Page 6 of Ellie 1

She simply chuckled and made it clear she was looking down at him—all of them even. “I appreciate the board taking the time to recruit possible applicants for open positions and take that off my plate when I’m busy running the entire hospital. I never dreamed the board could be so useful and put such time into helping the hospital this way.

“It was a lovely change and surprise.” She didn’t give them time to react to those insults before focusing on me. “Though I apologize if the board promised you anything given they don’t have any authorization to hire or make official offers. I have the sole authority to hire or fire any personnel. If anything was put into writing—”

“Nothing official, Ms. Reed,” I lied. “And I apologize this happened so fast to blindside you. It was my schedule and excitement to possibly join the mecca of medicine in our world.”

“I see,” she said evenly before focusing on the board. “I’m glad to hear that because if anything had been done officially without them having the authority to do so, people would have lost their posh board seats over that.”

“You go too far, Ellie,” Warren growled. “There’s no reason for you to block Dr. Clark joining or—”

“There isn’t and I don’t plan to,” she cut in. “But there is aprocedureand way things are done here,Mr. Warren. You are not looped in on it all, and I will not repeat myself again about behaving as you should. If you won’t behave appropriately with me, you won’t to others in the hospital.” She nodded to someone behind us.

And in a flash, security guards were standing on either side of Warren. Holy crap, this woman did not play.

“Please escort Mr. Warren from the hospital and revoke his access for the next two weeks,” she told them. “Until he apologizes for his continued unprofessionalism—”

“You’re being childish and petty,” Warren snapped.

“No, I’m drawing a line in the sand,” Ms. Reed said clearly, her tone icy. “My job is to protect everyone in this building. If you behave this way with me, then you do with others, and I will not allow it, Mr. Warren. I’m clearly sayingyouare being childish and petty, and you will not be allowed back into the hospital I run until you behave like a board member should.”

And then he was escorted out, the guards ignoring his objections.

She nodded to the other stunned board members. “I thank you for bringing such a talented candidate into the hospital and sending me such a complete background and resume. That was exceedingly helpful. Going forward, I hope we can get on the same page earlier and avoid such awkward situations. The focus is making ASH better, nothing else.”

“Yes, well, you weren’t open to discussing it,” Gordon replied, clearly annoyed she side-stepped him so utterly.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You didn’t ask for a discussion. This is a discussion. You gave an order and told me to hire him. I don’t answer to the board. If you need another hierarchy chart of the hospital, I will have someone send it toyou, but it will still have me at the top.” She focused on me. “Dr. Clark, follow me, please. I only have an hour for you.”

“Yes, of course, Ms. Reed,” I agreed, muttering a thanks to the board members before briskly walking over to her. A few of the board were clearly annoyed that I didn’t stand with them better or looked at me like I was a traitor.

Probably, but that had always been the plan.

Plus, they were so lovely that who wouldn’t want to be loyal to them?

I wasn’t sure what I was going to say as I fell in step with Ms. Reed, but I almost tripped over my feet when something big hit me. Something I’d never experienced before in all of my years.

Namely, I couldn’t tell what species she was.

She wasn’t a shifter. I knew that. I’d be able to sense her animal.

But she read as a witch… And a vampire.

She was either a vampire with the magic of a witch—which wasn’t supposed to be possible—or a witch who drank blood? I wasn’t sure on that last part, but it was the condition that vampires had that required them to drink blood that we could scent basically. Their strength that witches didn’t have.

Butshe had it.

Except that wasn’t possible.

I was so distracted by trying to wrap my mind around what I was sensing and figure it out that we were suddenly walking into the executive wing somewhere else in the vast campus of buildings. She nodded to people who hurried to greet her, keeping her brisk walk until she stopped at one desk to gently check on someone.

“I’m really okay, Ms. Reed, I promise,” the man said quietly. “I could use the distraction right now even.”

“I fully understand,” she accepted after a moment. “If you want to take your laptop and hide in one of the meeting rooms,I’ll talk to your supervisor. I get lost in my work too, and having people ask too many questions or dealing with complaints makes things worse.”

He sniffled and nodded. “That would be amazing. Thank you.”

“Of course. I’ll handle it.” She gave him a kind smile. “Whatever you need, and if today is too much then leave. You were granted more leave time and it’s still available to you.”

“Thank you. I might take it for the funeral, but I can’t—everything is being handled and I didn’t want to get in the way.”

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