“Thank you,” I whispered, my voice shaky. “Please don’t let them take me.” The upset and adrenaline overwhelmed me, thefearat being dragged back to that room in my family’s castle and them getting Theresa because I’d fought back, and everything went dark.
3
Creed
I caught Aurora before she hit the ground, swinging her up in my arms and glancing around trying to figure out how to handle this… And not land in way too much hot water. Security came racing towards me and I said the only thing I could think of.
“It’s not my fault.”
The guy slowed down and nodded, his partner already radioing in. “We know, Creed. Ms. Reed—we knew to be on the lookout for Andrew Graves. Someone thought they got a glimpse of him but wasn’t sure—we know.”
Relief filled me. “He tried to abduct Aurora.” I swallowed loudly. “I need someone to handle this with my PO.”
Kindness filled his eyes which surprised me given how big of assholes most of the hospital had been to me. “Ms. Reed will handle it. Really, don’t worry.” He looked past me and narrowed his eyes. “I’m not sure if that camera would have caught it all, so—we’ll take him into custody and sort it all out.”
He went to take Aurora from me, but I took a step back which made them both go tense.
“She asked me to save her before she fainted,” I explained, fibbing but not really. “I don’t want her to wake scared and…” I shrugged.
“Fair enough,” he accepted after a moment.
Ms. Reed came racing down the hallway a moment later, rage filling her eyes when she locked in on Andrew on the ground. Then she met my gaze. “Damn, I’m jealous you got to hit the piece of shit.”
“He went to hit Aurora. I had reason.”
She snorted. “I wouldn’t have turned you in if you just slugged him because it’s a Tuesday.” She sighed and rubbed her hand over her face. “Okay, back to my office. We need to finish our conversation and—how did she end up here?”
“From what we saw on the cameras, she got turned around and was circling,” the security guard told her.
I nodded, knowing I’d picked up her scent that way. Normally, my lion was shit for tracking, but he knew Aurora’s scent well after weeks of lunch and… We were worried about her.
“Did you find her like this or—” Ms. Reed asked, and I quickly explained for all of them what I’d walked up on and had happened. “Okay, then let’s not make a scene on the way to my office. We can sneak over to security.”
She looked like she might take Aurora from me but then seemed to sense that I wasn’t going to let go and sighed, waving me to follow instead. I did, and then she was amused when we were in the large office with atonof monitors and people watching them.
“Are you just going to hold her?” she asked.
I gave her a bored look. “She weighs like two pounds. She was scared. I don’t want her waking up in a strange setting and thinking she was ditched when she asked for help.” I swallowed loudly under her piercing gaze. “I know how much that sucks.”
“It does,” she agreed. “But this is about to get crazy, so how about setting her on the couch over there and staying by her. You’re going to want your hands free.” She snorted. “I do when the shit hits the fan.”
She waswaymore real than I would ever have thought.
I nodded and went to do that but then held her closer when someone cameflyingthrough the door and was vibrating with too much.
“This is Xavier, Aurora’s bodyguard,” Ms. Reed explained.
“Still?” I drawled as I eased down and set her on the sofa.
“I deserve that,” the man accepted, letting out a slow breath when he saw Aurora was safe. “But things are complicated.”
“Uncomplicate them,” Ms. Reed ordered, sounding not happy either.
The man sighed and rubbed his hand over his head. I felt bad for him when he explained. Basically, while he was waiting for Aurora, security alerted him that someonemighthave seen Andrew Graves and he wanted to take a look, so he was actually in the security office when everything started.
He confirmed it was Andrew and was trying to get in touch with Ms. Reed since she was with Aurora and… From there, the clusterfuck. Aurora had gotten confused in her upset and—ASH was a maze. I had worked there for months and still had to refer to the map on my phone at least twice a week.
Ms. Reed accepted that as well before looking at one of the higher-ups in security. “I need what you have sent to Theresa Reed. She’s handling all of this. Right now, we need to know if Andrew Graves was even allowed to be here legally. That would give us the best chance to throw the book at him and help Aurora.”
