Chapter Forty-One
Forty-One
Max had barely sat back down at his desk when Rashid came walking through his door.
He’d spent the morning meeting with his legal team about his contract with Yellow Sparks and Miles, trying to determine if it could, in fact, be terminated.
Thankfully, it could, although it would cost Max a pretty penny, but he could afford it.
Miles and his team would be getting notification about the termination soon enough, and they’d have to pull the plug on Sparky within the next twenty-four hours.
“Have you seen this?” Rashid asked, waving his phone in the air.
“Why does no one know how to greet anyone anymore?” Max asked. “And can you stop waving your phone? I cannot see anything while you do that.”
“Sorry,” Rashid said, handing over the phone. “But look. Stella quit Yellow Sparks and told the world about it. Your brother’s getting dragged all over the internet.”
“She what?” Max asked, even as his eyes began skimming the article Rashid had pulled up.
“She talks about Sparky, the Sprint Week stuff, everything,” Rashid said. “Can she get sued for this? Is she allowed to talk about this?”
Max held up a hand as he kept reading. When he’d gotten to the end, he handed Rashid his phone back.
“I don’t think so,” he said, his mind already racing. “She didn’t say anything that wasn’t true, and she didn’t even name her boss. Anyone can look up Miles’ name. I think as long as she doesn’t have some kind of NDA with the company she should be fine, but if not, I can help her through this.”
“So what’re you going to do?” Rashid asked. “People are calling us out, too, by the way. It’s not as bad, but you know they’re saying Sparky writing articles is plagiarism and the fact that Yellow Sparks posted AI-written articles but hid it behind their human employees is unethical.”
Max sighed. He’d expected this, of course, but it still wasn’t great to hear. If he didn’t know that his brother was already in the middle of a shitstorm, he might have called him just to say, “I told you so.” Maybe he still would.
“I’ve already had the legal team terminate our contract with Yellow Sparks,” Max said, rubbing his eyes. “Can you talk to Sierra and have her draft some kind of statement making it clear that we are no longer working with Yellow Sparks? She should double-check with legal that we can say that now.”
Rashid nodded. “Will do. Have you talked to Stella yet?”
“No,” Max responded. “So much has happened in the past twenty-four hours, I don’t want to talk about this over the phone. I need to just go see her.”
“Worried she’ll dump you like she did your brother?”
“She didn’t dump my brother,” Max said. “That sounds like they dated, which I’d like to never imagine.”
“You know what I mean,” Rashid said. “I don’t know if I’d want to see someone who looks eerily similar to the guy who screwed me over right now, or ever. I think you should have a plan.”
“A plan?”
“Yeah, like bring her flowers or something, I don’t know,” Rashid said. “Something so the first thing she thinks when she sees you isn’t, ‘Oh God, I’m sleeping with the enemy.’ ”
“I’m not the—”
Max blew out an aggravated sigh.
“I cannot deal with you right now,” Max said, shaking his head. “Just go talk to Sierra, please.”
Rashid held up his hands in surrender.
“Alright, alright,” he said. “Consider me gone.”
He got up to go but then stopped short as Miles stepped into the doorway, a look of fury and betrayal etched across his face. Max didn’t have to ask how much he’d heard. It was clear he’d heard enough.
“Looks like I better be going,” Rashid said. He quickly exited the room, squeezing past Miles as he entered.
“Miles—”
“I don’t even know why I’m surprised,” Miles said.
“The way you kept asking me all those questions and how pissed you got about everything. I should’ve known it was personal for you.
Of course it was! Because there is nothing you love better than being someone’s knight in shining armor. I would fucking know.”
“Miles, this has nothing to do with Stella,” Max said, standing. “I would’ve reacted this way if it didn’t involve her.”
“Yeah, sure,” Miles said, moving farther into the office. “Except that you are involved with her and have been for how long, exactly?”
Max swallowed hard. “Since Valentine’s Day. We met at Red as Sin.”
“Of course you fucking did,” Miles said. “So you’ve been lying to me this whole time. Knowing full well you were sleeping with one of my employees. That’s why you pulled yourself off the project, isn’t it? God, you’re so full of shit.”
“Look, Miles, I’m sorry you’ve found out this way, but Stella isn’t just someone I’m sleeping with,” Max said.
“This is serious for me, and I didn’t tell you because we were trying to keep our professional and personal lives separate.
What good would it have done for you to know I was dating one of your employees? ”
“It would’ve been the truth,” Miles said. He gripped the chair in front of him. “This whole time you’ve been lying to me, and you don’t even seem sorry about it.”
“I am sorry, Miles,” he said. “Truly. I didn’t want to lie to you, but I was trying to make the best out of a sticky situation.”
“Yeah, well, between you and your girlfriend, my company is probably going to go under,” Miles said. “So thanks a fucking a lot for that.”
“This is not our fault,” Max said. “Your decisions led you here, not mine or Stella’s. I told you this could become a problem for you, and you didn’t listen.”
“Ah, right, you tried to warn me about your girlfriend’s plans with some vague warning instead of coming right out with it,” Miles said.
Max sighed deeply. “I didn’t know she was going to do that. I haven’t spoken to her about any of this yet. But it also doesn’t take a genius to know that she would be pissed. And rightfully so, I might add.”
“Yeah, I get it, Max, you’re on her side,” Miles said. “You’ve made that very clear.”
“It’s not about sides, Miles,” Max said, walking around his desk. Miles stepped away from him and Max froze, leaving space between them.
“Look, I didn’t want any of this to happen,” Max said.
“But you have to take some responsibility here, Miles. Stella and I didn’t have some nefarious plan going to ruin your company.
You did that yourself. And I meant what I said.
We purposely didn’t talk about you or our work at all. This wasn’t some plot.”
“Well, I don’t believe you,” Miles said, glaring at him. “And I won’t forgive you for this. So congratulations. I hope you have a great life with Stella, and I hope it was worth it. Because you just lost a brother in the process.”
“Miles—”
His brother didn’t wait for him to finish. He spun on his heel and stormed out, leaving Max to wonder how everything had gone to shit so quickly.