Chapter Text
Claire laughed softly as she pushed Owen gently away from her, her hands dwarfed by his broad, muscular chest. “Get your ass out of here, Mr Grady. Some of us work for a boss who expects his employees to get a good night’s rest before work..” Claire trailed off as his hands cupped her face and he kissed her, both of them smiling at the statement. “I suppose that gets blown out of the water when your boss is the reason why you’ve had barely any sleep for the last seven days,” Owen smirked as he began to trail his hands down her ribcage, quite clearly on a journey to her silk pyjama pants. At this, Claire rolled her eyes skywards - now adorned with a masterpiece of stars - as she caught both his hands and span him towards the steps down to his car.
Owen couldn’t help the shit-eating grin etched across his face as he drove through the night back to his apartment complex. She already had him round her little finger, and he wasn’t even sure he gave a fuck about it. She’d bewitched him in the last week they’d spent together, sneaking around like teenagers after they were off the clock to one another’s residences. He hadn’t meant for it to happen this way, for them to come together under those circumstances - hell, he’d pine for her for a lifetime if it meant she never had to be almost sexually fucking assaulted by Hoskins.
The man in question was the only fly in the ointment; Hoskins had been right when he’d said to Owen that he couldn’t fire him. Either he’d had the security cameras wiped, or some fucking fairy had gone around removing any scrap of evidence that Owen and Claire could use to prove to the people in the higher echelons of the company that they had in fact hired a perverted piece of shit. The grin had slipped from his face, and Owen desperately attempted to regain his former mood by thinking back on the seven blissful evenings they’d spent together.
As they left the medics centre - Claire had hastily created a detailed and pretty convincing story that she’d walked into one of the doors as a result of too much alcohol, although this was met with narrowed eyes from Owen - he’d asked her what her sleeping arrangements for tonight were originally. “Oh, I had all my things ready at Zara’s.. Oh my god, Zara! She must be worried sick - or thought I just upped and left without her! Oh no, no, no..” Claire’s hands began to shake as she gripped her phone in panic. “Easy, Claire! I texted her whilst the nurse was applying that god-awful lotion to your eye for the swelling. Kinda detracts from the vanilla” he sighed. “What?! I don’t - I don’t smell like vanilla!” Her shoulders rolling in indignation, and Owen couldn’t help but laugh at her small frame drowned out by his large jacket. “She replied to me saying she’d gotten Barry to take her home. That’s definitely something I’ll be having a discussion with him about on Monday.” He raised his eyebrows and smirked in Claire’s direction; her fierce, angry demeanour began to diminish as her chin tipped downwards. “So what we do now?” Owen could hear her voice breaking, a suppressed sob in her throat. In the brief reprieve of normality he had forgotten just how long a night this must’ve been for her. She was clearly emotionally and physically exhausted, and he was right in what he said to her hours previously - he had a duty of care to his staff.
He reached out and gently took the point of her chin between his thumb and forefinger, and tilted her so she was looking at him. “Probably stick together” he said softly, and took her hand in his. She smiled shyly at him, and obligingly allowed him to lead her in the direction of his apartment. “You can stay with me, and I’ll take you back to your bungalow tomorrow morning, first light.” He said, squeezing her hand softly in reassurance and an attempt to warm her freezing skin. “Owen.. I.. I don’t know if this is appropriate. For one, I’m not really that kind of girl, and -” He realised what she was hinting at, and he stopped walking abruptly; absolutely mortified. “Claire, you have to believe me when I say that that is in no way what I want from you. I’ve just seen some jackass try and get his way with you.. I’m not gonna pull any of that shit. You gotta believe me. I’m just looking out for my friend.” He offered her a smile; that speech had been pretty heavy-going. He didn’t want her to think that he was totally repulsed by her, but throwing in the fact that he thought she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever met might be a bit too much. He’d save that for later.. Much later. Clearly relieved, she’d grasped his hand again as they entered his building.
“These should be okay. I don’t seem to have a drawer full of luxurious women’s nightwear.” Owen chuckled, passing the pile of clothing to Claire as she stood in the hallway. Moments later, they were drinking beers; Claire clad in his faded SEALS sweatshirt and Calvins that she had to keep rolling up her slim waist. Owen found himself staring a minute too long at the stripe of flesh above the waistline as she tried in vain to make them fit better. She hitched herself up and sat on his kitchen counter, endless pale legs swinging over one another as she ran a hand through her slightly-mussed hair as she took a pull from the alcohol. He swallowed hard; he didn’t think he’d ever seen anything so sexy in his life. After nearly half an hour of conversation - which Owen had ultimately lead to Claire’s favourite subject, her raptors, in an attempt to tear her mind away from the evening’s events - he had insisted she take his bed. Although she said she couldn’t possibly do that to him several times, Owen had insisted and found himself ten minutes later on his couch, the pure rays of moonlight dragging his mind to a certain redhead with skin almost the very same shade, sleeping in his bed next door. The next morning, as promised, Owen had got her home as soon as she woke. “You can keep that.. It looks better on you. Believe me.” Owen had said with raised eyebrows when she attempted to return the sweatshirt to him. Her abashed smile returned and she bit her lip, and Owen had to keep himself from telling her he really, really fucking wished to do that too. “Owen, I don’t know what I would have done without you last night. Is there any way I can repay you? Is there any extra work that needs doing from corporate?” She asked, totally serious. Owen stared for a moment. Man, this girl was funny. He snorted, “Ms. Dearing, you certainly do not need to do any more work for me. There is something that I have in mind, though” He leant back on the railings in front of her door, arms crossed as he surveyed the expectant expression on her face. “Dinner. With me. Tomorrow night.” He pointed at his chest comically. She rolled her eyes in mock despair, and a look of determination replaced the confusion. “How about tonight, instead? You can pick me up at six.” And with that, she closed the door in his face.
He couldn’t help but laugh as he made his way to the car. Clearly, that fucking asshole Hoskins was merely a chink in her armour. The sassy, passionate and fiery Claire he’d grown to respect and adore wasn’t going anywhere. And, he did the hell as he was told, outside her front door again at 6pm on the dot. Everything had snowballed from there onwards. He couldn’t remember ever enjoying doing something as mundane as eating dinner with someone as much as he was in that moment. Even surrounded by his boys in the navy as they feasted on whatever crap they had left, even at the million-dollar-a-plate dinners at charity galas he’d attended on his way up to the top. When she pulled him down to meet her lips at the end of the evening, once again outside her door, he didn’t think to stop her. Nor did he protest when she led him inside and into her bedroom. “So, you can like, track people’s scents or something? I wore that vanilla lotion tonight just to see if you’d notice” she giggled, a sound reverberating through her chest and made his own want to explode with happiness. It was his turn to laugh now, as he pressed kisses to her neck. “I was with the navy, not the Navajo.. I’ve just been granted the pleasure of your company enough to appreciate it.” And that was how the rest of the week unfolded. He had quite obviously torn the page from the rule book banning the boss from any kind of romantic relationship with an employee. Fuck, he’d thrown the whole damn book out the window. He sat, now, in the boardroom; waiting for various members of his senior team to arrive. As he heard the door open, he lifted his head to see Claire standing there. He couldn’t help himself - a grin split across his face at the sight of her and she reciprocated as she made her way over. “The latest progress report. My baby girls are making me the proudest mama.. I think you’ll be happy with what we’ve discovered. New facts that could possibly reinvigorate the public’s interest, kinda like the space programme..” He cut her off by wrapping his arms around her and pulling her in for a chaste kiss, that both of them weren’t afraid to deepen. “I love it when you talk dino to me” he laughed heartily as their foreheads pressed together.
“What the fuck is this?! He’s way above your pay-grade, honey. You think, that you can try and kick me out of this park for trying to get on with this little slice, so you can have her all to your god damn self?!” Both Claire and Owen had sprang apart at the previously unnoticed presence in the room. Victor Hoskins was stood, pointing a finger reprovingly at both of them and reddening with anger. Owen opened his mouth to speak, instinctively moving in front of Claire, his arm outstretched to protect if need be. But Hoskins was already bellowing again, spit flying in their direction. “You fucking wait until I tell Simon about this! He might be old and losing his mind, but this is gonna be special. His precious new manager, going against company rules and screwing the frigid slut who has a stick up her mighty fine ass about everybody! You would’ve been a damn shit lay anyway.” He was shaking visibly, chest heaving from rage. A finger reached out behind him and tapped his shoulder. Simon Masrani, flanked by the heads of InGen and the entirety of Owen’s senior team, were stood right behind Victor and had clearly heard his whole abusive, disgusting outburst. And if they hadn’t, Owen knew damn well that the cameras in here worked just fine.
Claire clinked glasses with Owen as they sipped the red wine they’d popped in celebration. Hoskins had been almost instantly removed from the island, Simon Masrani’s cool exterior taking no shit from the man who succumbed to whining on the floor like a baby begging for a second chance. Once he’d been dealt with, Simon gave a shrug in Owen’s direction, who himself was still stood protectively in front of Claire - whom he didn’t doubt would’ve been able to do the job just fine on her own anyway. “Look alive, Owen” he’d joked, and winked as he left the room. Now; Claire was curled up in Owen’s lap as they squashed comfortably into his office chair, glasses in hand, watching the sun set, the blood red sky streaked with gold and vermilion. Claire sighed into his chest, and he could tell something was playing on her mind. “I know he’s an asshole, but I can’t help thinking that all of the people who work with you will agree with Hoskins that I’m a whore for jumping into bed with you so soon.” She looked up at him, worry etched on her face. “Hey, don’t give me that shit,” he reassured her gently, kissing her hair and smoothing the auburn strands into place. “If that happens, so what? Fuck ‘em. You’re a beautiful, intelligent woman who makes her own decisions based on what she wants, not what she thinks she should want - or not, in this case. And if they come after us, at least we’ll have each other, huh? For survival.” He narrowed his eyes playfully at her, and as the tears slid willingly down her cheeks, she began to kiss him with all she had.