Empire of Deception (Harry Styles AU)

Chapter 46

 Victoria was gone when I woke up the next morning and it made it that much harder to put on another suit and walk out my front door. The office is eerily quiet when I arrive and April says hello with nervous eyes. "Is everything okay?" I ask, concerned.

"Mr. Christopher is waiting in your office for you, sir," she says.

Sure enough, Christopher Jarwin is waiting in my office, rudely sitting in my swivel chair. I roll my eyes.

"Good morning to you, too, Styles," he says stiffly, taking his feet off of my desk and setting them on the ground.

"No call? You just show up whenever you feel like it, eh?" I tease, although slightly irritated that I wasn't given a heads up before he just waltzes in here.

"Mate. Come on," he breathes with a dramatic sigh, looking down at his hands before reverting his dark eyes back up to me, "I'm Christopher Jarwin." He smirks, holding his arms up at his sides, like Christ himself.

I roll my eyes at him and set my suitcase down on the coffee table beside my office couch. "What do you want."

"What has happened since I've been gone?"

"You've been gone for like... 2 or 3 days, calm down. London isn't that exciting," I respond.

"Harry," he says through gritted teeth, lowering his voice. "Don't fuck around. You know what I'm asking."

I sigh. "Fine. You were right. Megan approached Ri and I after the meeting—after you bolted. She's... She's off, Jarwin. We spoke to Mark Tomlinson and learned about the drowning of her sister.... Zayn and Mia are going after her uncle to see if we can get more details. For how much power she possesses, she can't just be someone's wife. She has a bigger hand in this than she wants us to know and I'm going to find out what she is hiding and what the point of everything is."

"Has she reached out to you since then?" Christopher asks, his voice slightly distant as if he is deep in thought. His gaze is intense and his dark brows are furrowed as he seems to concentrate on his hands that are clasped lightly together. His dark hair seems even darker than normal and he looks like he hasn't had a good nights sleep in a while, since bags outline his eyes. He looks like he hasn't gotten a haircut in a while, either. I wonder what he had been up to after he left.

"No," I say, shaking my head, "But I feel her everywhere. Her webs are... Sticky. And they touch everything and they catch everything and I have a feeling we're going to start seeing a lot more of her," I confess, honestly slightly horrified at the thought of being confronted or cornered by Megan O'Connor again. So, I say, shaking away the fear and looking Christopher in the eyes, "Are you going to fucking tell me what the fuck is going on and where you went? Or are you gonna scamper back to Swann and hide out."

Christopher snorts, anger flaring up inside him as his jaw slightly twitches, appalled by my disrespect towards him and his character. Instead of fighting me though, or lashing out, he seems to swallow up his irritation and exhale it in a single, large, fire breath. "Out of sight, out of mind, Styles," he says, exhaling heavily. "When something tragic happens, you have to run away. I don't like it either, but it's best to lay low. I have a feeling we won't be seeing Des for a while, don't you?" he asks.

"And what about Alexander?"

Christopher's eyes narrow at the mention of his superior father. I can tell his soul is being torn apart by trying to figure out where his loyalties lie—with his family, or with his friends. With the corrupt, or with the people trying to bring justice. "Alexander is back but he's just migrating between the house and his office—and he's trying to do as much business as he can within the safe walls of our home," Christopher finally confesses before literally biting his tongue. "I-I can't say everything that I want to say but I know that between you and Ri, you'll figure it out. Fuck, I don't even know if I know what is going on anymore... Things just got... Fucked," he states for a lack of a better word.