poorer. Daily we clung to the jaw of hunger and want, since the meager vegetable garden he groomed could barely sprout enough produce, let alone make it to the market.

Grandpa died and opened the door of intense lack for us as we looked forward to joining him soon. Inheriting a poorly grooved vegetable garden and a fragile, roofless, thatched, cane house, we waited for the hands of death to pay us homage soon.

It didn’t stop us from going to the market anyway. While others sold their vegetables and smiled home with big pockets of coins, mom and I wailed inwardly and returned home the same way we came. Every day we came to the market not to sell vegetables but to enjoy just the trill that hung over the market.

Soon mom became sick. With no penny for her diagnosis, I could only describe her sickness in my own little way. Please, I entreat your sympathy! And don’t call me names! Now listen while I describe her sickness in this maxim; ‘everyday she grew bigger.’

I almost thought her sickness was related to the dawn of every day because she swelled by the day, so whenever I went on my knees to pray, I often prayed she didn’t see the next day.

Mom stayed back home and waited for the hands of death to clamp her away while I went to the market to sell the less patronized vegetables in Rio Hondo.

“Please, could you patronize me? I haven’t sold even a bunch since this summer!” I wailed at a customer, who almost gave me the cold shoulders.

“Go to hell with your poison!” the customer beamed.

“Eat your poison, Melissa!” Another snapped and rolled her eyes.

“It is as poor as you are!” the other emphasized.

And I bowed my head in shame and scorn, not until I heard a lad echo into my hearing.

“I need vegetables for my dog!”

I sprang to my feet like a cat. “I am available!” I gasped; that would be my first customer in six months.

“Give them to me free of charge for my dog,” the lad protested, peering down at a puppy that meandered between his legs. It was a midget mastiff.

“Go to hell, you lad!” I barked, and the dog started off barking back at me for yelling at the lad.

“A coin and I can have it all” the lad said, his offer.

“Get away!” I stamped my feet on the ground and gestured at him to leave, as my voice sounded from my enteric anger.

The boy fled with his puppy.

I sat back in my peril and wept like a kid. Mom would have no food and water again today, yet she grew bigger. Never in my life had I seen such irony. What could be the name of that sickness?

While in the cloud of my thought, I slept off; a deep sleep that was synonymous to death.

Hours dragged by as I slept off. If my receptors were right, I could hear the noise, yelling and murmuring of a mob; as though they were about to lynch someone; it sounded closer now, and I could tell it was happening around me. The reawakening of my miserable life brought me back to consciousness and I woke up, rubbed my eyes from the haze of slumber, only to behold an uncountable mob around me, armed with whips and logs, ranting and chanting. I looked around; I could not see my vegetables. They were gone. The ranting and yelling of the angry mob couldn’t let me comprehend vividly.

“Where is my vegetable?” I cried, stroking my hair confusedly for answers.

“What way of sleep befell you that you didn’t notice Brian munching all your vegetables!” a voice among the crowd echoed angrily.

“Brian?” I queried, “Who is Brian…?” my wailing voice died off slowly.

I gazed around me and then on the ground, Io and behold, there he was; all naked, unruffled, with saliva smeared around his mouth, and the last half-eaten leaf stuck between his cute, pink lips, and his arms and feet tightly bound with fetters. And an innocent, dashing, chiseled face laughing and waiting to be lynched by the mob. He was so cute to behold despite losing his sanity.

“Where is my vegetable?” I whined at the top of my voice and combed my menacing stare around in search of it.

“The billionaire’s mad son!!” a voice started off with the chant and others picked on it and chanted harder. “The billionaire’s mad son! The billionaire’s mad son!

A whip! A whip! A whip!

While they flogged him, he flinched in tolerable pain yet laughed and seemed unscathed as though they were wasting their energy.

They disciplined him until two luxuriously dressed ladies whom I perceived to be maids pushed through the crowd and spoke in his favor.

“Enough!” one of the maids, the chubby one beamed “We have been in search of him all over Rio Hondo.”

One of the maids wailed at the top of her voice. “He escaped from Fanny’s villa!”

“What did he do?” Another asked anxiously.

“Can’t you see he has masticated all the vegetables of poor Melissa while she was carelessly asleep,” a man among the mob elucidated.

“Enough! Steady on!” the maid pleaded with the mob, “How much is the worth of the vegetable?” she asked yet further.

“A hundred coins!” a voice replied from the crowd.

“I will give you two hundred,” the maid sounded. As soon as she took out a bag of coins, the angry crowd snatched them from her, scrambled over it and fled.

“My vegetable! My vegetable! What becomes of me? Eh, maid! Maid!” I cried and called on.

But it was too late. Hastily they dragged Brian into the Lamborghini that was packed elegantly by the corner and zoomed off.

I fell on the ground, pressed my face between my knees and wailed on. I was left with nothing to sustain my dying mother. What a cruel world!

I am Melissa Brant, a skinny, tall, auburn-haired, Caucasian and the poorest vegetable seller in Rio Hondo!

I was heartbroken all day. Ruin and disappointment pervaded my countenance, and while on my way home I wailed bitterly. I thought about what would become of us, especially my mother who was slowly dying of a mysterious ailment. I could barely say what mother was suffering from because we could barely feed her well, let alone afford to take her to the hospital.

The previous day we struggled to earn a square meal and I can recall promising mother that today would be better. I wondered if mother perceived the falsity of my promise because of our poverty. She had never believed life could get better for us. She only had consolation in her reverie.

After promising to buy good food for her with the proceeds from our vegetables, she only responded in tears and kept staring at the ceiling while she lay in her sick bed.

And today being the day I promised her at least two square meals, that billionaire’s mad son ate all my raw vegetables and left us to die of hunger.

“What nonsense a billionaire’s mad son is that?” I wailed in my head, while trudging home.

Why would they leave him hungry to feast on people’s means of livelihood, people like me?

Now he was probably being fed with the best of delicacy while mom and I were left to die.

I couldn’t continue walking home. I dashed to the ground. My life was devoid of any form of motivation to make it home.

I wasn’t mettlesome at all. My feet had lost verve and I couldn’t lift myself anymore.

What would I tell my mother now? Would I tell her that even yesterday was better off? If I told her, would she believe the grisly news? Would she believe that a disgruntled billionaire’s mad son rendered our vegetable business useless and ineffective?

Certainly, mother would lay a curse upon me and gnash her teeth in disappointment over my carelessness. Although my mother was sick, she knew how to flog offenders with her mouth.

My throat was tinder-dry. Neither water nor food had crossed it. I was dying of hunger too. If mother didn’t die before me, I would.

“Please sir, I need some money from you,” I sounded respectful. “I just lost my entire vegetable to the billionaire’s mad son,” I wailed coldly.

That was the only option I was left with; else at dawn Rio Hondo would bury mother and daughter. As hunger churned my stomach, I believed the same was happening to mother.

The haggard-looking young man swirled around, gave me a remarkable smirk and drifted to me.

Innocently, I stood, wondering the type of food I would buy for mom, because this young man was being generous. My eyes gleamed, and they were sparked with joy; you know the joy that beclouds you when a giver approaches you with his hand fondling in his pocket.

Beclouded by my misery and thought, I didn’t know when the haggard-looking man touched my breasts and squeezed them.

A slap!

“You must be stupid!” I barked and covered my bust with my nervous hands.

The ugly-looking offender was all smiles. “Do you want my money?” he queried and dug out a wad of dollars, “We can tuck away at the dark corner of the street for a quickie. Prostitute!” he cursed, laughed tauntingly and walked away.

I held my face in total frustration and fell on the ground to weep for my horrible fate and impending storm.

I was wailing right about then when a note struck my sight. I quietened, wiped my tears and peered at it for yet another time.

It was a one dollar note when I picked it up.

“Oh my God!” I exclaimed and cautioned myself with my palms on my mouth to turn down my voice. “Wow!”

My nerves opened for excitement. That quickie-demanding young man must have been careless over his money that he didn’t notice it fall off.

I took a breath of relief, squeezed the dollar into my hold and scuttled to the grocery store to buy decent food for my mother and me.

My lips curved, and I simpered from cheek to cheek. Excitement hung over me until I got home.

“Mother! Mother!” I chanted fervently, “We are going to eat a decent meal after a long while!” I sounded at the top of my voice unaware of the tragedy that had befallen my mother.

When I got to her inner chamber she wasn’t in her sick bed. She had fallen to the ground and around her was a pool of blood.

“Mother! Mother! What happened? What happened to you, mother?”

I shook her heavily and noticed she had no sign of life when I felt her pulse.

With the help of our neighbor, we rushed her to the hospital. All night at the hospital, I lay by her side, and prayed for a sustainable life.

At dawn, the doctor invited me to his office and brought it officially to my notice.

“Your mother is suffering from autosomal dominant polycystic,”

My lower lip trembled at the mention of that disease. I didn’t know what the disease was, but from its annoying name, I could tell mother was ill-fated.

The doctor explained further once he saw the color drain from my face. “It is a kidney disease and having lingered, it is right now at the terminal stage. Half a million dollars is needed for her treatment and if nothing happens in twenty-four hours, I am afraid we may lose her.” the doctor’s voice beamed within me.

Those words of the doctor still sounded in my head, with the ting effect of a bell sounding in the cathedral, even after I had dashed out to go in search of money which we didn’t have.

Later, while swallowed in my misery and gloom, a young beautiful nurse by name, Stella, told me of a billionaire by name, Fanny Luis, who was worth fifty billion dollars and the richest family in Rio Hondo.

“Listen Melissa,” Nurse Stella had said, “If you could get to the billionaire he would certainly be of help,” she told me emphatically. “He is very generous. I can count quite a number of Rio Hondo he has helped.”

Later, at twilight, she took me to this huge edifice, a villa with plaster of gold and precious stones. It was situated on the Island of Rio Hondo. No other inhabitant could be found anywhere around the Island except this magnificent mansion.

“Over there is where billionaire Fanny Luis lives. You just have to try your luck. I believe he would be of help. He certainly will.” Her jaw clenched.

I was all tears and shivering without any eagerness to move. I pouted.

“Go Melissa. Your mother must not die of kidney disease! Autosomal is a kidney disease nobody should toil with. Go and hug your good fate.”

Those were the last words of the nurse as I swirled to take a bold step.

When I advanced to the villa, I noticed my feet couldn’t carry me further. The splendor that hung across the mansion overwhelmed me so much that I deemed myself not worthy of being anywhere around it; not even its flowers and ornamental trees, which looked healthier than me.

I quickly distinguished myself from smearing the expensive environment by my poverty countenance.

Suddenly, I came to a halt once I caught sight of a uniformed band of security men, all well-suited with strong facial features, who asked me a thousand questions with their hostile faces and hefty chests.

My entire body vibrated as I folded my arms in anticipation of what they intended to do. Now they surged close to me.

One of them stared at me from head to toe, and must have perceived the wretchedness that encompassed around me; I perceived they were bored with seeing the scraggly faces of the poor hounding the villa all in the name of seeking the billionaire’s help.

Noticing one of the security prancing towards my direction, my nose wrinkled before I came to a halt, lowered my gaze and pressed my trembling hands in front of me.

“Who the hell are you? Did you miss your way?” he queried, and his face scowled irritatingly at me before his jaw clenched.

I believed my scraggly auburn hair, dried scaly feet, and torn off-the-shoulders dress must have turned him off. I couldn’t have looked better than that.

Thankful enough, he wasn’t very close to me, my body odor would have taught him a lesson, after repelling him.

I bowed my head, fondled my finger in shame and was mysteriously dumbfounded and bewildered.

“Speak, you dirty looking thing!” another barked at me like a mad dog, almost at the top of his voice. He gave me a dirty look and almost forced words out of my mouth with those dark, brooding eyes of his that flashed at me.

I had flinched and trembled under his groaning and about returning to my sick mother. Having contemplated inwardly that this was a lost course and not able to convince them with my timidity to see the reasons I was at the villa, I turned to take my leave.

While trudging away under the heaviness of my burden, I heard a still voice.

“Hold on, young girl!”

That was the next command that pierced into my heart. All eyes came upon Opula as she cat-walked down the staircase looking dashing and charismatic in her customized Italian gown, with piles of diamond bracelet round her neck and wrists. Flamboyance hung over her. Her hair was golden brown and long on her slender neck. She was towering and curvaceous, exactly like that of those kiss-it models I often saw on billboards in Rio Rondo. A party of maidens flanked around her

Her presence alone courted respect and affluence as I noticed the security bow to her.

She stood, gawked at me from head to toe and shook her head in confirmation.

“Take this young girl to the chambers. Make her look beautiful and presentable before my father now,” she commanded the host of maidens that accompanied her.

“What is happening? What did she just say? Just like that! Did anybody tell her of my visit or what?” I queried inwardly.

What could happen to me?

Those words of hers seared my countenance that I thought I had committed a sacrilege by bringing my scruffy, wretched-looking self to the home of the richest billionaire in Rio Hondo.

But my thoughts were disappointed. The maidens advanced to me with smiling faces and decorum.

Salsa, who happened to be the chief maiden, directed me and led me away into the same villa. I was still lost. I wanted to ask the reason everyone was genuflecting and greeting me as I got into my chamber.

They made sure all of Opula’s words was carried out to the latter.

Not only was I given a warm bath, they took ample time to decorate me and adorn me in an exquisite Turkish grown that I might never afford in my time or in my generation yet to come.

“Please, what is happening? Why are you doing all this to me? I am not supposed to be here in the first place, let alone being handled as a princess.” I nagged with caution while they invested their time in peeling off the poverty on my body.

Nobody gave an answer. All they did was smile and keep to their duty.

I wanted to protest yet further, but their smiles made me look stupid. I was radically beautiful as well, when I appeared before the mirror.

I was led away into the largest, most decorated mainstream sitting room I have ever seen.

Everything that hovered around my eyes was gold and diamond. I perceived I was in the major sitting room.

In less than a few minutes, a handsome, white-bearded, luxuriously dressed man in his late forties walked in, flanked by gorgeous-looking ladies, including Opula.

I perceived the man was Fanny Luis and the ladies were his daughters.

All the maidens and security genuflected and greeted them duly.

I bowed my face in shyness and lost in what was about to take place.

“Isn’t she beautiful, father?” Opula queried and turned her gaze to the man.

It was then I knew I was standing before the famous billionaire in Rio Hondo, Fanny Luis himself.

I stood star-struck, frozen within myself as he walked around and admired me, inspecting me from head to toe and nodding gratefully.

“She is superbly beautiful for your brother. Where did you find this damsel, daughter?” Fanny groaned, smiling cheek to cheek.

Opula smiled hugely, “I told you never to worry that I would find the perfect wife for Brian.”

At the mention of that, I raised my head, dragged a furrowed brow across my face and scowled.

Wife? What are they saying? And who is Brian? Am I about to be arranged as a wife to someone? And come to think of it, so all that happened to me was coming from prior preparation to betroth me to someone. What is happening, and who is this Brian?

I wondered within me, and smacked my lips nervously…

Fanny shook his head in the affirmative and became all smiles. His eyes sparkled.

“You are welcome to my humble family, my adorable sister-in-law,” Kate intoned, with a lop-sided grin.

Kate was the second-eldest daughter of Fanny’s. She was chubby, short and with pink cheeks that often smiled. Her hair was auburn. She kept smiling and shaking her head just like every other person except Eva.

Her nostrils flared, “Who is she? And who is her family in Rio Hondo?” Eva asked, gritted her teeth, shot her go-to-hell stare at me and walked around me as though I was some laboratory specimen.

Among the girls, it was Eva who cherished Brian most. She wanted the best for Brian and wished her family could give Brian a better wife than she saw. Although she rarely showed it, the love Eva had for Brian was rare, and she could sacrifice her life for him if there was need for it.

“No, no, Eva”, Opula, the eldest, protested with her hand, gesturing at Eva. She protested yet further, “You don’t have to raise that issue right now. I have not invited this pretty girl to be assessed by you.”

Eva raised a brow and squeezed her lips; that face of hers held thunder as she cast a menacing stare at her sister and then at me.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Eva queried Opula “You can’t choose this dirty, poverty-stricken girl for our brother!”

Opula stood to her feet with her hands on her waist. She had already gone crimson. She kept rolling her eyes and sighing.

Opula snarled, “And since when did my egocentric sister become interested in the family’s affairs, uh? You never wanted a wife for Brian! Possibly you enjoyed the way he is being attended to by nobody and goes the whole of Rio Hondo naked and being mobbed!” Opula barked radically.

Every other person became on looker as they quarreled at the tops of their voice.

Her nose wrinkled. “I have better plans for my brother, not this,” she gestured her fingers at me, “Poverty-stricken, disgusting girl. We are the richest family in Rio Hondo. Poverty and wealth have nothing in common. Do I need to remind you, sister uh? I thought you were going to fetch a model, a movie superstar or a musician for our brother. Come on think big.”

Opula interjected in fury, “She may be poor, but she is more presentable than the ugly wealthy women of easy virtue you presented earlier…” She wanted to speak yet further when Fanny intervened,

“Enough! Everywhere went cold at once at the groaning of his voice, “Is this how you girls want to welcome our new wife?” Fanny barked, and cast an appreciative stare at me.

My head bowed just then as I averted my gaze.

Wife? What is happening? Have they made me a wife already?

A wife to whom, if I may ask? I came here to see if I could borrow the money needed for my mother’s hospital bills and here I am donning diamond bracelets and jewelry, clad in a luxurious Turkish gown which I may never afford in my entire life.

As I looked at myself from head to toe, I wondered if I could summon the courage to question their actions, and why I was being given as wife to a man I knew nothing about and wasn’t in love with.

Something must be fishy. Are they mistaking me for someone else?

“I am confused please,” it almost sounded like a whisper, but with some reckless courage it sounded loud enough for everyone to hear.

Fanny smiled at me, and then stood at her feet. His face flushed with uncertainty.

“You see, my dear, for more than four nights now, my family has been in search of the rightful bride for my lovely son. I don’t know how my eldest daughter found you, but I must commend you for looking presentable and beautiful for my son. If you agree this minute to become the wife to the only son of the richest man in Rio Hondo, I promise you your poverty is over. You will have anything that is under the sun. You can be rest assured that hence forth your generation shall know no poverty,” he said and burst into a radical laugh.

Every other person smiled except Eva who was busy fighting me with her quarrelsome stare.

But Eva wasn’t my problem now. My problem was how it all happened suddenly. I had come to borrow the half a million dollars needed to commence treatment on my mother and not to be given as wife to any son.

I am losing it now. These billionaires could be so annoying. They felt everything was answerable to them and, because they were wealthy and influential, nothing was impossible for them to achieve.

Come on! Things are not done that way! How could you just see someone at the gate, and then you get her all luxuriously dressed, just to be given as a wife to your only son? A son I knew nothing about?

I protested, “Sir, I am here to see if you could lend me money for my mother’s medical bills. My mother has auto…auto,” I stuttered as I couldn’t recall the name of the disease the doctor called, but I just managed to say, “She has kidney disease and the doctor is requesting half a million dollars to save her life. She has just twenty-four hours to live if that money is not provided,” I intoned, went down on my knees, and bowed my head, “Please, my mother is all I have. Have mercy on a poor girl like me. That is my reason for coming to your mansion and not marrying your son.”

Fanny’s face held a huge grin. His jaw clenched. I knew he might be wondering what gave me the guts to visit his mansion in the name of borrowing money. I was young and naïve. I wondered what could be more important to me than my mother’s health. Marrying his son or whoever was out of it.

He pointed out, “You see that artifact over there. It is worth twenty million dollars. Do you see that artwork with diamond stones? It is worth thirty million dollars. Money is not my problem.”

He dug his hand into his blazers and slid out a credit card…