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The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Prologue

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It’s here! The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp is ready to be consumed by your eager eyes! I believe I may have promised the prologue and chapter one this week, but it’s just the prologue. I got a lot of balls in the air right now. If you don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, please refer to this post in which I explain what I’m trying to do with this experiment. Otherwise, you’re gonna wonder what the hell is happening here.

Prologue

The hologram hung between Fiona Trasket and her brother, her sins glowing in high definition, luminous color. She saw the reverse image glinting in his frosty blue eyes but held his gaze; Blayde might be able to intimidate his business rivals, but she’d known him her entire life. The bully he was. The golden child. The spoiled prince.

“This doesn’t prove anything.” She didn’t even glance at the footage playing in the air above her brother’s desk.

He smirked. “It proves you were at La Mer. That you went inside. That you came out arm-in-arm with one of them.”

Fiona’s skin prickled. “‘One of them.’ Now, you’re starting to sound like father.”

“Someone has to.” Blayde hit a button on his desk console and the image dispersed. He gestured to the chair Fiona had declined earlier. “Please. Sit. It’s in your interest.”

Swallowing against her rising fury, she sat, her back ramrod straight. Yes, she had been at La Mer, the premier merfolk bordello. But she hadn’t been there to fuck. Larkin had needed her help.

“I could release this to the press,” Blayde went on. “Maybe it wouldn’t hurt Larkin. A little controversy before her album drops? Her label would owe me. But the conclusions people would jump to…”

“They would infer that the daughter of the most staunchly anti-Fae Migration families in American politics and industry is having mer orgies with her pixie best friend.” Fiona rolled her eyes. “I’m not a child, Blayde.”
“Then, you also understand that such an act of indiscretion wouldn’t just hurt the family but the very business you depend on to maintain your lifestyle.” He splayed his fingers and lightly tapped the underside of his wedding band on the edge of his desk. “And mine.”

“And Julia’s senate campaign,” Fiona added. “Just tell me what you want.”

“I’d like you to stop socializing with freaks, for a start, Flicka.”

Her hackles raised further at her childhood nickname. “They’re not freaks. You’re small-minded.”

“I look at the future without sentimentality,” he corrected her. “Trasket Holdings remains heavily invested in fossil fuels and the deadline, set by the people you so passionately defend, the people who seek to destroy the human way of life, is fast approaching.”

“How charitable of you to call them people.” Fiona had little pity for her brother’s dilemma. The Global-Astral Energy Compact had been accepted by the Federated Nations twenty years before. All of their lives, Fiona and her brother had listened to their father’s ranting. He’d believed the deadline would never arrive or, at least, never be enforced. Blayde had never doubted their father’s word; now, as the year 2060 drew to a close, time had run out. The pact that had saved the Earth from the human race—and the human race from itself—would be law.

“You’re going to be ruined, you know,” she went on, taunting him. “You had so much time—”

Blayde stood so quickly, Fiona jumped back. Her brother had never committed violence toward her, but he looked like a man capable of murder now. “Five years! It’s been five years since the bastard died. And do you think he’d done anything to prepare the company for the changes to come?”

“No. I think he planned to live forever and challenge the compact again.” Though her tone was sarcastic, she had no doubt that her father had planned to do just that. He’d talked about another run for senate even after the doctors had given him less than a year.

“I wish he had. But he didn’t. And now, we stand on the precipice of failure. Poverty. Ruination—”

“Calm down.” Fiona rolled her eyes at her brother’s dramatics. He did like to perform, as their father had. “There are hundreds of clean energy sources now. It was your idea to cling to the past. You’ll take a hit, getting into the game this late, but all isn’t lost.”

“I had no idea you were so skilled at running a company.” Blayde’s eyes narrowed. “The point is to not take a hit at all. We have a new investor. And with him came some information we can act upon. It concerns the Chiron Corporation.”

“Of course it does.” It wasn’t enough that a rival company had overtaken Trasket Holdings. That it had been a centaur’s business that had overtaken them, that’s what stung her brother. Blayde’s hatred of the astrals in general had narrowed in focus to the CEO of the Chiron Corporation in particular.

Fiona had grown tired of her brother’s theatrics. “Just tell me what you want.”

“You’re the least publicly visible member of our family. You’ve never met the bastard. And I’m sure one of your ridiculous fae friends can disguise you where it counts.”

“If you’re suggesting I seduce him—”

“Oh, no, no. Never. Ask you to sully your pure, virginal image?” Blayde chuckled at that. “A position has opened in Chiron’s executive branch. An internship working for the man himself.”

The laugh she let out startled her brother. It was so satisfying. “Let me go back to college, then. I’m sure the position will still be open when I re-graduate and have the connections necessary to secure a not-at-all competitive internship.”

Blayde regained his composure too quickly. “You’ve already secured it.”

Fiona hesitated, her footing suddenly unsure. “What do you mean?”

“Well, Flicka Starr, a lovely young woman who recently graduated from Vassar with a B.A. in Earth Science and Sustainable Technologies, has secured the internship.” Blayde punched another button on his desk console, bringing up a holomessage between them. With a flick of his wrist, the image turned so Fiona could read it. The Chiron Corporation logo, a stylized centaur brandishing a bow and arrow, twisted and shimmered in the upper right corner.

“Flicka?” she snarled. “Really?”

“Don’t pout. You loved horses,” he snickered. “Which will serve you well in your new position.”

Fiona shook her head. “I’m not doing this. It’s not just ridiculous but unethical in the extreme and illegal. You might be willing to sell your soul for this company, but I’m not!”

“Then I’m afraid I’ll have to hand this video over to the tabloids,” Blayde said with a deep sigh of feigned disappointment.

He brought up the video again, and a lump formed in Fiona’s throat. Larkin.

It wasn’t the pixie’s fault that she’d been at that club. She’d developed a human tendency toward addiction. The sickness had infected the previously impervious species when they had only been trying to help their struggling neighbors on the mortal plane. Somehow, integrating into human society had caused the pixies to take on human traits, not all of them good.

And now, because of the machinations of a man she’d never met, Larkin stood to lose the career and life she’d built for herself on the mortal plane.

Fiona couldn’t let that happen. “What, exactly, do you expect me to do?”

Knowing he had won, Blayde didn’t gloat. “Chiron Corporation is developing some type of new fuel for ocean-going cargo ships. If we can get the jump on him, we might be able to save the company and secure the family legacy.”

“So, I’m a spy.” After years of trying to avoid any entanglement with her family’s shady, grasping corporate schemes, they’d finally gotten her.

“Exactly.” Blayde spread his hands as if to ask why she had a problem with that. “It’s terribly easy. You simply show up, insinuate yourself into as many important meetings as you can, take note of who is coming and going from the office, and report that information back to me.”

It wasn’t the ease or simplicity of the task that concerned her. “And if I’m caught? And charged?”

“Trasket Holdings has a legal defense fund, of course.” Those words were carefully chosen; her brother hadn’t assured her that the legal defense money would be available to her. His concern would always be to protect the company first.

Do it for Larkin. The pixie’s reputation hung by a thread and she didn’t even know it. Fiona could either cut the fragile strand or reinforce it. She took a deep breath. “I want that footage destroyed. And I want proof that it’s gone.”

“You have my word,” Blayde promised. “After I get what I need from you.”

Fiona nodded and rose with a bitter smile. “That’s what family is for, after all. Getting what you need and damn the consequences.”

He smirked and shrugged, and Fiona turned for the door. She’d made it only a few steps before her brother spoke again.

“And Fiona? Don’t discount your seduction notion. I wouldn’t turn down personal information I could leverage against him. I might even owe you a favor in return.”

Her spine straightened further, a steel rod down her back. She lifted her chin and marched out of his office, into the prison of her new double life.

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46 Comments

  1. Brandi
    Brandi

    I like it! There’s intrigue, and Fiona’s got a good heart and a spark, so you know she’s going to turn this scheme on its head.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
    • Dove
      Dove

      Yeah! I’m hoping she can find some way to become a double-agent.

      September 6, 2019
      |Reply
  2. Kate B
    Kate B

    I love this! It’s just the prologue but it’s already awesome. I bet this will be way better than My Hot Pterodactyl Boyfriend.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  3. “Blayde”! Ah, the ridiculous, y-heavy names that often pop up in romances…..

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  4. Bunny
    Bunny

    Yes yes yes! I cannot WAIT for this! Our boy Evil Blayde Trasket running Business Incorporated? I am HERE for this! I honestly think I’ve never been more excited for a book. Merpeople, pixies, centaurs, an impending environmental apocalypse …. YES. Go get ‘em, Flicka!

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  5. Larissa
    Larissa

    I’m in.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  6. Gretel
    Gretel

    Okay, this is really amazing, with the perfect balance between ham and seriousness. I love it!

    But imagine being one of the models on that cover…working on your body, dieting rigorously, sitting for hours for make-up and hair, posing in umcofortable poses for hours to then be cover art in a centaur/virgin story. XD
    Although after Chuck Tingle, there’s no barrier left to breach lol

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  7. Ishi
    Ishi

    I want to read every single word of this.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  8. Dove
    Dove

    I’m living for this and can’t wait to read more! So happy she has female friends btw.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
    • Dove
      Dove

      Female friends that she clearly genuinely cares about, i should say. Also happy you brought renewable energy into this.

      September 6, 2019
      |Reply
  9. Reyn
    Reyn

    First comment I’ve made here! I’m super excited for this, ..it sounds AMAZING!!!!!

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  10. Akri
    Akri

    Welp, I’m hooked!

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  11. Ria
    Ria

    I love it!!!! Can’t wait to read more!!!

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  12. Kara
    Kara

    This is awesome! I thought you might go for a parody, but this is way better.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  13. amblonyxx
    amblonyxx

    I was really wondering how you were going to bring the business and centaur part together but you nailed it! Mythical creatures in modern times!

    I can’t wait for the next chapter!

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  14. Jenn H
    Jenn H

    I like where this is going.

    September 6, 2019
    |Reply
  15. Thea
    Thea

    can someone please link to the original post that discussed this idea in its infancy ? i want to relive the whole thing.

    September 7, 2019
    |Reply
  16. Eclairmaiden
    Eclairmaiden

    This is brilliant! It’s a great start, and I already just love the world you’ve created and the way you’ve introduced it in these first pages! I’m so hyped!

    September 7, 2019
    |Reply
  17. Cat Mara
    Cat Mara

    A single post and the world-building is already better than that “Bright” movie on Netflix!

    September 7, 2019
    |Reply
    • Jules
      Jules

      Agree. Jenny’s prologue game is strong on this one. Considering how much unique info she needed to throw at us to set things up it was beautifully done in a nice, concise way. Can’t wait to see where this goes next.

      September 8, 2019
      |Reply
  18. Name*
    Name*

    Trade basket?

    September 7, 2019
    |Reply
  19. Maile
    Maile

    And I’m hooked!

    September 8, 2019
    |Reply
  20. Dvärghundspossen
    Dvärghundspossen

    Fun fact: Flicka is Swedish for “girl”.

    September 8, 2019
    |Reply
    • Kim Lloyd
      Kim Lloyd

      Yup, and it’s most famous in English for the novel “My Friend Flicka”, where a young boy is given a horse by his family. The family employs a Swedish farmhand who refers to the mare once as “Flicka”, and the boy takes it on as the horse’s name.

      So, of course, Jenny’s buddies used that as the name for the centaur’s love interest. 😀

      September 10, 2019
      |Reply
  21. JM
    JM

    THIS is the kind of urban fantasy romance I have longed for!

    September 9, 2019
    |Reply
  22. Izzy
    Izzy

    I was prepared to laugh my ass off (in a good way, of course) but I am intrigued and impressed. Though I did have a chuckle about Blayde. Name like that, you’re either a villain or an assassin.

    September 9, 2019
    |Reply
  23. Erin
    Erin

    Oh my God, this is a delightfully ridiculous premise and I’m loving it!

    September 9, 2019
    |Reply
  24. VVV
    VVV

    I loved this prologue reading on Patreon and I love it still. Great world building and characterization, from the very start. I thought it would be a ridiculous story but I find myself inadvertantly sucked in :).

    Just a tiny remark: Blayde calls Fiona “Flicka” right in the beginning, the tenth paragraph. I think that ought to be “Fiona”.

    September 10, 2019
    |Reply
  25. MyDog'sPA
    MyDog'sPA

    After so many 50SOG. Mister, Angel, Buffy, Apolonia, etc. recaps reading this was like getting the weight of the world lifted off my shoulders. So engaging, easy (and fun!) to read. My wife is busy writing on her steampunk comic and novels and she refuses to read the recaps for fear it would drag her down to the levels of lesser writers like EEL when she has to grow and get better. I now see her point. This was awesome, can’t wait for more.

    September 10, 2019
    |Reply
  26. H. Savinien
    H. Savinien

    Great! I look forward to Fiona’s further adventures!

    September 11, 2019
    |Reply
  27. Vince
    Vince

    I read My Friend Flicka when I was a kid, and I don’t think I have ever cried so much at any other book. I don’t remember much about the plot – just how it made me feel ( ‘every emotion ever’ more or less sums it up). I love that you’ve given it a shout-out here.

    Thank you for writing this for us, Jenny. It’s such a whimsical premise, and yet you’re crafting a genuinely excellent story around it.

    September 12, 2019
    |Reply
  28. Wub
    Wub

    I love this! Crack with world-building is my jam. If this actually existed on Kindle I’d buy it on Amazon for £2, so I don’t think it’s not-a-story or something. It’s like the parts that are missing from Chuck Tingles (how on earth the world fits together).

    September 16, 2019
    |Reply
  29. Kayla
    Kayla

    “Flicka” nearly made me snort tea up my nose, so thank you for that!

    September 16, 2019
    |Reply
  30. Omg, I’m at the edge of my seat! I don’t know what I expected, but I didn’t expected this. This is definitive proof for me that you are a unique and amazing writer. This level of talent is awe inspiring!
    I can’t wait to read more!
    I’m already hoping that at some point I can buy the whole book.

    September 23, 2019
    |Reply
    • Anon
      Anon

      Same!

      October 6, 2019
      |Reply
  31. Jordan Bell
    Jordan Bell

    This has started so well. I’m intrigued and can’t wait to read more!

    September 24, 2019
    |Reply
  32. NewFan
    NewFan

    Just the one thing…
    In this sentance: “I’d like you to stop socializing with freaks, for a start, Flicka.”

    you accidentally break out Flicka too early. Should be _Fiona_ there.

    Otherwise – LERV THIS! And I get to read the next part right away!!!

    October 16, 2019
    |Reply
    • Elizabeth
      Elizabeth

      Unless that’s setting up right from the get-go that her brother only refers to her by a diminutive that she hates, providing the name for use later and characterization for him. Which is how I read it.

      October 16, 2019
      |Reply
  33. Jenamac
    Jenamac

    So sly, do I spy a Merlin reference in there? (I can never read “damn the consequences” without hearing Morgana saying “sometimes you’ve got to do what you think is right and damn the consequences”.)

    July 7, 2020
    |Reply

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