"Our ratings have sky rocketed," Matt said excitedly as Tara chewed on the straw to her bubble tea. The man's green eyes glittered, and she jumped as he slammed a hand on her desk at the office. "Not a lot of other stations had information on the vampire's inner social working and agenda. People asked but only got generic one-liners about peace. That info you got on their profiting from our advancement was some good stuff. It was real and not powdered with that peaceful relations nonsense."

Tara felt a little guilty about profiting from Jesse's private conversation with her, but he'd said the info was public.

"They do want peace," Tara growled at Matt's spin on this.

Yes, Jesse had said they benefited from humans, but he'd also shared that they were genuinely interested in diplomatic relations and coexistence for the sake of peace. All of the stations had gotten that line from one interview or another, but it seemed the rest had been less forthcoming with the vampire council's agenda. She hoped it didn't get Jesse in trouble.

"Sure they do," Matt dropped his smile for his judgment. Even with her report, Matt was not convinced that they were here for anything but a wider pool to feed from.

People had been quaking for months with uncertainty, and after the vampires finally came out publically to discuss just what they were, it wasn't getting much better. The fanatics had emerged so quickly in mass that the rallies swarmed judicial areas who were struggling with whether or not to treat vampires the same as humans for the sake of enforcing human law. Humans were split down the middle on trying to coexist or bolstering their defenses and finding weapons to exploit weaknesses.

A bill had been proposed to track them. It required them to be implanted with some sort of magic tracker by these mages and adhere to a curfew around populated areas, like putting an electric collar on a dog so they couldn't feed around the club. That was so not happening whether the humans agreed to try it or not. As with the fanatics, radicals against their kind had already surfaced too, and Tara was worried Matt was jumping on board with them.

"I'm serious, Matt. Jesse was really kind and friendly with the people who stopped by. I can tell when a guy is trying to con people, and he just seemed earnest," Tara tried again, and Matt let out a disgusted breath.

"Sure. And he was hot as shit. I saw the social media posts with him in them. That man was a predator dressed like a thanksgiving turkey to lure in the hungry. I think you're a little biased, you know, being a woman."

Oh he did not just go there.

"Right, because my sex can't differentiate between good and evil when there is a dick attached," Tara said, knowing that biting her straw in half was not the same as punching Matt but her teeth had yet to agree. "Please don't smile too hard at me, I might just get on my knees and beg you to unzip your pants. I just can't control myself when there is a hot man around. Mount me."

Her coworker typing away in the cubicle next to her coughed up his drink, and it took him a minute to clear his lungs as Matt twisted a scowl. They both knew he was pretty as shit but all ugly on the inside when it came down to anything important. No one was a stranger to their hatred of each other around here, even if Tara kissed their boss' ass and took all the steaming shit stories he dropped on her.

"You're a real bitch, Tara," Matt snapped. "There's a reason you're the bottom of the rungs around here. Flattery might get you somewhere if you try."

Matt hit where it hurt, the fact that she hadn't been promoted in years. No matter how much overtime she pulled, what scoops she got, or how good she was at doing the unsavory work, she didn't mesh with the network social life. That kept her where she was, and Tara did not do a good job of containing her bubbling frustration and rage.

"The only thing flattering about you is your full wallet, Matt. It's a good thing your fiancé is into that, because it can't be that twisted mind. Did you stick bills in her underwear before or after you impregnated her with your spawn? Not sure which is worse, needing to pay her to suffer you in bed or you throwing it in her face as an insult after–"

Bubble tea went everywhere as Matt smacked it out of her hand, and Tara cursed and stood up. She had to take off her sweater and guide the liquid off the desk and onto the carpet before it hit her laptop or papers she was working with. Everything was sticky, and as Matt stalked away, she looked to every coworker who didn't even cast a blind eye in their direction.

No one wanted to be associated with her or they'd be stuck in her pit.

Heading to the bathroom, she slammed the door shut and locked it. No one needed to use the other stalls while she stripped and cried in front of the mirror. Her blouse didn't have buttons so she had to pull the moist cloth over her face, and she slammed her hands futilely on the sink as tea dripped out of her hair.

The tears finally forced their way to the surface, and she closed her eyes to shake them away. They were in anger more than despair, but it didn't change anything. Tears meant Matt had won again, and she didn't like it.

"Don't cry," Jesse's voice whispered into her ear.

Tara jumped out of her skin and spun around to the rest of the bathroom. No one was there, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to be imagining things or not. Most importantly, she was in nothing but her damp bra, and secondly, what was Jesse doing with his peeping tom ass in the women's restroom?

"Are you here?" she rasped in a low tone so no one outside the bathroom would hear. "You know stalking in the human world is frowned upon."

"You aren't frowning," Jesse chuckled in her ear, and her face reddened as cold hands touched either shoulder and leaned her back against his body. She tilted her head back as he came into view behind her, sitting up on the space between the sinks with her back between his legs as he angled his face down over hers.

Oh god dammit. Boundaries.

The tears that had welled up in her eyes only got heavier, and she clenched her fists and looked away from him. Had Jesse been here to witness all of that? What if she was too vulgar for him? The man was still here, but she had no idea why. They weren't supposed to meet until tomorrow morning.

"Ask, and I'll break his legs," Jesse said down to her, no smirk or joke in his voice. The way his eyes churned darker like the ocean and his normally gentle lips flipped into a hardened scowl skipped her heart. "No one will know it's me. No one can see me," Jesse insisted, touching her chin with his cool fingers and trailing them up her cheek.

"People can put two and two together, Jesse. Plus, I won't sink to his level. Thank you for caring though, even if you're a damn pervert showing up in the bathroom and fondling me." Tara was becoming more and more aware of her bare back touching the inside of his dark dress pants around his groin, and she swallowed hard as his thighs squeezed the outsides of her arms as if he could pull her closer with them.

"Fondling?" Jesse asked innocently. "I'm not even here for you."

Tara cringed on the words as he assessed her with no expression.

"I just like tea, and you smell like it," the smirk climbed his face, and she groaned at how damn tacky he was.

Hands slid down her bare sides, and she held her breath as Jesse lifted her up onto the sink to sit between his legs. In silence, he pushed her chin up with a gentle hand and lowered his lips to her neck. A shudder ran up her back as a wet stroke of his tongue crawled over the curve of her shoulder and continued onto her neck. All of her sadness and frustration faded into something else as she tried to figure out if she was aroused or creeped out.

"Strawberry is a good flavor," Jesse purred against her hair, inhaling the scent of what she hoped was her bubble tea, but she knew better. "I want more, but I doubt you'd relish me wandering to your other moist areas." Jesse treaded his fingers over her collar bone and down to her upper sternum, trailing spilt bubble tea with them. "You're absolutely drenched." His tone dipped from sexy to annoyed, and he disappeared from behind her, steadying her from the front when she didn't have anyone to lean back on. "Stay."

Jesse didn't have to tell her twice, nor was she sure she could stand right now anyway. All she could focus on with her blood pumping this hard was Jesse walking over to the paper towel dispenser, grabbing a stack, and then coming back to stand in front of her. The water turning on drew her gaze to the right as Jesse just blinked there in an instant, and as he squeezed some paper towels out, she leaned back from him.

"What are you–" The words barely escaped her before he ran a damp towel over her shoulder and down to her elbow where the tea had dripped.

"You shouldn't be forced to clean another man's rage off you," Jesse said, tightening his jaw with easily discernable anger. "If I cannot break his legs, I would... like to help you, and I don't intend anything nefarious. If my touch bothers you, I will stop."

"N-no, that's okay." Tara blushed as his lips lifted back into a way too affectionate smile and his hand moved around the front of her neck. His fingers lingered for just a moment on her throat, and Tara swore she saw his fangs grow longer.

"Your compatriots are not very protective of you," Jesse said, moving his teeth enough that she couldn't grab a ruler and figure out if her mind was playing tricks on her. "This sort of behavior would be frowned upon and punished in any of the vampire houses who support an alliance with your kind."

Jesse shifted to some dry towels and followed his previous path before moving to her other arm. As he did so, he offered her some and averted his eyes, gesturing to her front. A blush crept to her ears as she accepted the towels, wiping her lower chest off before stuffing a few in her bra to soak up some of the tea that had hit the tops of it.

"Yeah, well, men get away with more shit than they should in places like this," Tara fumbled on her words.

Jesse had some composure to stand their stone faced and not even glance at her chest, or perhaps it was manners and consideration. Not a lot of that going around here. Silence stretched on for a moment as Jesse set down the remainder of the towels on the end of the sink. It brought him just an inch closer, and reason wasn't much involved as Tara reached out and touched his face.

With just the very tips of her fingers, she hesitantly felt the skin of cheek, and it was so dark compared to hers, yet soft, as if vampires didn't know what acne was. Considering the man had just licked her, it wasn't a forward gesture, but it felt so invasive to her. Plus, the touch stilled Jesse like she'd pressed pause on a video, and his hands fell to his sides as he moved only his blue eyes to her. Even the song droning on the radio ended and gave them a moment so empty of anything that the bathroom fans rattled in her ears.

Word Count: 2073