Bex St. James opened and hurried through the double glass doors of the Supernatural Research Institute an hour behind schedule, which was unlike her. Her friends, hot flash and abdominal cramping, had overstayed their welcome, leaving her miserable into the early morning. Hitting snooze one too many times on her alarm clock, had now left her in a mad dash to her lab.

Late into the night, she’d realized she’d left the serum in her lab locker the day before. If she had the she-dragon suppressing concoction at home, it would’ve been able to control the side effects which always made her temperature rise and left her stomach in knots. But hey, that was a small price to pay to keep the she-beast chained up tight.

Bex raced down the hall toward the elevators, her heels clicking on the white marble floors. With her hands shaking, she pressed the elevator button once to grab its attention and then twice warning the damn thing to hurry the hell up. The silver doors hissed open, depositing a group of male doctors wearing blue scrubs onto the main floor. One of the good docs gave her a toothy smile, definitely with sexual undertones. Shit, she didn’t have time for this. She averted her gaze and stepped into the metal box, pushing the button to close the doors like she was sending out a distress call. Mayday, mayday, close the fucking doors.

Once she was safe from distractions, she took a deep breath. She leaned against the cool metal wall, finding relief for her scorching skin. Never again would she be so carless and leave her injections at the lab. Intelligent and driven, she usually wasn’t absent-minded. She’d busted her ass to stay on the academic path to achieve her goals. Furthermore, it wasn’t easy living in a world without her dragon kin.

Given up for adoption as an infant, she never knew her mother or father. She didn’t know if they had been married or if she had been a product of a one-night-stand. Time-to-time, she asked herself these types of questions, but in all honesty, she didn’t care who they were. If they didn’t have the heart to love her, she didn’t want to waste her time and tears on them.

Obviously, she wasn’t worth the effort, and she was okay with that—really. She was one of the lucky kids, and had been adopted right away to a nurturing couple who wanted nothing more than to have a family. In their eyes, she was the dream kid every parent wished for. She was the sparkling confirmation of her parents’ love and devotion, that they had raised an accomplished young woman.

The elevator doors slid open on the third floor, shaking her free from memories of home sweet home. She strode down the hallway, her lab straight ahead on the left. A nameplate mounted on the door marked where she was going, Dr. Lars Valstrath, Founder and Director of the Draco-sapien Life Science Research Lab. She walked in, confident Dr. Valstrath would be nowhere in sight. The man was like the great Oz behind the curtain, running the show but seldom seen. In her specific field of study, there were only two assistants, herself and her best friend Mel who was a wolf shifter. In fact, Bex was the only she-dragon at the institute.

Bex hurried to a row of lockers in the back room. Hands still shaking, she fumbled with the combination lock, finally popping it free. Sweat rolled down her back as she reached in and grabbed a black case. Unzipping it, she palmed the cold vial, warming it up. Thank God, she sighed, she had enough serum. She grabbed a syringe from a nearby bin and peeled it free from its plastic package and plunged the needle through the rubber top of the serum bottle.

Every milliliter she drew back was a reminder of the false life she’d been living. She wasn’t the perfect daughter her parents bragged about. Her dark secret had stayed hidden ever since she felt the shift at the age of ten. Raised by humans, she hadn’t been taught how to be a dragon shifter, nor did she have another she-dragon to confide in. It wasn’t like she could run to her mother for advice—Hey, look Mom, I have a tail and wings. How do I use them? Yeah, that would go over like snow in hell.

Growing up a dragon in a human world was difficult. A scared little girl terrified of the beast inside, she’d hidden her secret. When the shifts came, she chained herself inside caves, vacant warehouses, it really didn’t matter where, as long as the she-beast was contained and couldn’t hurt anyone. In a way, she was still that scared little girl, but now she didn’t need to hide.

Bex pulled the syringe from the vial and yanked down her khaki pants, enough to expose her right butt cheek. This was the bittersweet moment, right before she injected herself with anti-shift serum. Regrets were a bitch she fought every time she suppressed her dragon, and knowing she did this all out of fear, shamed her even more. Feeling her dragon fade away into darkness tore her up inside. If only she had the courage to let her fly and explore, but she couldn’t. An uncontrolled she-beast was far too dangerous to be free. She had to play it safe until she fully understood the dragon.

Pushing those thoughts aside, for nothing was going to change her mind, she injected herself. She pulled up her pants and braced her hands on the table, taking deep breaths until her dragon stilled. She was lucky she had made it to the lab before she’d lost all control.

What am I doing? Bex hung her head, her long blonde hair shielding her face. All her life, she’d been searching for answers about dragons. Throughout college, she took science classes and majored in biology in hope of gaining the knowledge she needed. After four years of listening to professors tell her that dragons didn’t exist, she knew she had to search deeper. It took a lot of digging around before she stumbled on the research institute. With her degree and impressive grade point average, she was accepted as an assistant researcher in the Draco-sapien lab working toward her doctorate.

However, she still didn’t trust her dragon, nor fully understand her kind even with three years at the institute. Her second year here, she’d discovered, through research, a way to suppress her dragon. No one knew about it. She was conducting undocumented research. If Dr. Valstrath ever found out, Bex would be terminated, her hard work a complete waste. Plus, the serum still needed tweaking.

As of late, the side effects were brutal, hot flashes, high fever, and stomach cramps. Her insides felt like a volcano and she was going to erupt at any moment. The injection was losing its potency and she couldn’t figure out what was causing this change.

Bex straightened and pulled her hair back into a ponytail, then grabbed her white lab coat from her locker after stashing her black zipper case. Putting on her glasses, she walked to the refrigerator and removed a box of slides she’d been working with. Placing the slides next to her microscope, she sat down at her lab station and opened her personal laptop. First, she needed to check her email from the great Oz. Every morning, Dr. Valstrath checked in via email.

Odd, she thought as she scrolled through her emails, finding nothing from Dr. V. Relieved she’d have time to work on her anti-dragon serum, she opened a spreadsheet where she’d documented the data about her serum. After reviewing it, she grabbed the slide labeled as A1 and placed it under the lens. Just as she was about to study it, the door swung open and her lab partner, Mel, bounced into the room.

“Hey, girl,” she said as she walked to her locker.

“Hey.” What is she doing here? Bex scrambled, shutting her laptop and quickly tossing the box of slides in her lab coat pocket. “I thought you weren’t coming in today.”

“Me, too,” Mel huffed. “I stayed late last night and still no progress. I just don’t understand F and V dragon genes. Seriously, they are both dominate. I say we cross them and create a fire breathing, venom spitting beast. Muwhahaha,” She laughed evilly, which she did too naturally, as she entered the lab stations.

“You’re a sick puppy, you know that, right,” Bex chuckled.

“But you love me anyway.” Mel kissed the top of Bex’s head on her way to grab a stack of Petri dishes.

“So, tell me again why a wolf-shifter is studying dragon genetics,” Bex asked jokingly.

Mel unloaded the containers next to her. “Because I’m continuing my education.” She gave Bex a toothy smile.

The real reason why Mel was assisting in the lab was first, there were no female dragons enrolled in the institute, and secondly, no male dragon scientist would touch Bex’s dissertation subject: Assessing reproductive interest and options for the female Draco-sapien. Of course, they wanted to assist her with her reproductive options, but that’s not what she wanted. Because of her subject matter, she was lucky when Dr. Valstrath fronted the grant money for three years. The whole department was counting on her—to screw up.

Bex’s career depended heavily on nailing her dissertation and quite frankly, she wanted to prove them all wrong. If she could pave the road for future she-dragons and help open up more opportunities for her kind, then it was worth the long hours and sleepless nights.

Bex adjusted her microscope to the magnification she wanted and then looked through the eye piece. From the corner of her eye, she saw Mel leaning against the table with her arms crossed over her chest, staring at her.

“What?” Bex pulled away and met Mel’s gray gaze.

“You look pale.” Mel reached out and touched Bex’s forehead. “You’re burning up.”

“I’m fine.”

Mel looked down at Bex. Her best friend had a nose for bullshit. She knew better than to hide anything from her. “Seriously, I’m fine. It’s just hot in here.”

“No, you’re not fine, Bex. Every day from the time we met, you’ve been buried in your research. You’re burning both ends of the candle and need to take a break before you burn out.”

“Mel, I’m—”

“Take a break,” Mel insisted. “I can handle the lab for a week.”

Bex shook her head as she went back to the microscope. “I can’t. Besides, I have to prepare for my dissertation presentation.”

Mel sighed heavily. “Knowing you, you’ve rewritten the damn thing serval times over. Listen, I’m worried about you. If you don’t stay healthy, everything you’ve worked so hard for will be for naught. You can handle a week off.”

Bex had never known her best friend to be so adamant about something like this before. Apparently, she wore her sleepless nights on her face. There wasn’t enough concealer in the world to hide the dark circles under her eyes. Thankfully, Mel didn’t know the why behind the hot flashes and flushed skin. “You aren’t taking no for an answer, are you?”

“Nope.” Mel grinned and pulled the microscope plug from the wall. “You’re officially unplugged.”

Bex rubbed her hands nervously down her khaki-cladded thighs. “I don’t know where to go. You know I’m a hermit, right?”

“Live a little. Just get in your car and drive where your heart takes you. Hopefully, it leads you to a sexy man waiting to ravish your body.”

No, that was the last thing she needed.

They shared a laugh as Mel settled into her work station. “I don’t want to see you until next Monday. But you better call me and tell me all about the sexy man.” Mel winked.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this.” Bex grabbed her laptop and walked to her locker. After stuffing the computer into her backpack, she reached back into the locker and pulled out her zipper case, then hid it deep inside the bag. “I wish you could go with me.” She flung the backpack over her shoulder and walked back to Mel.

“Me, too.” Mel stood and gave her a hug. “I’ll live enviously through you.”

“Are you sure about this? I could just take a day off, catch up on some sleep.”

“You’re not talking yourself out of this, girlfriend.” Mel playfully pushed Bex toward the door. “Go.”

“Fine.” She held her hands up in mock surrender. “I’m going.”

Five hours later, Bex stood at the end of the hallway entrance of her apartment, nervously chewing her cuticles while staring at the two gray, oversized bags she had packed sitting by the front door. She’d paced the small area, indecisive about leaving. She didn’t have time to run off and leave work behind. I have a laptop; I can work from wherever. Yeah, that excuse wasn’t going to work. Who’s going to water the plants? What, the dying one in the corner? No matter how many lame excuses she’d thought of, nothing was keeping her here. But why did she feel so damn guilty?

Mel was right, her presentation was done. There wasn’t one single reason for her not to go. If she was honest with herself, a week off sounded heavenly.

“I’ll go.” Bex tightened her ponytail and shoved on a light sweater, covering up her white tank top, then grabbed her car keys from the counter.

With her bags in hand, she headed to her red Toyota Corolla. She tossed the bags in the backseat, then got in. Breaking out her cell phone, she connected it to the car’s stereo, playing her favorite music. She gripped the leather steering wheel and exhaled. “Now, where to?”