Chapter Nine #2
Only I’d promised Henry I’d think about his fucking offer.
“You don’t have to do anything,” Noah said, putting his hand out and resting it on my knee.
“And Hollywood superstar or not, if he upsets you, they’ll never find his body.
” I stared at him because those were the last words I’d ever have expected to come out of his mouth.
Noah just shrugged. “I have a degree in chemistry, unrestricted access to chemicals, a friend who’s a builder, and another with several thousand acres of moorland. Trust me, I could make him disappear.”
“See,” Spencer said proudly. “I knew you’d be the one with the murder dungeon.” He walked over and leant down to kiss his boyfriend before turning to me and grinning. “I’d help. We’d totally get away with it.”
“You’d fucking tell everyone,” I said. “You’re fucking awful at keeping secrets.”
“I’d keep this one,” Spencer said, suddenly serious. I’d only ever seen him like this a couple of times before, and they were mostly when he was telling Noah how much he loved him. It made something twinge in my chest. “You’re my brother, and I love you.”
“I love you too.” It was something we only said rarely. I could probably count the number of times on both hands.
“Can I ask you both a question?” I asked.
“Sure,” Noah said and Spencer nodded, moving over to one of the armchairs and sitting down.
“What would you do if… if someone made you an offer… like a business deal… and if you said no, it won’t really affect you at all but there’s a good chance it’ll fuck the other person over.
And if you said yes, it won’t fuck them over, but you might have to do something you’re… uncomfortable with. What would you do?”
They looked between each other and then back at me, concern obvious on both their faces. “Alex, is everything okay?” Noah asked. “You’re not in any trouble, are you?”
“No! Fuck no! It’s just a question.”
“Is it something to do with Novel Tea?” Spencer asked, frowning. “Did someone offer you their business or something?”
“What?” I asked, trying to work out what he meant.
“Did, like, someone offer you their business? Like to take over? Something we could turn into another branch of Novel Tea—it doesn’t affect us if you say no, but I guess if you did, the person who owns the business might be kinda fucked if they’re already in financial trouble.
” His frown deepened as he thought the whole situation through, but I didn’t want to tell him he’d completely got the wrong end of the stick because it made a good cover story.
“But if you took it,” he continued, “you’d have commitments and contracts and there’s no guarantee it’d work, plus you might have to let some of their staff go and you’d hate doing that.
And you’d have to turn their business into ours, and that could get kinda awkward, especially if they’ve worked hard on it and we just come in and change everything.
It’d be hard if we made it into a success too. Is that the kinda thing you mean?”
“Er, yeah,” I said. Spencer had given me an out and I was going to roll with it.
“Something like that. It was just an initial conversation but I said I’d give it some thought before we went any further.
I’m not sure I’m comfortable with it at all, but I, er, I don’t know if I totally want to fuck someone over. ”
“That’s because you’re a good person,” Noah said.
“But I don’t think that’s the sort of situation where you can put other people first. If there’s money involved, things start to get complicated and you don’t want to make things worse.
You’ve worked so hard to make Novel Tea what it is.
You can’t put that at risk because you feel sorry for someone. ”
“Exactly,” Spencer said. “Like yeah, we’ve talked about expanding but it’s gotta be right for us. We can’t jump on an offer if it’s going to fuck us over in the long run. I know you feel bad for whoever it is but, like, you can’t put yourself at risk just to make them feel better.”
I nodded. “I guess. Yeah… I just…” I couldn’t shake the feeling that turning Henry down would be the wrong thing to do, but I didn’t know why.
Even if it had no consequences for me, I hated the idea of it having a knock-on effect.
I wished I could just shut down and not care what happened; it wasn’t like it was any of my business.
But somewhere along the line, I’d developed a bleeding heart and I didn’t like the idea of other people losing out just because I couldn’t suck it up and play pretend for a couple of months.
“Who is it?” Spencer asked, snapping me from my thoughts.
“Who what?”
“Who were you talking to? Who’s going under?”
I shook my head. “They’re not… local. That’s what makes it more complicated.”
“Oh… wow. Like someone from Whitby? Why would they ask us?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe they like what we’re doing? Or maybe they’re trying to dump a bad situation on us.”
Spencer hummed. “Oh yeah, I could totally see someone doing that.”
“If you’re really not sure about saying no, maybe get some more details,” Noah said. “Ask for financial reports, stocklists, things like that. Whatever you need to make yourself feel more comfortable with the decision.”
“That’s not the worst idea,” I said. “I could do that. Thanks.”
“Of course,” Noah said. “It’s what I’m here for.”
The conversation turned onto something else, but I wasn’t really listening.
I wished I could tell him everything, because giving him twisted truths and half-lies hadn’t exactly helped.
But Noah was right about two things. Firstly, I needed more information, and secondly, I shouldn’t put myself at risk just because I felt bad for Henry.
Except I already knew I would, and I didn’t even know why.