Page 64 of Robin and Marian
Scarlett gasped. Even Marian was astonished. Was this what Robin had found?
“I don’t work with Jana,” Alan said, confused. “What do you mean, insider trading?”
Guy set you up, man,” Robin said. “You’re the next fall guy. If he gets caught, you’ll go to prison for longer than I went. He’s into some really bad stuff.”
Alan licked his lips, looking nervous now that Robin had laid it out. “Well, I didn’t do it. The sheriff’s in the other room. We’ll tell him.”
“No!” Robin lurched up from the couch. “That worked so well for us last time.”
“Last time I checked, you didn’t even try to explain,” Alan shouted. “You let us all believe that you’d…” he couldn’t finish. The pain in his eyes told the rest of the story. He lowered his voice. “Why didn’t you say anything?” This was no longer about proving Alan’s innocence. Robin’s lifelong friend was calling him out for driving a wedge between them that shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
“Would you have believed me?” Robin asked.
“Yes!” Alan’s eyes watered. “You never gave me a chance.”
Robin looked at his sister and she nodded. He swallowed and his gaze lowered to the floor. “I’m sorry. I was wrong…” He took a deep breath. “Guy is going to do the same thing to you if we don’t stop him.”
“Richard!” Alan caught onto that idea like a ray of hope. “What if we bring this to him?”
Robin made a bitter sound. “Don’t you think I thought of all this when this happened to me? You might be family, but he’d turn you in if he thought you were guilty. He’s not going to lose everything for some lowlife.”Robin would know.“We’ve got to get at Guy a different way.”
Alan seemed to be at his wit’s end. “How?”
Looking over at Marian, Robin reached his hand out for her bag and Marian pulled out the jewelry to show what they’d found. “Your mother’s jewels!” Scarlett cried out. Midge was fascinated and he scampered closer to see.
“I need to borrow your Tesla tonight,” Robin said.
“You can’t,” Alan said. “It’s in the shop.”
Scarlett lurched forward in her seat in sudden inspiration. “We’ve got the Engler F.F.!” Alan cast her a betrayed look. “What?” she asked.
Robin’s eyes widened and Marian recognized the name as the motorcycle Lamborghini hybrid that he’d fallen in love with. “That’s yours?”
Alan gave him an uneasy look. “What are you planning?”
“Marian and I are going to pay back a few debts.” Robin untangled the jewelry from her hand. “You need to go to Richard’s party tonight and convince Guy’s investors not to sell their lands to him.”
“Who are they?” he asked.
Tuck counted them off on his fingers. “Old Man Pete, the Hunger Game twins, the snob squad, Marian’s auntie.”
Alan nodded, probably not knowing who half those people were. “We have money put aside. We could put an offer on their land.”
“No!” Robin said. “You can’t do anything like that. Your name is all over those documents. You can’t invest in this or you’ll just look guilty, and we can’t bring anyone’s attention to what’s going on illegally. If Guy goes down, you do. Do you understand?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“No!” Midge shouted. He was livid. “Guy’s going to get away with being bad?”
“Definitely not.” Marian met the kid’s eyes—they had to convince him that this was the best, most exciting plan or he might go to his dad and get Alan caught in the fallout. “Guy wants Richard’s company more than he’s ever wanted anything in his life—we’re going to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
“Exactly.” Robin nodded and his eyes flashed with excitement. “The Mayfair is going to be a huge success. We’ll just put Scarlett’s name on that. Little John would do that for…” He hesitated when Scarlett glared at him.
“I’ll cover advertising for the Mayfair,” Tuck volunteered. “That’ll bring in the numbers.”
He seemed an odd choice to take over marketing. If anything, that would be Marian’s job. She worked for the paper; but Tuck was crazy, and for now, everyone ignored him.
“Don’t worry,” Robin told Midge. “He’s not going to get away with anything.”
