Julie was fuming. He was expecting her to bow down to him? After he had insulted her clientele and treated her like simple hired help? Even if Laura hadn't given Julie her opinion on the man, Julie had already formed an opinion of Lawrence that was certainly not in his favour.
If that meant losing what could be a profitable line for her so be it. She didn't work with arrogance.
"Sorry. I can't do it."
She caught Lawrence as he was turning away. Lawrence looked back at her and stared at her in confusion. He clearly hadn't expected her to say no.
"Why not?"
"It's too short notice. And I can't have that many people in here." Julie wasn't going to tell him the real reason. "You'll have to find somewhere else. Do a barbecue up at the ranch or something. But not here."
Lawrence was now looking at her in total bewilderment. Julie wondered how many women had said no to him and deduced there weren't many of them.
An image of her laid across the counter with her jeans on the floor while Lawrence pounded into her hard enough to make her scream her normally quiet climaxes flashed across her mind. Her pussy clenched and Julie squeezed her thighs together, glad that she was behind the counter. But she couldn't do anything about the blush that rose up in her cheeks.
"You're turning the money down?"
"I have principles."
"Oh?" Lawrence leant on the counter, his face just beyond the range of too close for comfort for Julie. Whether it was a flirtatious move or intimidation, she didn't know but it sent her body into overdrive. "Like what?"
"I have to like my clients." Julie stammered. She gulped and tried again. Men like this shouldn't have her reduced to a complete mess. "I don't work with bullies and those who flash money like it's nothing."
"I'm a bully?"
"And a flasher." Julie managed to maintain eye contact. "For me people talk, money doesn't."
They stared at each other. Julie was then aware of Lawrence's eyes changing colour. One minute they were brown, the next they were gold, glowing as he looked at her. Julie couldn't tear her eyes away; it was beautiful. Then it hit her.
Lawrence was a shifter. No human’s eyes turned like that. Julie hoped he wasn't a werewolf; they weren't exactly her favourite shifters on the planet.
"So money doesn't talk to you?" Lawrence purred and grinned. "Does fifty thousand talk to you?"
Julie couldn't speak. Both for the way Lawrence's voice rippled across her skin and the sound of fifty thousand dollars. She had never had fifty thousand dollars before.
The most she had managed in one go was nearly thirty thousand and most of that had gone in to building and starting up the cafe. Now she was careful, setting aside the money needed for Charlie's tuition and living on a shoestring. She was good at being careful with money.
But fifty thousand dollars could have her set aside the money needed for tuition fees and have plenty left over for her.
Lawrence saw her hesitation and his smile widened, his eyes glowing.
"It sounds tempting, doesn't it? You sort this party out for two days' time and it's all yours."
Julie shook herself and glared at him. She knew what he was doing. Shifters were good at getting people under their spell to do whatever they wanted. The fact they were gorgeous as sin helped. And Ryan Lawrence certainly fell in that category.
But Julie wasn't going to fall for it. If she did this one thing for him, she would be under his thumb for life. He would essentially own her and Julie wasn't a kept pet.
"No, thanks." She said stiffly. "I'd have to do a lot of cancelling and I'm not putting people out. The book club meet here at that time and I'm not telling them it's not on this week because a spoilt brat wanted to indispose them."
"They can come another time." Lawrence said carelessly. "My party can't wait."
"Do it elsewhere. Not here." Julie leant forward. "And don't use your name and influences to change my mind. I'm not doing it."
Their faces were closer now. If Julie just moved a little further forward, she would be able to kiss him. But she shoved the thought away and stood her ground. Now was not the time to be thinking what this arrogant rich bastard kissed like when she was trying to turn his business away.
Lawrence's nostrils flared, his eyes glowing brighter before dimming and going back to brown. He growled.
"You're going to regret saying no to me." He said in a low voice.
"Are you resorting to threats?" Julie grinned nastily. "I have a shotgun behind the counter and I know how to use it. Would you like to find out?"
She did have a shotgun but she had no idea how to really use it. But she had used the bluff of getting it out before on a disruptive customer and they had calmed right down. However, suggesting it to a shifter was rather futile since a normal blast from a shotgun wouldn't kill them. It would likely slow them down, though.
But this didn't feel like threats. This felt like foreplay. And Julie's body was heating up at the thought.
"No one's ever said no to me before." Lawrence looked like he was in total wonder at the sensation.
"There's a first for everything." Julie jerked a thumb at the door. "Now out."
Then she hurried into the back, hiding in the kitchen until she heard him leave. Only then and after her body had cooled down so she didn't feel like she wanted to jump him did she come out.
#
Ryan sat in his car and calmed his anger. He managed to temper it but it still flared. How dare she tell him what to do? How dare she refuse him?
But, damn, he was turned on as hell.
That shouldn't happen. There wasn't a woman he hadn't encountered that he hadn't managed to charm when he turned it on. But this Julie Fowler had turned his business down and hadn't even blinked when he turned up the demands, still saying no. It was as if his name and wealth didn't mean a thing.
He had found a note in his father's diary of this cafe where he went most mornings for his coffee. Apparently, according to many of his employees, it was the best place to get your coffee and a pastry or cake of your choice. The woman behind the counter was a whizz when it came to baking.
Ryan hadn't thought much of it but had decided to see what the woman was like and if what he had been told was the truth. So he had gone to the cafe with the story that he had a big party to host.
And he hadn't been disappointed. The woman was bright, sassy and could face down a bear if she wanted with that glare. Those green eyes had had him rooted to the spot the first time he saw them. They were stunning.
Hell, the damn woman was stunning. Petite and a few pounds on the heavy side, she carried herself in a way that she was happy with her own body and didn't care what people said. And it wasn't pounds of fat - it was pounds of muscle. The woman worked out.
And that red hair cut in that style. Ryan had found his gaze straying to her hair and how one stray strand that had escaped the bright green clip kept falling over her face and kept getting brushed behind her ear. It was endearing.
Julie Fowler, all in all, was beautiful.
And it wasn't just Ryan that thought so. His tiger, which had been lying around bored for most of the day even with some delectable flesh in the office, had sat up and taken notice when it caught sight of Julie.
Then it had growled and paid close attention to her during their verbal sparring. Ryan had had to focus hard not to let the beast out in case he scared her; he didn't want her screaming and calling the police on him. But the tiger had wanted her. It wanted out.
It was screaming one word.
Mate.
Ryan didn't know what to make of that. After being married at eighteen for a short eight months, he didn't believe he would find his mate. And being the tiger king, he needed a mate. While he hadn't paid much attention to that while his father was alive, Ryan knew he would need to think about taking someone as his queen soon.
Julie was his mate. He should ask her to become his queen. But she was human. She didn't know about shifters. So she was ou
t of bounds.
But that didn't stop Ryan wanting. And did he want.
Chapter Two
It took Julie several hours before she was able to fall asleep. Normally, she conked out as soon as her head hit the pillow but tonight she tossed and turned, unable to switch off.
All she could think about was the insufferable Ryan Lawrence and that sexy smile of his and his even sexier eyes. The way they glowed golden amber before turning back to brown.
It changed his whole face and he went from gorgeous to devastating. Julie's whole body was still heated from their exchange, her pussy complaining that she hadn't got any action.
She really did need to go out and get laid if she was considering a shifter attractive. While Julie knew not all shifters were the same, she was still apprehensive about even thinking that he was smoking hot. Her brain must have got frazzled from all the stress.
But she couldn't stop thinking about the image that Lawrence had cast in her mind when they had been verbally sparring, of her lying on her back while Lawrence fucked her hard, touching places none of her previous boyfriends had been able to reach. Her body was flushing red-hot even hours after the thought and Julie was getting fidgety.
Even using her dildo and bringing herself to orgasm by hand didn't seem to help. She was still on edge. Just because of the damn man who thought he ruled the roost.
It was nearly dawn by the time Julie finally fell asleep, only to suddenly awaken by her phone ringing loudly. After a moment she realized it wasn't her alarm going off. Julie fumbled for her phone, rubbing sleep out of her eyes.
"Yeah?"
"Julie, you gotta come to the cafe now."
"Richard?" The words were jumbled in Julie's head but she recognized the voice. She sat up. "What's wrong?"
"Your cafe is on fire. Can you not hear the sirens?"
It was then that Julie heard the familiar screeching that was from the fire department sirens. She was right on the edge of Little Rock but it was small enough that sound simply echoed through the streets. Immediately Julie was awake.
"My cafe?"
"Someone's torched the place. It's going up like an inferno."
Julie didn't hear what else Richard had to say. Slipping jeans on over her bikini panties, leaving her oversized shirt on, she stuffed her feet into her sneakers and ran out of the house. It was only a few hundred feet to her work place but it felt like a mile. Julie felt like everything was going on in slow motion.
She turned a corner and the heat and smoke hit her in the face. Her cafe was ablaze, flames reaching high up into the sky. The firefighters were trying to contain the fire but it was too much. They only had two hoses and they were fighting a losing battle.
Julie's heart dropped like a stone. Her work. Her life gone up in flames. There would be nothing left.
Her legs gave out from under her and she collapsed onto the ground. It was then that the tears started to fall.
#
The loud ringing of his phone had Ryan jerking away from sleep. Slowly, the vision of Julie on top of him and riding his cock to an orgasm disappeared and he was awake and alone in his bedroom, sporting an erection that was bordering on painful.
Rolling onto his side, he fumbled for his phone and snapped it open.
"Yeah?" He growled and then realized that his fangs were out, filling his mouth.
"You okay, Ryan? You don't sound good."
"I'm fine." Ryan concentrated and his fangs receded enough so he could talk. But they didn't completely go. "Talk to me, Greg."
"That girl you asked me to check out? Her cafe was just burned down."
That had Ryan's attention. He sat up; his painful hard-on forgotten and sleep became a thing of the past.
"Burned down? Was it a gas leak?"
"No. From what the firefighters said, it was torched." His second-in-command and cousin sounded grim. "It was deliberate, Ryan."
Ryan's heart was hammering in his chest. He knew from what people had said about Julie that the cafe was her whole life, with the exception of her kid brother. This would devastate her.
He swallowed.
"Is Julie okay?"
"She's fine. She wasn't in there. Our guy had to drag her away before she ran into the flames." Greg sighed. "She's torn apart."
Only Greg knew about Julie being Ryan's mate. They shared everything and Ryan could trust Greg with this. If it got out that he had a mate, female tigers would go out of their way to eliminate their human competition so they had a shot at being queen. Ryan didn't want that to happen so Greg was the only person he had confided in.
Could it be that someone had found out about Julie and gone after her instead? It was possible but Ryan didn't think so. However, he wasn't about to discount it.
"Do what you can, Greg." He said gruffly. "Find out who the bastards are. I want their heads on a platter."
"You think one of the girls wanted to take her out?"
"I don't know but I wouldn't put it past them. Some of those felines are downright nasty." Ryan took a deep breath and let it out with a shudder. "Just keep tabs on Julie. Keep her safe."
"You can rely on me, Ry."
Greg hung up. Ryan closed his cell phone and tossed it onto the bed. Then he buried his face in his face.
Things were going to get hairy if any of the female tigers was involved. They knew the consequences of messing with a human mate but evidently someone didn't care.
Ryan was going to make sure they knew how badly they had screwed up.
#
Julie drove home, her mood the lowest it had ever been in her life. It had been two days since that fire had wiped out her livelihood and she had spent those two days trying to salvage what she could and sorting out the insurance.
Thankfully, she had kept on top of the payments but the insurance company was refusing to pay out as the fire was being seen as arson and was under police investigation. The dumbasses thought she had set the fire.
The structure of the place was sound, which was a good thing. Richard had told her if she cleaned everything away the structure would hold easily and she could set up again. That was the easy part. Finding a bank that was willing to give her a loan to refurbish and set up again was not.
Julie had gone to three banks, both in Little Rock and in Benton and Conway, and all of them had turned her down. She had even gone all the way to Pine Bluff and Hot Springs but it was the same result. Even the manager who had given her a loan the first time around said he wouldn't give her another since she still had half of her original loan to pay off.
Julie was lost. Everything had gone up in flames and she had no way to support herself and no way to afford the tuition fees for Charlie. He would have to leave Oxford and come home or get several jobs to pay his way through. The admissions team might be able to give them special treatment due to circumstances but Julie didn't want that. She didn't like special treatment.
Her uncle and aunt had taught her to do things off her own back. So when she had turned eighteen and gone off to university to do a business degree she had done everything herself. Her uncle had given her half the money for the fees every semester but Julie had paid the rest. She never asked for it and she never took money for granted.
Now it was looking like she was back at the bottom rung again. She would have to look for a crappy job and start saving up again.
Dusk was falling as Julie pulled into her street. She just wanted to go inside, lock the doors and have a good cry. She was not looking forward to the phone call to Charlie that he would have to leave university unless he paid his own way.
There was a flashy dark blue BMW parked outside her house. Julie could see someone sitting on the porch, his face half-lit by the light on his phone as he texted away. She groaned. Of all the people she didn't want to deal with, this man was at the top of the list.
She pulled into the driveway and got out, snatching for her purse and clutching it tightly to her as she locked up. Then she stalked towards the porch.
"What are you doing here?"
Lawrence looked up. Julie was surprised to see a frown between his eyes. He looked worried. Then it disappeared as Lawrence put his phone away and he stood, coming down the steps to meet her.
"I came to check you were okay." He stopped when Julie stopped, keeping his distance. "I heard you were rather distraught after what happened to that quaint little cafe you ran."
"You'd be distraught if the only thing that paid the bills and kept your brother in the school is what is not there anymore." Julie snapped.
"And I'd be distraught if that happened and no one would give me a loan to help me get back on my feet."
Julie gritted her teeth. She had a headache coming on.
"Why are you here?" She demanded. "Are you here to gloat? To say that serves me right that I didn't let you have that party?"
As soon as she said that, a disturbing thought came into her head. It took firm root and began to grow. Julie knew it was ridiculous but...
She stared at Lawrence, who was watching her closely.
"Oh, God. You set the fire, didn't you?"
Lawrence scoffed and rolled his eyes.
"Now you're getting hysterical."
"Really? Then what's to prevent me from calling the cops right now and saying I have the man responsible for the arson outside my house?"
"Because it's a stupid and clumsy theory that you've come to and we both know it."
Julie knew he was right. She was being hysterical. Just because they had come to a disagreement didn't mean that he was responsible for starting the fire. He wasn't that vindictive or stupid.
Was he?
Lawrence sighed.
"I actually came here to offer you some help."
Julie scoffed.
"I don't want any help from you." She snarled.
"You might change your mind when you hear the terms."
The Tiger's Reluctant Mate: BBW Paranormal Tiger Shifter Romance Standalone (Hunky Shifters Book 2) Page 2
