by Leela Ash
“She was different. I loved her, and I would have loved her fat. I would have loved her pregnant. I would have even loved her if she had two heads.”
“Really?” Janie asked, squinting at Dean.
“I don’t know,” he said with a laugh and a shrug. “I was pretty blinded. Not thinking with the right head, probably. I know I should have known better. I just wanted so badly to be able to trust someone.”
“It must be hard,” Janie said softly. “Having all that money must make it almost impossible to know who is truly your friend.”
“To say the least. Even without my baggage.”
“Baggage?”
Dean smirked. “I wasn’t always fit to be some hero for the kiddies. I have always been a hard worker, but there’s more to the story than that.”
“I’d love to hear about it,” Janie said.
Dean shook his head. “I don’t talk about myself. Especially not to women.”
Janie raised her eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Dean froze and furrowed his brow. “I don’t want the whole world knowing my life’s story. It’s bad enough that I told Kiera anything. Now she thinks she has some kind of power over me. She’s even going after the company now.”
“You’re kidding!” Janie gasped. If Kiera took the company from Dean, then he would have nothing left to show for his years of hard work. Sure, he would have memories from his long-standing football career, but not much else. “She can’t take your company.”
“She seems pretty certain that she can,” Dean said, glowering as he dried the last cup and set it gingerly in the dish strainer. “And I have a feeling that she knows what she’s talking about. It all seems like everything is heading for disaster.”
“Don’t give up already,” Janie exclaimed. “The fight has just barely begun yet. And if she thinks she’s got some big guns ready then you’re just going to have to get bigger ones. Don’t worry so much. You’ll figure things out. You always have before. Things like that don’t change.”
Dean’s face seemed to lose a bit of the darkness to it and he sighed deeply. “If you say so.”
“Come on,” Janie said, draining the sink. “Let’s have a drink before you go. I don’t want to leave on that note. You’ve done so much to help me today. Let’s just try to stay positive.”
Dean nodded and followed Janie to the living room, and they sat together on her comfortable little loveseat. She’d never had to buy much furniture before. Her apartment in California had been tiny, and she rarely dated or had friends over because she had always been so busy with work and school, so the loveseat had suited her just fine.
Now, though, with Dean on the other side, it suddenly seemed far too small. Her heart tremored nervously as his elbow brushed against hers and they turned awkwardly to face each other.
“Sorry it’s so tiny,” Janie said with a nervous laugh. “I should probably upgrade.”
“No, it’s comfortable,” Dean said decidedly. “I like it.”
She gazed quietly at the man labeled the sexiest entrepreneur in the world and swallowed hard. Did he mean everything he said to sound like a warm invitation? Or did he actually like her?
“So, since you live on your own, what do you do to occupy your time, anyway?” Dean asked, his voice a soft, gentle rumble that stirred the heat in her loins. “I’m a loner too, but all I ever do is think about my company. What’s it like to be normal?”
“Normal?” Janie laughed. “Hardly. I’m constantly trying to find ways to achieve the goals I’ve set for myself. It’s obsessive, really. If my goal is to get through school, I find a way to get through school. If my goal is to get you the best PR campaign you’ve ever had, then not even the most shifter-phobic person in the world will be able to look at what I create without thinking twice.”
“That’s a lofty goal,” Dean said with a soft laugh. “I just thought we were going to hang out with a couple of brats for the season and hope for the best.”
“Well, that too,” Janie said. “It’s all part of the plan.”
Janie tapped her temple and laughed. She was shocked by how easy it was to speak to Dean. She had originally thought that because of his billionaire status, he would consider himself far above doing trivial things himself, such as moving her in or just sitting on a beat up old loveseat in thrift store clothes and listening to her make corny jokes about her obsessive need to plan and organize her life. Dean was surprisingly good company.
“Well, I know a thing or two about plans,” Dean said, “and having to surrender my company to the woman I married was never in my plans.”
He sighed heavily and Janie turned to him, doing her best to smile reassuringly.
“It’s going to be okay, no matter what happens. I believe in you. There is no doubt in my mind that if anybody can fight this bullshit and come out on top, you can.”
Dean smiled tiredly at Janie. “I appreciate your confidence.”
“I’m serious!” Janie exclaimed, looking into Dean’s sexy, stormy eyes and finding herself lost in them as she spoke. “I wanted to work under you for a reason. You’re the most confident, capable man I’ve ever seen, and unlike most people with a lot of money, you actually have a vision. You want to make this world a better place…”
Janie trailed off. What she was saying sounded stupid. What was the point in letting her private thoughts come out of her mouth? Saying them out loud would only make Dean want to mock her.
But to her surprise, instead of making fun of her, Dean’s hand was suddenly on her shoulder and he was looking deeply into her eyes. Janie’s heart hammered in her chest as his handsome face came inches away from her own. All thoughts left her mind and suddenly, the only thing in the world that mattered was Dean.
“Thank you for feeling that way,” Dean said. “But I’m actually a piece of shit.”
“Why?” Janie asked, her brow furrowing in confusion.
“Because of how much I want to do this.”
Dean’s body was suddenly pressed close against her and the small fire in her loins exploded into an inferno of heat. His lips grazed hers, gently at first, and then more urgently. Janie gasped as her body was engulfed in flames at the sensation of Dean’s hard cock pressing against her thigh as they kissed, his tongue and hands pleasuring her in ways she could never have imagined.
She wanted nothing more than to give everything to him; her body, her mind, her time. But the man was her boss, for crying out loud. She couldn’t just throw her career away because Dean Resner wanted a booty call with his young new intern. No matter how badly she wanted it, she wouldn’t be used and thrown away like that.
Janie pulled away panting, putting her hand over her racing heart. The man knew how to kiss, that was for sure. But he also knew how to use his words and charm the pants off of anybody he wanted to charm.
Still, his eyes were confused and sincere when she cut off the passionate embrace so quickly, and even though her body wanted nothing more than to surrender to the sensual thrills of Dean’s mouth, hands, and…other things…she couldn’t let herself throw her career away for a tryst with a horny billionaire. She had work to do. Plans.
“Is this why you go through interns so quickly?” Janie demanded breathlessly, standing from the loveseat. Her legs were quaking beneath her, and she considered it a miracle that they didn’t buckle under her weight. “You fuck them and then hang them out to dry?”
“What? No. Janie, I…”
“Look, maybe we should call it a night. I’m flattered, but I think it’s best if we just keep our relationship professional right now.”
Dean stood and frowned. “I shouldn’t have done that. It was completely inappropriate. I’m sorry.”
Dean turned his back on Janie and she had to stop herself from running to the door to keep him from leaving. She watched, her body on fire from head to toe, as Dean disappeared out the front door without a single look behind him.
11.
“Ho
w could you have been so stupid?!” Dean growled at himself. The wolf had caused him to do some ridiculously impulsive things in the past– things that could ruin his career if they came to light–but this time, it had simply gone too far. “She’s barely legal! What the hell are you thinking?”
Dean punched the steering wheel a little too hard and suddenly remembered that this wasn’t his vehicle to beat up. It belonged to the moving company. He would have to try to be more considerate than he was being if he wanted to stay on good terms with the people of Stonybrooke. Although he had been the alpha of his pack there once before, not giving a damn about anything or anyone but ruling the world, afterward he had chased true success, and the pack that had formed beneath him dissolved as he toured the world and left the town he was raised in behind.
“You might as well give up the company to Kiera right now if you’re going to be pulling this shit, because everybody is going to be talking about what a pervert you are. Who’s going to want to protect their kids with equipment made by a man who can’t seem to keep his hands off of young women?”
The wolf seemed unimpressed with his logic, which made the whole thing that much more infuriating. Maybe, in nature, it was better to simply claim your mate and move on, but he had already been there and done that. Dean had claimed his mate and she had turned out to be a psychopathic bitch who wanted to tear down everything he had spent his entire life trying to build. What good would come from allowing that to happen again? The whole notion was absurd.
“It wouldn’t even matter if Janie really was different from Kiera. I’m not different. I’m not going to treat her better than I’ve treated any of the other women in the past, especially not during all of this shit with the divorce. In fact, I’d probably treat her like the worst rebound girl of my life. I can’t let myself do that to her.”
But the wolf already knew what it wanted, and he could still feel his cock burning heavy and hot against his thigh. All he wanted was to turn the van around and ask Janie for a second chance. Ask forgiveness for being so forward and let her in on all of the bittersweet details of his life. And, ultimately, to make his claim on her official.
Unfortunately, that’s exactly what he had done with Kiera, and it had all turned out to be one expensive and soul-crushing waste of time. He couldn’t let that happen again. No matter which way you looked at it, it seemed destined for failure. And that was the sad truth of the matter.
“Hey, you’re back!”
The human-wolf hybrids that had loaned the van out to Dean were still waiting in the office when he got it back to them, and he forced himself to smile at them. Even if he gave the wolf its way and eventually mated with Janie, the two of them would end up having human-wolf hybrids like these two weaklings. What kind of alpha would he be? There were so many reasons to fight his feelings, no matter how hard the wolf tried to claim Janie.
How shocked Janie would be to know he was thinking such thoughts. The man she considered to be the face of shifter and human integration was balking at the idea of his first pups being hybrids.
“Thanks for helping us out today,” Dean said, fishing in the pockets of the swim trunks for his wallet. He cursed when he realized that in the shift earlier in the day, he’d left his personal possessions back at the office. “I’ll send over compensation.”
The men nodded. Everybody in Stonybrooke knew that Dean Resner was as good as his word.
By the time he got out of there, it was already getting late. The sun had set, and the moon was rising high in the sky. Dean headed straight for the forest and stripped off the terrible smelling thrift store clothes that Janie had gotten him. His cock was still aching for release, but this wasn’t the place for it. He would shift into his wolf form and head back home.
At least there, he wouldn’t be thrown off by the power of his temptations. Nothing would stand in his way there.
***
Dean tossed and turned that night, lost in a deep, fitful sleep. Janie was hovering about his dreams, more beautiful than he had ever before seen another person in his life. Not even Kiera could compare to the sensual inner glow that radiated through Janie and touched the deepest part of him.
In the dream, Janie was dressed in a long white gown, her hair finally out of the tight bun she wore to work and laying loosely on her shoulders. Her smile was serene and beautiful, and her eyes completely hypnotic; it was as if they moved the same way as the crashing of ocean waves would ripple throughout the ocean. He simply couldn’t look away.
When she finally crossed the earth to stand in front of him, the gown was slipping from her shoulders and Dean sank his teeth deep into her neck. She let out a soft gasp of pleasure, and then suddenly, in the fragmented but fluid motion of a dream, Dean’s cock was inside of her and he felt the heat of her body tighten around his shaft. He closed his eyes in pleasure and shock as the feeling filled him up entirely. It was so much more intense in his dream, and he closed his eyes as he surrendered his control to Janie for once, and a hot flood poured from a deep, tingling well inside of Dean’s abdomen.
He seemed to know immediately that the seed took, and he pulled away from Janie, falling from the heat of her body and looking at her as if in a new light. Now, not only was she peaceful and serene, smiling as if she knew the answers to every secret ever uttered in the universe, but she was with child, and the fruit of her belly was round and ripe. He had never seen anything so beautiful.
Dean woke up with a start and cursed, realizing that he had climaxed in his sleep. He got up groggily to take a quick shower and try to get at least another hour’s worth of sleep before he had to get to work. He had fallen behind the day before, helping Janie with the move.
Still, the image of Janie’s pregnancy haunted him and refused him his next hour of sleep. It felt profoundly important, almost prophetic, but he knew he was only having these thoughts because of how insulted she’d been when he had asked if she was pregnant. It had seemed like a joke to him at the time, but he quickly realized it was more of an inside joke to him and more of an insult to her.
How strange, considering seeing Janie pregnant was the most beautiful image he’d ever had implanted in his mind.
Besides, now that there were more bear shifters hanging around, it meant that all pregnant women were in danger from the bear shifters. In the beginnings of the war between the bears and the wolves, countless pregnant women were killed to lower the numbers of wolf shifters. It hadn’t happened for a long time, but with the recent surge of bear shifters in Stonybrooke and the fact that they were grasping for power, particularly his company, things were looking grim and shifter women had been advised not to conceive.
It was just a dream, though, fortunately. He doubted he would be able to breed with a human anyway. Not unless she was his one true mate.
Dean got ready for work in a daze. It would be easy to avoid Janie, if nothing else. And if it wasn’t, and she hated him for what he had done, then that would be fair too. He could simply put her in another department so they would never have to see each other again.
Simple as that, right?
***
Dean was surprised when, bright and early, his secretary came on the line.
“Sir, Ms. Alexander is here to see you.”
“All right,” was what Dean said aloud, but “Fuck!” was what he was thinking. He wasn’t sure he was ready to face her. Not after what had happened the night before, both in the waking world and in his dreams.
A few moments later, Janie entered and the whole room filled with her delicious scent. The wolf immediately became alert and Dean sat rigidly at his desk, silently demanding it stay silent.
“What can I do for you this morning?” Dean asked, doing his best to maintain an air of authority, even though they were probably both thinking the same thing. It had felt so unbelievably good to touch her body. But now, just remembering it made him feel sick to his stomach. He had been rejected. And rather fairly, at that. It was kind of a first for him.
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“I wanted to talk to you,” Janie said, gritting her teeth and looking down at the floor. “Privately. Is it all right if we arrange dinner tonight? The team was hoping to meet you and I thought that you might want to have a quick bite to eat.”
“Of course,” Dean said automatically, when what he was really thinking was “Shit!” The wolf seemed to be grinning smugly at him for thinking he had any real control over these matters. Apparently, when he was with Janie, all bets were off.
“Great,” Janie said, standing up. She was about to head out the door, but seemed to think better of it and looked at him with a smile playing her lips and a twinkle in her eye. “You look much better in your business suits.”
Dean laughed despite himself and Janie’s features visibly relaxed.
“I’ll see you at dinner,” she said.
“Right. I’ll arrange for the limo to take us tonight. I’ll give you a call when I’m ready.”
Janie nodded and walked out the doorway, and Dean could almost hear her heart beating. It wasn’t that she wasn’t interested in him. He could tell from her body language–not to mention the maddening scent of her arousal–that she was. There was something else stopping her. Something she wasn’t saying...beyond how utterly inappropriate it was for him to be interested in a young employee. Maybe he would be able to get it out of her during dinner.
Dean looked down at his desk and sighed at all the work he had abandoned in his stressed state the day before. Worrying about Janie and her feelings toward him would have to wait. For now, he had more pressing matters. Most importantly of which involved his ex-wife.
It was time for him to stop puttering around and entertaining thoughts of a fling with a young woman who didn’t want to be with him and start focusing on what really mattered; saving his business.
12.
Nervous butterflies hurled themselves against the confines of Janie’s stomach as she waited in the lobby for Dean to come down from his office. He had sent her a text message a few moments beforehand telling her that he was ready to meet and that the limousine was on its way. Truth be told, she had never been in a limo before, and the idea of being in one and going to dinner with Dean Resner, of all people, was exceptionally exciting.