Chapter 239: Customer Service Had Teeth

DOVE’S POV

The man at Dove’s counter called himself a stock inspector and held his paper too high for her to read it.

That was not a promising start.

She stayed on the public side of the curtain, with the open shop door behind her and the street in view. The system cabinet was closed for the afternoon heat. Her owned goods sat on the ordinary counter and shelves, exactly where she had left them.

"Put it down," she said. "I don’t read better when somebody waves."

The man lowered the paper, but not enough. "We’ve been told you have supplies that aren’t listed."

"By whom?"

"The district office."

"Which person in the district office?"

He looked past her toward the curtain. "This will be easier if you cooperate."

Dove was becoming very tired of men using easier when they meant quieter.

Thorne was next door helping move a water container into shade. Edrik had gone into the rear room to collect a tool. Neither was far away, but she did not wait for them to become the beginning of every answer.

"You can bring a named officer with a proper order," she said. "Until then, you’re leaving."

She moved toward the open front door, making sure the neighboring seller could see them. The inspector followed, stepping sideways as if he could still reach the curtain before she finished speaking.

Dove put the counter between them.

"I said leave."

He grabbed for her arm. She turned out of the reach she had practiced, knocked his hand away, and took another step toward the street. Her heart kicked hard enough to make her angry. She hated that he could put that feeling in her body with one stupid movement.

Then she saw his other hand move beneath his shirt.

Edrik caught the grabbing wrist before the man reached her again. The sound was small and horrible. The man shouted, a knife slipped against the counter, and Edrik took it away with a speed that left Dove staring at the empty hand afterward.

"You heard her," he said.

His voice was quiet. That made it worse.

He drove the man out through the open doorway, holding him by the broken wrist and the back of his shirt. Thorne arrived from the neighboring shop, took in the knife, and moved people clear without asking Dove to repeat herself while she was still breathing through the shock.

The supposed inspector went down onto his knees in the street.

Edrik kept him there until two actual guards came running. He handed over the knife, named what had happened, and looked back at Dove as if the rest of the street had ceased to matter.

"Did he catch you?"

She shook her head. Her hands were not shaking much, but she put them flat on the counter anyway.

"I moved."

"I saw."

Something in his expression warmed, fierce and proud beneath the anger. He had seen her do the thing they practiced. He was not going to pretend she had simply stood there waiting for him.

Dove breathed out. "Good. Because I’d hate to have listened to all those lessons for nothing."

His mouth lifted, but he did not rush her into laughing.

The paper had fallen beside the counter. Dove picked it up with a cloth, keeping the smeared print clear enough for the office to read. It listed shop names, quantities someone had guessed at, and a date for collection. Her name appeared near the top.

Thorne passed her water and waited while she checked her arm. No broken skin, no mark from a hand that had failed to catch her. That mattered. She drank slowly enough not to cough, then made herself look around the shop instead of only at the place where the knife had fallen. The curtain was still closed. Her room was still hers. He had not got past her.

The neighboring seller came over. "He tried my door yesterday. Said he’d return with someone stronger."

Dove looked toward the guards taking the man away. This was not a private argument anymore, if it ever had been.

She closed the shop, cleared their immediate things, and went to the security office with both husbands and the neighbor. The clerk who had handled the canceled transfer list recognized her and looked briefly exhausted.

"Believe me," Dove said, setting down the paper, "I’m also disappointed we’re spending so much time together."

Ash came out when he heard her voice. His attention went first to her face, then her arm, then Edrik’s expression. He looked ready to start something before she finished the first sentence.

"I’m fine," she said. "Listen to what happened."

He listened.

The neighbor backed her account. The guards brought in the weapon and the man, who had lost much of his confidence on the walk. One officer tried to call it a misunderstanding over supplies.

Ash put the false inspection paper on the desk in front of him.

"Then explain whose misunderstanding carries a knife toward her bedroom."

Dove looked at the dragon. His anger was useful, but it was still anger. She did not mistake it for an answer to everything he had done before.

The office kept the man in custody while checking the other reports. Dove kept a copy of the paper. Outside, Edrik reached for her hand and waited for her to take it.

She did, then pulled him close enough to kiss his cheek.

"Thank you for the timing," she said.

"He reached for you. I wanted to break the other wrist too."

"You made your feelings clear."

Thorne wrapped an arm around her shoulders on the walk home. She let herself lean on him, not because she could not walk but because she wanted to.

Behind them, raised voices carried through the office window. By evening, they learned Ash’s patrol had been moved away from their block after he refused to dismiss the complaint.

Dove laid the copied paper on their table.

It was not just a list of shops someone wanted to inspect. The note beside hers said to empty it first.