Page 7 of The Scandal You Started
“It’s only in the last two days that he’s calmed down and started asking questions,” Monty continued, glancing across his shoulder to George and her. “Today, since he woke up, he’s exercised, taken a bath, and has changed into fresh clothing. But otherwise, he’s just been sitting on the bed. He refused breakfast, so he hasn’t yet eaten.”
A ticking silence fell around the room.
“He’s scared,” Rayna said, voicing what no one had directly said.
She didn’t blame the lord. Had she been in his position, she knew her defences would have unleashed a similar torrent of blind rage on everyone around her.
“He is,” Monty agreed, a twist forming on his brows. “But no matter what we try, he won’t listen or give us long enough to assure him there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
“Why not send him back?” George asked.
“How, George?” Victor said in frustration. “He won’t let anyone approach him. And with the amount of Type Two Z-Energy released on the return journey, it wouldn’t be safe to send him back drugged and asleep. Even for a man of his size.”
Silence.
Rayna looked between River and Monty. “Is Zack still going to be his Guardian?”
River shook his head. “No. I’ve accepted his guardianship now.”
“But we can’t take him out of here until he starts cooperating,” Victor repeated.
Rayna’s thoughts whizzed a mile a minute as she stared at Victor before they locked like a slot machine on a very stubborn decision.
He was going to hate her suggestion. But why had he called her back if not to do her job?
She sat up confidently. “I want to meet him. Face-to-face, with no guards.”
“No.” There was barely a second between her declaration and Victor’s refusal. “I haven’t let anyone in there alone. I won’t. Not even you, Rayna.”
“You have to,” she countered. “The whole problem stems from the fact you’re hounding him with too many people at once. It’s terrifying him. He needs to speak to one person who—”
Victor moved upright, a storm clouding over his ice-blue eyes. “There is no arguing on this, Rayna. You are not going in there alone.”
But his furious rejection only stirred her own frustration, fortifying her stubbornness further. She leaned back on it with all her weight.
“He needs to know we’re not a threat, V,” she said.
“What if I go in as well?” George offered.
Victor shot up from his seat so aggressively the chair flew back behind him. “I said no!”
The bang of it hitting the carpeted floor echoed in the small room, shattering the tension but renewing it all the same.
Fizzing blood prickled right under her skin as she gritted her teeth and glared back.
He was worried about her, which was why he was vetoing the one solution that might have worked. But he didn’t need to be.
Rayna wasn’t being reckless and overconfident by putting herself, and therefore others, in a situation she couldn’t handle. As modestly as she could put it, this part of her job was what she excelled at most. She was good at first-day introductions and talking to Studies, helping them understand what was going on. Everyone in the room knew that, especially Victor.
But that was the thing about him. Victor Johnson wasn’t always good at separating his role as her adoptive dad from his role as her boss. And right then, he wasn’t thinking objectively as a case manager, but as her worrisome father.
At first glance, he didn’t seem like he had the stress of being a single parent on his shoulders. Either because he was the stereotypical tall, slim-built scientist with glasses and short, messy blond hair who didn’t look like he cared about anything other than sitting in a lab. Or because other than the constant line of worry between his straight brows, his ice-blue eyes and neutral expression never gave away that he’d spent his thirties looking after two traumatised children who he’d stepped up for when they’d needed him most.
Rayna owed Victor a lot for everything he’d done for her, and she knew George felt the same. But Victor also had a tendency to forget they were no longer teenagers, and she outright refused to let that dictate her work.
Before she could continue arguing her case, Monty’s deep voice cut through the silence. “Victor…we have to try.”
“No, Monty.” Victor shook his head. “I will not risk her safety, nor anyone else’s, again.” He threw a hand towards the door. “He nearly put Zack in the hospital.”
