I lifted my eyes to my daughter. "You... you want me to sign the company over to her?"
Marta nodded, casual as anything. "Don't worry, Dad. After everything you've done raising me, I'll still take care of you when you're old."
Laura, who had been quiet this whole time, finally spoke. She walked forward and took Marta's arm, looking at me with an expression of practiced warmth. "Andre, don't worry. I'll manage the company well. You just stay home and relax. You've earned it."
I looked at her face, and in that instant, I understood everything.
She hadn't come back for her daughter. She'd come back for the company. She'd worked on Marta, driven a wedge between us, and turned my own daughter against me—all to get her hands on this business.
What she didn't know was that the company was about to collapse. Eighty million in debt: a bottomless hole.
I opened my mouth, then closed it. I looked at my daughter and asked slowly and carefully, "This company is twenty years of my life. Are you sure, absolutely sure, you want to do this for someone like her?"
Marta's expression pinched into impatience. "Dad, this is what you owe Mom, what you owe me. Do you know what it was like growing up with everyone calling me the girl with no mom? Stop fighting it. Just sign."
She slid the stock transfer agreement across the desk toward me. I looked down at it. One signature, and everything the company owned would belong to Laura—including eighty million dollars of debt.
I picked up the pen. My hand hovered in the air. I didn't bring it down.
And then: "Hold on."