Chapter 116 Revelations

Eden’s POV:

Sitting in a dingy corner of the pub, I wait for Alice and Holly to arrive. I can’t even begin to imagine what they could possibly have to tell me. This whole thing is very cloak and dagger; it’s like something out of a spy film. Perhaps they know something about this whole lawsuit drama with Lewis. It would be a big help if they could give me something I can use to fire him.

I’m nervously tapping my foot on the ground.

I wish Noah was here with me. He always manages to calm me down. I can’t get the two women’s scared facial expressions out of my mind. Who has made them so terrified that they can’t even talk to me outside the company building?

“Eden?”

I jump slightly at the sound of someone talking to me. I’d been distractedly staring out the window and had completely missed the two women entering the pub.

“Can I get you both a drink?” I offer politely.

“Er… That’s not necessary,” Alice says. “We won’t be here long.”

“But we’ll look significantly less suspicious if we have drinks in front of us,” Holly whispers, her eyes darting around as if she thinks someone might have followed her here.

“Fine,” Alice sighs before getting to her feet. “I’ll get drinks.”

“I can…” I begin to offer.

“No thank you, Miss Clancy.”

“SHH!” Holly barks.

“Goodness sake, Holly. No one is here.”

Alice gets to her feet and approaches the bar, leaving me with Holly. The young woman that I first met on my very first day at Clancy’s Comforts, looks significantly less put together than she had that day. Her lips are in a grim line and there are dark circles under her eyes.

Her eyes are on Alice at the bar. It’s almost as if she’s scared to be alone with me.

“Are you alright, Holly?” I ask softly.

Her head snaps around so she’s looking at me, a haunted look on her face.

“Me? Y-yes. Yes, I’m fine,” she answers, her words mumbled.

When she falls silent again, a new awkwardness settles between us and I’m at a complete loss how to react or what to say. I should say something right? For one thing, I want to know what the heck this is all about. But her eyes keep darting towards the door and I think I might be better to wait for Alice. The slightly older woman seems remarkably calmer.

Alice crosses the pub back to our table, placing two glasses of red wine on the table.

“Wine alright?” Alice asks Holly.

“Anything will do,” she replies, before lifting her glass and taking a large gulp from it.

Alice shakes her head, before taking a seat opposite me. “I don’t know what’s got you so worried. It’s not like your boss is a murderer.”

That word catches my attention. Do they know something about my parents’ deaths?

“No but he is a criminal,” Holly retorts. “Who knows what he is actually capable of.”

They bicker back and forth momentarily, seeming to completely forget that I’m even here with them. I really wish they’d get to the point. Alice rolls her eyes before turning her attention back to me.

“Holly has something she’d like to give you,” she tells me in a far politer voice than the one she was just using with Holly.

“Something for me?” I ask eagerly. I’m inching forward on my seat, hoping against sense that she’s got something I can use against Lewis or his uncle.

Holly passes a USB drive across the table. “Lewis was always very careful not to send emails or anything traceable when he was doing something less than legal.”

“Yes, we’ve noticed,” I say irritably.

“Instead, he insisted that I speak with the team directly. He would print off the information about a product he wanted us to copy, make notes on the papers and have me write up a new version which I would give to the team members.”

“Are you saying the team didn’t know?”

“They may well have suspected but no, I don’t believe they actually knew what he was doing.”

My fingers curl around the USB drive. “And on here…?”

“Lewis demanded that I destroy his notes but I always copied them first. There’s notes on every product we’ve ever stolen, in there.”

My eyes widen. As much as I might have hoped that Holly might have something that would help me with Lewis, I hadn’t expected anything like this. I was hoping for an email or two, not a whole file of notes in his own handwriting.

“This is brilliant. Thank you, Holly!”

She reaches into her bag again, pulling out an envelope.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“My resignation.” She looks close to tears as she continues, “I should have told Mrs Clancy years ago. I’m really sorry, Eden.”

I hesitate to accept the letter. I definitely should accept it, except I can’t help but thinking that it’s a little unfair that she should lose her job because her boss is a thief.

“Do you have a new job lined up?”

“Huh?” She looks confused. “No. I haven’t even started to look.”

“Then why don’t you hold onto that letter. I’m not saying there won’t be consequences for your involvement in all this. You’re right; you should have told us sooner.”

She opens her mouth to respond but I continue, “however, you told us eventually and that definitely counts for something.”

I’m not completely sure what to make of the look on her face. It could be relief but it might also be fear.

“Unless you don’t want to stay,” I find myself muttering awkwardly.

“No. No, I do. I really do.”

I expect the nervous energy around us to dissipate but it doesn’t. If anything, it intensifies and I wonder to myself if there’s something else they want to say to me. Aren’t we done? Haven’t they done what they came to do?

Holly gasps, filling me with alarm.

“Why is he here?” she hisses, staring towards the door where Lewis has just entered. Talk about bad luck, I think to myself, not feeling particularly bothered. He’s long gone. He just doesn’t realise it yet. “I need to go.”

She hurriedly gets to her feet, almost spilling her drink in the process.

“Are you coming, Alice?” she asks, ducking her head slightly so she can hide behind a burly man that is sitting at the next table.

This whole thing would be comical if it wasn’t for the USB drive that I still have clenched in my fist and what it means. If it wasn’t for the fact that my family’s company is currently being sued by what feels like everyone.

Alice hesitates, looking between me and Holly.

“Alice?”

“I’m going to stay a moment,” she says eventually. “Besides, it’s better if Lewis finds you leaving alone. We should leave separately.”

Holly looks less convinced. She clearly doesn’t feel confident leaving alone but she can’t deny the logic that Alice is offering her either.

“That’s a good idea,” she decides. “Bye then.”

I watch her leave. She’s trying to be stealthy and failing miserably.

“She was really anxious about coming to see you,” Alice is saying. She’s talking quicker now, more nervous, and it surprises me. Only seconds ago, she was so controlled, practically holding Holly together and now it’s like all that confidence has gone.

“It’s not an easy thing to do,” I tell her reassuringly, “reporting your boss. It takes guts. I respect that.”

“Yeah…” She’s not really agreeing with me. In fact, I’m not even sure she’s heard what I just said to her. Her eyes have glazed over and her skin has a icy sheen to it, almost like she’s seen a ghost.

“You need to be careful,” she tells me. “There are still things you don’t know.”

I hesitate to ask. I want to know but I’m scared that she might be talking about my parents and I’m not even sure I want to know what happened to them. I hate the idea that someone might have killed them intentionally.

“I think your life might be in danger,” she whispers.

That’s not quite what I expected to hear and yet it makes sense. If someone really did kill my parents, the natural progression is that they might kill my grandmother and me. Maybe. I guess it all depends on the reason my parents were killed.

“Why?”