Page 19 of Minding the Minotaur
After Bradley was killed trying to contain a wolf pack skirmish three years ago, his wife, Sally, lost her mind from grief and ended up in an institution. The three other Cane kids—all younger than Otis—scattered to work on other levels, leaving Otis to take the reins as sheriff.
This old place is quiet now, but weirdly familiar. All the furniture is the same, just older and dustier than it was when we were younglings. The lights are dim when they used to be bright. The Canes were known to have the brightest lights on level one. Bradley earned enough that he didn’t care about the energy bills. Some said he took kickbacks, but nothing was ever proven.
“Here,” Otis says, flinging open one of the many doors. “Your room. Next to mine, so I can keep an eye on you.”
I amble inside.
“Now what?” I say, hurling myself onto the bed.
“You’ll stay here until I’ve found someone to guard you in your home. Then I’ll have bars put on your windows, locks on your doors. Surveillance.”
I stare at him, slack-jawed. “You’re joking, right?” Bars. Locks. Surveillance. The thought makes my big strong body want to buckle.
Otis’s large shoulders slump before he pulls himself upright. “For your own good,” he mutters, then adds, a tad more kindly, “I’ve got some stew on the stove. Want some?”
Amid my horror at my predicament, I also realize I’m starving.
Portal travel uses up a lot of energy. I’ve felt this bone-bending exhaustion shortly after each visit. It can take a while to wear off.
“Yeah, that would be good.” Otis disappears and I hear cupboard doors open and close in the kitchen down the passage, a saucepan clattering onto the stove.
Lying back on the bed, my eyelids droop. I jerk awake. I need to stay alert. Hopefully after I’ve gotten some food in my belly, I’ll be able to persuade Otis that he’s overreacting, that I will absolutely never, ever attempt to portal travel again. But even as I make this resolve, my heart rebels. I know Iwon’t stick to it. Not if it means I won’t meet my little human again.
A moment later Otis pokes his head in. “Could you come and watch the stew, check it doesn’t burn? I have a few calls to make.”
I sit bolt upright, alert with suspicion. “What kind of calls?”
“If I told you, I wouldn’t be doing my sheriff duty, now would I?” He quirks his mouth in a superior smile that makes me grind my molars. I’m pretty sure those calls will be about me.
Fuck the bastard. Wide awake now, I make my way down the hall toward the aromatic scent of slow-cooking meat and herbs.
In the kitchen, I amble over to the stove and stir the stew, then taste it. Not bad for a bachelor orc.
I think about my total lack of culinary skills. I used to just heat up pot noodles, gods knows how I got so bulked up on them.
But since I’ve been earning good coin at the clinic, I’ve employed a nutritionist, who cooks for me. Some of Tippy’s green smoothies are hard to swallow, but generally her food is okay.
Guess I should have learned to cook for myself, but it’s not like there’s been anyone I wanted to impress.
Until now.
I have a sudden fantasy of preparing a meal for the beautiful human, holding her hand across a candlelit table, gazing into her big blue eyes.
The memory of her bouncy tits and curvy ass has my cock fluffing. I shift, grunt. Rearrange myself. What the fuck? I’ve been smashed by the portal, hauled over the coals by Otis. I’m fucking exhausted. But my dick is tenting the front of my pants, ready for action.
I’m still daydreaming about all the things I’d like to dowith my human when Otis walks back in, humming.
“Sorted,” he says.
That’s enough to make my cock shrivel.
“Meaning?” I side-eye him as he gets out two bowls, knives and forks and puts them on the table.
He strides over to the stove and starts ladling out the stew. “My contacts have found you a minder.”
“A peripheral, right?” I grunt, slumping onto a chair. Otis places a bowl in front of me and I start shoveling food into my mouth.
He doesn’t answer. Guilty by omission.
