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Another growling noise moved through Bael as his gaze went to the handcuffed man.
“Don’t!” I squeaked when he went to take a step toward him again. “What are you doing?” I hissed, jumping in front of him to block his path. “The guards have it from here,” I told him.
Tentatively, I reached out, placing a hand to the center of his chest. Not holding him in place. It was clear that there was no way I could do such a thing, not after witnessing him lifting a grown man off the ground like he weighed nothing more than a doll. But trying to get his attention.
It seemed to work as his murderous gaze slid from my attacker and back to me, losing some of the fierceness almost instantly.
“Hey,” I tried, voice going softer, wanting to counteract his anger. “Thank you. I, ah, I don’t know what was going to happen if you didn’t step in. He, uhm, he didn’t seem to want my money,” I added, shaking my head.
“I heard a scream,” he told me. “I knew it was you,” he added.
“You didn’t have to come. I’m sure plenty of other people heard but didn’t come. It’s why they teach us to scream fire instead of, like, rape. No one comes to save a woman being attacked,” I said, feeling the heavy sadness of those words.
“Fucking insane,” Bael said, shaking his head. “You can’t be walking to your car so late without an escort.”
“Don’t be silly. I do it every night. Literally every single night since I was a teenager attending school instead of teaching here. This is the only time there’s ever been an incident.”
“It needs to be the last,” he said, and I didn’t quite know how to take that.
“It’s a safe campus. I mean, the security is all around. I should have parked a little closer is all,” I said, shrugging.
“I’ll be walking you to your car from now on,” he declared. Then, seeming to remember the situation, added, “For as long as I am in town.”
“That’s very… nice,” I said, wincing a bit at the word because it didn’t seem to suit the man at all. “But it really isn’t necessary.”
“It is.”
“Really, it isn’t,” I said as police sirens started making their way in our direction.
“You’re going to need to give a statement,” the campus security told me, giving me an apologetic look.
“Oh, right. Yes, of course,” I said, feeling like my migraine ramped up times a hundred at the very idea of having to recount it.
It all went so fast.
Which was exactly what I told the police when they showed up, putting my attacker in the back of the wagon as he ranted and raved about Bael needed to be the one who got locked up for assaultinghim.
“Yeah yeah yeah,” the policeman grumbled. “Maybe if you didn’t attack defenseless women, you wouldn’t get your ass kicked by a Good Samaritan,” he said, then nodded and scribbled in his notepad as I told him all I remembered, then gave him my contact information.
It felt like it went on forever. Objectively, it was likely all over in the course of half an hour, but my exhaustion and the jackhammering behind my eyes was making every second feel excruciatingly long.
“You really should get checked out,” the officer said for the fourth time. “You don’t want to mess around with a possible concussion.”
With that, he was gone.
And so were the campus security.
Leaving just me. In all my misery.
“I’m driving you to the hospital.”
Okay, not just me.
Bael as well.
I thought he’d disappeared after giving his statement, going back to his room to get some rest. He’d done enough. I had no right, at the time, to feel upset that he’d gone.
But he hadn’t.
