To Save Our Families, Let's 'Marry' (BoyxBoy)

Chapter 9

It was a chaotic Monday morning for both the Reyes's and the Lore's.

Following the previous morning at the hospital, which ended with Ramy and Haerin – who no one had noticed disappear over the course of the night – coming in to confirm that the fire was indeed due to the Q Group's main family. This had led to the two families agreeing to meet at the Reyes's company building to discuss the merger with a steady haste. This was later followed by the news of the culprit behind the hacking of the Reyes' mainframe a few days earlier reaching Marcus. Unsurprisingly, it was also the Q Group. He wasted no time in informing Hanna and John, especially since the likelihood was that the merger plans had been found during the hack, perhaps even the real intention behind the whole affair.

This was more reason to hasten the public announcement to give the decision more context before it looked like a desperate retaliation. A fake context of course.

Joshua had stayed naïve to the developments, having locked himself up in his room and playing out his original plan. Somewhat miraculously, he had gone through five full length, classic romance novels while also sleeping thought half the day and the whole night. There was little limit to the young man's genius. He just blindly agreed with his parents when told the family were going to the Reyes's company building for and meeting in regards to the Q Group before meeting Penelope at the hospital for lunch. Joshua had simply put it down to the possibility the notorious group could be behind everything; in a way that was the truth, however far too oversimplified, as he was to find out.

Henry was a little more aware of the situation having gone to the office for half of Sunday, Ramy had updated him on the truth of the fire during his break. How he was not remotely surprised to hear that his morning work had been cleared for him to attend a meeting with Lore family. The Q Group had attacked their only daughter and injured innumerable people as by product. It was not something he was shocked to hear; they had done far worse before with a lot more discretion. This was clearly a warning to the Lore family, just as the hack could have been to his own parents, of course with far less severity seeing as the Reyes' were not the main contender against the Q Group. While not far off, they were still behind the Lore family.

It was only on his drive to the office he realised that he had never brought up the horror of a marriage meeting his parents had set him up on, he was still half hoping it was a joke because their family shouldn't be so desperate to give their son to the Lore's for the sake of the merger. Clearly Joshua was as lost as him, which only confused him more; he couldn't help but wonder where on earth either side had thought of the idea. It was absolutely horrendous.

Just the memory of the encounter gave him shivers.

But all that aside, even if him and Joshua had changed the plan last minute to speak first about a solution, Henry wasn't sure about what he should do now.

After having seen the other man after finding out his sister was hurt, he couldn't imagine him being remotely coherent on the situation – an assumption that could only be described as spot on ­– there was little chance he had even thought of such things. They were supposed to have spoken on the phone on Sunday to discuss solutions to present to their parents on Monday. However, Monday had come and no such talks took place. Henry couldn't deny that he had completely forgotten about it all, spending the whole day suppressing all memories of the ordeal. He had only remembered in that moment.

Was he supposed to go with the old plan and respectfully decline to the Lore's while telling his family they had completely lost the plot?

Or was he supposed to keep quiet because...?

Well, he could not think of a particular reason to stay quiet. Finding a stable foundation was imperative for the merger, and with the recent events it was clear that time was of the essence. The faster the two men shot down the horrendous idea, the faster everyone could find a more plausible alternative and truly begin the merger. The logical option was obviously to outright say the verdict of the marriage meeting, regardless of whether the other party had even thought about it. Especially since they both had the same response to the preposterous situation.