by Starla Night
She followed his tight buttocks right through the operations quarters, supplies warehouse, to his workspace. Unlike the sharp glass and somber mahogany offices on the top floor of the Onyx Corporation, his work office was made of sturdy, practical plastics.
He took a seat. “Your area of improvement, Rose, is your unwillingness to embrace your position as a leader within a team.”
She remained standing.
Jasper thought she’d make a good leader, and he wasn’t shy about saying so. The first time he’d said it, fear had petrified her. Someone thought she, Rose Owens, could be a leader? Even if she was only the lead janitor, his words had awakened a sharp desire deep in her bones. A desire so strong and hungry she’d hidden it away, stuffed it deep in her heart, and pretended that she didn’t hear it.
Then she couldn’t disappoint herself when he was wrong.
Jasper gestured her into the guest seat, and she hesitated a moment before complying. He folded his graceful hands on his desk. “You have worked for me for almost five years and trained every new coworker to build a skilled team. This would have been an ideal time to involve them.”
“I didn’t know if my spray would work.”
“And what? You didn’t want to waste their time?”
“Yeah.”
“You think their time is better spent betting on your abilities in my office?”
She hunched in. “Well, I didn’t know they would do that.”
He lifted his index finger to make his point. “And you should, Rose. A leader should know her team and predict their actions.”
“Well, I didn’t predict their actions, so I guess I’m not really their leader.”
Jasper leaned back and studied her. “Rose, are you well?”
“You already asked me that this morning, Mr. Onyx.”
“You called me Jasper on the sixth floor.”
Her body heated. Oops. “I don’t remember.”
“Try. And I am not asking about your health. Are you happy here at the Onyx Corporation, or can I help you into another position where you would be more fulfilled?”
Her heart thudded again. This was why she had a love-hate relationship with her boss.
Jasper Onyx—part dragon, part human, all sexy male—made her feel like she could be someone important in life.
She put tart into her tone to discourage a long conversation, and gazed anywhere but into his mesmerizing, ruby-flecked brown eyes. “I’d be happier if I was done with my daily tasks.”
“The purpose of this meeting is not just a safety briefing, but also because I’ve received a new catalog.”
She suppressed a groan.
“You are the professional.” He turned the catalog to face her. “Which trash bag is the superior product?”
Rose gave the trash bags a token glance. “It doesn’t matter.”
“But which is superior?”
“They’re fine. What you have already is also fine.”
“Notice the differences.”
“They’re small, white, and fit in our trash cans. What do you want?”
“Rose, every employee action affects the Onyx Corporation, and so every employee must optimize their environment. Your choice is critical to our company’s domination of the intergalactic human-clothing market.”
“If the fate of the company depends on your trash bags, you’re in real trouble.”
“Rose.”
“There’s a two-cent difference between the bags on this page. Is one cheaper than what we’re already using?”
He rotated to the computer and tapped the keys. “We can study the spreadsheet…”
His total focus reminded her of Liam stringing colored macaroni onto her old, frayed shoelace. Rose covered her mouth so Jasper wouldn’t see her smile.
“Here.” He waved her around the desk and insisted she lean over his shoulder to read the screen. “Our current bags are priced here.”
He smelled like fresh soap. Something fancy like those big candles that burned clean, in sage and vanilla and sandalwood. She wanted to rub her body against him or nuzzle his taut neck and lick.
Rose leaned back, trying to get out of his addictive scent orbit, and crossed her arms. “You want the Rolls Royce of garbage bags?”
“I have no opinion about car manufacturers.” He glanced back at her and frowned. “Come, read this. I need your expert evaluation.”
Rose held her breath and leaned over his shoulder. If she lost her balance, she could fall into his arms. He’d cradle her, stroke her brow, and gaze into her eyes. Then, his lips would descend and she could taste…
She jabbed her index finger at the screen. “The ones we’re using are cheaper. Let’s try the expensive ones.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yep.” She scuttled back to the employee side of the desk, hesitated at the chair, and then hurried to the door. “Well, I have to get back to work, so—”
“Rose.”
She shut her mouth with a snap.
He softened into a melty smile. “Thank you.”
Her belly dipped like a rollercoaster, and her heart thudded.
She nodded and escaped.
The first time he’d called her into his office, she’d been so terrified she was losing her job. She’d sat stiffly, terrified she’d—
“Oh, Rose…”
She paused in the hall.
He leaned against the doorway, his slim form filling the door with masculine heat. “I would like to meet with you. Coffee, drinks, dinner and a movie, a walk in the park, skydiving, board games with friends, and a comedy show… How about tonight?”
“Tonight? You want to do all those things tonight?”
He nodded.
“You asked another human for date ideas again, didn’t you?”
He smiled helplessly, and her heart swelled so tight she almost couldn’t breathe. “How did you know?”
“Because only a dragon would try to cram ten dates into one night.” She shook her head. “You know how I feel about mixing work in my personal life.”
His face fell. “You separate the two for work-life balance.”
She wanted to give him a hug. Obviously she couldn’t do that. Rose snapped her fingers instead. “There you go.”
“I could fire you,” he offered.
“I could hate you,” she returned.
“But I don’t want you to hate me.”
“Mmhm, so you better not fire me.”
“Why can’t we date? I’m serious, Rose. When Mal was serious about Cheryl, he abducted her.”
She could only imagine what that must have been like. “If you try to abduct me, I will Mace you into next week.”
“Cheryl never Maced Mal.”
“Missed opportunity,” she sympathized.
He frowned. “How can we compromise to overcome this impasse?”
“We can’t. Don’t feel bad, Mr. Onyx.”
“Jasper.”
“Dragons are from Mars, humans are from Venus.”
“No, dragons are from Draconis, and humans are a genetically recessive sub-species localized on a backward, fringe planet you call Earth.”
And five years ago, Rose and the rest of her genetically recessive sub-species on Earth had wrongly thought they were alone in the universe.
Ha ha, cosmic joke!
When the spaceships had landed, disgorging colorful dragons in plain beige jumpsuits, she’d watched the news program in her high school classroom just like the rest of the students—and then she’d raced outside to stare up at the visible ships wheeling overhead.
But the dragons hadn’t meant to invade. They’d just wanted to buy clothes.
That wasn’t the only weird thing about them, and Rose didn’t mind the low-key invasion. She preferred a paycheck over being enslaved, body-snatched, probed, or whatever real aliens did to helpless populations. She knew she had it good, and she didn’t ask too many questions.
“Right, so, we’re from two differen
t worlds,” she pointed out.
“And I have already crossed a galaxy to arrive at yours.” Jasper’s gemstone-flecked eyes glowed with promise. “I’ll go as far as I need to reach you, Rose. Just tell me how.”
He had her there.
She would love to tell him. Love, love, love. Love.
But…
Rose held up her hands. “There’s a lot more separating us than distance. I mean, there are places in Vancouver where you cross the street and you’re no longer in the same city. You know what I mean?”
He shook his head, frustrated.
“I like you, Jasper, but I can’t be responsible for you. You wouldn’t last five minutes in my neighborhood, and I wouldn’t last five minutes in yours.”
“You’re already in my neighborhood. We work for the same company. The same division. We’re on the same team.”
“You think we’re the same?”
“Of course we’re the same. We’re…”
Security sirens blared and yellow emergency lights bathed the hall.
The intercom overhead beeped and Jasper’s oldest brother, Mal, roared. “Jasper! Intruders are attacking the roof! Now!”
Jasper raced into the largest section mid-hallway and hunched.
Brown scales showered over his body like a bucket had been emptied over him. They coated his human skin in impenetrable scales as his arms and legs elongated, claws burst through his shoes and from his fingernails, and wings shot from his back. The transformation shredded his nice suit. He just fit in the hallway and flew out of the massive shop doors.
The doors closed behind him.
Rose just shook her head, grabbed the electric Swiffer from the closet, and vacuumed up the fine cotton and silk.
Sure, they were the same. She transformed twice a day, right? Fended off intruders. Sure. All the time.
A larger square of fabric clogged the vacuum. She pulled it out and held the smooth fabric.
His soapy scent wafted from the square.
Her femininity clenched.
She pocketed the fabric, returned his abandoned keys and important things to his office, plugged in the electric Swiffer, and headed to the elevators.
Elle met her coming out of the break room, and they waited together. Although she had her earbuds in like always, she commented, “People in love can do some crazy things.”
“In love?” Rose’s heart thudded out of rhythm. The fabric square burned a hole in her pocket. She hadn’t realized anyone had been watching. “I’m not in love. Jasper’s my boss! Geez.”
“I meant him.” Elle tipped her head to the hall, seeming to see deeper than Rose wanted her to. “Why don’t you just say, ‘I don’t like you, please stop asking to meet me’ and be done?”
“Because I do like him—as a boss—and I don’t mind telling him the truth. He asked me to always be honest and I am.”
“Okay, well, don’t turn into a statistic.” Elle entered the elevator going down.
Rose caught the next elevator up to the fifth floor and finished out the day. The dragons had driven away the invaders with little damage, and so she ran into half-nude dragons dressing everywhere she went. She tried to keep her head down and avoid notice.
It partially worked.
Mal shouted her into his office and demanded her “human” opinion on which Chinese character made her happiest—as if she suddenly knew Chinese?
Then Amber, the only female dragon in the company, complimented her on growing her hair six inches in the last week.
“My hair takes much longer to grow.” Amber patted the shoulder-length auburn hair she kept tucked into a bun. Despite running a clothing company that exported exotic fabric and fashions across the universe, she dressed like an accountant. “Congratulations on your follicular abundance.”
Rose considered explaining about extensions for half a second.
When she’d first started, she’d spent half her cleaning shifts explaining ordinary things to the dragons. Lately, she only bothered to take the time to correct Jasper when he was wrong.
“Right.” Rose backed away. “Okay. Day’s almost over.”
“Yes, of course. Thanks for your hard work.”
“You, uh, too.”
Amber headed to her office, silencing a wide swathe of dragons as passed as though she emitted an invisible force field. She was mysterious. Even though she rarely raised her voice, the male dragons walked around her with a wide perimeter. Female dragons breathed fire, grew to huge proportions, and were super dangerous.
But so long as she wasn’t the target, Rose didn’t care. Dragons were dragons. They lived in a different world.
Elle wasn’t wrong. Rose did make excuses instead of telling Jasper to stop. She had no problem telling him everything else, so she was in the wrong.
Most people didn’t have her job security. If their boss made a pass, they’d be screwed. It happened all the time.
She was one of the lucky ones.
And yes, she would be desperate if she lost this job, but Jasper would never fire her.
She shouldn’t drag out rejecting him. It wasn’t fair. He deserved more.
The problem was her.
It was always her.
She enjoyed being the first person he greeted in the morning. She liked the warmth of his smile. She liked verbally sparring with him, even though he came at her straight-forward, and she batted him away like it was a game. For a few hours, she could take a mental break from real life. She could be the kind of woman who had a rich, successful, devoted boyfriend chasing after her, and it was nice.
All she had to do to stop him was give in and invite him over. Let him meet her outside work. See how she really lived.
He would discover the dirt and the filth she cleaned up every day didn’t end after she went home. A hot shower would never scrub it off. She worked so hard to stay on top of the mess, and she precariously balanced on an ocean of nastiness.
If that didn’t kill his interest, then it would be worse. She’d have to pick him up too and worry about keeping one more person afloat.
Nope.
She was out of energy, out of ability, out of time. She couldn’t take on Jasper, too, and protect him from bad life choices or terrible people.
The only way to protect him was to keep Jasper from ever getting involved.
She would reject him. The next time she saw him, she would end it.
And her pathetic life would become downright tragic.
Chapter Three
Jasper returned to his office, sat at his desk, and finished the order for the new trash bags.
Then he closed his eyes and rested his hands in his lap.
He could just make out Rose’s intoxicating feminine scent, even after all these hours. Woodsy and earthy, lush and untamed. It emanated from the swan curve of her neck where her fine braids pooled, the gentle swell of her perfect breasts, the round curve of her buttocks. He craved a taste.
And sometimes, when she studied him with her fiery, dark eyes when she thought he wasn’t looking, he swore that she was thinking delicious thoughts about him, too.
Jasper opened his eyes and let out his breath in a long sigh. His hard cock pushed against his human trousers. He rested his palms flat on the desk.
Almost wasn’t good enough.
Two months ago, the Onyx Corporation had reached the number one ranked company outside Draconis. Immediately after, their mother had announced she was dissolving the company and marrying them off. Why? To give her dragonlets! She, a high caste aristocrat, had been forced to give up her dragonlets and their poor, low-caste, brimstone miner father. Because the marriage had never been validated, Jasper and his siblings had also grown up low-caste. And now that the old matriarch was dead and their mother was the new Onyx matriarch, she’d set about arranging for what she’d never had.
Jasper could understand her desire. She just went about it in a way that upset her heirs.
The elderly, senile, vicious Empress Ho
rribus had offered her claw to Mal. Mother had declared Mal would take it, shocking dragon society, from the highest aristocrat to the lowest low-caste. The rest of the siblings would marry Palace advisers.
Jasper had objected because he was pursuing Rose.
“You are?” his mother’s excitement had turned to skepticism. “Where is this female? Produce her, and better yet, show me she’s already pregnant with your dragonlets!”
“I need more time,” he’d hedged.
“Very well. You have two weeks to produce this female or else you will marry Adviser Wrathmoda!”
The rest of his siblings had fabricated females that they were pursuing, too. His mother had accepted their delaying tactic on the condition that they actually produce females.
His older brothers had miraculously complied, one by one, until the Empress’s offer had stopped at Amber.
Amber, being female, was exempt from any forced marriages.
The threat would soon pass to Jasper. He just didn’t know when.
Jasper lifted his palms off the desk and opened another computer browser tab on human dating advice. He had to make a breakthrough with Rose. He had to.
His video screen flashed with a call. He clicked to answer and his youngest sibling, Flint, appeared in human form with glasses shielding his large gray eyes.
“Jasper, I assume you’re alone.”
“I am,” Jasper confirmed. “It’s been a long time, Flint. How are you?”
“No time for socializing.” Flint glanced over his shoulder and lowered his voice. “How’s your female?”
“Fine.” Nerves uncoiled in his belly. “I thought you didn’t have time for socializing.”
“I’m not socializing. Focus, Jasper. Your female. No forward progress?”
Jasper’s hands trembled. He folded them in his lap. “Define ‘forward’.”
“I don’t know how to define human romances. Are you any closer to giving Mother her much-anticipated dragonlets?”
“Decidedly no.”
“What are you waiting for?” Flint leaned closer, making his gray eyes appear large like an owl. “Once Empress Horribus threatened to marry Mal, he courted, married, and impregnated his female in two weeks. Pyro also. And, incredibly, Kyan. They’re nowhere near your level of care nor organization, Jasper. Do you desire to marry an ancient monarch?”
