by Riley Storm
The others were nodding now, and she could see that they were all incensed, ready to use any and all tactics to their advantage.
She smiled.
Victor won’t know what hit him.
Chapter 6
Victor didn’t want to see her again.
Now he stood outside her office, hands full of documents, and paused.
He’d wanted to argue with Aaric about it, to convince the fire dragon to deal with her instead, but he couldn’t. If he did that, his plan would fall apart. It was that plan which was keeping him going.
You can do it. Stay calm. This time, you’re the one in charge. You’re the one dictating the terms. They can’t make you do anything, because you hold the power. As long as she doesn’t gain any sway over you, you’re fine.
The time had come to face her again, and though he’d tried to be firm with himself over the intervening time, now he was outside her office, Victor found he was faltering. Apparently, a week hadn’t been long enough. He’d delayed as long as possible but couldn’t risk her contacting Aaric behind his back either. That would be bad for sure.
Just think of her reaction. Think of the dismay and revel in how distraught she’s going to feel.
He smiled, strengthened by those thoughts. Yes, this was going to be good. She would see the new plans and discover he was serious. That he wasn’t going to back down or be swayed.
The funds would leave the account Aaric had prepared for them, and then find their way into Victor’s. Both of them would suffer, and he would profit. His own accounts, so depleted and nearly empty, would swell. Once he’d taken the majority of the money, then he could finally leave the depressing town of Plymouth Falls behind.
He hadn’t shared any of that with Aaric of course. It had been an interesting dance after the fight, trying to talk about how Aaric had purposefully set him up to be embarrassed after realizing Cheryl was either an eerie lookalike of a woman from his past, or more likely her descendant.
That was where he was going after this meeting. To search through some records and see if he could figure out whether his suspicions were correct or not. Aaric had been suitably apologetic, but he’d sworn he didn’t know. That he did not actually know what Elizabeth had looked like.
Even just thinking the name sent a shiver down his spine. One day, perhaps after he got his revenge, he would be able to think about what happened without burning shame and embarrassment. But not yet.
No time better than the present to get started on fixing that.
Reinvigorated by his little pep talk, he strode forward and into the exact same meeting room. Everyone was seated around the table.
“Hello,” he said before Cheryl was even done rising.
“Victor.” Her voice wasn’t—quite—cold, but it was certainly far less welcoming and respectful than the last time.
She was going to put up a fight. He could tell. Let her, there’s nothing she can do to you.
“Cheryl,” he said, turning his attention to the rest of the team before she could reply. “Stephen, Liz, Tanya.” He bobbed his head ever so slightly in turn with each one.
Then he strode to the table and set down the items he was carrying, including a sheaf of new plans hastily drawn up by a harried architect from out of town. It had cost him a pretty penny to get them done urgently, but the money would be nothing compared to what he stood to gain.
“Here,” he said, tossing a stapled stack to each person at the table. “The new plans based on the financial commitment we are now able to put aside for the project. I know it’s not what you wanted, but times change. We have to adapt, but easy going. Take a look, and when you’re ready, here are the documents.”
He pushed another stack across the table at Cheryl. “They are certified by our lawyers. Send them to yours if you wish.”
But Cheryl wasn’t paying any attention. Her head was buried in the plans. Victor frowned. She was ignoring him. Completely. In fact, he realized as he looked around, they all were. None of them was giving him the time of day; instead, they were looking at his plans.
He returned his focus to Cheryl. He watched the horror slowly play over her face as she realized just how small he’d downsized everything.
Yes. Now you begin to see. Complain about it if you like. I won’t mind.
That’s what he told himself, letting similar thoughts run through his mind. The longer it went on, the more Victor found himself forced to come up with new versions of the same thing. The look and emotion on Cheryl’s face was leaving him unsettled. He didn’t understand.
This was to be his moment of victory. Of extreme satisfaction as he got his revenge on both people who had treated him badly. Ones who had made him a laughing stock among his peers. This was to be it!
So why did he feel like taking her into his arms and telling her it would be okay? That made no sense. He hated Cheryl. Hated her with every fiber of his being. He didn’t want to touch her. To hold her. He didn’t want to make her feel better. Victor knew this.
Didn’t he?
So why couldn’t he stop visions of that exact scenario from playing out in his mind? It would be so easy. One large step to his left, and then she would be in reach. All it would take was gentle pressure on her shoulders and she would collapse into him.
In front of all her team? I doubt it!
“Victor, is everything okay?”
He realized he was staring at her now, and she was looking back at him, having finally torn her attention away from the new plans.
“What?”
“You look pale,” Cheryl said. “Are you feeling okay? Can we get you anything?”
After all he’d done to her. Pulling the project out from under her feet, and yet she was still concerned with his wellbeing? Who was this woman? Elizabeth wouldn’t have cared. She would just be trying to milk it for all it was worth. Trying to claw back on the project, to take more of his money while he was confused.
But Cheryl was asking him if he was okay. If she could help him. Not take from him. There had to be another plan. Something she was hiding, that he wouldn’t see until it was too late, and he’d already accepted her help. Victor knew that. It was the way her bloodline worked. They were all thieves and con artists.
Well she isn’t going to pull one over on me this time!
“No, no I’m fine,” he said, standing up tall, reminding them of his power.
Reminding them, or reminding yourself?
“You weren’t lying, were you?” Cheryl said at last, looking just as pale as she’d said he was. “You really do intend to do the bare minimum. Why? What did we ever do to you? What came up? Maybe there’s a way Plymouth Falls could help in other ways.”
Victor shook his head. “No.” It was a struggle to even say that much.
Ignore her. This is your plan! This is what you want! Who cares how she feels? You don’t. It’s not like she cares what happened to you! Remember how Elizabeth acted!
He pulled up that memory now using the biting laughter of Cheryl’s doppelganger to feed his resolve.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Cheryl said stiffly, then gestured at her team.
All at once, the others got up and filed out of the room.
“We’ll be in touch,” Cheryl said before he could say anything, and then she was gone too, leaving him alone.
Victor was stunned. He’d come in planning to command the room, to be the one making the decisions. And yet in one fell swoop, Cheryl had managed to pull it out from under him, leaving him standing around like an idiot.
What was going on here? She was supposed to be distraught. Begging him not to do what he was doing. Victor had expected her to throw herself at him, saying they would do anything to get him to redo the plans again, but larger.
There was only one thing he could infer from this reaction though. Cheryl and Plymouth Falls weren’t going down without a fight.
“What are you up to?” he muttered to himself, resolutely ignoring the other feelin
gs going on inside him.
The ones that told him he was making a mistake by hurting her. That he should go apologize and try to make things better. To get her to like him.
Chapter 7
When he finally untangled his brain enough to leave the office—her office—he resolutely told himself he would take the most direct route back toward the elevator. He would not go searching after Cheryl, wanting to know what had just happened in the conference room.
So when his feet took him on a hard right turn down a hallway lined with closed doors, each with a different nametag on them, he didn’t immediately understand what he was doing.
No. The elevator’s the other way.
But he couldn’t stop it. His curiosity was insatiable. Cheryl had walked out of that meeting as if she held the high ground and he needed to know why that was. What plan did she have?
Victor moved silently, not sneaking, just without much noise. It wasn’t hard. Even with most of the doors closed, there was enough ambient sound to mask his light footsteps. For a big man, he could move very quietly if he chose. The ventilation system, the sound of voices behind closed doors and the wind outside the building easily covered up any trace of his approach toward the corner office.
The door labelled ‘C. Anders.”
He paused outside, opening his hearing, tuning in to his senses to try and hear what was going on inside the office. Was she in there with her team, gloating, perhaps? Or was she nervously answering to a superior? Victor smiled at the image of that last thought and leaned in close.
Silence.
That was all he could pick up. Complete and utter silence. If she was in there, Cheryl wasn’t doing anything more than breathing.
Was she not in her office?
He figured it was possible she was still with her team, of course. If she was anywhere else, it would be there. Looking around, he tried to figure out where that might be. Would they have moved to another conference room? That would make sense.
What are you doing? Why do you care about this woman so much?
I don’t. I’m here to figure out what she’s up to, so I can prevent it. No other reason.
Victor told himself that. He called up memories of his past, the ones that drove him night and day now and fed off the shame, embarrassment, guilt, and even the anger. He fed it all inside him…only for it to be doused by the liquid of his soul. What was going on?
Confused, not understanding his inner reluctance to continue his crusade against Cheryl and what her ancestor had done to him, he stood up straight. This was pointless. He needed to go back and start preparing to spend the money coming his way. That would be the best use of his time.
As he stepped away from the door, however, a sound caught his ear. Victor froze, listening closely, wondering if he’d heard it correctly. It had sounded like—
Yes, there it was again! A sob, a soft cry, from inside her office.
A stab of guilt ducked in under his chest and rammed home deep in his gut. He was destroying this woman’s life. A life she had no doubt worked hard to create. This project would have been her crowning achievement, he was sure. Something she would look back upon with satisfaction for a long time to come. And he was ripping it away from her.
She deserves it! He sneered at the thought and its truthfulness. Her entire bloodline deserved what they had done to him. She didn’t need the wealth. Her grandmother, or great grandmother, would have left enough. Victor had been anything but a pauper, even among dragons. He had worked hard for his treasure, only to have it snatched away on the back of a witch. Now she would have the same treasure taken away from her.
Victor tried to smile at that thought. To bask in the victory coming his way. It should have been his moment of triumph.
But the quiet sounds of Cheryl’s distress peeled back his hatred and satisfaction like a master chef preparing a cut of meat for the burner. He was powerless to resist. In fact…it almost hurt.
Without thinking, he reached out and opened the door to her office.
“Cheryl…” he trailed off as she looked up at him, twin laser beams of red-tinged brown drilling out of her eyes and into him with a hatred he could no longer match.
“What do you want?” she hissed.
Victor hastily rethought his approach
She doesn’t want to be consoled by you. You’re the reason she’s upset!
“I have to know something,” he said, forcing himself to act nonchalant, as if he didn’t care about her feelings.
At no point did Victor make the connection that even having such a thought meant he did care.
“What?” she asked dully, wiping at her eyes even as they continued to try and impale him to the chair. “What could I possibly say that you would care about?”
Victor frowned at the uncomfortable pit in his stomach but pushed it aside. Now wasn’t the time to focus on that.
“Elizabeth Anders. Are you related to her?”
The look she focused on him was so malevolent, so filled with disgust, anger and sheer contempt, that Victor found himself recoiling from it slightly.
“That’s what you want to know?” Cheryl hissed. Both palms came down on the desk with a loud slap. “Of everything you could have asked, that was your question?” She rose from her seat to loom over him as best as possible given their height differences.
Victor stood hastily. He should leave. Just exit and close the door behind him. That was what he should do.
I will not retreat! I am a dragon. I fear nothing from this puny woman!
Cheryl slapped one hand on the desk again. Victor flinched.
“Get out of my office.”
Finally, finally something defiant in him perked up, and Victor stood his ground. He had to know the answer to this question. To ensure he was justified in his plan. That she wasn’t just some sort of freakish lookalike.
“Do you know her? Is she your ancestor?” he rumbled, spreading his feet ever so slightly, making it clear he was planting himself in that spot until he got an answer.
“You’re a creep,” she spat. “A stalker. How would you ever know that?”
“Trust me,” he said dryly. “The last thing I wanted was this. It’s just a question.”
Cheryl threw her hands in the air in frustration. “Yes. She’s my great-grandmother on my father’s side. There, are you happy? What the hell kind of good does that do you? Now get out of my office before I call security and the police.”
Victor nodded and backed toward the exit, putting an extra step or two between them before he gave her his back and retreated.
“Take care,” he said as he pulled the door closed behind him.
“Go fuck yourself.”
He yanked the door fully closed just before the flying stapler slammed into the door. Frowning at the sound of the impact, Victor let go of the handle, pausing in the hallway to try and gather his thoughts.
Why was she so mad? All he’d done was ask a question…
Chapter 8
“What an asshole!” she hissed, staring at the closed door for several long moments before going to and retrieving her stapler. The office item wasn’t deserving of her wrath.
Unlike that ass Victor Drakon, who had more than earned every ounce she could hurl his way. How dare he come in here after what he’d just done and pretend like none of it mattered!
She seethed with fury, practically shaking in her skin as she sat back down behind her desk. The only benefit to his sudden appearance was that she was no longer sad, but instead livid beyond belief.
Not once had he apologized for what he was doing or acted like he even cared. Which, it was safe to say, meant he didn’t care. Not that it should come as a surprise. From the moment she’d laid eyes on his perfect teeth and admittedly strikingly hot facial features, he’d acted in nothing but his own self-interest.
“Standard hot male, only cares about what he wants. Not about anyone around them.” She sighed. “Why couldn’t the hot ones be the caring one
s as well? Instead of the stuck-up assholes?”
Flopping down behind her desk, the wind suddenly taken out of her righteous fury, Cheryl rubbed at her forehead. What else was she supposed to do? This wasn’t the city’s project. This was something the Drakon family had come to them to propose. They were going to fund it. The city was just going to ease some restrictions, give them some kickbacks to ensure they used local labor and parts as best they could. Things that would benefit Plymouth Falls.
She could take those away of course, but what would Victor care? He must have been ready for that anyway. He would expect her to remove those from the agreement. There was nothing else the town could do to him.
“Wait a minute,” she said with a frown, sitting upright. “There’s nothing else the town can do to him on this project.”
Her years of experience in Plymouth Falls had taught Cheryl a lot, and she’d noticed much more. Everyone knew there were three founding families. The Drakons, the Canis, and the Ursa. Very weird names likely descended from some sort of noble or some such. But they had been there from the start.
And they were heavily invested in Plymouth Falls. Cheryl had done countless projects where she’d come across their name, or across businesses that she knew could be traced back to them. The common layperson in Plymouth Falls would never know just how much of the town they controlled, but Cheryl did. She was one of the few who had worked with them, or their liaisons, at least.
“Maybe we can’t stop you from downsizing the Outreach Center,” she said nastily, sending out a quick text to her team, letting them know they needed to be in her office five minutes ago.
Wiping the last of her tears away, Cheryl’s face cracked open in a grin as Liz entered first.