by Amelia Jade
***
“Put the knife down!” he called, stepping through the back door.
Quinn laughed, and he felt her amusement pulsate through him.
“I don’t carry it anymore!” she protested, putting down the food she was preparing and striding toward him.
“Are you sure?” he asked, giving her a quick frisk.
“Yes. Though if you aren’t sure, you might have to give me a more thorough inspection,” she purred, pushing her ass back into him and grinding it up and down.
“After dinner,” he said, his palm making firm contact with her behind, causing Quinn to jump in both surprise and delight.
“How long are you home for, dear?” she asked, stressing the last word happily.
“Three full days,” he told her, holding up the equivalent amount of fingers as he smiled broadly.
“Really? That’s amazing!” she said, throwing her arms around his neck and giving him a kiss.
“I know. We passed stage one.” Asher tried to say it as calmly as possible, but Quinn saw right through his façade, and could feel his inner excitement.
“You can brag to me, you know,” she told him, hanging off his neck, her eyes mere inches away from his. “It’s okay to be proud of yourself.”
He shrugged. “I guess. It’s kinda cool though.”
She planted another kiss full on his lips. “It’s amazing. We’re going to celebrate. Break out the wine!”
Asher chuckled, arms tightening around her waist as he spun around in a circle. “Oh we are, are we?”
“Of course.”
Squirming out of his grip, she planted her feet on the ground and took his face in her hands. “I love you, Asher Owens. This whole thing is crazy, and while I’m glad I was finally able to get word to family and friends outside of Cadia, I’m here with you. And I’m proud of you.”
He heard all of her words, but only the first five truly registered.
“I love you, Quinn Bryant,” he told her solemnly, opening his mind fully to her, so that she might experience the depth of his feelings for her.
“Good, because you went and stuck yourself with me,” she said, sticking her tongue out at him.
Asher grinned and kissed her again, more passionately this time. And for longer.
Much longer.
“Oh my,” she said, waving a hand in front of her face. “Is it hot in here, or just me?”
He laughed. “Have you decided on what you’re going to do now?”
One of the deals he had made with Quinn was that she needed to find a job, or a hobby. Something that kept her involved.”
“I think so,” she said nervously, and he could tell she was seeking his approval.
“Well, make with the details!” he said, tickling her sides slightly as she hesitated.
“Stop!” she giggled, then sobered. “I was thinking that I might start a travel agency for shifters leaving Cadia and going to the human world. Places to go, places to avoid, things to see, educating them on cultural customs and the like. What do you think?”
Asher looked at her in surprise. “Quinn, that actually sounds like an amazing idea!”
“Really?”
He nodded. “Really! I honestly do. You should definitely go for it.”
“Thank you,” she said, looking up at him. “Seriously. Thank you for everything.”
He brushed it off. “Nonsense. You’re the brains here. I’m just the brawn.”
Quinn laughed. “Well duh, but what brawn it is,” she said, squeezing his bicep as he flexed for her.
“So, I met the neighbors today,” she said, trying to sound nonchalant despite the sudden change in topic.
“Oh,” he said, feigning calm, wondering what she was going to drop on him next. “And how are the Swifts?”
Though they weren’t close, about a mile down the road a wolf shifter family had taken up residence half a dozen years or so prior. Asher liked them enough for the little interaction they had.
“So nice!” Quinn said, taking his arm and leaning against him. “It’s been nice getting out and meeting people, knowing that I can be seen in public without possibly being instantly killed.”
Asher squeezed her tight, indicating his agreement. “I’m glad of that too.”
Daxxton had made it known to Cadia that Quinn was bonded to Asher, and that she was to be accepted. That was basically it, as far as things went. A bonded human didn’t need forms to come into Cadia, as long as the shifter they were bonded to was present as well. So over the past week Quinn had slowly been stretching her legs, getting out and seeing the place where Asher had grown up.
“They have the cutest pups,” she said now, slowly and cautiously.
Asher’s stomach did a backflip. He turned to look at her. “You want kids?”
She blushed. “I don’t know. Maybe? Yes? I hadn’t really thought I was ready, but things with you just…oh, I don’t know how to say it. But they just make sense. And seeing the Swifts’ kids…oh they’re just the cutest.”
He grinned. “Quinn Bryant. You know that we shifters highly value children. You would never have to fight with me for that. But there is a condition.”
She looked at him. “What’s that?”
“We wait until after I’m done with Top Scale, one way or another. I don’t want to be unavailable at all during my training.”
Quinn smiled happily. “That, my love, is more than acceptable. But,” she took his hand, “I too have a condition then.”
He sensed part of her emotions coming through their link, but it seemed like she was doing her best to shield him now, because they were fuzzy.
Damn, she learns quickly.
“And what is yours?”
“You promise to practice as much as possible in the meantime.”
“Deal.” He grinned. “Starting right now then.”
Without waiting, he reached down and threw her over his shoulder, carrying her to the bedroom as Quinn howled with laughter and pounded on his back, telling him to put her down.
Eventually, he did.
THE END
This concludes Book 1 of the Top Scale Academy Series. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Keep turning the page for Fire Dragon – Book #2!
Fire Dragon
Chapter One
Amber
“Can I help you, miss?”
There was no missing the slight condescension in his voice. He knew it. She knew it. There was no hiding it as she approached him. To her, it made no sense. She wasn’t dressed in a miniskirt with her front ripped open to expose her cleavage to him. This wasn’t some backwater bar or downtown hotspot. She was wearing functional clothing appropriate for the job site.
Steel-toed boots, dark pants, and a button-up white blouse. Perhaps the color wasn’t the best choice, given that she was out in the field today, but the hard hat and clipboard in her hand, along with the security badge, should have been enough for the clown of a foreman to realize that she was supposed to be there.
Amber had been planning on doing a quick inspection and then gone on her merry way, much to the relief of both her and the slump-browed buffoon in front of her, but now she decided that his tone merited a closer look.
“Yes, you can,” she said, holding out her hand and looking at him expectantly until he took it.
She shook his hand once perfunctorily and dropped it, wiping her hand none-too-discreetly on the back of her pants.
“And how may I be of assistance?” he replied slowly, looking her up and down. It wasn’t a sexual look, but a reevaluation of her after she had quickly turned the conversation around.
His jaw worked at the overt slight directed at him, and she saw something flare in his eyes. Not respect; she never expected that from this type. They wouldn’t know what to do with an intelligent woman even if one fell into their lap.
Which she most certainly was not going to do.
Amber had to try not to snort at the mental image of such a scenario.
“Yes, you can bring me up to speed on the work,” she said. “Progress charts, reports, problems. Everything.”
The foreman—she didn’t know his name, nor did she care to at that point—looked over at the man next to her. It was a brief look, his eyes barely flickered, but everyone present knew what he was up to.
But Amber wasn’t having any of it.
“This is Anton,” she said slowly, as if talking to a child. “He’s security for me, since we’re close to the border here. I did not want him to come along. He did not want to come along. But corporate said I have to take him. But understand this: he goes where I go. Not the other way around, okay?”
The foreman just nodded, disinterested. “Sure. Wanna come to my trailer then?” he asked, his facial expression stopping just short of a leer.
Amber tried not to shudder at the way his worn features, yellowed teeth, and unshaven facial hair half-contorted. She had nothing against construction workers, but this man was a brute that made her want to retch.
He must be good at his job though, to get this posting. Corporate wouldn’t send amateurs out to work this section of the line, I know that.
“Has there been any trouble from the other side?” she asked, tilting her head in the direction of the chain of snow-capped mountains to the east of them.
The pipeline was due to run right along the base of them, cutting as close as possible. She wondered if there would be any protests, even though they were technically not crossing the border. A lot of times that little tidbit didn’t actually matter to locals.
“Not a peep,” the foreman said quickly.
“Excellent. So we’re on track?”
“We are, Miss…” He trailed off, motioning her toward the door of the long trailer that served as the site office.
“Klose,” she supplied. It was on her badge, but perhaps he couldn’t read.
“I’m sure you’ll be more than happy,” he said. “You can go back to corporate and tell them everything is proceeding as planned. They don’t need to waste their time sending an inspector out here.”
Amber succeeded at keeping the frown from her face at his comment, but she couldn’t do the same as she stepped into the trailer.
It was a disaster. The twenty-foot-long unit was filled with clutter. Papers were strewn everywhere, with no organization to them whatsoever. The garbage under the table was overflowing with food wrappers and other things that she didn’t want to think about, the stench of which filled the room. Ashtrays littered the surfaces of the tables, cabinets, even on top of the old computer monitor. The place reeked of cigarette smoke mixed with the garbage, forming a putrid aroma that threatened to bring up her breakfast on the spot.
The look of victory on the foreman’s face coincided with the queasiness she was sure was displayed across her own features.
You will not let this caveman win. You will not.
Straightening, she swallowed her rising gorge and pointed at the table. “Can you find me the latest progress report?” she smiled sweetly, but did not add a “please” to her sentence. Instead she waited expectantly, with her hand outstretched, until he sneered and pushed some papers around until he found the one he wanted.
“Here you are,” he said with fake kindness.
What the hell is this guy’s problem? Does he treat everyone like this, or just me? And how the hell does he justify working like this?
Something was up, but she wasn’t sure what. Calmly she took the report and glanced over it. As she did, she turned, ostensibly to put her back to the foreman, but also so that she could covertly survey the rest of the office. This had to be a prank or something. A chart on the far wall, small but detailed, caught her eye. She paused in her turn long enough to eyeball it.
It was a drawing of the pipeline and its expected layout. But in what appeared to be crayon, someone had drawn a new line. One that cut through the mountain chain, before hooking back up far to the north where the pipeline curved to the east around the chain and the border, lopping nearly two hundred miles from the overall length of the pipeline. The new line would save the company tens of millions of dollars, and months of construction time. The new line was on infinitely easier terrain.
The new line cut right through Cadia.
Amber steeled herself and nodded, putting the report down on the table, pretending to glance over a few other blueprints and miscellaneous forms. The foreman had no idea she wasn’t just a mere inspector, and that she could read some of the more complicated blueprints and charts scattered there. That all showed the changes. Changes she, as one of the lead engineers on the entire pipeline project, had not authorized.
She no longer cared about anything else. She had to get out and see the progress herself without making it seem like she was on to something. If they truly had decided to cut through the mountains without permission, things were going to end badly. For everyone.
“Well, everything seems to be in order here,” she said, scribbling on her clipboard and marking a few things off. “I just need to review the newest sections, the ones laid down since the last inspector, and then I’ll be out of your hair,” she said, trying to sound as prissy as possible, hating herself for it the entire time.
She shouldn’t have to pretend that she was someone else just for cooperation, but Amber knew it would be the easiest way. If he thought of her as an uppity desk-jockey who didn’t know left from right and was only there to sign papers, he would be much more willing to work with her.
It went at odds with her earlier show of personality, but the foreman didn’t seem to notice. He nodded slowly. “Of course. Does the same chopper that brought you out here have enough fuel for a visit?”
“It should,” she said as they exited the trailer and headed over to where her pilot was parked.
“Charlie, do we have enough airtime to go check out the construction?” she shouted over the idle whir of the engines.
The pilot checked his gauges, and then nodded. “Shouldn’t be a problem.”
Amber didn’t hesitate, hopping in and beginning to buckle herself up. Anton and the foreman followed somewhat slower, but neither of them protested the immediacy of everything. She did see the foreman pull out his phone and punch some buttons on it as he sat opposite her. What could be so important that he had to text now, before they were airborne?
She shrugged mentally and watched the landscape shrink below them as they rose into the air and then headed north, following the pipeline through the forest. Amber sat back and pretended to be bored, trying as hard as she could to pretend like she didn’t notice when the chopper slid between two mountains and across the Cadian border.
Her heart started to race. They could be attacked by the shifters who resided there at any time now, without warning. She was scared, but letting it show would doom her effort. So she forced herself to sit back into the chair and let her eyes droop closed.
“Almost there,” the foreman said over the headsets they had all donned upon buckling in.
She sat up, forcing herself to glance down at the ground, and not look frantically up at the sky. That didn’t mean she was completely successful, but for the most part, her eyes tracked how far into Cadia the construction teams had come.
Her heart sank. They were a good five miles inside the border now. Amber hadn’t known much about the shifter territory prior to securing her position as one of the engineers attached to the project. But she had made it a priority to read up on it as much as she could, just in case they had any interactions with the shifters. This was, to the best of her knowledge, almost as far away from their centers of population as one could get. A desolate, backwater corner of the vast lands that had been carved out of the country well before her time. Still, Amber knew they patrolled their borders ruthlessly. The way the mountains came together made it more convenient for them to patrol the smaller paths farther to the east, but she doubted this would remain secret for long.
How had anyone gotten approval for th
is lunacy?
The chopper set down near the end of the pipeline where a number of idle machines were parked, along with neatly stacked pipeline parts. Pallets of other materials were sitting nearby, and several large dump trucks sat empty, ready to haul dirt away as it was dug. To Amber’s eye it looked like a construction site, complete with people milling around, having paused their work as the unexpected vehicle descended near them.
Amber hopped off before they were even fully down, ducking low and holding onto her hat as she was buffeted by the turbulent air from the rotors. Now that she was here and had seen the massive deviation from the planned route, she knew she was in over her head. She couldn’t bring this crashing down on her own. For it to have gone this far, the new plan must have had support from very high up the chain.
As she waited for the rotors to die down, the workers all began to pile into pickups and drive off.
“Where are they going?” she asked, looking at the foreman.
“Shift end,” he said with a shrug. “They’ll be back at it tomorrow.”
She thought that was odd, but didn’t say anything. It was far from the first odd thing she’d noticed. In moments, it was just the four of them. The pilot in the powered-down helicopter, Anton, the foreman, and her.
Amber poked around the work site, but besides the route it was taking, everything else seemed to be done in proper fashion. All safety protocols were being followed, and things were clean and in working order. It was a stark contrast from the clutter of the office.
“Is everything okay?” the foreman asked after ten minutes had gone by. The afternoon shadows were beginning to appear, though the sun was still bright, and she figured he was eager to go have a beer.
“Just about.”
“Good.”
Her head came up abruptly at the change in tone of his voice, and at the same time she heard something approach.
She looked to the sky as something slid in front of the sun, casting its shadow across the ground.
Chapter Two
Zeke
