Paws off the Boss - Casey Griffin (best books under 200 pages .TXT) 📗

“I wasn’t sleeping with the profess—”

Laura turned to plead with the crowd, talking over her. “Someone please get her away from me. Call the cops. She follows me everywhere I go. I just want to move on with my life.”

Random people got to their feet uncertainly. A couple of SFAAC members closed in on Laura and Piper as though about to intervene.

Laura turned back and beamed triumphantly, speaking low enough for only Piper and Aiden to hear. “You know, I can’t get in trouble for hitting you if it’s in self-defense. Just give me a reason.”

“I would have to attack you first,” Piper said. “And I wouldn’t want to give you the satisfaction.”

“Maybe you will. Look around.” She gestured at the park. “All these people have witnessed that you’re here to harass me. Who knows what you’ll do when we cross paths again? I could say you did anything, and these people will vouch for me.”

Piper swore steam must have been pouring from her ears. She took a step forward. Who wanted to wait until next time? If she was going to be accused anyway …

Aiden stepped between them, glowering at Laura. “Do it and she can press harassment charges. And lay another finger on her, and I’ll call the cops. That goes for the rest of you.” He shot a threatening look at the advancing people.

Laura crossed her arms. “This is a protest. We have a permit and everything. We’re not the ones doing anything wrong. But Piper here looks ready to do something. Are you going to hit me?” She turned her face, presenting her cheek to egg Piper on. “Come on. Punch me.”

“Don’t tempt me.” Piper’s hands balled at her sides.

Suddenly, Aiden’s warm hand clasped over hers. The touch was so unexpected, so gentle, that her fist relaxed in shock. His fingers interlaced with hers, and he drew her away from the tense crowd.

All Piper could focus on was the sensation of his warm hand in hers, his own steady composure contrasting with her behavior, chastising her. She’d almost thrown a hissy fit like a five-year-old who hadn’t learned how to play well with others, and here was the CEO of a Fortune 500 company who had probably never lost his cool in his life.

Who cared about Laura, anyway? About what those people thought? About anything else but that hand in hers? The park faded into the distance, the chanting, the yelling.

Laura called after her. “Maybe someone should expose you for what you really are, Piper! You hear me? Force you to confess how you cheated me out of a college education.”

But Piper barely heard her because she couldn’t hear anything over all those morphos fluttering around inside her. When she and Aiden had walked a little way—she wasn’t paying any attention to how far—his hand dropped from hers.

“I’m sorry,” Aiden said. “I thought it was best to leave. There was no reasoning with her.”

Piper nodded, not trusting her voice. Of course, he wasn’t really holding her hand. He did it to get her out of the situation. Don’t be stupid, Pipe, she told herself.

A pang of disappointment hit her, but she quickly smothered it with annoyance. Piper didn’t need him to interfere. She was doing just fine on her own.

She picked up her pace, forcing Aiden to jog to catch up. With her shoulders pinned back and her chin raised high, she marched forward at a brisk clip.

A moment later, Aiden grabbed her firmly around the waist and tugged her toward him. Thrown off-balance, she swung around and found herself chest to chest with him. He smiled down at her.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she managed with a trembling voice.

“Uh, you were about to …” He glanced down at the ground.

When she did the same, she saw the poopetrators had struck again.

If she weren’t so frustrated, she would have laughed. But her heart was racing, with anger, with surprise, and, if she were honest, from Aiden’s touch. How did she keep getting into such embarrassing situations? Ones that Aiden always seemed to be around for, to pull her out of.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

Piper knew he didn’t mean physically. She turned away and straightened her disheveled tank top. It took a moment to find her voice, to pinpoint what feeling plagued her the most: embarrassment, anger, bitterness, or her pity for Laura. Because she did pity her, every time she recalled that day the truth came out. But then, she’d think of the last three years of constantly watching her back, and that pity would evaporate.

“That was humiliating,” Piper said.

All those people glaring at her like she was the one who did something wrong. Of course, they didn’t know what had really happened. How could they? Laura was a little too convincing. She wouldn’t have a future as a veterinarian, but she would make one heck of a soap star.

It occurred to Piper that Aiden didn’t know what had happened, either. She wondered what he thought after witnessing that. She wouldn’t have blamed him if he rescinded his offer of employment right then and there.

“I’m sorry about back there,” she said. “It isn’t like how Laura said it was.”

“What was all that about?” Aiden jiggled Sophie’s leash so she would follow him down the path, back through the park, back to the parking lot—to get away from Piper, no doubt.

Her heart gave a funny squeeze.

“It’s true. I got Laura kicked out of the veterinary program,” she explained as they walked. “Only, it wasn’t because I was jealous. Far from it. It was because I caught her cheating. At the end of class one day, we handed in the final assignment for the semester. After I’d left, I realized my cell phone had fallen out of my pocket. When I got back to the room, I caught her riffling through the assignments while the teacher had stepped out. She was swapping her paper with mine.”

“And her story about the professor?”

“I’ve barely had time to date, much less manage a highly unethical affair with one of my professors. That was just her way of trying to take the focus off her and to discredit me, not to mention the professor, who already had his own doubts about her. After the investigation, it came out that she’d cheated her way through the entire semester.”

“I’m guessing that’s not how she”—Aiden thrust his chin back toward the off-leash park—“remembers it.”

“Laura will believe what she wants to believe. In a way, I feel bad for her. I know how much she loves animals and wanted to work with them. But the program is tough. She wouldn’t have gotten far. Besides, if I had to take my sick pet to a veterinarian, I wouldn’t want one who didn’t have the skill or knowledge to graduate on their own.”

Aiden made some noncommittal noise in response. She wondered what he was thinking. Then again, maybe it was best she didn’t know.

Piper focused on the path. “Laura went to the media with her own version of the scandal, and it got completely out of hand. They ran the story without checking with the school first. Next thing you know, I’m crossing angry picket lines at school for weeks.”

Aiden frowned. “That’s not right.”

“Once the newspaper heard of the real story, they printed a retraction.”

“Did it help?”

“No. They buried it somewhere on page twenty-five. I guess the headline ‘Newspaper Screws Up: Oops, Sorry’ wasn’t as catchy as ‘Veterinary Violation: Student Wrongly Dismissed.’” Piper formed air quotes with her fingers. “Besides, the damage was done. Laura’s slander campaign had reached enough of the campus that no one knew quite what to believe. They just knew to avoid me.”

Aiden shook his head. “That’s terrible.”

“It’s been a lonely few years. Other students stayed clear of me. Not that I’ve had much time for friends anyway.” She shrugged it off. “But our professor got the worst of it. Laura damaged his reputation. By the next week, someone had already replaced him. I think he took a job at another university.”

They walked in silence for a minute. Piper watched Aiden out of the corner of her eye. She wished she knew what was going through his mind. As good as she was at reading animals, Aiden remained a complete mystery to her.

“If you could go back?” he asked. “Would you make the same decision? Would you turn her in?”

Piper blew out a long breath. “Yeah. As terrible as it all turned out, I would have. Laura was wrong to do what she did.”

And it was true. But deep down, Piper still wished it all could have gone differently. That she could have avoided the public shame, the drama, the misplaced guilt. If only she hadn’t left her cell phone behind, the professor could have caught Laura in the act. Then again, maybe Laura would have gotten away with it. Maybe it would have been Piper forced to leave the program because she’d failed the assignment. No, as hard as it was, she’d done the right thing. She’d worked too hard to let someone like Laura take it all away from her.

“I thought once things died down, she’d move on with her life,” Piper said. “But ever since, Laura has harassed me any chance she gets. I was once a member of SFAAC. I used to fundraise and protest with them on my free weekends. Then Laura weaseled her way in, spread her lies, and turned certain members against me. It got toxic, so I left.”

The steam that had built up inside of Piper condensed into tears. Without warning, they filled her eyes and ran down her cheeks. She swiped at them with the back of her hand, but not before Aiden saw.

He reached into the suit jacket slung over his arm. Fishing out his pocket square, he handed it