Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 89162 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 446(@200wpm)___ 357(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89162 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 446(@200wpm)___ 357(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Torus nodded again.
“Yes. He was harassing her. I made him stop.”
Commander Sylvan raised his eyebrows.
“Should I assume this has something to do with the gunshot wound you were treated for in the Med Center yesterday?”
“Yes, he shot me—but it went clean through my arm and it’s already healed.” Torus flexed his arm experimentally. It was a good thing that his kind of Kindred were extremely fast healers. He barely even had a scar. “I punished him for the attack,” he added.
“Well, you also stole a lot of his personal property—very expensive tech equipment,” Commander Sylvan pointed out.
“He had compromising vids and pictures of my subordinate which were stored on the tech I took,” Torus said. “I wanted to be sure he couldn’t distribute them to anyone else—as he has done in the past, multiple times.”
“Well…” Sylvan sighed and ran a hand over his spiky blond hair—an odd effect to watch over the holo-projector, since it looked like a disembodied hand touching a disembodied head.
“I did what I thought was right,” Torus said, frowning. “The male got what was coming to him.”
“I’m sure he did, but he happens to be quite rich and fairly famous,” Sylvan said. “What the humans call a VIP—a ‘very important person.’”
“That’s ridiculous—I don’t care how rich or famous he is, he got what he deserved,” Torus growled. “He’s lucky I let him live.”
“It might have been better if you hadn’t—then he couldn’t have caused such a commotion.” Sylvan shook his head. “I’m sorry, but I’m going to need you and your subordinate to come to my office to talk this over.”
“Right now?” Torus asked.
“Immediately.” His commanding officer nodded. “I need to know all the facts so I can decide how best to proceed.”
“All right.” Torus nodded stiffly. “I’ll get Molly—er, Ms. Byrne—and we’ll come to your office right away.”
“Thank you. I’ll see you soon.” And Sylvan’s head disappeared abruptly.
Torus sat back in his chair for a minute, frowning. He wished that his commanding officer hadn’t asked for Molly to come too—she’d already been through enough trauma and she didn’t need more.
Well, he would just take the blame and tell Commander Sylvan that none of this was her fault, Torus decided. If there were any punishment or punitive actions coming as a result of his actions, he would deal with them entirely by himself.
10
MOLLY
Molly hummed to herself as she disconnected from the call she’d just finished. It was mid-morning and she was finally beginning to feel semi-normal again.
True to her word, Lana had come to work early and called an impromptu meeting to explain everything to their coworkers. She must have done an excellent job because when Molly walked in, a bunch of them had come up to her and expressed their sympathy. A lot of them had similar stories of the human men they had dated being assholes or abusive jerks.
“That’s why I’d never go back—even if I could,” one girl confided to Molly. “I’ve never had a human man treat me half as good as my Beast Kindred husband.”
“I caught my husband cheating on me with five different women!” another one told Molly. “When I found out about it, he tried to gaslight me into thinking I was crazy! What a bastard!”
Molly nodded and sympathized, though she privately thought that none of the stories she was hearing were quite as bad as what Zach had put her through. The thing was though, the women in her department weren’t trying to shame her. They were kind and non-judgmental—unlike most of the other coworkers she’d had that were exposed to her videos, courtesy of her sadistic ex.
It made her feel good to know that they weren’t looking down on her. Well, most of them weren’t, anyway. Karen Geners had been the only one in the whole department who hadn’t come to commiserate with Molly or say how sorry she was that something so awful had happened to her. Instead, she gave Molly a narrow-eyed, tight-lipped stare before walking past the knot of women and straight to her own cubicle.
Karen’s reaction had been hurtful, but since she and Molly weren’t really friends anyway, Molly had decided just to ignore it. After all, you can’t win over everybody. At least the whole nasty incident was behind her now, she told herself. It was over and done with and she was never going to have to deal with her ex again.
“Ms. Byrne?” The deep, rumbling voice made her heart start to flutter immediately.
Molly looked up, knowing that her cheeks were getting pink but unable to help her intense reaction. Commander Torus was standing there, looming over her cubicle with a serious look on his face.
“Yes, Sir?” she asked, her voice coming out in a squeak.
“Forgive me, but you and I have some business to attend to,” he told her. Looking around the room, he caught Lana’s eye.