by Sophie Stern
“He’s one of the only new people we have here,” Brian said. “I think it’s safe to say that yes, she tried to blame him.”
“What’s going to happen to her?”
Brian smiled sadly and shook his head.
“We both know I can’t have a thieving employee hanging around. I certainly can’t have someone who is going to cause trouble for me.”
Allison swallowed hard and nodded.
“I think I’d like to go back to my office now.”
“I think that would be a good idea.”
Chapter 9
Christopher was slightly disappointed to find Allison was no longer in his office when he arrived. He probably should have figured that she’d find a way to gracefully duck out. That was Allison. She was always graceful, always wonderful.
He pulled his clothing back on and checked his messages. He didn’t have any, but he did notice an outgoing call from his office that he hadn’t placed. He called the number back. A female voice answered.
“What’s the problem? Clothes didn’t fit? I told you to cut back on those bento lunches you have with boss boy.”
“Boss boy?” Christopher growled into the phone.
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah, oh shit, who is this?”
“Um, Yvette?”
“You don’t know?”
“I do know,” the voice said. “I am Yvette.”
“Okay, who called you from my office?”
“My sister.”
“Allison?”
“Yeah, the one and only.”
Christopher fought off a growl. His mate had been alone, and she’d called her sister. She’d asked for clothes, apparently, because he’d basically just abandoned her and flown off to hang out with his brother.
Oh, he knew there had been a perfectly legitimate reason for him to leave. He’d wanted to talk with Declan about his next steps. Besides, he’d been scared and nervous about the realization that Allison really was his mate. He’d also been annoyed that she’d asked James to the holiday party.
“Listen, don’t be a dick to her, okay?”
“I would never.”
“That’s simply not true,” Yvette said.
“I’ve never been a dick to Allison.”
“Leaving her alone and naked wasn’t a dick move? Wow, could have fooled me.”
Okay, so Yvette was just as protective of her sister as Christopher was of his brothers. Point taken. He’d keep that in mind.
“I’m going to find her and apologize,” he said.
“See that you do.”
Yvette ended the call, and Christopher stared at the phone. Where had Allison gone? Was there a chance that she’d gone back to her office? Maybe she’d just decided to go home for the day. If she had, he couldn’t even blame her for it.
Christopher stepped out of the office expecting to go ask McKenzie if she’d seen Allison, but he walked into a total shitstorm. He had planned on trying to find Allison so he could apologize, but it seemed as though the drama police had arrived, along with the regular police.
“What’s going on?” Christopher asked one of the officers who was standing there.
“A Miss McKenzie is being arrested, sir.”
“Why?”
“She was the hacker,” James said. He was standing beside Christopher’s office door with wide eyes, staring at everything as it happened.
“Why are you always around?” Christopher growled. James looked over at him, blinking, but didn’t seem offended.
“Because I work here,” he said slowly.
Christopher just sighed. He needed to play nice with James. He knew that. He couldn’t be a jerk just because he was hurting and upset.
He wanted to be, though.
“Anyway,” James said, staring at Christopher, “your brother figured out that McKenzie took her little crush to an extreme level.”
“Meaning?”
“She tried to come up with ways to spend time with me,” Brian said, striding over. McKenzie was being handcuffed as they spoke, and she looked over at Brian with tears streaming down her face. Christopher had never seen her looking like this.
“Never forget me!” McKenzie was sobbing and crying and screaming. She was also flailing around as the officers tried to cuff her, which was making their job more difficult than it needed to be.
“Oh, I won’t,” Brian muttered. “You don’t need to worry about that.”
“That was kind of dramatic of her,” Christopher pointed out.
“You have no idea,” Brian said.
“Well,” James said, rubbing his hands together, “looks like all of the action is coming to a close. I’m going to get back to work.”
“Good plan,” Brian patted him on the shoulder.
“Hey,” Christopher said to James. He took a deep breath. It was time to man up and stop being a dick. “Thanks for working so hard and staying on top of everything. I’ve seen how far you’ve come with the software you’ve been working on. I know you’re doing a great job.”
“Like I said,” James shrugged, “I work here. It’s what I’m supposed to do.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked away, heading back toward his part of the building.
“He’s not a bad guy,” Brian pointed out.
“I know,” Christopher agreed.
“She only invited him because he’s new.”
“I know.”
“And because you pussied out,” Brian added.
“Hey!”
“Just saying,” Brian shrugged. “If Allison was my mate, I wouldn’t have waited until she asked someone else to the Christmas party to make a move.”
“That wasn’t why I waited.”
“Really?” Brian looked over sharply. “From where I’m standing, brother dragon, it kind of seems like you’re being totally lame. You like this girl, don’t you?”
Christopher did.
So much.
He more than liked her.
He was crazy about her. He spent every waking moment thinking about Allison and wanting Allison and craving Allison. When they weren’t together, he was wondering when they were going to be again. When he wasn’t close to her, he was thinking about when he’d get to be.
“She’s my mate,” he said.
“Finally,” Brian threw his hands up in the air, obviously exasperated. “Then go tell her, okay? Do us all a favor, and just tell her.”
“Do you know where she is?”
“Yeah, after your little escape thing,” Brian wiggled his hands toward Christopher’s office, “she was upset. She changed into her sister’s clothes, and then she came by my office. I showed her my proof about McKenzie.”
“That was it? No big showdown?”
“No,” Brian shook his head. “You know I have no flair for the dramatic. I just called the police and had them come get McKenzie.”
“You didn’t talk to her first.”
“No.”
“Really?”
“I feel like this is really, really hard for you to understand,” Brian snapped. “I don’t want to talk to the girl who tried to hack my company for attention.”
“Well, it kind of sounds like she wasn’t really hacking you at all, she was just sort of, fiddling.”
“Yeah, I get it, and she wasn’t afraid to take poor James down in the process.”
“Poor James?”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t suspect him,” Brian said. “We all did. I thought for sure the new guy was trying to cause trouble, and I was thinking about all sorts of stuff. I thought oh, maybe he wants to change the employment records, or oh, maybe he’s Kellen’s brother trying to come seek revenge on Zoa and Declan.”
Christopher swallowed and looked away. Brian had been worried, hadn’t he? Kellen was the man who had hurt Zoa. He’d captured her, locking her away, and Declan had saved her. There had been a big showdown, and Kellen had been killed. They didn’t talk about what happened very often becau
se it was a horrific thing to happen, and none of them felt like drudging up those horrible memories.
“I suspected him,” Christopher admitted.
“We all did. Now go to Allison. She’s waiting for you. I guarantee it.”
Brian turned and went back into his office, slamming the door. Oh, they were going to have so much to tell Declan when he and Zoa came back to work. As it was, they were still on their “lunch break,” which Christopher thought was kind of ridiculous. It didn’t really matter what he thought, though, did it? What mattered was finding Allison and talking to her. He just needed to make sure that she was okay, and he needed to make sure that she knew he cared.
Christopher didn’t pretend to be the smartest dragon on Sapphire Island, but he was the dragon who was going to love her better than anyone else possibly could. Christopher didn’t just walk to her office. He ran. He ran like a man on a mission, and he bumped into people and pushed past them and hurried until he got to her office.
In actuality, it wasn’t very far. She worked down the hall from him and around a corner, but there had been a crowd because of McKenzie’s arrest. When Christopher neared Allison’s office, he saw that she was standing outside of it talking to James.
“That’s a nice dress,” James looked at her curiously. “Is it new?”
“Sort-of,” Allison nodded.
If Christopher wasn’t mistaken – and he could have been – it looked like James actually sniffed the air discreetly.
What the hell?
“Is it yours?”
“What?”
“Is it your dress?”
“That’s a weird question, James,” Christopher said, approaching. “And you’re standing awfully close to my mate.”
“Your mate?” James turned back toward Allison. “Mate?”
“It’s my sister’s dress, it’s not a weird question, and I would like to repeat the question that James just asked. Mate? What?”
“You’re my mate, Allison,” Christopher said.
In romance movies, there was always some sort of big reveal where everyone realized they were actually kind of perfect for each other, and in his mind, this was that moment for them. This was the great romance movie of their life. This was the scene where she would say that she knew, that she had always known.
This was the moment where she would promise to love him back.
Only, Allison didn’t do that. Allison didn’t do any of that. Instead of falling into his arms, and instead of promising to love him, and instead of saying that she’d known all along they were mates, she stepped back into her office, and she closed the door, and she left him standing in the hallway with James.
“Ouch,” James said.
“Get lost,” Christopher growled.
“Yep.”
James turned, walking in the opposite direction, and Christopher stepped up to the door. He wasn’t giving up on her. Not just yet. Not like that. Not ever.
“You may not be ready,” he said to the door, “but I’ll wait for you, kitten. I’ll wait for you.”
Chapter 10
The night of the Christmas party came, and Allison stood in front of the bathroom mirror at the party, looking at herself. This was it. This was the night she’d been waiting for. This night was the reason she was not currently speaking to Christopher, and she felt horrible about that. The idea that she was working with a dragon shifter she couldn’t even bring herself to talk to was horrible.
Everything had happened because she’d asked James to come with her to the party.
It had been dumb, she knew. She should have just been brave and invited Christopher to come with her in the first place. It would have been far less difficult than she pretended it was. It wouldn’t have been bad at all. After all, if Yvette had planned to propose to a guy, Allison could ask a guy on a date.
She’d been a nervous wreck, though, and she hadn’t known whether he liked her, too, so she’d gotten scared and totally screwed up.
Well, tonight, everything changed. She was here with James, and she’d invited Yvette to come along, too. Allison’s goal was for the two of them to hang out and have fun, and then she’d be able to go find her feisty dragon boss and win him over.
“Are you ready to go find this guy?” Yvette said, turning to Allison.
“Yeah,” she nodded. “Definitely. Are you sure you don’t mind?”
“Entertaining a hot guy? No, I don’t mind.”
“I mean, I know it hasn’t been long since you and Frank broke up, and you do live together...”
“Frank and I are old news,” she said.
“Has he tried to get back together with you?” Allison asked.
“Yes,” Yvette nodded. “I’m not ready for that, though.”
“I don’t blame you,” she said. Relationships were hard work. Whether you were 18 or 28 or 108, relationships were tough.
“Let’s go,” Yvette said. “Let’s get this over with. I’m ready to drink, and I’m ready to dance, and I’m ready to party.”
The two sisters left the bathroom and walked out into the ballroom. The Monster Brothers Security holiday party was one of the biggest events of the year on Sapphire Island, and it kind of felt like most of the island was in attendance. Oh, that wasn’t true, of course, but it certainly felt like it.
“There he is,” Allison said. “James!” She waved to the man standing at the closest bar, and he turned and smiled at her, waving back. Then, just as suddenly, his smile disappeared.
“What the fuck?” Yvette stepped up beside Allison and looked from James to Allison. “What the hell, Allison?”
“Um, what?” Allison blinked, wondering what her sister’s deal was. “That’s the guy I told you about. That’s James.”
“No,” Yvette hissed. “That’s Frank!”
“What?”
“Ladies,” James said, coming up to them.
“Hey,” Allison looked at him. “I was going to introduce you to my sister so that the two of you could talk and I could go find Christopher, but Yvette just told me you’re actually her ex-boyfriend slash roommate?”
“That’s right,” James nodded. “It’s okay, Allison. You want to go find your mate, but mine is standing right in front of me.”
“Mate?” Yvette whispered.
“Wait, so is your name James or is it Frank?” Allison was confused.
“And why would you ask my sister out if you liked me so much?” Yvette whispered.
“I didn’t ask your sister out. She invited me to the party as a friend, and she made it very clear that the invitation was just as friends. I figured that it would be a good chance for me to get to know a new colleague.”
“You knew I was Yvette’s sister?” Allison asked.
“I suspected that you were. You look enough alike, Once you were wearing her clothing, I knew for sure. I scented her on you.”
“Okay,” Allison said, putting her hands on her hips. “That still doesn’t explain why you lied about your name.”
“I didn’t,” he said. “My name is Frank James.”
“Frank James?”
“Yep.”
“That’s a horrible name,” Allison whispered.
“That’s why I go by James.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you worked here?” Yvette whispered.
“Because we broke up, and I needed something to take my mind off of you,” James said. “I was offered a job on Sapphire Island, so I figured I should go for it. Besides, it wasn’t like the commute was bad.”
“But you just told Allison I’m your mate.”
“You are my mate, Yvette. You’re my one and only.”
“But we broke up.”
“And I’m sorry about that,” James said. “I was a fool, Yvette. I was a complete asshole. I know that. I’m going to make it up to you, though.”
“What?”
“I’m going to spend the rest of my life making it up to you if it means you’ll just give me another chance,
” he said.
“James...er...Frank?”
“You can call me whatever you want, princess,” James stepped closer to Yvette, and Allison realized the moment had turned really, really personal. She mumbled something about finding Christopher, but neither James nor Yvette noticed when she stepped away. She turned, hurrying away from the couple embracing, and she ran into a big wall of muscle.
She looked up to see Christopher standing there, staring down at her.
“Hello, kitten.”
“Oh,” Allison whispered.
“Oh indeed. Come with me.”
Christopher took her hand and led her out of the ballroom. The party was being held at a huge hotel that was both beautiful and overwhelming. There were guests everywhere and loud music playing, but once they were out of the ballroom, the noise quieted. Christopher guided her down a hallway and to a set of elevators.
“Where are we going?” Allison whispered.
“To my suite.”
“You have a suite here?”
“I do tonight, and we’re going to talk, kitten.”
“Talk?”
“Yes, Allison. We have a lot to talk about.”
“Did you know that James is actually my sister’s ex-boyfriend?”
She still couldn’t wrap her head around that. She hadn’t known. She’d had no clue at all.
“I found out today,” Christopher told her. “James came by my office. He was concerned about hanging out with you tonight and wanted to make sure there weren’t going to be any hard feelings.”
“And were there?”
“No, kitten.”
They reached the top floor of the hotel and stepped off. Then Christopher guided Allison down a hallway lined with mirrors and to a big door at the end of the hall. He swiped his keycard, and they stepped into what was probably the most gorgeous hotel suite she’d ever seen in her life.
“Christopher?”
“Allison,” he turned to her and reached for her shoulders. “You’re my mate. I’m sorry I ditched you in my office.”
“It’s okay,” she whispered.
“It’s not okay,” he told her. “It won’t happen again, and I’m sorry for any pain I caused you.”
