The Price Of Salt

Isla Bennett survives on poverty math and a meagre $14.22 bank balance until Gabriel Hunt, the ruthless, intelligent CEO known as The Debt Collector, acquires her $250,847.36 inheritance debt and forces her into a clinical, eighteen-month contract marriage. Told through an alternating first-person POV, this dark romance and financial thriller exposes the cold utility assessment behind a billionaire’s search for an asset chosen specifically for maximum compliance. In a world where finance is a weapon and boardrooms are battlefields, Isla is dragged into a thirty-year revenge plot against the Black Swan, a price-fixing syndicate that murdered her father in 1988. As Gabriel deploys mafia-style tactical teams and extraction protocols to protect his interests, Isla begins a weak-to-strong transformation. She evolves from a waitress who feels like breathing, walking furniture, into an interim CEO capable of executing the hostile absorption of forty-seven companies to dismantle her enemies. Behind the silk dresses and staged performances of a perfect couple lies a lethal game of medical hostage taking and manufactured stress tests designed to prove whether she is Option Zero, the only variable that will not break. From the glass towers of Manhattan to the remote Morrison Estate, the bought variable must choose between the $4.7 billion profit of a ghost and her own sovereignty.

Six years after the Jennings family threw me out for being their fake daughter, I was surviving by selling my blood. I had just been handed a few bills and was about to call my doctor for more medication when a bodyguard kicked the back of my knee. My knees hit the floor, and I heard a scream. "You ungrateful brat! What are you doing here?! Are you still trying to kill Tina?!" Then, there was a slap on my face. Only then did I realize that the woman in front of me was my mother, Florence. She had come looking for blood for her precious daughter, Tina. My older brother, James, stood beside her and watched her break down. Then, he ordered the bodyguards to throw me out. He looked down at me, saw the cash in my hand, and sneered. "Looks like the past few years aren't enough to wipe that temper out of you. To think that you're willing to sell your blood just for some money to satisfy your vanity. Tina graduates in two weeks, and she'll go abroad to further her education. "Once she leaves, the family won't have to spoil her alone anymore, and you won't be able to bully her again. When that happens, I'll explain everything to Mom and Dad and bring you home. You'll still be the family's princess." "Home... Princess...?" I muttered under my breath. Then, I shook my head and laughed. My amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) had progressed too quickly. I would not last for another month. From the moment James accused me of being a fake heiress for Tina, I no longer had a home.

He's sugar. She's spice. Together, they will never work. She has done the impossible. Working for the country's most difficult boss for seven years. Rosaline Carter's work life is fueled by her love for spicy food, a fat paycheck, and dreams of sending her brother to Harvard. She's sworn off love completely. Until that fateful monday morning. "I need a fiancée, Miss Carter. And I need one who at least knows my favourite brand of coffee." A contract marriage to her boss, the impossible and difficult Alaric Sylvester? Rosaline never even saw him as a man to begin with. But for five billion dollars? She would propose to Mr Ice king and plan the wedding alone. Alaric Sylvester hates his assistant. With her sensible shoes, horn rimmed glasses, and perfectly polite way of speaking, she never fails to get on his nerves. She's the last person he wants for a wife, or even a romantic figure. Yet she's the best option. No one knows his schedule by heart, or his love for sweets. It's just three years. And he'll never see her again. With his inheritance on the line, the board of directors hounding him for being too antisocial, and rumours starting to stir...he will do anything to save his reputation. Including marrying his cold hearted assistant. And with her hatred for sweets, he's sure he'll never like her. It's only a marriage agreement. The terms were simple. But simple doesn't always equal easy. And the human heart is a traitorous beast.

After ten years studying interior design overseas, I came back to my hometown to do work that mattered to the people who raised me. I offered the full package, from site survey to soft furnishings. The materials were chosen by hand. The price was fair to the bone. The town had just gone through a redevelopment. Everyone was getting new units. With the new family policy, every family wanted a third bedroom too. My business was good. Customers from the next county were driving in. Then a girl just back from a city college kicked open my studio with her phone on a livestream and her neighbors at her shoulder. "This is the dishonest one. Look at her. She has been ripping the village off." "In the city, an eighty-square-meter unit can be done for twenty thousand dollars. She is charging eighty." "That's a sixty-thousand-dollar margin. Sixty thousand. Right out of our pockets." The village fell in line behind her. They demanded the difference back. When I refused, they smashed my studio. They beat me into a coma. The pile-on online killed me. When I opened my eyes again, I knew exactly what I was going to do. I would refund every single one of them. And then I would tear out every single thing I had installed. Let's see what twenty thousand dollars actually buys you.

A king crab in the company's storage is about to die. In order to prevent the company from suffering a loss, I decided to buy it at the price of 480 dollars and treat my friends to a nice feast. The next day, my boss, Mitchell Wright, calls me to his office. "Ms. Langford, it's true that the net price of a king crab is 480 dollars. But the company has a rule that states that if an employee buys the company's products, they still have to pay according to the selling price." While I'm quite displeased, I still transfer an additional 400 dollars to the company's bank account. But Mitchell raises his voice at me. "Stop being a smartass! The selling price of a king crab is 88 thousand dollars, not 880 dollars!" I do my best to refute. "But we give all of our customers a 99% discount! Surely you can't force me to spend 88 thousand dollars on a crab!" Mitchell just chuckles icily in return. "Rules are rules! While customers are always right, you're nothing but a corporate slave! What makes you think you deserve to receive the same treatment as the customers? "If you refuse to pay the selling price for the crab, then don't blame me for being ruthless!" As I watch Mitchell, who keeps yelling at me with spittle flying everywhere, I find myself filled with an eerie sense of calm. I hope that Mitchell will still be able to chuckle when he finds out that my dad is the biggest seafood supplier.

My mom is a woman who takes frugality very, very seriously. When I suffer from a high fever, she feeds me moldy chicken noodle soup. In fact, I can only wear my older sister's hand-me-downs since I was a little girl. After working hard for so long, I finally qualify for the final interview of a top-500 company. I keep telling my mom repeatedly to not cause any trouble for me. Alas, my monitor winks out when I've reached the most critical point of my interview. At the same time, the router has lost access to the internet. I rush out of my room hurriedly, only to see my mom flipping off the main switch in the darkness. "Why did you leave the lights on at night? Imagine how much money you'll have to pay! I've already calculated everything for you. If we turn off the lights, we get to save a few pennies per night!" Thanks to those pennies, I end up losing my job that can guarantee an annual salary of a million dollars. Later on, my older sister, Andrea Fletcher, is diagnosed with a kidney disease. In order to latch onto Andrea's rich husband, Kirk Herrera, my mom forces me to work overtime at a shady factory just to gather enough money for Andrea's medical bills. Even when I'm about to die, my older brother, Anthony Fletcher, and my dad keep blaming me. "You can't even get hired at a proper factory! You really are useless, Alice! Your mom went through all those frugal nonsense just to raise you for nothing!" When I open my eyes again, I've returned to the day I'm about to attend the online interview. I just chuckle coldly as I look at Andrea, who has just found out about her kidney disease and is waiting for me to earn enough money for her kidney transplant. Then, I toss her expensive, specialized medication into the trash can. "What use is there for you to take the medicine, Andrea? What a waste! Mom already stated many times that being frugal is the way of life! "You should drink more water instead. Once your rich husband finds out how good you are at saving money, he'll definitely compliment us for knowing how to balance our finances!"