Page 22 of These Little Heirs
“I was going to set something on fire so they’d listen to me. You can’t go and take away everyone’s money!” Torvan said from the bed.
“Brother,” Morvan sighed before Medwin had time to say anything. “Seriously, brother. No one is trying to make you go broke. The restaurant industry would still exist.”
“Not if food is free everywhere!” Torvan growled.
“Yes, it would. You still charge for the service of cooking it, ding dong,” Teal said, sounding more lighthearted than Iexpected him to. “Seriously, that’s one we have thought through. You wouldn’t charge for the food because you wouldn’t be charged for the food. You could either sign up for the program we’ll start and be paid by the fund every month or get paid for cooking by whoever comes into the restaurant. You still make a profit to pay yourself and employees for things that aren’t food. And I’m sorry Morvan got arrested. I’m not thrilled about that either, okay? He’s my best friend. So, cool it and you’re going to have to apologize to Ciro and Medwin and probably Clarence and maybe if you convince them you have a little remorse it’ll be community service and not---”
Cobalt looked at Teal and they fell quiet as Clarence’s scent wafted into the bedroom. The alpha dragon was pissed. He’d sent his grandkids out here to be safe and raise their families not to be blown up by the likes of Torvan. Cobalt shifted away from the door frame leaving plenty of room for Clarence to take up the spot. He glared at the idiot tied to the bed. No doubt he watched him grow up in Moonscale London as much as he’d watched the rest of us grow up. Morvan positioned himself between his brother and Clarence.
“You’re not saving him from this one, Morvan. You’re already on my shit list. My golf course didn’t do anything to you.”
“And I merely dressed it up in drag, huh?” Morvan squared his shoulders. “And let it make friends with butterflies.”
Clarence rolled his eyes, but his scent softened. It was hard not to like Morvan, and it wasn’t like the golf courses were blown up or anything.
“I’m going to make sure you have a lot of work to do in making this plan of yours and Teal’s work. Going to make you work as tirelessly as I did trying to figure out who hated me enough to attack my golf courses,” Clarence said.
“We already are,sir,” Morvan said, drawing out the sir until Clarence rolled his eyes.
“Don’t do that. I am not the enemy.”
“No, dear. Of course, you aren’t,” Medwin said. “Just your golf courses.”
Everyone laughed except for Torvan who didn’t find all the banter all that funny. I’d have felt bad for him except he had blown up part of the cabin and interrupted my alone time with Teal. For all I cared we could have a seven-course feast while he watched, and his mouth watered for a single crumb. Though, Teal would feed him because he was Teal and even evil fuckers deserved to eat.
“He’s your ex,” I whispered in Teal’s ear while Clarence and Morvan discussed golf courses and flowers.
“Morvan is not my ex,” Teal said too quickly.
“Not him. Torvan.”
“One summer. I was fifteen. By the end of summer it was clear we valued different things. He came to visit me in Heartville one weekend. I had been looking forward to giving him a tour of where we grew the food. He was not excited and made this huge ordeal that he’d taken me to his family’s five star restaurant and I took him to a field of manure to eat. No, I took him to eat food fresh from the source. You haven’t eaten until you can pull your food right off the plant and---” Teal paused.
“Keep going.”
“You’re drooling,” Teal laughed and wiped my mouth.
“Are you still hungry?” Medwin asked. “I can have some of the guards bring more food up.”
“He’s over here talking about fresh fruit off the vine and expects me not to drool,” I laughed and rested my forehead against Teal’s shoulder.
“That date sucked,” Torvan said, having picked up on our conversation.
“You give him a hundred hours of community service for having bad taste in date locations,” Teal said and Clarence actually laughed and so did Medwin.
“I should make him rebuild the cabin by himself but he’s more likely to blow it up than fix it,” Medwin said.
“We don’t even know that he’s not going to lockup yet,” Clarence said. “I know we’re all laughing right now but this is serious. Torvan, you know this is serious, right? I’m in the same boat as you. It’s ridiculous to seed bomb places but blowing people up isn’t the answer.”
“I wasn’t going to blow them up,” Torvan rolled his eyes.
“You were setting a fire,” Clarence nodded. “You know that fires kill, right? Sometimes they even kill dragons? So are you enraged or stupid?”
Torvan winced and for a split second I felt bad for him. Just a split second, though.
“You went to war over shinies and you’re angry that I don’t want to lose my family’s legacy so everyone can do nothing?” Torvan huffed.
“They won’t be doing nothing. People will still work,” Teal rolled his eyes. “You need more than food to survive.”
