LEIGHTON
The police car sat parked on the street outside my apartment building.
To get there, we would have to pass through a crowd of reporters. They had cameras and microphones trained on the building, trying to get a good shot of me beyond the glass. I had handcuffs snapped around my wrists, and I wasn’t afforded the courtesy of hiding that from the world.
This was a new low for me.
My reputation was trashed. Shot to complete hell. No one would hire a fixer who couldn’t even fix her own life. That wasn’t the worst of it, though.
Mother was going to hear about this.
It didn’t look like Kiara had been dragged out the front of the building like I was—there was no buzz from the reporters, they were all half-asleep waiting for the story to show up until they’d spotted me. Hopefully that meant Mother wouldn’t knowwhoI’d dark bonded, but Tobias was bound to figure it out. The pieces were all out in the open now.
“Are the metal bracelets really necessary?” Ambrose growled as he followed behind me and the few cops who shoved me forward. We hadn’t yet breached the front doors, and thankfully the reporters hadn’t gotten inside.
Dash had gone with Kiara. Thank fuck they’d let him when she’d asked, because I’d been half convinced this was a ploy to get her back into her brother’s grasp. Mercury and Ambrose had stayed with me, even to do this horrible walk of shame.
The reporters were eating it up. I heard some shouts that told me they were already running with the story of an illicit affair between Leighton Winston and her brother’s rejected scent match pack.
They weren’t wrong, but I wasn’t looking forward to the fallout of that being added to the whole chaotic situation.
“She’s in custody for the time being,” the man in charge barked. “This is a serious offense.”
“That she hasn’t committed,” Mercury said. “You’re actively destroying her life.”
I was surprised he was willing to defend me. So far, Mercury had only been along for the ride. He was trying to keep his pack together more than anything else, and he didn’t need me for that.
“We’ll see what the Institute determines,” he countered.
“And then you’ll see what our lawyers can do to you. The damages your organization will have to pay are astronomical. I’m sure you’ll be fired. Remember what happened to the man who led that little raid on Dash’s studio?”
Mercury wasn’t even being discreet about his threats.
The GPRE had raided the Dirt with Dash studio during a rather… controversial broadcast a couple of months ago. That case was still in the courts, but the Loranger pack’s lawyers were suing for destruction of property, arrest without cause, and impeding free speech. Oh, and emotional distress.
I’d seen them at the GPRE headquarters and Dash had almost been pleased to be arrested. No distress present.
Needless to say, the person who’d ordered that action was now on unpaid leave.
“Your threats aren’t going to stop me from doing my job.”
“Enjoy your unpaid leave.”
We exited the building then. Muffled shouts grew clamorous, and it was hard to keep my head high when I was the centre of attention. I was no stranger to it, but it usually wasn’t this loud. Microphones were shoved in my face, requesting my comments. I turned away from them all.
That was the advice I gave my clients. Don’t let them force you into speaking in a stressful situation. It’s better to look like you’re snubbing reporters than to say something you haven’t thought through.
No one ever listened to that one, but I at least was going to follow my own advice.
When I was helped into the back of the cop car, Ambrose was stopped from following me and Mercury never tried. He faced the crowd of vultures instead, acting as my own PR manager.
He better not say anything that would bite me in the ass.
I didn’t get a chance to hear his speech because the car pulled away from the curb. Ambrose was jogging down the street to catch a cab, and we left all that behind.
* * *
“Kiara didn’t tell me how she received the bruises on her neck,” I said for the fifteenth time.
