Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 124077 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 620(@200wpm)___ 496(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124077 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 620(@200wpm)___ 496(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
The elevator doors opened onto silence.
“Taurex?” Terra called as she walked toward the office but there was no answer.
The penthouse seemed even emptier than she remembered. Without Taurex’s huge presence filling it, the rooms felt sterile and impersonal again—all expensive stone and glass with nothing warm enough to make them a home.
Terra walked into the office and found it was tidy, which should have made her happy.
Instead, it made her heart ache all over again.
The filing cabinets she had bullied Taurex into buying stood along one wall. The conference table was clear and the accounting folders she had created were arranged neatly in their proper places.
Then she saw the envelope—it was sitting in the center of the desk, and her name was written across the front.
Terra.
She stared at it for several seconds before picking it up. Inside was a single sheet of paper which read…
Terra,
Commander Rarev requested that I undertake the mission to Valeria Prime concerning the kethra resin. I have agreed and will be away from Earth for an indefinite period. Because I do not wish you to feel obligated to remain in my employ or to return to a workplace where my presence might make you uncomfortable, I am releasing you from your position with Intergalactic Imports. I have deposited a severance payment into the account you provided for payroll. I hope it will allow you sufficient time to complete your education and pursue whatever career you choose.
Thank you for everything you did for my business. I wish you and your family happiness and prosperity.
Taurex.
Terra read the note twice…then a third time.
He was gone. He had actually left Earth and now he was far beyond her reach.
“Damn it, Taurex,” she whispered.
Her hands began shaking. What did he mean by severance payment and how much had he given her?
Terra pulled out her phone and opened her banking app. She logged in with trembling fingers.
Then she stared at the balance with wide eyes.
“No,” she whispered, staring at the figure. “No, that can’t be right.”
She refreshed the screen—once then twice but the number remained unchanged.
An electronic deposit from INTERGALACTIC IMPORTS had been made three days earlier for the sum of $100,000.00
Terra actually sat down.
“Oh my God,” she whispered.
A hundred thousand dollars. He had given her a hundred thousand dollars.
Not five thousand…not ten.
A hundred thousand dollars.
Put with the savings she already had in the bank, it was enough to live on comfortably for quite a while if she was careful. Enough to pay for the rest of her schooling and enough that she could finish her accounting degree and complete whatever additional requirements she needed to become a CPA without dancing at The Doll House ever again.
She ought to have been thrilled…instead, Terra felt like someone had hollowed out her chest.
Taurex had done exactly what he had promised himself he would do from the beginning—at least, she assumed he had. He had made certain she was secure, then removed himself from her life because he thought that was what she wanted.
No pressure…no strings…no demand that she come back. Just a hundred thousand dollars and a note telling her to have a good life.
Terra dropped her head into her hands.
“What did I do?” she asked herself.
The question slipped out before she could stop it. For two weeks she had replayed that night again and again, and every time the memory changed slightly. Not because the facts changed but because the panic had begun to fade enough for her to look at them clearly.
Taurex had told her she was his fated mate and had said they were meant to belong together. He had also told her a Bond would let them hear one another’s thoughts which had seemed really scary and invasive at the time.
But what had he actually done to hurt or scare her?
Nothing.
He had backed away every time she asked him to. He had never touched her without permission. Even when she had kissed him in bed, he had been the one to say they should be careful because she was upset.
When the pleasure-bloom reaction forced them into intimacy, he had repeatedly asked for consent. Then, when she rejected him, he had left. And when she panicked and begged him not to hurt her, he had looked heartbroken, not angry.
And now, instead of using her job or her financial dependence to pressure her into coming back, he had given her enough money to make certain she would never have to depend on him again.
Terra closed her eyes. Maybe she really had made a terrible mistake. Maybe she had taken every awful thing Jackson and Orlov and what countless strip-club customers had taught her about men and projected it onto a male who had never once behaved like any of them.
The thought made her feel sick.
She stood alone in Taurex’s empty penthouse, surrounded by the office she had helped him organize, and suddenly missed the big Monstrum with such intensity that it was difficult to breathe.