by Jade White
“This sounds really big,” said Macy. “Will you be going out of the country?”
“I can’t even say where I’m going,” Aaron answered. “It’s that secret, and it’s that important. But I’ve been in talks with some of the other business leaders in my community…”
“You mean other weredragons in business? Other weredragon CEOs and executives and heads of companies?” She did not want to say “other weredragon billionaires,” but it was not necessary. Aaron took her meaning.
“Yes,” he replied. “They all came into New York, and there have been meetings and luncheons and dinners all week. We’ve all been making presentations and proposals and bids, and it’s been pretty much a week of competition. There’s something going on that…again, I can’t talk about it, but the other power players among my people all wanted in on it, and so did I. We’ve all been jockeying for position about this. This week, frankly, it’s been the most grueling time I’ve ever had.”
Macy was glad they were video chatting now instead of just using a voice call, because she could see from his expression that his week was exactly what he said it had been. “It certainly sounds like you’ve been under a lot of pressure,” she said.
“I’ve been up against it, yes. And it came down to the wire. But finally…I won the bid. It was the narrowest scrape I’ve ever had, and I hope to hell I never have one like that again. But I won, and the contract is mine. And I have to go away for a week now to get it all set up.”
Macy’s eyes lit up at the news. “You won? You closed the deal, got the contract? You got it?” She was actually proud of him without knowing what she was being proud of.
Aaron himself looked proud to see her reaction. He felt like a teenager, a Big Man on Campus, having just impressed the prettiest girl in school. He found it a silly way to be feeling at his age; his teens were long behind him, and he had nothing to prove. And yet, Macy being happy for him felt like as much of a reward as the success of the deal. “I won. I got it. There were times I thought we were going to go dragon and come out with claws flying—but I got it. It’s mine, and I’m going ahead with it.”
“From the sound of it,” said Macy, “when this whole thing shakes out, you’ll be even richer than you already are.”
“Believe it or not,” said Aaron, “it’s not about the money. It’s not about how much I’ll be spending to make this happen. And…it’s not exactly money I’ll be getting out of it.”
Macy blinked and looked off, genuinely puzzled. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand. What kind of business deal is it where it’s not about profit? Unless it’s one of those government things… No, that doesn’t make any sense. If it’s a government contract, I know what kind of money those things pay.”
“It’s not a government project,” said Aaron flatly.
“I don’t understand, then,” Macy said. “All those people, flying in to New York to make all those bids on something that isn’t for profit, probably millions or even billions of dollars at stake…”
Aaron cut her off. “We bid on it like a business contract, but…this is something more like an honor. A really huge honor.” He sounded more serious than Macy had ever heard him. There was a mysterious tone in his voice that she had never heard from anyone. “This is the most important thing I’ve ever done, Macy. Probably the most important thing I ever will do. It’s something that all the most important Nathairfear wanted, and something I wasn’t even sure I could get. But this is the biggest responsibility I’ve ever taken on in my whole working life.”
“It sounds so intimidating,” Macy said.
“I really can’t say what it is,” Aaron told her. “As a matter of fact, I probably shouldn’t have told you this much. But…you kind of have an effect on me. I think maybe if you were anyone else, I wouldn’t even have brought it up. But because it’s you, I did. And in spite of the fact that it is you, I can’t say anything else. I’m sorry; I know it sounds as if I’m acting like the big corporate warrior who’s gone out and scored this victory that’s too big and important and complicated for regular people to know about. I must sound really self-important and arrogant, but…this is about my people. Some things, dragons only talk about with other dragons. I’m sorry, Macy.”
She could not help but be touched. At this moment, he could have been proud, conceited, even haughty and swaggering. Instead, there was a quality about Aaron right now that, if Macy had to put a word to it, she would almost call…vulnerable. Was he really this way now only because he was speaking to her? Was his manner really so different from this when talking with his own kind or with those who worked for him?
From nowhere, Macy asked, “It is legal, right?”
And equally from left field, Aaron chuckled. “Yes, Macy, it’s completely legitimate. Trust me, I came by my money honestly, and I use it honestly. There’s nothing shady. Only secret. You can believe me.”
“I do,” Macy said, and she meant it. After a beat of silence, with the two of them gazing at each other through their respective screens, Macy ventured to ask, “Aaron…is that true, what you said a minute ago, before I asked if it was legal?”
“What?”
“The thing you said about me. You said I have an…effect…on you. Do I really?”
“Sweetheart,” Aaron replied, “you could see the effect you had on me all weekend.” And he made a smile that was more than suggestive while pointing down to a place below the screen—and below his waist—then making the less-than-gentlemanly gesture of putting the index finger of one hand through a loop made by the thumb and index finger of the other hand, then pointing right at her.
“That’s not the effect I meant,” Macy said with a grin.
“Well, you know it’s the effect you had. Or one of the effects. The other one is… I suppose I just feel comfortable with you. Or I feel as if I can talk to you about…that…and other things. I guess I’m saying I have a feeling about you, and it tells me I can trust you. It tells me that if I could talk to you about what I’ve been doing this week and what I’ll be doing next week, I could trust you with it. Even if you’re not Nathairfear. I guess it’s because…you’re just you. Does that make any sense?”
Macy smiled at him with the most touched and moved feeling that she had ever felt for anyone in her life. They’d had total intimacy together on the weekend of his birthday, but this was a different intimacy altogether, an intimacy that did not need their bodies. Aaron was telling her that he trusted her. His trust, in its own way, felt as good as his sex.
“You know what?” Aaron went on. “Since I feel like I can trust you, maybe there’s something I can let you in on.”
Macy’s heart leapt a bit at that. He had actually used the word: trust. She loved the sound of that word coming from Aaron, loved it more than she ever expected she could.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“There is something that one of my companies has been working on. It’s only a secret for now; we’ll be going public with it. But for now, it’s in the testing stage. There’s this new app that we have; it’s a new security app that prevents phone calls and video chats from being recorded. Other companies have this, and other companies are working on it, but this is our version. I’ve got a copy of it, and I think maybe this is a good time to test it. So, I’m going to trust you with it. This doesn’t go any further than your computer and mine. Deal?”
She nodded, feeling very honored and very special. “Okay. Deal.”
“Okay. I’m going to log out of this and E-mail you a code. When you get the code, I want you to log out of here and then log back in and use the code I’m sending you. It’ll bring you back into chat, but there’ll be no way for anyone else outside to pick it up. This will be private—really private.”
Macy’s eyes widened. She gave him a bemused look through her screen. “Aaron, what do you have in mind?”
“You’ll see,” he said. “I’m logging out now. Go and watch your E-mail.”
Aaron lo
gged out, and Macy did as he asked. In a few seconds, his message appeared in her inbox. She copied the code she found there, returned to her video chat app, logged back in, reconnected with his app, and submitted the code. At once, Aaron was back on her screen—with a difference that made Macy feel as if sparks of electricity were dancing on her skin.
He was sitting at his desk where he had been sitting when they spoke a moment ago—but his shirt was gone. It was Aaron, bare-skinned from the waist up, showing her once again the splendor of his muscles.
Running a hand across his prodigious pecs, Aaron pursed his lips sexily at her and asked, “Still want this?”
Macy almost giggled like a teenager. “What do you think?”
“I think you still want this,” said Aaron. “And I’ll bet I know what else you still want.”
Slack-jawed at what she knew he had in mind, Macy blurted, “Aaron, you’re not going to…! Not like this!”
“Why not?” he said lasciviously. “No one can see or hear. Or record. It’s just us. And it’s just this.” He stood up and showed her that his trousers were still on. He moved his hand to his belt buckle, showing her that it was a condition that would quickly change.
Right there on his computer’s camera, Aaron took down his trousers and briefs and unleashed the monster again.
Her mind crowded with memories of that weekend. Macy sighed, “Oh, Aaron…”
Aaron shook the beast between his legs at her. “You want some more of this, don’t you?”
Macy felt herself blush like a tomato. “Aaron! Really…?”
“Yes, really. What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong? Aaron, we’re on computers…”
“And what? We’re using the app. It’s private. It’s as private as it was when we were alone at my place. Are you feeling awkward about it because we’re not in the same location? You only feel that way because it’s something different. You’ve probably never had virtual sex before, right?”
Macy leaned back in her seat. His use of the word “awkward” was very apt. But she was transfixed at the sight of him, standing there with his trousers and briefs down around his knees, letting her see his ample hose change to a large and powerful pipe. “No, I never have,” she admitted. “And I guess you have.”
“Actually, no. But life is full of things we’ve never done before. There was a time when you’d never been to bed with a dragon man. This is new. But it’ll be fun. Take off your clothes. Touch yourself for me.” He began to run his fingers along his stiffened length as Macy wished she could do. “Watch me stroke it off. Think about how good it’ll be when we’re in the same room again. Come on—for me.”
Macy frowned—not an angry frown, but the kind of frown one makes when screwing up one’s courage. Which made Macy wish all the more that she were about to be on the receiving end of a different kind of screwing. Deciding that the best way to take on a challenge was simply to jump in and do it, she set her MacBook down on the bed and kept herself in full view of the screen for him while beginning to peel off her own clothing.
Her heart felt as if it were jumping hurdles in an equestrian show through the long, combustible minutes that followed.
At the end, Macy lay propped up against the headboard of her bed, naked, her legs curled and her breasts in full view, with a fluttery feeling of post-climax making her feel as if she were lowering herself down from the clouds. On her screen sat Aaron, back in his chair, stroking and squeezing the last dollops of man-custard from his softening hose. His stomach was covered with the sticky wet whiteness of his own eruption.
“Mmm…” Aaron said, extracting the final bit of sap from his vine. He reached over to a place off-camera on his desk and drew back a handkerchief—obviously he’d been prepared to talk her into this—and began to wipe himself off. “That was good. Remember that time I splurged on your boobs? I wish I’d done that right now. Or better, I wish I’d splurged inside you. Didn’t I tell you this would be fun?”
Sighing, Macy replied, “I can’t believe I let you talk me into that.”
“You don’t get to be a billionaire without being able to persuade people sometimes. But admit it: this was good. Not as good as actually being in that bed with you—but good.”
Still fluttering a bit, Macy conceded, “Yes. It was almost as good as it was…at your place.” She hugged herself a bit, wishing the arms around her were his.
“We’ll have more of that, Macy, I promise,” he said. Instead of pulling his briefs and slacks back up, Aaron bent down while still sitting and stripped them off, letting them rest on the floor off-camera. Somewhere in her heart, Macy continued to wonder how a creature as gorgeous as he was could even exist. “When I get back from my trip, I’m getting you back in bed and banging you ‘til you don’t know what year it is.”
Inwardly, Macy answered with, Hurry back. Please. Outwardly she said, “It’s going to be a long week.”
Gesturing to the pertinent place, Aaron said, “You know what else will be long. And very, very hard.”
Macy curled herself up a little tighter, still showing him her breasts, suddenly not caring how naked she was on the bed by herself, and sighed at him.
_______________
And that was the last that Macy saw or heard from Aaron. That was Friday night, the anniversary of their first night together. The next morning, he sent her a text that he was flying out of town and would see her the first chance he got when he returned. That left Macy alone with her work and her thoughts of Aaron, his body, and his lap lizard, which were a terrific distraction to her—until another distraction presented itself.
It started on Tuesday. Macy noticed she was not going to the bathroom very much and that she felt dehydrated in general; she began to drink a lot more water than she usually did. She drank mostly coffee or tea, but now she needed more water—and yet she did not need the bathroom as much as she should for what she was drinking. By Wednesday, she was suffering the most wicked, persistent, pounding headache she’d ever had in her life, and gulping aspirin was not helping. Compounding this was a frequent racing of her heart, and not in the good way that it raced in the presence of the naked and erect Aaron. For no apparent reason throughout the day, Macy’s heartbeat sped up, and she felt hot and dizzy. On Wednesday afternoon, she actually needed to lie down on the sofa in her office, letting work start to back up. In spite of how busy she was, Macy decided to delegate her work to staff and go home in case she was coming down with the flu. If she were to spread it to others on staff, her problems would only multiply. On the way back to her apartment, she stopped at the drugstore to pick up some flu medication and wished she had thought to get herself a shot. While there, she passed by a certain aisle where certain products were kept, but pushed the thought of those things and their intended purposes from her mind. She had caught the flu, she convinced herself, and she had better spend the next few days resting up and recuperating. As it was, when Aaron came back, she might have to delay their reunion a bit, a notion that she did not care for.
The headaches and racing heart persisted through Wednesday night until Macy got herself to sleep. Then came Thursday morning, when in spite of the woozy, groggy feeling that made her feel as if she had turned to swirling slush inside, she lunged from her bed, clutching at her stomach and covering her mouth, and leapt and bounded to the bathroom, where she emptied what little food she’d been able to eat during the previous day into the toilet.
Pulling herself to the mirror and seeing a shaky, sickly woman staring back at her, Macy suspected she could no longer dismiss the contents of that particular aisle of the drugstore, and that she had better get back there and buy herself a couple of those things. She called in and took the morning off, and got herself back to the pharmacy.
She returned home and did not even bother to take breakfast before opening what she had bought, taking it back into the bathroom, and following the instructions.
Two plus signs on two sticks greeted Macy’s panic-stricken
eyes. When Aaron returned to pick up where they had left off, they would be continuing from a place that neither of them had bargained for.
CHAPTER SIX
And that was what had brought Macy face to face again with Aaron in his office.
“I’ve been to an OB-GYN,” she told him. “I managed to rush the appointment because you were coming back, and I didn’t want to delay telling you.” She waited for his reaction and braced herself. It came with a look of panic on Aaron’s face that matched the way she felt when she saw the plus signs on the sticks.
“PREGNANT?” It was both a question and an exclamation.
