The Billionaire Shifter's Curvy Match (Billionaire Shifters Club #1) (2 page)

“Halt!” Gavin demanded. It sounded like a growl.

Manny slammed on the brakes, a small thump registering in the dim recesses of what remained of Gavin’s human mind. In the cheap streetlight’s glow, Gavin could not tell what they had hit, and as his body pounded, blood pouring into limbs as they stretched and filled, joints loosening and lengthening as he shifted without control, he barely cared.

Twisting his head and resisting the urge to rip the door off its hinges and lunge up the building, he found her.

Her.

The throbbing beat in time with hers, an ancient sound neither could deny. Tale after tale had been told, in hushed tones and passed through more generations than anyone could count, over centuries or—perhaps—millennia, of the Beat, but Gavin had dismissed it. His own father said it was a fairy tale, a gibbering fantasy spewed by weaklings who believed in fairies and wood nymphs.

Gavin was not weak.

Therefore the legends must be true.

“Smoky!” he heard a woman’s voice cry out, the sound carrying like music through the air.

Manny got out of the limo and muttered something about a dog as Gavin stared up, nose smelling her, the blend of musk and cinnamon, pencil lead, and sweetness tearing through his nose and straight into his throat.

Her.

Her.

Her.

His arm snapped up to open the door but missed the mark. He fumbled with the window, desperate to roll it down but so focused on her scent he could no longer control his fingers. Finally he stabbed the button and the glass lowered. He reached out to touch her and could see his change begin, the dull, pale human flesh turning robust and textured, joints thick and long with promise and power.

This, too, was part of the legend. That he would lose control in the face of the Beat. The One. Until he mated with his chosen soul, he would have no power over his own body and heart. It would come back when he was complete.

With
her.

A blur of blonde and white rushed out of a doorway, a young woman wearing light cotton pajamas, hair wavy and loose. Security lights behind her made a halo about her head, the effect ethereal, brown eyes wide and thick like pools of mink fur.

Her.

She bent down and scooped up the dog—which Gavin could see now—and his own lupine paw reached for the door handle once more. If he could not open it, he would crawl through the window to touch her. Stroke her.

Take
her.

Their eyes locked for a split second, a thousand lifetimes, and as her chocolate orbs widened with desire—not fear—his heart changed, too. One look spoke one million words, just as one touch would be worth one million years.

He had to have that touch.

And the taking would be mutual.

“My God,” he said to her. “You’re real.”

Manny looked back at him just as the Beat changed. Whatever Manny saw when he glanced at Gavin made him move swiftly, his thickly muscled bodyguard’s form leaping with remarkable speed. His driver climbed back into the limo, peeling out, the word caught in Gavin’s throat as he barely held back, knowing he should not go to her—not now, not
ever
—and yet how could he fight it?

For the Beat became a siren’s song, a female timbre joining his own to create a melody so sweet he would dream it for a thousand years.

Mine.

Mine.

Mine.

Manny raced around a corner, turning left, then right, as Gavin’s changed body struggled for freedom. His nose elongated and his leg muscles thickened, ready to lunge. The call of the moon made him scramble out the lowered window, forelegs hitting the pavement. The fall barely registered as he shot forward, the wind tickling the fur that covered his changed body.

No one called his name.

No one
knew
his name. Not even Gavin at this point. He was white light and pure feral form now, his nose and eyes his guide. Words eluded him in this state, fully transformed to a wolf, his body moving with languid heat as he circled back to her den.

Her.

The scent of her filled his nose, his blood thumping hard against his veins, warming his skin. Eyes caught every movement, from rats behind a dumpster to a drunk in an alley, but all he could think was
her her her her her
.

Caught in the split between animal and human, his primal mind scrambled to hold on to a tiny sliver of humanity. In the city, in wolf form, he had no choice. His mere presence guaranteed death if the wrong men knew he was here. Animals were prey in advanced civilizations. In the woods he could be the hunter. But not here.

Except with her.

His eyes ticked up as he turned, following her scent. Her apartment window was open and the need to mate pulled him closer.

A black beast pulled up to the road next to him, a human he dimly remembered calling a name he should know. The human climbed out and beckoned with an outstretched hand. The scent was one of comfort, of knowing, and his human mind resurged.

Get in.

Pushing his powerful legs up, he climbed back into the black metal beast and left her building behind, words reforming in his feral mind.

He looked down.

He was naked, the human mating equipment on full display. Touching his nose, he felt human form. Touching his cock, he felt his lust for her.

Pressing his palm over his heart, he felt it crack in two.

Her.

He needed her.

“The Novo Club, sir?” the man in the long black car asked.

Gavin grunted a yes.

Gavin.

That’s right.

His name.

Then what was hers?

L
ilah let
Jess pull her into their apartment building, away from the scene on the street, the mysterious limo, the man inside.

Her temple throbbed, hair wet and sticky against her face and neck. She was drenched in sweat, her shirt adhering to the flesh in the valley between her breasts. Smoky wriggled inside the cradle of her arms, digging his little claws into her chest.

Covered by only the flimsy pajamas, her skin was probably getting badly scratched, but she didn’t feel anything but the pounding ache in her head.

Well, not just in her head.

Who the hell was that guy?

She staggered up the stairs behind her sister, sweating even more in the stifling corridor. Smoky twisted around in her arms, stretched up his snout, and licked her chin.

“He seems to be feeling better,” she told Jess, readjusting his weight.

She wasn’t feeling so bad either. Parts of her that had been sleeping for months, even years, were suddenly wide awake. The world was rich with sensation, loud with scent, heavy with feeling. A delicious tightening between her legs made her steps shaky.

And when she followed Jess inside their apartment, she suddenly forgot how hot it was, how minutes earlier she’d been rubbing her skin with ice cubes. All she could think about was how it had felt to look into those blue eyes.

You’re real.

He’d said those words with a clipped British accent that went straight to her toes, making them curl, a delicious spine-tingling heat filling her.

On the other hand, maybe she did need an ice cube.

“I can’t believe you did that,” Jess said, turning on her, her catlike eyes narrowing with worry and fury.

“They ran over Smoky.” Lilah turned the dog in her arms and gently probed his furry, filthy body with her fingers. “I don’t feel anything broken. Not that I know exactly what to look for.”

“I hope nobody saw us bring him in here. They’ll tell the landlord, just to be evil.”

“Let them. This place is a dump anyway.”

“Just a minute ago you were freaking out about losing this dump,” Jess said.

Lilah knelt next to her futon and lay Smoky down on the old pink comforter. Trembling but quiet, he fixed his round brown eyes on her.

“He trusts me,” Lilah said.

“Oh no. You’re getting attached.”

Lilah stroked the dog’s body, continuing to search for damage, finding none. “The car must not have hit him, or he’d be dead. It just gave him a big scare.”

“What a faker,” Jess said. “Crying like that. Got us to run out there with the drug dealers for nothing.” In spite of her words, she had a tender smile on her face as she reached down and tickled him behind the ears.

“We need to feed him,” Lilah said. “Do dogs drink milk? Did you buy some in that luxurious bag of groceries over there?” She craned her neck around Jess to take a look at the bag on the table.

“Lilah, you can’t. You’ll never get rid of him.”

“Maybe I don’t want to,” Lilah said.

Jess grumbled all the way to the fridge. “We’re going to regret this.” Jess put the groceries away quickly. She got out a hunk of mozzarella and their last slice of turkey breast from the deli, set it on one of their four mismatched plates, and carried it over. “Man, what a day. I haven’t even told you about Mom yet.”

Lilah frowned at her sister as she took the plate from her. The pain in her head was still a steady, rhythmic pounding, and she didn’t want to deal with any more stress today.

“I’m afraid to ask.” She lowered the plate to the futon. Smoky inhaled the scraps of food so quickly that the plate was empty before she’d let go of it.

“It’s her hip,” Jess said. Lilah didn’t need more details. She knew them already.

“She has to get the operation. I know she’s scared, but she just has to do it.”

“She’s worried she’s going to lose the house.”

“But she owns it outright,” Lilah said. Their dad, a late-in-life father, had died suddenly fifteen years earlier. Luckily, he’d been a hardworking, thrifty man who had paid off the mortgage on their two-bedroom ranch house, the one where both Lilah and Jess had grown up, before his heart had given out. Not so luckily, it had given out while he was in bed with another woman. Their mother still lived there.

“She took out some kind of loan on it. And after she gets the operation, she won’t be able to do everything she used to do for a while, and she’s afraid we’re going to put her in a home, or the bank will throw her out on the street.” Jess picked up the empty plate and walked over to the sink. “Like a dog.”

Lilah’s blood pressure spiked. “A loan? She had to take out a loan?”

“It’s been a rough few years. The roof needed replacing, and there was something about the furnace, a utility tax, a medicine she needs that isn’t covered—”

“How long has this been going on?” Lilah asked. “Why didn’t she tell me? We could move in with her and help out.”

“Oh God, you know she’d hate that. She’s too proud. And she loves the idea of us being out on our own, pursuing our dreams. The last thing she wants is to add to
your
worries. She knows you’ve had trouble of your own, starting a career, paying for college.”

“She didn’t want to worry me,” Lilah repeated to herself, closing her eyes. Poor Mom. Guilt washed over her. She should’ve found a steady job by now. She should’ve majored in something practical, like software engineering or rocket science. Hospitality management was what she loved, but...

She should’ve moved to Fargo to take that hotel job that paid less than she made waitressing at the twenty-four-hour diner she worked at through college. At least then she’d
have
a job.

She should’ve been born with a multimillion-dollar trust fund to pay for school.

No point dwelling on the past. Right now she had to do whatever she could to get a real job. One that paid enough to get out of the shithole where they lived, one that would give her the resources to help the people—and dog, she thought, petting Smoky’s scruffy head—she loved.

As soon as possible.

Worst case, she’d go back to waitressing. That’s how she’d paid for part of college. It wasn’t so bad, but it felt like a step backward.

Then again, it was a step that had a paycheck.

Smoky let out a sigh and closed his eyes.

“He’s kinda cute when he sleeps,” Jess said.

I’ve
got
to figure something out
, Lilah thought.
But what?

* * *

T
he first thought
that crossed Gavin’s mind as he came to, long legs stretched out before him on the leather ottoman, a roaring fire flickering behind closed eyelids, was that he really needed to leave this godforsaken city. Now.

With her.

“Sir?” The voice was familiar. Cultured. Concerned. In this city, hearing that voice could mean only one thing: he was at the Platinum Club’s inner sanctum. Built in the late 1800s by Gavin’s father, the club was buried deep underground, tunneled out at the same time as the expansion of Boston’s subway system. So secret was its existence that engineering maps of the city did not include it.

Which suited its members just fine, for secrets were their lifeblood. The members of what they called the Novo Club were accustomed to keeping secrets for long stretches of time. Centuries even. As animal shifters, they lived their lives in secret, known to the outer world only as humans. In human form, they blended in. As animals, they most certainly did not.

As legends, they threatened the very heart of the world humans lived in, and that meant they must hide among them, integrating and yet remaining separate. The secrecy of their true nature must remain unbreached.

Manny had done well, bringing Gavin into the sanctuary of his peers. Willing his eyes open, he let the soft glow of firelight and old sconces penetrate his weary brain. He looked down.

At least his naked cock wasn’t on display. Someone had dressed him in simple, business casual attire.

“Brandy,” he said, clearing his throat, the voice rough but his own.

A glass appeared as if Morgan, the club’s stalwart butler, had conjured it via black magic. Eyeing it with great relief, Gavin drank the two fingers of liquor in one long, quenching swallow.

“Another?”

Gavin sat up, joints tight, legs aching. He turned slowly to take a good look at the man. If any creature on this planet could possibly be immortal, then it was Morgan, a smallish man with a light eastern European accent that was hard to place. He wore a white serving jacket, a black bow tie, and had elegant, wavy white hair the color of freshly fallen snow.

Eyes the color of the brandy he’d just served stared at Gavin from under bushy brows that looked like tangled vines.

“Yes, Morgan,” Gavin answered crisply. “Thank you.”

The second brandy made him warm from the inside out, limbs coming to life as he flexed, inhaling so deeply his ribs nearly cracked.

Recovery was often sluggish, but this feeling was entirely new. He always controlled his own changes.
Always
. Shifting from human to wolf form was a voluntary act, one that he could implement and withdraw at will. Old wives’ tales said that the Beat could make a shifter lose his mind until he’d truly mated with his one true partner...

Could he lose his body as well?

Unaccustomed to being out of control, Gavin felt the loss keenly, as if his mind were seized by hands the size of planets and he was shaken violently, desiccated and spread throughout the universe.

Her.

This was all
her
fault.

He laughed, a softer sound than he expected to hear from his own mouth, the smile cutting through his face one that he likely would not recognize in a mirror. Smiles tended to be wielded like weapons for Gavin, part of business strategy or carefully meted out to snare a woman to share his bed for a night.

He didn’t want this woman for just one night, though. And a smile of pleasure was as foreign to him as his loss of control.

Long blonde hair. Tall and graceful, with a body like a lithe, curvy mountain lion, protecting her dog. How she had run so fast and free, thinking nothing of the limousine, the drug dealers, the dirty danger of her neighborhood. Rescuing the animal had been her sole focus.

The dog.

“Manny!” he called out, not caring for the breach of decorum. “Is the dog injured?”

“No, sir. We checked. The mutt’s fine.” Manny appeared from behind Gavin’s chair, quickly moving to the side, coming into Gavin’s vision. Inscrutable features made Manny the perfect driver for the Stanton family. Ex-special forces with a face that was multicultural and chameleonlike. At any given time Manny could become whatever he wished.

Or no one at all.

Today he wore hair shorter than an infant’s fingernails, jet black, with a black goatee, the look just sinister enough to make him look like an actor in a horror film.

Nearly black eyes shone in the fire’s light as he caught Gavin’s gaze and added, “The woman’s safe, too.”

“Add a security watch on her,” Gavin snapped.

“Already did.” Manny’s tone carried a hint of smugness to it.

“And keep that confidential.”

A man who had not spent the better part of four years with Manny might have missed the microexpression that passed over his face. Gavin, though, knew him too well.

“You told my brother.” The comment was a challenge. Not a question.

“Your shift, sir, was... unprecedented.” Manny’s face was an impassive slab of putty.

The tension inside Gavin’s chest twisted his core, a hard grunt of disgust making his throat hum. Asher Stanton made it a habit to exert as much control as possible over his younger brother. Gavin’s rebellion—leaving the family’s traditional businesses for twenty-first-century high-tech—had been hard fought. The Stanton Corporation stretched back centuries, started in Gavin’s country of birth in a London shipyard long before the colonies were touched by Brits.

Moving into biotech was an unexpected, and unwanted move on Gavin’s part.

Too bad.

Gavin was less concerned with his brother than with the woman. “Her name?” he asked, changing the topic abruptly.

If it flustered Manny, he did not show it. “Lilah. Lilah Murphy. Lilah with an
h
.”

“Lilah.” His mouth devoured the word, the feel of it like licking a rose petal. He hardened at the thought, mind racing to an image of that creamy skin, those big, brown eyes, that long hair stroking his own naked form in bed, dipping and dragging those blonde locks against his—

“Yes, sir. Twenty-five. Just fired from her clerical job today. College graduate.”

Gavin smirked. That’s right—Manny was a former CIA operative, too.

A walking encyclopedia with fists the size of hams. Perfect.

Morgan entered the room with a glass of sparkling water and set it on a small, polished oak tray on a marble-topped coffee table. He and Manny exchanged a glance that piqued Gavin’s curiosity, but did not divert him from his all-consuming thoughts about Lilah.

Lilah. With an
h
.

Manny cleared his throat. Gavin shot him an aggravated look.