Chapter 7

"Ms. Wei, you need to focus," Argent said."Several groups have requested interviews. You have your choice of who handles-"

I drug my eyes away from the large window. "No."

"Ms. Wei, that isn't how this works. People have questions. If you refuse to answer them, they will make their own. That is dangerous for your reputation, it could harm the future of your career."

"Set up whatever you want. I will not answer any questions about my father or about leaving. Do what you have to but I won't- I'm not going to talk about it, ok?"

The woman sighed. The argument had been going on since she'd been hired by the President's staff to handle the situation. From what I understood, Argent was a part of a larger team that was meant to handle me and my father and it almost made me feel bad. The lawyers had pulled from Wei Industries all of the contracts my father had signed on my behalf and the wages I was meant to earn. What had pushed my father- Don- over the edge was the threat of legal recourse over his actions. Don had given in at the thought of what would he could have lost. There was a part of me that enjoyed that, wanted him to hurt, but I couldn't deny that it had hurt me too.

"I'll see about a press release. A simple statement, you have final approval but we need to say something." Argent nodded and wrote a note on some of her papers.

"Have you managed to set up an account for me yet? I don't like wasting other people's money when I have my own."

"The trust fund has been expedited but there's some negotiating going on about what your father owes you. He has agreed to pay but it's the how much he's concerned about."

"Yeah, his tendency to doc my pay every time we disagreed. I imagine he didn't really keep track of that."

Argent sighed again. "Yes, there is that. There is also another problem that you may not have been aware of." She looked up as I stared at her in confusion. "Your father treated your wages, your salary like it was an allowance. He didn't give you the full amount even when you were in good standing. There are financial documents that show what he did. He is fighting it but the lawyers are handling it."

"So until then, I've got what I've got. Right."

"No until then, President McMullen is paying for what you need and there are sponsors coming in for the racing side. As for that, we did manage to get your ship from the garage. It's at a new field waiting for you to go out whenever you want."

I nodded. "Ok." I looked to the side and noticed the clock. "Uh, look, my friends are coming over soon. I haven't seen them since everything went down." I don't want you here when they get here.

"Of course, I'll get you a draft of that statement for your approval," Argent said gathering her things to leave. She paused as she moved to leave the dining room. "Eva, the President might be the one paying the bills at the moment but we're here for you. Let us help."

You can't but just believe that. None of you can bring back the dead. "Yeah, sure."

I waited for the sound of the door to the suite closing before getting up myself. Every little noise seemed to echo like this was just an empty cave. All in blue. It was all nice, just cold. The long hallway that led back to the master bedroom felt small and dark. The room wasn't, two sets of windows let light into the already bright room. I considered hiding on the cold balcony, it would feel less empty, less lonely. But I was alone. Without thinking I walked away from the open French doors to the more discrete guest bedroom. Everything still felt too nice, too expensive. I sat on the bed and just flopped back on to the comforter. For a moment, I just listened to the ticking of the clock. With my eyes closed, I could almost pretend I was home and nothing was wrong. Then the knock came.

I popped up and moved from the guest bedroom into the foyer. "Ms. Wei, your guests have arrived." The butler announced, motioning the group in.

"Thank you." Deep breath. "Hi, guys."

"Eva, what did you get yourself into?" Chelsea asked.

"Umm, yeah. This is home now." I said gesturing to the cavernlike entrance. "Want to have a seat in the living room? It has a great view of the city."

The five shared a look but nodded slowly nodded. They followed me from the foyer to the open living room in silence. There was a gasp from one of them as they entered the blue room. I gave up on not facing them and looked back to see their reactions.

"It's…..nice. That's for sure." Chelsea said. "Who's paying for this?"

"President McMullen, currently. At least until I…." I choked on a sob. "I don't have anywhere else to go."

Immediately, there were arms around me, comforting me. A shrill ring echoed in the silence of the suite. I stood up and rubbed my face. The girls that had come to my aid looked at me with concern. I waved them off. I needed to be fine. I had to be fine. One shuddering breath later, I was preparing myself for the phone call to come.

"I have to take that," I swallowed. "If you guys want you can go ahead and order room service. There's a menu on that screen over there. Get whatever you want."

I stumbled down the hallway to the master bedroom and closed the door. Taking a quick moment to be sure that there was no way anyone could listen in on the conversation but when the phone rang again, I grabbed the phone and dashed into the bathroom.

"Ms. Wei? It's Argent. I've got that statement in the works but there's something else we need to discuss." Argent's voice came through filled with hesitant urgency.

"Now isn't the best time, my friends are here," I whispered.

"That's exactly what we need to discuss. The President has gotten in contact with the new coaching and training staff. Somehow they have it in their heads that they were meant to meet with you today. Don't say anything, I wasn't informed either." She took a deep breath. "I don't think that that is what this is all about though."

"What does that mean? What's it all about?"

She sighed. "The President may be concerned about your dedication to this process."

"What? I have lost so much for his little project. I need my friends, if not for them I have nothing of value in my life. My father has done the exact same thing my entire life. I don't….I don't know what to do about this right now."

"I agree, this is extremely uncomfortable for me as well. I do think that I have a solution."

"Lay it on me."

"You need to come to the table to negotiate for yourself. If you list out your demands, the things you need and that you want, you might get what you want. Right now, might not be the best time for it though, not with the President having lawyers on both sides. Give me a week to get you some kind of income and we'll do it together."

I took a deep breath. "One last thing before we get back to today. Why should I trust you? You're on his payroll as well?"

"I guess I'll just have to earn your trust. For right now I'll leave it with as your agent, my reputation depends on you. If you suffer a breakdown at this stage, I go right on down with you."

"Fine, what about today?"

"I handled most of it already. I reached out to the team and let them know that we were handling some of the optics today and scheduling."

"And what did I schedule?"

"A small interview and photo op on the National Mall. They might ask a few questions about the statement and leaving Wei Enterprises but it will be about the diplomacy of the race and about the Prince. You talk and then they get a few pictures."

I rubbed my forehead. "Fine, when?"

"This Sunday, you'll go in tomorrow to meet with the coaching staff and then you'll spend Saturday morning preping for the interview. Your friends can come if you want but if you don't want them to hear the inner workings of this you may want to keep them out. Saturday afternoon you'll be back at it training. You'll be free after the interview, you can do whatever you want."

"Yeah sure, one thing. We should talk Sunday. Like you said, figure out how to get it under control."

"Sounds perfect. Tomorrow."

I hung up and took a deep breath. It was a start but it felt like I was back at the very begining. I put the phone back in the bedroom and the took the closet exit to living room and my friends.

"Everything ok?" Morgan asked.

"Just letting me know about my schedule for this weekend," I said. "There's some stuff you guys can sit in on, if you want. You guys order something."

"Burgers, everything else was weird," Steven said.

"What stuff can we get involved with? Jordan asked.

"Interview prep. Mostly it'll be just getting what I'll be wearing and then maybe some stuff about what I want to say and I what I can say about the situation."

"Cool."

Deep breath. I can do this. Yeah, I can do this.

Notes:

I want to send a quick thank you to imaginationlover101 for their support as I wrote this chapter and for reading it over before it got published. They're the whole reason this story is going again.

The place Eva is staying is strongly based on the Connaught hotel in London, specifically the Apartment suite. It is a very large, very lavish suite that has a blue theme. The suite itself can cost upwards of 16,000 pounds (sterling, British currency and I am not converting it) a night. You can go over to the Connaught's website and take a virtual tour of the suite and view a floor plan. The Apartment is not the only awesome suite at the Connaught. If I were to stay there (if I ever could afford to), I'd chose the Library suite.

In this chapter, I decided to finally lay down an exact location. As far as I know, the only confirmed location in canon is New Mexico which is where Rick meets Don Wei. Assuming that Don is not wandering too far from where he began at the time of this event, I'm assuming he and Eva lived in the continental United States (which may not exist in the Earth Coalition but is a geographical feature I'm holding on to). From there I looked for an area in the US with a high concentration of boarding schools (even though Galla isn't, Stern was). In the US they're kinda scattered but are concentrated on the coasts, heavier on the East coast. I also factored in other info from both canon and this story to chose Maryland as the general locale for the story.