Love Me Little

This Is Not the Epilogue You're Looking For

Summary: Being head of HR at a large corporation is always challenging.

Notes: This is, in fact, the epilogue nobody asked for but my brain delivered. I'm working on a serious sequel, but in the meantime have...whatever this is.

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Aun thought of herself as being pretty unflappable. You didn't make it to head of HR at a company like ST Industries without having seen (and fixed) a lot of problems over the years. Yes, she was calm and collected, no matter the disaster that was dumped on her desk, and that's why she was in charge.

So, when VP of Marketing Tharn Kirigun marched into her office on a Thursday morning, grinning like a madman, she didn't even roll her eyes. No, she clasped her hands in front of her and asked, "What did you do this time?"

Dropping into one of the visitor's chairs, he smirked at her. "The good news is that I wasn't drunk last night and I wasn't caught kissing the prime minister's great nephew behind a potted plant."

"I'm glad to hear it." She frowned. "Weren't you at that charity event last night? I didn't see anything on the news."

"I would hope this wouldn't have been on the news." His smirk faded into a distant smile that she had never seen on his face. "Although I did punch someone."

Aun waited.

"He won't be telling anyone about it, though, since I punched him for scaring my boyfriend."

Aun raised an eyebrow.

"My boyfriend who started working in our sales division last week."

Aun allowed herself a sigh. "You're dating an employee."

"An employee in another division!" He leaned forward, looking at her with an earnest expression.

"That's only slightly better. You know that." She watched him with the experienced eye of someone who really had seen almost everything. And damn it, he was worried. "Wait, when did you start dating this gentleman?"

For the first time in the years she'd known him, she saw Tharn Kirigun blush. "Last night."

"Okay," she said after a moment to collect herself, "we're going to have to set up some ground rules."

"Yes, absolutely." Tharn paused. "It actually gets a little worse."

"Did you sneak off and marry him last night, perhaps?" At the look on his face, she immediately said, "Not that I'm recommending that!"

"No, I didn't marry him last night." He looked down at his hands.

And that was when she knew she was really in trouble. "I can't help you if you don't tell me."

"There's almost certainly going to be an attempt to get him fired. An ex-boyfriend who's done that to him at previous jobs." He met her gaze and oh yes, that was the tough intelligent man she had met on their orientation day at ST. That was the man who had worked his way up to VP in record time and he was serious about this guy.

"He'll need to tell me as much as he can," she said gently. "Otherwise I won't be able to help."

Tharn nodded. "I'll bring him by as soon as possible."

He looked too serious, so she glared at him. "At least it's not another goat incident."

Leaning back in his chair, Tharn laughed. "Hey, that one was funny!"

"Not in the slightest. You really do cause me a lot of trouble."

"But you love me anyway." He grinned at her, holding out his fist. "Still friends?"

"Still friends." She bumped his fist. "But don't you go telling everyone I'm turning into a softy."

"I would never." Tharn jumped out of the chair. "You're the toughest, meanest, cruelest HR person in history. Now I'll get back to work."

Aun watched him leave, shaking her head. On the bright side, being Tharn's friend was rarely boring. She couldn't wait to meet the guy who had turned Tharn this upside-down in one night.

—end—