Harper
The next nightwe’re settled in Violet’s living room with Scarlett and Joss. They’ve brought wine, chocolate cake and pitchforks because I spent the day explaining to Scarlett at work, and Violet has been filling in Joss yesterday and earlier today as they cleaned up after Ben’s party.
I fill them in on Drew’s latest reiteration of his threat. One he was keen to remind me of when he was suspicious I’d talked to Alex yesterday at the party.
“That absolute motherfucker.” Violet slams her hand down on the table after we all sit down.
“Language, Violet.” Joss gives her a look.
“Oh, you’re one to talk.” Violet rolls her eyes.
“Oh no, I meant you should expand on your language. Because he’s an absolute cunty little fuck who deserves to be flayed alive.”
A laugh bubbles out of me for the first time in days, and I nearly choke on my last sip of wine.
“Oh, I like her.” Scarlett smirks at me.
“Me too.”
“You’ll like me more when we figure out how to get you out of this mess because there’s no way we’re letting this fuckfaced pigeon shit win this. Nothing gets in the way of true love if I can do something about it. Violet can tell you.”
“Except you get in your own way.”
“We’re not discussing that right now, Violet. Stay on fucking task, will you?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Violet gives her a mock salute.
“All right. How much money are we talking here? Because I don’t know if you know but you have some famous friends that might be able to donate or get their friends to donate.”
“It’s a lot. At least twenty million for a new building, ten million to repair the one we’ve got. Then we’d still need to fund staff and programs in the place, plus rent.”
“What if you rent a new place instead of build or stay where you are, there’s got to be something already out there that we could modify. Might even work better and you wouldn’t have to worry about renewals like this, where governments and old dudes with grumpy dispositions make decisions for you.”
“Even then, with the renovations to bring it up to speed for our needs, it’ll take time. And we’d have to store the objects in the meantime. If they close us down, they’re only giving us three months to transfer everything to other museums or auction them off and clear it out. There’s no way we can renovate a new space in that time. So we’d have to store the objects offsite somewhere, which will cost a fortune.”
“What about some of the other museums? Do they have spare storage space they could take some in, in the meantime while you renovate? Temporary loans? Even I have a little bit of secure storage space for the bigger pieces I don’t keep at my office. I could give you some of that.” Violet offers.
“I could ask around. It’s possible.” I shrug.
“I know a couple of realtors. I don’t know if any of them do commercial, but I bet they could put us in touch with someone. We can research buildings tomorrow. Maybe there’s even something historical where we could pitch it as saving history twice over,” Scarlett offers.
“As long as we can get proper HVAC and lighting.” I tilt my head because the idea isn’t a terrible one.
“Right. Of course. I have someone in mind. I’ll go call them now.” Scarlett offers.
“Yes. You do that. Violet, get your husband and tell him to call everyone he can think of. Ask them how much they can donate. It’ll save their guy. Alex is well liked? Yeah?” She pauses to watch me nod. “Good, give them the old band of brothers’ speech. Then tell them we will praise their names to the end of time if they can pitch in to do this. I’ll make sure it gets them publicity and more deals. And you know that calendar we were going to do? Let’s make it a coffee table book. Rare, numbered editions. Signed. We’ll auction them. See which of the boys is willing to play ball. You better be willing to put that gorgeous ass husband of yours on the sacrificial altar first.”
Violet raises her brow. “I’ll allow it. This once for a good cause. But he’s the one you’ll have to convince. He did say, Colton first.”
“He’d do it for me. That boy knows he owes me for all the ways I helped him get you.”
Violet shakes her head another smile playing on her lips. “We’ll see what he and the other guys say.”
“I’m not kidding. Depending on who agrees… with those abs and my camera… We could probably raise another million.”
“You know who you’d need to make it two. So do you want to call him or should I?” Violet gives Joss a pointed look, and for the first time this evening I see her face falter the slightest bit.
“We’ll discuss that later. The rest of the guys first, yeah?” Joss makes a face at Violet.
