Dragon Temptation (Crimson Dragons Book 1)

by Amelia Jade

  And everything with it is over too, you know. Look at her, staring straight ahead, not even glancing over here. As soon as you’re back in Surrey she’ll probably take a shower and pack up her things and go. You’ll never see her again.

  Lex sagged as the truth of his thoughts weighed down on him. He’d thought for sure that she was a soul he could spend his life with. That Petal was that person to him. He didn’t want to use the word, for fear of jinxing any remaining hope he had, but his mind had been thinking it while they were lying naked together in the cave. Everything had felt right, then.

  Did she not feel a thing for him? Had it all been an act? Or was this now an act, a persona that Petal didn’t know how to drop? Feeling a sliver of hope that maybe that was the case, he spent the rest of the ride looking over at her, waiting for her to look in his direction and give him a smile, or a wink, letting him know that underneath it all, she truly did care.

  The entire ride back, she never looked at him once.

  15. Return to Form?

  Petal

  She sagged into the first-class flight chair, thankful that though it wasn’t an international flight, this particular aircraft still had the huge single-person seats with the little sidewalls that allowed for privacy. Right now the last thing she wanted was to have to force conversation with some stranger for four hours.

  There was more than enough talking going on in her head as the whirlwind two and a half days came to an end. Petal knew she should have stayed in Surrey longer to ensure everything went smoothly, but nobody would fault her for wanting to come home after what had happened. She was taking advantage of that, using the excuse to flee so she wasn’t forced to stay in close proximity to Lex.

  It had just been too much. All she could see any time she looked at him, heard his voice, or someone mentioned his name, was the look of hurt and betrayal on his face when she’d told him he couldn’t tell anyone. The automatic assumption that she’d immediately jumped back into bitch-mode now that they weren’t alone.

  The worst part is, he’s not even wrong.

  While Petal had meant it because she was his boss, and they couldn’t let anyone know about it while she was in a position of power, lest she, or both of them lose their jobs, he’d interpreted it to mean that she thought he wasn’t good enough for her. It wasn’t true, but that was only because she knew him now. Even she couldn’t deny the fact that she’d been upset about the idea of dying in the cave with a line worker. A lowly grunt manual laborer. Who could blame Lex for thinking that’s what she’d meant, when it could very easily be the truth, based on her earlier actions and thoughts?

  It was that realization that had slammed down any ability for her to communicate with him. Petal didn’t know what to say, because she wasn’t sure how she felt. The one thing that was clear to her was that she had a lot of self-discovery to do. That wasn’t something she could do around him. If she tried, two things would happen.

  One, she would become overwhelmed with anger and disappointment in herself for what she’d said to Lex. Secondly, her mind would go back to the way he’d fucked her. It was a crude saying, she knew, but it was accurate. The more she played back the scenario in the cave, the more clear it became that though she’d enjoyed it thoroughly, Lex had been in charge. He’d made the decisions, and he’d done to her as he wished.

  Never before had that happened to her. There was something about that statement that nagged at her. Petal couldn’t figure out what it was. She knew that the sex had been quite different from much that she’d had, where the lovers had been like other men in her life. Subservient, not overly strong.

  Not Lex though. He was a dominating power, there was no doubt about that in her mind. He took control, and let his base instincts run wild. It drove her crazy to think about. Each time the memory came up, she felt herself become instantly aroused. Like right now.

  Angrily she downed the water provided to her by the stewardess. He’d treated her perfectly politely, minus the bit of lip every now and then that she probably deserved. And in return, she’d betrayed his trust. All because she couldn’t find a way to do away with something that had once been a cloak of protection at work, but had now grown to be a core part of who she was.

  That was why she was so angry. Petal knew she was a bitch. That she’d earned her nicknames honestly. It wasn’t an issue in the office, but now it seemed she couldn’t even turn it off outside of the corporate environment. After all, what sort of person would just let Lex go on thinking she thought he was below her, when it wasn’t the truth at all? Petal hated herself for it, but she didn’t know anything else.

  She’d been a cold-hearted bitch for so long, she’d forgotten how to laugh. Slumping down into the chair, she buried herself in sadness, self-doubt, and depression.

  The moment the plane took to the air, the tears came.

  ***

  The next day, back at the office, Lex was still on her mind. He’d never left. All during the flight, and then through the night as she drank an entire thing of boxed wine by herself, he’d been there.

  And there’s nothing wrong with boxed wine. Just because I’m a corporate operations executive doesn’t mean I’m above boxed wine.

  Even in her head the title came out sarcastic-sounding. Petal was upset with herself, and who’d she’d become. In her head, she thought back to a time before she worked in the corporate world. When everything had been open and the possibilities endless. Back then, she’d dreamed of meeting someone like Lex. He quite literally had the entire list of qualities that she’d hoped to find in a man.

  Funny. Tall. Intelligent. Well-spoken and well-educated—if not formally. Strong. Gorgeous looks. Capable and handy in a pinch. Good with his hands, the type not afraid to take on home renovations himself. She didn’t know about the last, but it seemed like a good bet. Everything she’d ever dreamt of had come and dropped quite literally into her lap. He was even interested in her!

  But the Full-Petal-Bitch had reared her head, biting his off like she were a praying mantis. Her inability to let her guard down had been brought into the light with Lex. All it had taken was one fearful moment that someone might find out, and she’d clamped back down into her old ways.

  Perhaps the most frustrating thing for her was that she could see it. She knew damn well what the problem was. How to solve it was just as easy: Don’t be a bitch. Don’t be afraid to tell him that you like him. That he’s amazing, and you’re not ashamed to be with him.

  But every time she tried to pick up the phone to call him, her body froze, and the unsavory thoughts returned.

  She emerged from the elevator and walked down the hallway. Everyone scurried to get out of her way, not wanting to risk her wrath.

  Lex never ran away from me like that. He would have stood directly in my path, pretending like he didn’t notice that I was forced to walk around him. Then he’d probably say something just to make me realize how I was acting.

  A smile crossed her face at the thought, which sent her subordinates ducking for cover. Petal sighed as the door to her office finally closed behind her. Lex was so different from all the people around her. His love for nature and the desire to be a help to his town. It spoke of an honest person, one who cared for his fellow man. The contrast was hard for her to believe.

  He would talk to her, she realized. As in, hold an actual conversation. He’d talked to her about his life a bit, about who he was, what he liked. She knew who he was as a person.

  Could that be the difference?

  She poked her head out of her door, found the first person to make eye contact and jerked her head, indicating he should come over.

  “Close the door, Jimmy,” she said as he entered.

  The door shook slightly in the doorframe as he closed it, betraying his nerves.

  “Relax, I’m not firing you,” she said, smiling to let him know it was okay.

  “U-Uh. Oh. Okay,” he stammered, looking frantically around the room, anywhere but at her
.

  “You can look at me. You won’t turn into stone.” She tried another joke.

  Jimmy made eye contact once, then resumed his staring at the wall above her head.

  “What do you do for fun, Jimmy?”

  He frowned nervously. “Pardon?”

  “Fun. You know. Hobbies, things like that. What do you do?”

  Sweat was starting to bead on his forehead. “Oh. Um. Hobbies. Right. Well, I like to read,” he said hopefully, as if he were trying to come up with the right answer, something that would make her happy.

  “Oh, that’s fun. What do you read?”

  “Um, mostly the classics. You know, Dickens and such.”

  He was just trying to appease her.

  “Do you play any sports?”

  “Me? Sports?” Jimmy burst out into nervous laughter. “No, no sports for me.”

  Petal sighed. “Okay. Thanks, Jimmy, that’s all.”

  “Of course, ma’am. Always glad to help.”

  She gestured for him to leave. It was useless. They were all petrified of her. This was the life she had cultivated with her personality. Not what she had glimpsed while out in Surrey while trapped with Lex. This is what she was forced to deal with if she wanted to ascend the corporate ladder.

  Petal leaned back into her chair, considering that last statement.

  If I want it.

  But is that still what I want?

  The answer eluded her.

  16. Mating Call

  Lex

  “Boy is it nice to be done and still have the energy to go for a drink!”

  Lex smiled and lifted his frost-covered mug in cheers to Ronnie. “Absolutely.”

  The past four days the trio had been working until well into the evening and night. Often by the time they got back to the shop they were beyond exhausted. One night they’d simply rolled out blankets and crashed on the floor there, too tired even to go home.

  Now though, things were finally, almost, sort of, under control. There was still months upon months’ worth of work to be done. Many of the fixes they’d done were temporary, but they would do for the short-term. The first and most important thing was to get power back to the majority of Surrey. Some of the outlying farms still were without, but they had generators to keep them going in the meantime. There were just too many lines down. In another three days they would start to get to some of them he figured, judging by the progress being made.

  With the power back on, and the roads mostly cleared, life had started to resume. A veritable flood of contractors had come into town, so many that an actual honest to goodness tent-town had been set up on some town land to accommodate them all. So many houses had lost all their windows, roofs were gone everywhere, and more. The cleanup and repair would take at least six months he guessed. Possibly even longer.

  But despite all that, now that the power was back on, people could resume their normal routines. He’d noticed truckloads of food coming in, with the two grocery stores likely stocking up big time to replace all the food that had gone bad in the fridges and freezers before the power had come back.

  It never ceased to amaze him how important power was to everyone’s lives. That was one reason he’d chosen to work for Western Hydro. People could get by without water, or heat. They could make do. But power? Absolutely not. Nobody liked to live in the dark. Man still had a primal fear of things it couldn’t see, and far too many people had been forced to live in darkness thanks to the storms.

  “I heard rumors that we’re going to get Sunday off after all,” Ryan said, looking down the table at Lex for confirmation.

  “Don’t look at me,” he said with a smile, holding his arms wide in innocence. “I haven’t heard a thing about that. I think we’re going to be working. There’s so much that needs to be done.”

  Ronnie shook his head. “I doubt it. Maybe volunteers. I can see that. But you know how they get. We’ve already been pushing regulations pretty hard the past week. Electricity is dangerous, man. If we get too tired and lose focus, we might pull a Rick.”

  Rick O’Connell had been a hydro worker ten years before, who had worked too much overtime, ended up forgetting to test his wires, and gotten a major shock on the job. He’d survived, but the fall had broken his back and he’d have to live the rest of his life in constant pain.

  Nobody wanted that.

  “That’s a good point,” Lex conceded. “Which is part of the reason why I don’t think we will.”

  The two brothers started to make little wagers about it, but he tuned them out, his eyes focused on the television while his brain went elsewhere, conjuring up images of a younger blonde woman in a ripped and torn gray business suit.

  He couldn’t get Petal out of his head, no matter how hard he tried. Tonight Lex was contemplating seeing if the bottle would help. He knew turning to alcohol was a bad idea, that it would only ever dull the pain at best; it would never help. But he was out of ideas on what to do. She occupied just about every waking thought he had, when he didn’t need to focus on his job. And even then he’d caught himself daydreaming during more than one critical moment, when the wrong move could hurt someone, or worse.

  You’re better than booze. Enjoy a couple with the boys, but that’s it.

  His eyes wandered up to the little boxy television mounted from the ceiling over the bar. It wasn’t a flatscreen, but an old tube-style that was rarely seen these days, even in a little town like Surrey. The news had come on, with the headline something about two missing persons. Lex frowned and focused his hearing on the box, trying to pick up what the reporter was saying.

  Pete the bartender noticed and flicked the volume up several notches. Lex gave him a thankful nod of the head, but his attention never wavered from the screen.

  “They still haven’t found them?” he asked, speaking more to Pete than his two crewmates, who were still bickering over Sunday.

  “Found whom?” Pete asked, wandering over to stand near him.

  He jerked his head toward the screen. “The two people.”

  “These are new, I think. The first two were younger women. This is a middle-aged couple.”

  Lex sat up a little straighter. “Wait, they went missing together? From the same area?” He looked at Pete now.

  “Yeah? What’s so unusual about that? They could have gotten caught in that storm. Maybe a landslide washed them out. Weren’t you caught in one yourself?”

  Lex almost asked how Pete knew about that, but stopped himself. Surrey was a small town. Something like the ordeal he and Petal had gone through would have been the gossip of the town. It was a small surprise that he hadn’t been asked for more details by anyone just yet.

  “Yeah,” he said instead. “But four missing people? That’s a little unusual for Surrey, don’t you think?”

  Pete fell silent while the reporter continued to give more details.

  “Last seen by the Wortley Manor,” Lex muttered. “We haven’t put power back there yet. I wonder what they were doing way out there?”

  “Hiking, probably,” Pete supplied. “There’s a great trail that runs through the forest there and over to the Lora Gorge.”

  “Shit.”

  Pete nodded in understanding. If they were at the gorge when the storm hit, the wall of water would have likely slammed into them and swept them away. The gorge was a low point in the area. Water would have rushed toward it from all over. The hikers wouldn’t have stood a chance.

  “That’s not the only thing that’s been unusual,” Pete said after a minute.

  Lex, sensing something personal in the tone, looked up to meet Pete’s eyes, giving him the respect he’d earned over the years.

  “Pardon?”

  The bartender shrugged slightly. “Word is you’ve been really off your game. Not quite all there.” He licked his lips nervously, perhaps not entirely comfortable to be the one to bring things up. “Some folks are saying something happened to you out in the hills, Lex. Somethin’ bad.”

&
nbsp; He stared at Pete for upward of thirty seconds, letting the mood linger and darken. It wasn’t nice of him, but he couldn’t help himself. Just as the bartender looked like he was about to wave the conversation off, Lex started to laugh.

  “This isn’t the part where you go berserk and kill me, is it?”

  Lex laughed harder.

  “No, you idiot. Not at all. Even when you spout such ridiculous nonsense like that. ‘Something baddddd happened in the hills.’ Oh, that’s rich!”

  “Well, what the hell did happen?” Pete pressed.

  Lex sighed. He had to tell him now. “You know the woman I was out there with?”

  “Yeah, the corporate-level boss. Everyone heard about it. They figured you’d be fired in an instant for getting her stuck out there.”

  He snorted. “Oh, so I guess the fact that she forced her way into coming out there hasn’t made the rounds?”

  Pete had the good graces to look a little sheepish. “Uh, no. I hadn’t heard that.”

  “Yeah. Anyway, she’s the reason I can’t think straight anymore, Pete. Can’t have a dream without her in it. She’s practically haunting me.” Another short explosive laugh. “Maybe something bad did happen, I dunno.”

  “You afraid she’s gonna come after you?” Pete asked slowly.

  “No. I’m afraid she’s not.”

  There was silence. It lingered on and on. Suddenly Pete hissed in surprise. “Holy shit. You fell for her!”

  “Bingo. Got it in one.” Lex considered. “Sort of. More like a Final Jeopardy problem. I should have played the music; it would have been close.”

  Pete gave him the finger. “You fell for a suit-wearing office-working woman who is your boss like, what, three times removed?”

  “Seven, actually, if you want to be specific,” he replied.

  “Damn. That’s what I call hitting out of your league.”

  “Thanks Pete,” he said dryly. “Always a source of inspiration you are.”