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Chapter 12
Sushmita made her way to the lunch lounge that was built exclusively for the chameleons while the octopuses and archers spent their lunch hour on a separate floor. The chameleons’ lounge had posh furniture and high-tier lighting, floors that shone and air-conditioners that were all fully functional. Sushmita breezed past the food stations and chameleons queuing to form a millipede, heading straight to the VIP section where the salt and pepper hair of her boss came into view. Patterson was there, too. As expected.
The Chief Chameleon sat leaned back with one leg over the other, an arm casually resting on the empty chair next to him, chatting with Valor with the confident, easy smile that gave him such a big boost in climbing up the ranks.
Sushmita wasn’t sure whether it was the pattering of her sneakers or her radiating anno
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Exiting the elevator, Sush drew in a greedy lungful of air. She loved the smell of the trenches, which she wasn’t sure whether was odd. Even before she was chief, her senses loved it here. She didn’t like the politics, the gossip, the need to please the higher-ups, but the work? God, she loved the work. She especially loved inventing things and tweaking inventions, drawing immense satisfaction from bringing her imagination to life, running tests, finding solutions to problems, improving designs and modifying structures. This was her place, her escape. Sure, there were bad days but even those days had good stuff in it.It was sad that she’d have to leave once she’d avenged her mother. It was the main reason she stayed, she felt - to linger around long enough to be entrusted with every piece of information within the headquarters. Deep down, she knew she’d love to stay forever if she could. But she couldn’t have it both ways. It wouldn’t be wise or feasible to stay by the end of her pl
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 14
Sushmita reached her one-bedroom apartment after midnight. Lying in bed and staring into the darkness that jeeringly matched her life, she kept telling her body to go to sleep. But it couldn’t. Her energy levels would normally be wiped out by now and she may not even remember her head touching the pillow or whether she pulled up the blankets. But tonight, she even had the mental and physical strength to charge her phone.Yes, she knew it wasn’t good for the battery. No, she didn’t care.Her brain was still buzzing, nerves still firing. From Delilah to Valor to Catrine Carter to Monica Upshaw and… to Greg. Why Greg? She delved deeper into that.Unlike the catastrophe of a person she’d imagined, he actually seemed… decent. Not a choice of word she’d go for from the little she knew about him before today, especially not after the way he ended Logan Larson. She should be terrified from witnessing the kill, but she actually felt envious that Greg was granted permission to do something she
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 15
“Did you know he threw the iced latte right down the sink?” Hazel whispered like a flood just swept away an entire village.“Really? I didn’t think someone like him would drain a cup before throwing it into the trash. Ow! Haze!” Sush flinched when her deputy struck her arm with a thick ring folder.Sulking in her chair and tucking the folder back under her tablet on her lap, Hazel said, “You’re usually funny when you’re mean, but not this time.”Rubbing away the sensation from the blow, Sush said, “Maybe the duke’s just here to work, Haze. How about you give him a pass? It’s not like you don’t have other offers. And pull up B-12 for me, please.”
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 16
At lunch, Hazel asked Sush about why she had to get Greg bagels and coffee. Sush lied eloquently on the spot, saying that she lost a bet against the duke about his age, to which Hazel reprimanded, “How could you not know that? Everyone knows it’s a hundred and ninety! Five years older than the king! Last I checked, you’re thirty-five, so aren’t you supposed to have the memory of a thirty-five-year-old?” “Unlike you, my brain cells are limited and I have to be selective about what I store in them. His age seemed too trivial to warrant a space in my mental archive.” The truth was she knew. Like Greg, she’d memorized his and the mavericks’ profiles and faces before they showed up, down to the most trivial detail of their ages. “So… he just happened to tell you he took coffee?” Suspicion crawled onto Hazel’s face. “Nope. He just said whoever lost the bet would buy the other bagels and coffee.” “You two sure are getting along,” Hazel remarked, not even trying to hide her indignation. H
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 17
Back in the trenches, Greg popped from correspondence to system maintenance to weaponry maintenance when he heard her sigh. It was as if his auditory nerves had been programmed to listen for that sound. His ears perked, his skimming of the inventory list paused, his chin lifted. He watched as Sush dumped the clipboard next to the keyboard as she slumped into her swivel chair, brows furrowed and mouth downturned in a frown as she scrolled through her phone.Setting the list in his hand onto his chair, he strode across the space, toward the elevator, jabbed the number six, tapped his foot impatiently against the ground as he waited for the elevator bell to chime faintly, stepped onto the cafeteria floor and made a beeline for the coffee bar.Nancy looked up from her phone when Greg asked, “What does the Chief Octopus normally tak
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 18
In the dark room of Sush’s apartment, the red strips displaying the time on her bedside alarm clock showed 3:16 AM when the sound of her ringtone blared through the room, jostling her awake. Phones were never turned off in this profession, especially not if they were chiefs or deputies. They were paid at a laughable wage to work at fixed hours and be reachable at all hours. Swiping to answer the call without checking the caller identification, she hid under the covers with her eyes closed while the caller spoke. A security breach. In the east. EAST. She didn’t choose to stay in the west because she’d enjoy taking a hell of a long flight to the other side of the globe, especially not when it was still dark, her bed still warm and her eyelids still heavy. She tried wrigg
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 19
The latter two questions had been answered by an autopsy report and confirmed by the eastern octopuses: the sprinklers were not turned on from the control room, meaning it could’ve only been switched on by an external source. They traced it to an unauthorized wireless device, suspecting that the intruder had a remote in his trousers pocket that managed the feat.As for the screaming, the sprinklers sprayed - not water - but zahar: an air-borne substance that tampers with its victim’s neurons. They’d feel as if a million needles were being pierced through their skin, causing momentary paralysis while their assailant struck. Zahar wasn’t lethal in open spaces, but it did buy time.Why wasn't the assailant himself affected? The octopuses concluded that either he had already ingested an antidote or he wasn’t
The Indomitable Huntress & the Hardened Duke Chapter 20
The following day, Sush was scrutinizing each flagged file. Frustration filled her when formatting issues disturbed her flow. These were very old files overseen by Kenji’s predecessor, who wasn’t exactly the most efficient or thorough octopus, so Sush supposed she should have expected half-baked work like these. It really bothered her, but since the retired hunter was not within her vicinity to be yelled at, all she could do was sigh to herself as she perfected the documents by correcting each formatting issue that didn’t conform to the standard way they did things. These old timers, she thought to herself in dismay.Her flow got better, until one broke her momentum - an archive from over a decade ago about the remnants of a victim suspected to have been bombed. Her eyes trailed along each line, each photo. Her hea
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