Page 153 of Broken Brothers

I could not take the same approach, just for the sake of my own ethical values and for what I believed was right. Maybe it would hurt me in the short term, but I had to put my faith into it working out in the long term.

“Honestly, I don’t know yet, Andrew,” I said, somewhat holding my breath. “Truth be told, the relationship of Edwin and I is… it’s not the greatest, put it that way. But I can promise you that for me personally, regardless of how this all shakes out, I’m here for you as a consultant and an adviser in whatever way you need. Don’t let the politics of this sort of thing distract you. Most of your customers won’t give a damn about who owns the company, they just want a good product. You focus on making a good product, I’ll focus on advising you as best as I can, and we’ll let whatever happens with ownership play itself out. Does that all make sense?”

An awkward pause came, enough that I said Andrew’s name twice to make sure he was still on the line.

“Yeah, yeah, it does, yeah,” Andrew said.

An outsider might have thought he was hedging himself, trying not to commit, but I knew this was really Andrew being in full agreement with what I had said.

“I really appreciate all of your support, Chance, your advice has been invaluable along the way. I just wish that there, umm, that there was a way to ensure you could remain with us.”

“Well, you’re not gonna hire me as a consultant,” I said laughing. “I don’t need the money.”

But the money can get me a spot.

And that’s when I had an idea that might have been either incredibly stupid or very brilliant. It was going to raise a lot of hell at Hunt Industries, but it might just have given me what I needed to get the ball rolling.

“But I do have some money that I think can help me stay on,” I said, unable to hide my smile. “I want to invest a quarter of a million dollars in your company, Andrew. And I want to be the only individual to do so. Not as part of MCH. But just me.”

“Really?” Andrew said, practically giddy at the surprise money coming his way.

“Yes,” I said. “I will do what I can to spin MCH off to my own half or to make sure it doesn’t die out. Either way, this will give me enough of a voice with you that you won’t have to worry about losing me.”

It’s going to piss off like hell Edwin too. Oh, this is too good. I don’t even care about potential blow back, either. This is too good not to have happen.

“Wow, uhh, Chance, thank you,” Andrew said. “I can’t believe it.”

“Well, believe it,” I said with a smile. “We’ll make it work, OK? I’ll get logistics over to you shortly and we can figure that out, but do we have a deal?”

“Hell yeah, we have a deal!”

I laughed, exchanged some more pleasantries, and then hung up. I looked right to see Layla, her hair half hanging over her face, smiling at me.

“Sounds like some good news just happened,” she said.

“More than that,” I said with a smile. “All will be good with Virtual Realty. It’s a win I need to figuring things out.”

“What does that mean for Edwin?”

The smile grew wider at the prospect.

“It means that our little war is about to get a lot more explosive.”

63

Istood up from my table and walked over to the girl one back from the front of the line.

“Looking for company?” I said.

Claire smiled up at me, her expression weary and exhausted—almost as if what I had expected from my mother and from her were swapped, my mom looking like the youthful one and Claire looking like the one who had added a few years to her life.

“I don’t know that I would say that,” she said.

“Well, do you have somewhere to be?”

“Work, but, you know, everything is going to shit, so what’s another half hour of not being able to catch up on things?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, knowing full well that Edwin had played a major shadowy role in the demise of her company, Rising Sun. “I’m right over there.”