The Billionaire Life

While in another town, eat your hometown meal

"Ugh!" Alex throws himself in the bed, grunted. "I am sooo... tired..."

After days of circling selected Westfield malls that Great River is planning to buy in California, they finally arrived in Tukwila, WA, where they're also going to buy the Westfield Southcenter mall. On that day of the site tour, Henry dragged Alex for another wonderfully exhausting and excruciating day of leg exercise.

Right now, Alex's face is planted on the pillow while Henry is lounging on the sofa, unaffected.

"Let me tell you this," Alex said in a muffled tone. "Once Sears gave their space back to you, destroy it and replace it with either a hotel worthy of the mall or a serviced apartment..."

Sears at Westfield Southcenter is, in Alex's lack of better word: a disgrace.

The managing director said it was a shell of its former self and if there's a way, the management will not extend their contract under any circumstances whatsoever.

"Why are you so adamant about destroying Sears?"

"Back in 2018, my uncle saw Sears inside South Coast Plaza, and he wept like a baby," Alex said. "It was his paradise, especially to that little kid inside him when arriving in the American city of Los Angeles for the first time."

"I went inside a Sears store once back when I was in USA for the first time, and the atmosphere reminded me of Matahari in the early 2000s, when all you can see are baskets and baskets of items that are on sale. It's exactly like that but worse."

"So that's why Anton Segerstrom and David Grant were grinning like Cheshire Cat when we talked to them two years ago..." Henry said, remembering his and Maria's interaction with the men of the Segerstrom family during the opening of Sarinah Select. "Sears become a sore thumb to luxury malls like South Coast they can't wait to kick them out when they had a chance... Yeah, I think I get it."

"Trust me on this one," Alex said. "Right now, Sears inside the Westfield mall we visited is the only one left in the state. Also, I've been monitoring Sears for quite a while, and I have to say, Eddie Lampert is an asshole that needs to die stabbed in the chest, and his body left in the ditch on the side of the toll road."

Henry just chuckled as he sat down on the bed beside his husband, "I knew you were such a savage but damn, you can't wish something like that."

"That SOB is making my Mall Tycoon fantasy faded before me..." Alex grumbled.

Alex is not much of a game player, but instead of Call of Duty and DOTA-World of Warcraft, he loves playing construction and management simulation games like The Sims, Beach Life, and Roller Coaster Tycoon 2. Out of all the games he played, he loves Mall Tycoon the best.

Henry patted his husband's shoulders, but he felt heat radiating from it. He shrugged it off and said, "Say, we have a free time tomorrow before dinner with everyone, Jason included. What do you want to do?"

Alex mumbled, "I don't know... I'm too tired to think..."

"How about touring around Auburn? You said you knew the town when you visited thirteen years ago?"

"Just because I went there thirteen years ago doesn't mean I remember the places. The only place I know in Auburn is the Supermall," Alex replied, groaning. "I'm too tired and dizzy to think. I feel like I'm getting sick or something..."

As he said that, a waft of omega pheromone scent started to hit Henry's nose. Henry's Alpha instinct suddenly went into red alert.

Henry asked slowly. "Honey. By any chance, have you eaten your suppressant this morning?"