Chapter 45: Family

Abigail hadn’t seen or heard from Mark for over a month. And that was entirely by her own choice.

She had asked her father to see to it that he was never able to set foot on their grounds ever again, and her father had kept true to his word.

Still, Abigail wandered the grounds, unsure herself what she was searching for. But she walked the parts of the garden that she had used to ignore, she wandered through the maze, through the labyrinth and often among the rose bushed.

Lyall found her often now. Sometimes she found him. Lyall liked the other parts of the ground more, the more cultivated parts, which explained why Abigail had never seen him there before.

He often walked alone. Olivia, Lyall had explained to her once, had sensitive skin, and couldn’t withstand the sun much. She also had terrible allergies, often keeping her indoors.

Lyall himself quite liked the labyrinth, he had explained to her on another chance meeting, since it gave him clarity of thought. Abigail had tried it out but found it hadn’t really worked in her favor. Her heart was in too much turmoil to find clarity in the stones.

There was another veranda set up on that side, and once, Abigail had found Lyall sitting in it, having afternoon tea.

“Do you live in this house?” Abigail had asked him, a little annoyed. She had planned to use that veranda today. And she had no desire to go to the one she and Mark used to use.

“Often,” Lyall acknowledged playfully. “But don’t you and your boyfriend normally use the other one?”

“You know about Mark?” Abigail had asked softly, stepping closer. Saying his name was like a balm on her heart.

Lyall raised an eyebrow, “I am here often and I am not blind,” he responded. “Haven’t seen him in a while, though.”

Abigail couldn’t explain what came over her, but she sat down beside Lyall, and poured the entire story out to him, her heart healing just a little each time she said Mark’s name.

“And you don’t want to marry a Billionaire Land Developer?” Lyall asked, teasingly, at the end of the story. “How sad that you can’t marry the love of your life.”

“How would you know anything about this?” Abigail snapped at him.

“More than you might think, actually,” Lyall said, sighing as he cupped his head in his hands. “Love is always tricky, but in our world, its impossible. A marriage is never for love. A marriage is a card you can play, it’s an alliance, it’s something that can save you from otherwise drowning.”

“I don’t understand,” Abigail frowned at him. “How is it like that, though?”

“Say a company is about to go under,” Lyall began explaining. “Say thousands are about to lose their jobs, but there is a way to save them, there is a way to stop all of the otherwise unstoppable chaos from unfolding. A simple marriage. That, naturally, causes a sharing of resources. Causes stocks to suddenly have better worth than they did before. Causes a company to be saved, thousands of jobs to be saved, thousands of families prevented from starvation and destruction. Marriage is a tool.”

“I’ve never thought of it like that,” Abigail murmured.

“Of course not,” Lyall laughed slightly, but it was in no way demeaning. “How could you? Why would you? In your world, marriage is a thing of love. A child is a product of that love, not an heir for a company.”

“But you weren’t born in this life either,” Abigail pointed out.

“In a way,” Lyall admitted. “My parents’ company went bankrupt very early in my childhood, I was about eleven or twelve when it all came crashing down. But my father had made a great name for himself, and many in the business said it was simply bad luck, so though we lost the company, we didn’t lose everything.”

“I’m so sorry for you,” Abigail murmured. “And all those people.”

“I plan to rebuild my father’s company,” Lyall told her. “One brick at a time, if I have to. Many of the people that used to work for him are still unemployed, nearly two decades later. I plan to get them all their old jobs back.”

“And to do that,” Abigail realized. “You need a marriage.”

“An Alliance,” Lyall corrected her. “Remember what I said, sharing resources, knowledge? My father’s company was well-respected till the last, I would bring something to the table no one could scoff at. Well,” Lyall waved his hand at her. “Except you and your family, of course. I’m not exactly in that range just yet.”

“Is that why you won’t marry Olivia?” Abigail asked, “Because she’s disinherited from having the running position of the company?”

“There’s more than one reason why we can’t marry,” Lyall shook his head. “We don’t have that luxury around here. Our positions in your father’s company don’t align, our aspirations don’t align, our networks don’t align.”

“Why though?” Abigail asked. “Can’t some things be changed around?”

Lyall shook his head, “We’ve been puzzling it out for three years, it just can’t be helped. Conflict of interests, one of us would have to stop working, and that-”

That was impossible. Even Abigail knew that. She wouldn’t give up her position at the company right now, and she had only been there for a few short months.

Lyall stopped speaking for a while after that, and they sat in companionable silence. It wasn’t a friendship. It was simply two people, pining for two others, their hearts and lives bound by something else.

Adam found them like that, coming to see Lyall in his daily walkabout the grounds.

Adam spoke with him for a few minutes, before Lyall declared he should be going, and that he would see them all at work tomorrow.

Adam sat down beside Abigail, and for a moment, he said nothing. But when Abigail made no move to leave, he moved closer to his daughter.

“Lyall is a good man,” Adam told Abigail, as they both sat on the veranda, watching him leave. “He is ambitious, it’s true. But he is always honest. He will never deceive you, or manipulate you into anything.”

Abigail felt a twinge in her heart. She wanted to defend Mark, she did. She hadn’t felt manipulated, but what other word was there for it? He had purposefully lied to attain a specific outcome. What else was that, except manipulation?

“Olivia wants to marry him,” Abigail answered her father tiredly, guessing where this was going. Even though she’d just had that conversation with Lyall, she thought if her father just gave the company to Olivia, so many problems would be solved.

“Olivia cannot inherit the helm of the company,” Adam said, tired just the same. “She can’t. She’s too much under her mother, even now. Do you know how many attempts Charlotte has made on Olivia’s life? Thirteen. Each time progressively worse. She can’t seem to decide if Olivia is a threat or an asset to her. And still, Olivia doesn’t shun her mother. Instead, she becomes volatile to everyone and everything. She cannot have the helm of the company. And so, without it, she can never marry Lyall.”

Abigail sighed; she had no idea what she should do in this.

“Olivia knows this,” Adam tried to tell her. “Lyall knows this. It’s why he’s agreed to marry you, he knows even if he didn’t, he would never be able to marry Olivia. It’s you, or someone with a similar rank in another company.”

Kind of the way princes were only allowed to marry princesses or queens before. So much for the monarchy being abolished.

Abigail thought of her own heart. Broken as it was, she knew she would never love someone else again. She knew she would never be able to trust anyone else ever again. If she ever married, it would be for a purpose. Never for love.

She was, well and truly, a part of this world, now.

Mark had seen to that thoroughly.

And finally, Abigail allowed herself to think of Mark.

Mark, who had eventually stopped calling her, stopped messaging her. He would move on, Abigail knew. His heart knew how to mend. It had recovered from the loss of his parents, after all. He would be able to get better in time.

He would be able to love again.

Not that it really mattered. Since Abigail would never be able to trust him ever again anyway. He had lied, and lied about something so vitally important.

He hadn’t just allowed her to continue believing a fabrication, he had blatantly lied to her. And then he had accused her of breaking trust and confidence, and then he had defended his actions so!

Abigail wondered if she had truly known him, who he was, or if she had just known a façade.

That, in the end, was what made her mind up.

“Alright,” Abigail agreed, glancing up to her father. “I’ll marry Lyall.”