the Legend

Chapter Eight – Behind Closed Doors

The polished black car rolled away from the town hall in silence. Inside, the two developers sat rigid, their smiles gone the moment the doors shut behind them. The town’s cheers for Adrian still echoed faintly through the harbor streets, a sound that gnawed at both men as the headlights cut through the night.

At last, the driver pulled them into a rented office on the edge of town—a temporary headquarters disguised as a “consultation center.” Inside, the facade of charm and polished manners evaporated. Papers were scattered across the long table, maps of Greyharbor marked with red ink, contracts stacked in neat but accusing piles.

The taller of the two, Harrington, tossed his jacket onto a chair and slammed a folder shut. “Damn him. We had them in our pocket. A week more, maybe two, and they’d have signed themselves into chains. Then he decides to speak.”

The other man, Mercer, leaned against the table, his expression sharper, colder. “Not just speak. He named himself. Adrian Locke. Do you understand what that means?”

Harrington’s eyes narrowed. “A runaway rich boy playing fisherman, that’s what it means. He’s hiding in this nowhere town, and now he thinks he’s their savior.”

“No,” Mercer said quietly, with the tone of a man who had seen too many deals unravel. “It means influence. It means resources. You don’t just brush aside the Locke name, not in this business. Every door we knock on, he’ll have already opened. Every investor we court, he’ll scare away with one phone call.” He rapped his fingers against the table. “We thought Greyharbor was just another acquisition. Now it’s a battlefield.”

Harrington paced, his frustration boiling. “So what do we do? Pack up and walk away? We’ve sunk too much into this already. The contracts, the permits—this deal is ours. The Locke boy can posture all he wants, but he hasn’t been in the game for years. He doesn’t know how the world really works anymore.”

Mercer’s smile was thin and humorless. “Don’t underestimate a Locke. He grew up in boardrooms sharper than knives. If he’s chosen to step back into this fight, it’s because he knows he can win it.”

The room fell into tense silence. Only the hum of the overhead lights filled the space.

At last, Harrington muttered, “Then we cut deeper. If we can’t buy the town, we divide it. Turn them against him. You heard the doubts in that hall—half of them still don’t trust him. The idea of a billionaire’s son hiding among them? That stings. All it will take is the right whispers, the right reminders that he’s not one of them, and he’ll lose their faith.”

Mercer nodded slowly. “Divide and conquer. If Locke wants to stand with the fishermen, then we show them what it means to trust a man who could buy their livelihoods ten times over. Paint him as a fraud, a manipulator. Make them believe he’s only here to take back what he abandoned.”

Harrington smirked, his temper cooling into calculation. “Yes. If we can’t silence his voice, we poison it.”

Mercer’s eyes glinted with something darker. “And if that fails…” He let the words trail off, but the implication was clear. Not every battle was fought with contracts and persuasion.

The two men shared a long look, the air between them heavy with unspoken agreement.

Adrian Locke had thrown down a gauntlet. But the developers of Greyharbor had no intention of leaving quietly.

The storm gathering over the harbor was no longer just about land and contracts. It was personal.