“Blame the dead guy.” Ronan shakes his head. “That’s so fucked up.”
“Yeah, well, if you’ve got any other brilliant ideas, I’m all ears,” Henry barks. “Because if the truth comes out, our lives will be hell, and both Audrey’s and my father’s reputations will be dragged through shit.”
Maybe they deserve it, though. Audrey committed a terrible crime and William buried it from everyone, including Henry. Maybe they don’t deserve to rest in peace. But no one deserves to make money off this story, which is what these tabloids will do.
Silence hangs in the living room, and my mind drifts back to thoughts of the last time the three of us were in a room together. My body flushes with the memory.
Henry’s phone rings. “That’s Dyson. Excuse me.”
I move my feet and watch him stroll toward his office, his sweatpants hanging low on his hips. I can’t wait to peel those off later and lick every inch of his skin.
“So?” Ronan leans into me until our shoulders touch. “How are you holding up? Really?” In his eyes is genuine concern.
I shrug. “There’s not much I can do, is there? Henry’s got HR and the lawyers preparing all the dismissal paperwork.” Their security badges have already been suspended, with plans to haul them into a room the moment they show up for their shifts. If they have the nerve to show up. “He’s calling in by video to fire them all personally. Theft charges are pending for the security guards.” Tillie’s going to get her wish of some face time with Henry, just not how she dreamed.
“Damn.”
“Yeah. They’re looking into ways to punish the magazine for printing stolen corporate property. We’ll see if they can make it stick.”
“And this reporter?”
“Ben Shaw is a cockroach, but he didn’t write anything in that article that is blatantly false. The last thing we want to do is have our business aired out in court during a lawsuit. They’ll uncover everything.” Which Ben surely knows.
“That wouldn’t be ideal.” Ronan rubs a hand over his short hair. “And that bitch from Thursday night?”
“I don’t know what Henry has planned for Roshana yet.” But I’m excited to find out. “If I didn’t have this sale launching on Monday, I would throw my phone away and hide in here for the next year, until people forget.”
“Attagirl. Face it head-on.”
“They’re attacking me, Ronan. Over a headline in a magazine they read in the grocery store.” Or one they spotted as they scrolled aimlessly through their feeds. The “news” has grown legs, with dozens of secondhand basement-reporter sites regurgitating Ben Shaw’s article for their own content. “Seriously, don’t these people have lives?”
“No, they don’t. Ignore them. Don’t go looking for it.”
God, he sounds like Henry. “That’s the thing, I’m not!” I pull up Farm Girl’s social media, something I’ve avoided doing for hours. Now? There are hundreds of new comments under posts from the past week. Annie wanted to go private, but Zaheera strongly advised against it. “See?” I pick one to read. “‘I was going to try out this soap because Kendall McCoy said it made her skin feel so amazing, but now that I know the owner is a lying, cheating whore, I’m not giving her my money.’” My insides burn with indignation.
“Who the fuck is Kendall McCoy?”
“An influencer,” I grumble, scrolling. “‘Bitch not happy with her fine-ass man, she gotta get herself one for every day of the week.’”
He snorts. “Okay, that one’s kind of funny.”
I scroll farther. “Oh, this is even better. This person is psychoanalyzing me. According to her, I’m clearly working through commitment issues.” I frown as I read another. “Apparently, I was handing out my soap at a party in Detroit last weekend and it gave her a terrible rash. Why would I be handing out soap at a party in Detroit?”
“People make shit up all the time. You can’t trust anything on there.”
“This one says she was in a sorority with me, and I slept with her boyfriend. Northgate doesn’t have sororities! Oh, here’s one defending me, I think? She says Henry’s the personification of the patriarchal scourge upon society. He deserves to be cheated on. But then this one—”
“Okay, bad idea.” Ronan yanks my phone out of my hand and tosses it to the opposite side of the couch. “Who has time to read a gossip article online, go search up the people, and then leave messages like that? People who have nothing good going on in their lives.” Ronan raises his voice, a rare occurrence. “These people are fucking losers.”