I felt restless.
After seeing that woman by Celestes house I did not feel settled by it. Something about it felt wrong but when the report came back she checked out. She was just a regular citizen with no ties to the de'Medici family. She was not even of European descent.
"Hmmmm." I was in my families home garage working on a project car I had neglected. It had been sometime since I was in my childhood home since I moved out but my parents insisted I visit and I needed a task to think.
Fixing cars was a nice task for me to just space out and think. From the years I have spent working on vehicles and taking cars apart and putting them back together I had built muscle memory of the interior and anatomy of a car.
I was currently working on the engine of an old 1964 Porsche 356C Cabriole. I found the car a few months back which at the time I bought it was partially restored but I decided to redo it so I could use my preferred parts and do the color way and upholstery to things I like and was classic of the vehicle at the time.
I was woking on the getting the engine in which was stripped from checking all the parts and replacing what I needed to. Though at this point I had stopped and was just staring at the hood of the car for a while. "Something is not right. I feel it but I don't know for sure."
I have acted out on less information before and while I usually was right in the end, this time was different. If I am not careful with who I am dealing with I could hurt Celeste which is not and never will be an option.
That man, he isn't like our other friends or peers. He was a foreign entity I had little knowledge of, but I knew his family was like ours in terms of wealth. And knowing what I know about myself, no doubt he was the same. Dangerous.
"Something eating you up? Is the restore not going well?" My father had come down and was looking at the hood with curiosity. "I don't think I have ever seen you struggle with a car before, anything I can do to help?" He had rolled up his sleeves though I knew he would not get near the car.
He did not like doing stuff like this, but he was humoring me. "Ah no Dad, I am not thinking about the car right now." I took off my work gloves and grabbed the towel from the rack by my workstation. I wiped my face and hands to get rid of the sweat and oil.
"Hm well if it is not about the car then I have a better chance at helping you." His words reminded me of the task I was doing before the woman caught my attention.
"Well if you are offering I have a few questions for you. But this stays between us. Man to man. Mom cannot even catch a whiff of our conversation." I sat in a swivel stool and pushed the other one with my foot towards my dad so he can also take a seat.
I grabbed a small remote from my pocket and activated a partition which normally went down if I was doing a paint job for the cars I worked on. It sealed the room so our conversation was actually private.
He surprisingly sat down without another word. "Ok I am listening." He folded his hands the same way he would a business proposal. "I have been thinking for a bit and it does not make any sense. Why does who I marry matter?"
His eyebrows rose seemingly thrown off by my question. It made me think he had anticipated something else. "Well who you marry does not really matter. At least at your current age. Honestly your mother would accept just about anyone. Back when you were younger however, we had different expectations."
'Expectations?' As if he read my mind he leaned his head back in remembrance. "The women we would hear you affiliate with were interesting to say the least. Some had clear motives of only wanting one thing whereas others were less clear of what they wanted from you. Back then if any of them asked we would have denied it."
"Denied it? Could you even do that?" My mother in particular had been begging for me to get married as soon as I entered my twenties. Especially because at the time I openly voiced my vision that I would remain a bachelor for life. Of course they did not know that I only claimed that because Celeste was getting married and I was just angry. So I assumed they would take whoever they could get.
My father rubbed his chin in deep thought. "Yes we could deny it because our family has its own due process that any Cortez member must do to keep their claim for inheritance."
I did not think it was that serious. For even my seat to be taken from me. "For starters, we must meet the girl and if she gets approved then the head of the family drafts the prenup. Once every asset is assigned and covered and the terms of the marriage is settled then the head attorneys from each family reads it over, approves it, and notarizes it."
He nodded as he recalled the steps he must have taken to marry my mom. "Then its wedding bells. You kids can plan the wedding to your hearts content and as per tradition we negotiate which family will take care of what for the wedding. So us parents fund the whole thing and get you kids ready for after so think a house, car, etc."
Because of my aversion I never really asked about what I needed to do to get married. But now that I know, this was going to be a bigger mess than I anticipated. Inside the house I had one issue. Lets say I give up my claim to inheritance in effect I would lose my money and thus get into a lower bracket so I could marry Celeste. No family approval needed.
I would consider it but I knew I would never betray my family like that. I would have to abandon them which not only I did not want but I knew Celeste would skin me if I tried that route.
On the other end lets say I manage to push it through on my end of things there was still her family and then the judge. So no matter what I was screwed over. There had to be another way.