“H-he doesn’t take calls.”
“Name?”
“Gregory Sinoff. And I don’t even know how to—”
I already had my phone out and hit contacts. The phone rang twice before I heard a familiar voice say, “Grant. I heard you’re at the desert resort this week. I hope everything is to your satisfaction.”
“It’s excellent. In fact, if you’d name your price, I’d like to take it off your hands.”
He named a price about 10 percent higher than he should have, but at this moment, I didn’t care.
“Deal. Let’s have our people get started on the transfer. Oh, by the way, I’m firing your HR manager now. I’m sure you havesomeone else who can fill in while we get all the i’s dotted and t’s crossed.”
“There has to be a story there, but if you’ll promise to tell me what led to this moment next time we run into one another at a club, I’ll have my headquarters staff handle HR from here. I imagine it will only be a week or so.”
“I bet we can do it faster.” I hung up and met Tim’s horrified stare across the desk with a friendly smile. “Get out.”
Chapter Eleven
Ches
I stormed out of the meeting and straight to my shared room with Alias. He’d hung back to talk to Grant, but I had no interest in speaking to either of them. They’d both betrayed me. Sure, there intentions were good, but a promise was a promise.
Not only did the HR manager look at me like I was lying, but he said the alphas must’ve had a good reason for doing what they did and that the whole thing was a misunderstanding.
He must’ve reminded me over a hundred times that the alphas who came here did so at great expense, and we didn’t want negative reviews.
Reviews and money were more important to this place than the lives and health of the people working here. That was the message I left with, and it was conveyed with the tiniest amount of empathy possible.
The first thing I did when I got into the room was get my bag from underneath the bed. I’d come here with only a few things to my name. Bare-bones wardrobe. Shoes on their last mile. A few items from my childhood. All in a discount store bag sewn back together with dental floss of all things.
I’d stuffed most of my things inside it when Alias came into the door. “Ches, what are you doing?”
“I’m packing. You were there in the meeting. Maybe another resort will overlook this complaint.”
“What? No, Ches. You can’t go.”
“Why? You think a place like this is going to put up with a tattletale? Someone who cries wolf every time something almost happens to him?”
Alias moved my bag aside and sat in front of me. “Almost? Worse things almost happened to you, but you were druggedand tied up in a guest’s room, Ches. That’s a big fucking deal and against the law. Not only should they have taken you more seriously, but they should notify the authorities. This goes beyond the boundaries of this resort.”
“Come on, Alias. That manager has probably already deleted the report and put my name on a list for firing. He’s not concerned about what happened to me or the fate of those alphas. No way in hell he’s going to call the police. He’s going to hope we don’t speak of it again and, to guarantee that, I’ll be a goner before the end of the day.”
“Ches, there are things that happened after you left. Things you don’t know. Please. Let’s calm down and go back to work. It’s all going to work out.”
“Calm down? I was just treated like the aggressor instead of the victim. This is why I didn’t want to go to them! This is why I asked you and Grant not to tell. You both promised. I think I’m more angry about that than I am that useless manager. I can’t believe you gave me an ultimatum. You forced this on me, and now what am I going to do?”
“I didn’t betray you, and neither did Grant. We both had your best interests in mind. I don’t care if you don’t believe that because it’s true. You can be mad at me and Grant, but don’t do something rash before you’ve settled down.”
I expected him to have an explosive reaction as I had, but he hadn’t. He was measured in his response and he was right to.
What hurt the most was Grant. He went against my wishes and the reason it stung so badly was because a part of me knew my wolf was right. He was my mate. My alpha. The one I’d been waiting for.
I plopped down on Alias’ bed and hung my head. I was angry at the wrong people.
My rage should’ve been directed at those assholes.
And the manager for his response but not at my friend and Grant.
