Mal reached a stalemate with the Empress’s adviser.

“You must give us all your profits from this launch,” the smarmy adviser droned, ignoring any counter-offers. “We don’t care how that places you at a disadvantage for selling your company. You are marrying a human. Your family’s future is not our concern.”

Amber tapped her extended gold-orange claws on the budget sheets she’d been reviewing. “Giving you this launch’s funds is equivalent to giving you the whole company.”

His lips pulled back in a sneer. “Oh? I didn’t realize you were so close to insolvency.”

Her eyes crackled and smoke curled from her lips. “We planned to grow our business, not allow someone else to plunder it.”

He shifted nervously. Despite being days away and shielded by planetary, capital, and palace security, he had every right to feel uncomfortable. “This isn’t my choice. It’s what your eldest brother has driven us to. We were counting on his honor to uphold the marriage promise.”

“She was counting on his money,” Pyro snarled.

“How dare you!” he hissed. “Take care, Sparky. The Empress will hear of your insult.”

Pyro’s nails extended. Claw gouged the table.

Jasper raised a finger. He wished to speak privately.

“Pause the transmission,” Mal ordered.

The adviser’s brows rose in shock. “Don’t you dare pause—”

Alex pressed the pause button. The adviser’s face froze mid-threat. On Draconis, their screen would be frozen for him.

They were already in the Empress’s bad graces. They could hardly afford one more insult to her negotiator.

Mal snapped. “What, Jasper?”

“We’re not making any progress,” Jasper said.

“Obviously.”

Exhaustion pooled in his back. He stretched. His spine popped. His wings trembled beneath the skin. They desired to flex so badly his shoulder blades ached.

What time was it?

Mal had surely missed the hour he had promised to attend Cheryl’s art show. She would be angry, but she would understand.

“What leverage can we use?” Mal slumped in the seat. “They must want our business. They’re going to crush us and take over.”

“Then why not take it?” Kyan asked quietly, his scars a silent testament to his deadly past. “Why talk?”

Huh. A good question.

The Empress controlled the military. She had the power to destroy planets. Taking over one small company—even using a secret, black ops operation like the kind Kyan used to perform—was nothing for her.

“Why not stop the banks?” Amber agreed. “Why not confiscate our products? We will never willingly give them up. Especially not for a stupid reason like embarrassment. The Empress isn’t our mother. This conversation makes no sense.”

Alex tapped his lips. “Unless the Empress is backing Sard Carnelian.”

“Why would that make a difference?” Amber tilted her head at Alex. “She could take everything and give it to Sard. There’s no reason to ask us so nicely to roll over and die.”

“That is also what I thought.” Jasper pondered aloud, steady and thoughtful. “There is no reason for this conversation. Why waste time? And then, I thought, that is the purpose.”

Alex blinked. “Wasting time?”

Jasper nodded. “That adviser is trying to stall us.”

They all pondered it.

“Until when?” Mal demanded. “For what reason?”

“I don’t know.” Jasper scratched his head. “Perhaps it is to give the Carnelians a chance to gain an advantage over us.”

“Steal our products? Impossible. Sard’s in pre-launch now. Their new product goes out next week. He doesn’t have the capacity to steal ours.”

“Perhaps the Empress is unaware of this conversation. Perhaps the adviser is acting without her authority. Aristocrats have connections in the palace we don’t. The adviser may be giving the Carnelians time to do something before our launch.”

“Such as what?” Amber asked.

Jasper shrugged. “Perhaps I am mistaken.”

But he had gotten Mal’s brain moving in a new direction. “Perhaps it’s not a ‘what’ but a ‘who’.”

“I don’t follow,” she said.

“We often stalled the enemy to capture a critical unit.”

Pyro nodded; he and Mal were the only two who had completed military service.

“We would make up any reason,” Mal said. “Any demand. And while our enemies were distracted on one front, we would strike.”

“Who’s missing?” Amber asked. “They can’t be interested in Darcy.”

“Rose.” Jasper levitated. “I will locate her.”

“Of course there is also...” Mal trailed off. Of course. He jumped to his feet and slammed the intercom. “Jeanine? Have you heard from Cheryl?”

“No,” the gravelly voiced receptionist said.

Relief warred with nerves. “Good—”

“Her professor called a little while ago. She needs to ‘fly back to the art show and submit her final self-assessment’ if she wants to pass the class.”

Mal released the intercom. That did not mean what he thought it meant.

“Cheryl doesn’t fly,” Jasper said.

“No.” Pyro rose. The fury in his eyes echoed Mal’s. “But Sard Carnelian does.”

Mal slammed from the room, Pyro right behind him. The rest flew after, levitating down the hall to the nearest external exit.

Kyan met them at the doorway to Mal’s office. His hulking form was most welcome. He fell in behind them as they crowded around the glass exit.

“What would he do with Cheryl?” Worry darkened Jasper’s brow. “Recruit her for his company?”

“We will not give him the chance to find out.”

Amber crackled. “I will assist.”

“We need you here.” Mal shoved open the door and nodded at Kyan. “Kyan and Pyro will assist me.”

Energy shifted Amber’s wrist and hand skin over to scales. “I am Cheryl’s friend.”

The rest of their siblings stared in shock. Female dragons did not make friends easily. And with a human woman? Unheard of.

But this was no time to be amazed.

“You are the only one who can stand up to this adviser,” Mal argued. “He is Draconian through and through. He will try to alert Sard when he sees our absence. Devise a plan with Jasper and Alex. And if all else fails, call our mother.”

Amber blinked. “If we cannot run our own company, she will prevent you from ever running another business.”

“That’s why I’m relying on you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I did not wish to become this company’s figurehead.”

“You’re not.” He strode around the desk and gripped her scale-covered hand in a human shake. “You’re its CFO.”

She blinked.

He looked at his other remaining siblings. “Can you do this?”

Jasper and Alex nodded. They were already thinking about the problem.

Amber’s gaze relaxed. He recognized her not for being a dominant female dragon, but for being the Chief Financial Officer, fourth in order of age, and also fourth in the chain of command after himself, Pyro, and Kyan.

“Our final product will be launched by the time you return with Cheryl.” Amber released him.

“It sure as hell better be,” he roared, “or else we’ll have to fly to Draconis and force it through ourselves!”

He flew into the glass shaft. His clothes shredded and fluttered off as he shattered into dragon form, zoomed free of the roof, and ascended into the bright sky.

Now.

His wings burst free and stretched to their full size. They shocked the other dragons, who burst their own wings shortly after. Three males flew a domination flight to attack their rivals. Mal was a powerful male flying to claim his female and destroy all resistance.

Pyro and Kyan flanked him.

“Mal.” Pyro’s voice crossed the wind in an echo. “Females are grasping and fickle. Human women are no different. What if Cheryl has already rejected our company work for Sard?”

“She will not,” he snarled.

Cheryl was the secret asset Sard had identified. Mal thought she was his luxury. Like stretching his wings, like sleep, like trusting in his siblings. She wasn’t a luxury. She was essential. Only with her could he become whole.

And confident. Mal hadn’t thought he was lacking in confidence, but this final incident revealed just how cowardly he had been. Believing others wanted him only because of his work ethic was a weakness. It could be exploited. Instead, believing others wanted him as he was—needed him even if he wasn’t working himself to death—was his new mission.

He should have trusted in his siblings. He should have trusted Cheryl when she said he was good enough.

He should have trusted in himself.

Cheryl’s kidnapping was his fault. He’d been too fearful to go to her all the times he’d needed her. What if he had believed in her healing words? Giving into the craving was right. She was his soul.

He would rain fury on any coward who dared threaten her.

Once she rejected Sard, what would he do to her? She was a fragile human. Not a claw-wielding, fire-breathing dragon female.

Mal growled.

On his other side, Kyan matched his fury. The scarred dragon shared Mal’s protective instincts of those who he considered family. And despite their few interactions, Kyan considered Cheryl family.

They all did.

“If Sard threatens her,” Mal growled, “then he will die.”