My Alpha Boss Gave Me Triplets – Episode 05
Francesca lowered the kettle, but Leopold had already seen enough. Evie’s hands were red and wet, her fingers trembling around the scalding mug. The department’s silence told him the abuse had not begun with this single punishment, only that it was the first time he had witnessed it. The pain still burned through his own skin, feeding an anger far more dangerous than anything he allowed to show. If the curse was correct, Francesca had attacked not only an employee but the Alpha’s destined mate.
He crossed the department without acknowledging the employees who hurried to bow their heads. Francesca attempted an explanation, but one look from her Alpha silenced her. Leopold took the kettle from her and set it aside before turning his attention to the cup.
“I am a firm believer that a department head should be able to handle any job she assigns,” he said. His voice remained level, which made the threat in it more frightening. “Hold out your hands.”
Francesca’s confidence collapsed. “Forgive me, Alpha.” She glanced around for support, but the coworkers who had watched Evie suffer now studied the floor. Pack hierarchy offered no refuge when the Alpha himself had passed judgment.
“I said hold out your hands.”
She obeyed. Leopold placed the heated mug in her grasp and made her experience the punishment she had devised for someone weaker. Francesca cried out almost immediately. “It’s hot. Alpha, it’s too hot!”
Leopold watched her drop it before a single second could pass. “It seems you can’t do the job.” He let the words settle over the department. “You’re demoted.”
Shock rippled through the room. Department heads did not lose their rank for mistreating interns, especially human ones, and everyone understood the judgment carried significance Leopold had not explained. Francesca stared at him in disbelief, then at Evie with hatred she no longer dared express aloud. Evie barely noticed. She was trying to reconcile the ruthless man from that humiliating morning with the Alpha now using his authority to defend her. The contradiction made it impossible to decide whether she should thank him or guard herself more carefully.
My jerk of a boss is actually helping me, she thought. The realization unsettled her more than his cruelty had. If Leopold were simply heartless, she could despise him and move on. His unexpected protection made him harder to dismiss.
An assistant approached with a new company badge. “Miss Evie Florentine, present this to Human Resources. They will arrange your full-time employment.”
Evie stared at the badge. Her name appeared above the title she had worked toward for nine months, transforming a private promise into something official. Leopold had remembered his word after all. Her probation was genuinely over, and the future her family had threatened to take from her was finally within reach. Relief rose so quickly that she nearly forgot the pain in her hands.
“Thank—” she began, turning toward him.
The movement pulled burned skin across her fingers, and pain tore through her unfinished word. Leopold’s expression tightened as the same sensation struck him. He could not explain the connection in front of the department, and he seemed equally unwilling to let her see how deeply her injury affected him.
“Take the rest of the day off,” he ordered. “Put ice on that wound.” He wanted to escort her for treatment himself, but too many employees were already watching their every exchange. The command sounded brusque, but Evie recognized concern beneath it before he turned away.
Later, her phone displayed a payment she could hardly believe: twenty thousand dollars from Leopold. No message explained whether it was compensation, concern, or another attempt to close the subject between them. The amount could cover expenses her new salary would not solve and free her from the extra work she had been taking to survive. Yet accepting more from him risked confirming every ugly thing he thought about her. Evie left the money untouched while she reported for the evening shift she had already promised to work.
That evening, Leopold entered one of his private clubs with Max. A glamorous woman immediately pressed against his arm and told him how much she had always admired him. He removed her hand with visible irritation. “Would you mind not touching me?”
Max watched the rejected woman leave and shook his head. “She was hot.” Leopold ignored him, his attention caught by a familiar figure moving between tables with a tray balanced carefully above bandaged hands.
Evie had exchanged her office clothes for the club’s uniform. She carried drinks between wealthy patrons while protecting her injured hands, concealing each wince behind a practiced smile. The permanent job and Leopold’s money had not stopped her from reporting for a second shift. Whatever explanation he had expected for her request that morning, the sight before him did not fit the image of an opportunist looking for easy wealth. For the first time, Leopold wondered what desperation he had mistaken for greed.
Evie turned and nearly dropped her tray. “Alpha Leopold?” she said. Surprise gave way to dread as she realized the man she had hoped to avoid was standing in the middle of her other workplace. Leopold looked from her bandaged hands to the crowded club, troubled by a question he could no longer ignore: if money was all she wanted, why was she still working herself raw?