Alpha's Sacrifice (Fallen Alpha) (10 page)

"Excellent."

Draco rose from his seat and she stifled a gasp. He almost never stood at their first morning meeting.

"Sir?"

"Hmm?" He looked at her questioningly. "I told you not to call me sir two years ago."

She nodded. He had. Back then, she'd fancied herself half in love with him and had foolishly gone home and written down every word he'd spoken to her all day. Fortunately, she'd moved past her infatuation. Her best friend and fellow co-captain of their fan group, Kyle, had made fun of her mercilessly for her infatuation. What had he called Draco? Oh right, the Capitalist Guardian. She'd tried, and failed, not to laugh at his joke.

"Yes, it's just I'm surprised you stood up."

She bit the inside of her cheek. Sometimes she couldn't stop herself from speaking. There had to be some kind of therapy for her impulsiveness. Some kind of hypnotherapy...

"My back's a little sore." He stretched his arms over his head, giving her a view of his abs through his tucked in black dress shirt. They looked fierce and well defined. "I got banged around pretty badly yesterday, taking down that rocket."

"I'll call medical right away." "Wendy, I'm sure it's nothing—"

"Sir, I'm afraid I'm going to have to cite Handler's Code 815, and you should be familiar with it, considering you wrote the code. It states a Handler's first job is to make sure her Guardian's health is looked after. If you're injured, I'm calling for a medical evaluation, whether you like it or not."

She crossed to his desk, lifted the receiver from its cradle, and started to dial the medical extension. Draco's rough hand covered hers, forcing her to hang up the phone. He didn't hurt her; no, he'd barely touched her. It was more the fact that he'd made physical contact with her, at all. Outside of picking her up to fly her from one destination to another, he never got close enough to touch her hand.

"I appreciate your concern. I promise you I'm not one of those men who spend time avoiding doctors. If I need to go, I will tell you to call."

Did other men spend time avoiding doctors? She didn't know. Having been raised in an orphanage for girls, she had no experience being around men. None. She'd never even dated.

Except for Kyle, who was a man, but she never thought of him romantically. She had no idea what men did or did not do. Instead, she spent an incredible amount of time not thinking of Draco as a man.

He was her boss, her superior, her favorite Guardian—he was all of those things, but to think of him as a man was a dangerous prospect. If he was a man then she had to acknowledge in addition to his blue eyes, he had the darkest black hair she'd ever seen—so black, sometimes it looked blue. If he was a man, then she had to sigh when she thought about how his sheer size dwarfed her and made her feel small and feminine, instead of too round and too tall. If he was a man, she had to notice the fine shape of his biceps, or the way his perfectly tailored, always black clothes clung in all the right places...hugging his rear end, begging her hands to reach out and squeeze. If he was a man, then she'd have to admit he was completely out of her league and she was sad and pathetic to make him the star of so many of her late night fantasies.

No, she couldn't work here and think of him as a man. He was a Guardian, he had superhuman abilities, and, by definition, not just a man. He was incredible, gifted, kind, fantastic, and so high above the realm of normal human females, he was safe for her to think about, occasionally. He was Draco Powers.

"When was the last time you saw your doctor?"

He smiled, the right half of his mouth tilting upward in an amused smirk. "I can't imagine you don't know the answer to your own question."

He was right. Of course, she did. It was her job to know. It had been eight years since he'd been looked at, before she'd become his Handler. His first Handler, who'd disappeared one day without ever giving notice or coming back to work, had insisted Draco go to the doctor when the Guardian collapsed in his chair.

"Promise me it won't take a near-death collapse to make you go again."

Had she just asked her boss to make her a promise? What in the hell was wrong with her? Her request was the kind of thing you said to a friend, to a confidant, not to your Guardian employer...

"I promise."

"You do?" He did?

"I was a lot younger then. I've learned my lesson." He raised his hand in mock salute. "I am not invincible. If I drink too much poison, I will die. I almost learned the hard way."

She swallowed. The secret behind why Draco had collapsed had been so well guarded she'd never known the cause. "Poison? You drank poison?"

"It saved a lot of people." He shrugged. "I've done it before, just never so much.

My stomach has never quite forgiven me. I still can't consume as much arsenic as I would like."

Her mind whirled. "What? Why on earth would you want to consume arsenic?" "Ha. Wendy, it's a joke."

"Oh." Her cheeks heated. "I'm sorry. I guess I don't have much of a sense of humor."

If he wasn't going to go to the doctor, she needed to get out of his office and regroup until she regained control of her emotions. "If you don't need anything else, I'll go work on tomorrow's schedule and do more research on the missing son case you have on your afternoon agenda. Something isn't sitting well for me with this one."

He nodded and an emotion she couldn't identify filled his eyes. Pushing away the thought that his mood had something to do with her, she waited for his response in a way she hoped came across as calm or serene.

"I trust your instincts, if you think something is not kosher, I believe you. We can cancel." He moved away, crossing to the window to stare outside.

In all their years together, she'd never seen him like this. He seemed almost pensive.

"Do you think it's the Organization?" he asked.

The Organization. The two words always made her shudder. If Guardians were real then so were their nemeses, and for lack of a better phrase, they were called the Organization. A group of people out to destroy the world Powers, Inc. worked daily to preserve. Two of Draco's associates had nearly been killed the week before and were recovering. All of the employees knew to be on guard until they uncovered the mastermind and his organization disbanded.

Slowly, she moved to stand next to him. "No, I don't think it's them. I just think something is...off."

He nodded, a few wisps of black hair falling over his eyes. Wendy stuck her hand in her uniform pocket to stop herself from pushing his fallen strands out of his vision.

Draco finally spoke. "And the legal matter?"

"I'll call downstairs and see if there's an update."

One of the newest associates had overstepped and interfered in a matter where they didn't have a contract. The person he'd pursued and brought to the police was now suing the company. Wendy wasn't overly concerned. This wasn't the first person to begin litigation either to get money or to stop them from doing their jobs. So far, Powers, Inc. had always won.

"Your first job is about three hours from here by air." She looked out the window. "The weather should be fine."

"Excellent. Then we'll leave two hours from now."

With one last nod, she walked to the door and stepped through it, shutting it behind her with a thud. She had to give Draco credit. When he'd commissioned the building, he'd used only the best materials. The thick oak door separating his office from everyone else made a point every time it closed. If anything ever screamed, 'stay out', the thud of his office door shutting did.

Approaching her desk, she found herself humming, though she'd been horribly nervous and embarrassed a moment earlier. Draco seemed satisfied with her job performance; she'd get to fly with him in just a matter of hours; he'd touched her; and it was likely she would progress another level on Hero Land tonight.

Life was good...until she reached her desk.

Gasping, she rushed forward as she realized the contents of her purse littered the floor. What the hell? Scrawled across her computer monitor in red lipstick were the words, SLUT and FREAK.

Whirling around, she glared at Kate, who typed at her computer, apparently working on the database Draco had asked her to finish the week before.

"Why would you do this?" Wendy hated the way her voice shook. She knew this was a little thing, nothing of consequence, a mean spirited prank, but still, she felt violated. They'd gone into her desk, touched her purse, and defaced her computer. This was her private space.

Kate raised an eyebrow. "Why did I do what?"

"This..." Tears threatened to spill, but she knew she wouldn't give Kate, Tania, or any of the others involved the satisfaction of watching her cry. She pointed at the mess on the floor and then to the computer. "Why would you do this?"

Rising from her desk, Kate looked the model of perfection—as always. Her black hair fell past her shoulders, perfectly coifed, never a strand out of place, slick and smooth. Her sculpted eyebrows sat atop her long face, which belonged in a magazine spread not on the top floor of a company of Guardians. Oh yes, Wendy was sure Kate knew how beautiful she was, the amount of power her looks held over both men who wanted her sexually, and women who hoped being in her presence would make them somehow like her.

"I didn't do anything." Putting her hands on her hips, she regarded Wendy's destroyed purse and disrupted computer screen with an air of amusement. "I was with Tania the whole time. I only recently got to my desk. It must have happened while you were in there doing whatever it is you do every morning with Draco."

Whatever she did every morning with Draco? She gritted her teeth and wished she could scream. "You're lying." She pointed a finger at Kate. "If you ever do this again—and tell this to all of your friends too—I'll go to HR and report it."

Kate laughed mirthlessly. "You're going to tattle? I told you, I didn't do this."

The thud of a door closing interrupted Kate's speech. Oh, god. Draco. Wendy had only a second before he appeared. Even knowing how powerful and fast he was, his quick arrival at her desk still startled her.

"What's going on here?"

Kate's eyes widened. If Wendy hadn't been so furious, she might have laughed.

Unless you were used to Draco's intensity, you could be overwhelmed. Kate almost never saw him in person. Most of the time, he spoke to her over the intercom or sent her computer messages.

Wendy covered her eyes with her hand. When hysteria threatened, it helped to shut out all light. Since she couldn't actually flip the light switch, this would have to do. Draco could not see her lose her cool. Handlers did not display emotions in front of their Guardians. It was imperative to remain calm. Guardians lived with a lot of pressure, both by putting their lives on the line and then by having to hide their real identities from the world. Handler rule number one? Make your boss' job easier, not harder by freaking out all the time.

Taking her hand off her eyes, she forced a smile. "It's fine, I think we just had a misunderstanding."

"You're lying to me. I can hear it." Draco turned all his attention on Kate. "I have the ability to compel you to tell the truth. All I have to do is alter my vocal patterns and not only will you tell me what I want to know, but you'll also confess all kinds of things we'd both rather I not hear. If you want to keep your job, tell me the truth, Kate. What happened here?"

"It was just meant to be a practical joke. She's just such...a..."

He narrowed his eyes, and though the force of his blue-eyed stare was not on her, Wendy gulped.

Draco raised an eyebrow, with what could only be described as venom in his gaze. "Such a what?"

"Such a geek, and she gets such preferential treatment here. We wanted to knock her down a peg."

"If Wendy gets preferential treatment, which I don't think is true, it is only because she does her job better than anyone else."

Feeling her cheeks heat again, she wanted to crawl in a hole and hide. It was great to be appreciated by your employer but not like this.

She tried to interrupt. "Look—"

"If anything like this ever happens again to Wendy or to anyone else, the person responsible will be fired immediately. Clean up this mess, Kate, now."

Without another word, Draco turned on his heel and returned to his office. The thud of the wooden door stretched out over the silence in the room. Kate's eyes, still huge from Draco's interrogation, closed for a second. When she opened them, she'd regained the distant composure Wendy was used to seeing.

"I'll get a cloth to clean off your computer."

As Kate walked down the hall, Wendy gave in and collapsed in her chair, letting her knees buckle as she did. She wished, for a moment, she were a member of the crew in Space Adventures; none of them would ever have needed their boss to rescue them from bitchy coworkers. Sighing, she wondered how he had known to do so in the first place.

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