“I’m fine,” I said. “My parents came in and threatened to call you unless I signed over part of my business. I wanted you to hear that directly.”
Silence.
Then Ray exhaled, long and annoyed.
“All right,” he said. “Daniel, you still on speaker?”
My father stiffened. “Yes.”
“Good. Then hear me clearly. I don’t deal with fathers. I deal with my tenant. Is Mara okay?”
My mother’s smile faltered. Laya’s phone dipped, then corrected. My father stepped closer to the phone like he could force authority into it through proximity.
“Ray, you don’t understand the situation—”
“No,” Ray cut in. “You don’t understand the boundary.”
My father’s voice sharpened. “She’s in violation of—”
“Of what?”
“Her lease.”
A short laugh came through the speaker, humorless and flat. “Interesting.”
My father frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” Ray said, each word clean as snapped thread, “you don’t know how this lease works. Because I wrote it.”
A flicker of confusion crossed my father’s face.
Ray continued before he could recover.
“Riverside’s business rider is approved. Electrical work was inspected. Permits were filed. Buildout passed. I signed off on it personally. So unless your hobby is calling strangers to invent breaches, I’m not sure what you think this conversation is.”
My father tried a new tone then—reasonable, paternal, a mask he wore in boardrooms and charity galas. “Ray, I own multiple properties. I know what red flags look like. Mara has a history of impulsive decisions. We’re trying to protect her.”
Across from me, Grant actually looked up from his laptop in disbelief.
On speaker, Ray laughed again, softer this time, somehow more contemptuous for it. “Protect her? By extorting fifteen percent of her company in the middle of her café?”
My father’s lips flattened.
My mother stepped in, voice silky. “She’s our daughter.”
“I’m sure she is,” Ray said. “And yet she’s the one who called herself in fine and you’re the ones threatening her.”
He paused.
“Daniel, if you call my number again to harass her, I’ll treat it as interference with contract and hand it straight to counsel. I don’t play games with people who bully women in my buildings.”
My mother went pink around the edges of her cheeks.
“You’re overreacting,” my father snapped. “This is a family matter.”
“Family matters don’t include extortion.”
The word hung in the room like a dropped glass.
I said nothing. Let it land from another mouth. Let my father hear someone he expected to dominate identify the act for what it was.
Ray’s voice softened when he addressed me again. “Mara, do you want me to come down there?”
“No. I want a record.”
“You got it. I’m texting you now that your lease is secure and that I do not recognize any claims made by them. Save it.”
“Thank you.”
“And Mara?”
“Yes?”
“If they threaten you again, call the police, not me.”
My father finally lost the smoothness completely. “This is ridiculous,” he barked into the phone. “You have no idea what she’s done.”
There was a beat of silence.
Then Ray said, very quietly, “The only thing I know for sure is that she built something decent, and you walked in trying to take a percentage of it. Goodbye.”
The line went dead.
For one strange second after the call ended, the café seemed to tilt into perfect clarity. The hiss of the espresso machine. The click of the old radiator. A spoon tapping against ceramic. Someone by the window pretending to read an email with eyes that hadn’t moved in a full minute. My father’s breathing. My mother’s perfume. Laya’s thumb smudging the edge of her phone case.
