Chapter 325

While my two attackers were distracted by the taller, more confident Alpha male who had come to my rescue, I rolled away from them and got to my feet.

Clutching my phone in my hand, I continued to record.

“They were threatening me to get me to quit coming to classes here,” I told my rescuer. “When they found out I was recording them, they tried to take my phone.”

“Were you threatening my friend? Shane Ross asked. There was an edge to his voice that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

“She’s a Beta-loving troublemaker,” the blonde Alpha replied. “She wants them to go to school with us.”

“Yeah,” the brunette chimed in. “Maybe you should pick your friends better. Or are you one of them too?”

“I think more highly of Betas than either of you dirtbags,” Shane replied. “Most Betas wouldn’t gang up on a female to bully and attack them.”

“You better walk away, pal,” the blond growled. “Or you’re gonna get hurt.”

“Sure, I’ll leave.” Shane gave them a chilling smile. “Come on, Daisy. Let’s go.”

Shane stepped toward me, watching my antagonists with his peripheral vision. As soon as they thought he wasn’t looking, they sprung at him.

But Shane was ready, and so was I.

I side-kicked blondie in the knee, dropping him to the ground, while Shane punched the brunette on the chin hard enough to knock him out.

Shane sneered at the Alphas, now lying on the ground. “Let’s get out of here, Daisy.”

We began walking toward the quad when I remembered my key fob.

“Wait, I have to find the key fob for my car,” I said as I walked to the bushes where one of my attackers had thrown it.

Shane helped me look for it, and we found it quickly. Then, we walked across the campus to talk.

“Thanks for the help,” I said. “This was a lousy day.”

“I heard about your lousy day yesterday,” Shane responded. “Other than those two creeps, what else happened today?”

As we walked, I told him everything that had happened since I arrived on campus this morning.

“Daisy, you can’t keep attending classes here.” he shook his head in disbelief. “You can’t keep looking over your shoulder for jerks like those two, and it sounds like your professors are trying to flunk you on purpose.”

He was right. But I had such high hopes when I started attending Frampton University that imagining myself quitting made a feeling of profound emptiness form in my stomach.

“You could do a lot of good working with me instead of dealing with this crap every day,” he persisted. “We could tackle important problems and make the public aware of them to help make life more fair for everyone.”

“That sounds good,” I agreed. “But I need to talk to Victor before I give you my answer.”

Shane stopped walking and turned toward me. “Do you think he’ll agree with me?”

I nodded. “After Victor knows what happened to me today, he will. I’m not safe on this campus.”

“Good.” Shane nodded. “When are you going to tell him?”

“Walk me to my car, and I’ll go to Victor’s office on my way home and tell him,” I promised. “I’ll call you later tonight.”

Shane walked me to my car, and we discovered the two Alphas were gone. He checked inside my car to make sure nobody was hiding inside it and watched me drive away.

As I drove back to Denhurst, I rehearsed my conversation with Victor about why I had to quit Frampton University. He had to understand I couldn’t attend classes there anymore.

Working with Shane didn’t need to be a permanent arrangement. I could work on a few stories with him to get more experience and exposure as a journalist before returning to classes elsewhere.

But since I promised to discuss it with Victor before making any decisions, I didn’t want to sound like I’d made up my mind before speaking to him.

I arrived at The Association and parked in the front lot. My hands shook as I walked to the main entrance and signed in with the new security team.

They checked my digital photo and thumbprint according to the new visitor's protocol. Then, I was escorted to the executive wing of the complex to talk to Victor.

After leaving me at Victor’s outer office door, my escort wished me a nice day and left. It was a better system than allowing visitors free reign of the complex.

Stepping inside the administrative assistant’s office, I noticed a woman’s suit jacket hung over the back of the assistant’s chair and a purse on the floor next to it.

Did Victor hire a new assistant already? He hadn’t mentioned it to me.

The suit jacket was a pretty teal color, and it was made by a good label. A suit like this was much more appropriate for an office than Chloe’s skin-tight party dresses.

There were voices in Victor’s private office, so I made my way to the door and tapped a few times before opening it.

The first thing I saw was that the portion of the wall to the right of Victor’s desk had been replaced without the air vent grate that allowed him to be spied on. This new development made me smile.

The second thing I saw was a tall, voluptuous woman with coppery hair, blue eyes, and a pretty face at Victor’s side, leaning over the desk.

This hot woman was wearing a skirt that matched the jacket. She wore it with a taupe silk blouse unbuttoned enough to show deep cleavage as she bent over next to my fiancé.

She wasn’t a Chloe clone. She was something far more. The way she spoke and moved with grace and class made her feel like a more significant threat to my relationship with Victor than Chloe.

I was totally unprepared for this attractive, professional woman who was working closely with the love of my life, and I almost walked out of the room without saying a word.

But Victor looked up and saw me standing there staring with my hand still on his office door.

“Daisy, what a surprise,” Victor said. “Come in and meet Sarah. I hired her this morning.”

Our argument the previous evening and the way he had pretended to be asleep after we made love flashed through my mind. Had he hired this woman because he was angry with me?

The copper-haired woman turned toward me with a polite smile on her pretty face. She extended a perfectly manicured hand and said, “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Wilson.”

“Daisy, this is Sarah Diehl,” Victor said. “She’s my new executive assistant.”

“Oh,” was all that came from my mouth. The more I looked at Sarah, the hotter my jealousy burned.

I looked away and mumbled, “It’s nice to meet you.” But it was apparent I didn’t mean a word I said.

“I’ll get this memo out to all the departments immediately,” Sarah told Victor and discreetly left the room.

“How long have you known Sarah?” I asked as soon as the door closed.

“I’ve known her for a while,” he replied as he sorted some papers on his desk. “I should have hired her instead of Chloe.”

“Yeah, she’s definitely an improvement over Chloe,” I said sarcastically.

“What’s wrong with you?” Victor asked. “I thought you were meeting Shane, the super-journalist, this afternoon after your classes. Did he stand you up?”

“No, he was there when I needed him,” I scoffed. “I came here because I need to talk to you.”

He began to react to my attitude. “Well, here I am. What did you want to talk about?”

“I won’t be attending classes at Frampton University anymore,” I said. “I’m quitting tomorrow, and I’m going to work with Shane.”

Victor’s mouth tightened. I knew he was angry. “That wasn’t talking to me about anything. You made an announcement. I thought we agreed we would talk it over before you quit.”

I shrugged. My temper and jealousy were out of control. “Things changed. I’ll let you get back to Sarah. And I’ll be spending the night at Alex’s.”

I turned and opened his office door.

“Daisy, we need to talk about this,” Victor said. “You promised we would talk about it.”

“Like I said, things have changed,” I insisted. Whether I was being rational or not, I had to get out of that room before I burst into tears.

“What do you mean by that?” Victor snapped.

The lump in my throat made it impossible to answer. I hurried out the door and ran across the outer office and into the hall.