Her Billionaire Lion: A Zodiac Shifters Paranormal Romance: Leo

by Dominique Eastwick

  “Do you need dinner?” One of the twins looked in the Styrofoam cup in his hand. “Or real coffee? How can this not cause people to become ill?”

  “It’s job security Silas.” Liam nudged his brother chuckling.

  “What in the devil are you two idiots still doing on my floor? I thought I told you to get lost.” A woman whose hair matched her fiery feistiness stood in the doorway. “Stop flirting with the women who are here to visit their family.”

  “Flirting, what?”

  “No,” the twins said at the same time both putting their hands up to fend innocence.

  Silas finally answered. “Liam, do you want me to do the honors?”

  “By all means, you do it.” Liam crossed the room to lean against the snack machine.

  “Um, Siobhan, this is Kalista. Leonidas’s mate.”

  The other woman stopped and stared. “As in, our prime?”

  “Is there another?” Liam asked.

  “Where is your protection detail?” Siobhan asked staring out the wall of glass down the hallway.

  “My what?”

  “Leo let you leave without a bodyguard? Doesn’t seem like my prime.” She sniffed the air. “I don’t smell his mark. Gobshite.” The last word dragged out in a thick Irish brogue.

  Liam turned to his sister and then back to her. “Has he not bonded yet?”

  “What the hell are you talking about? And, I assure you, there was no letting about it. I got off the island of my own volition, and no one was going to stop me. If you’ll excuse me, I need to check on my father.” She stormed out of the room. How dare any woman question her importance to Leo. It was her right…

  Around the corner, she collapsed against the wall, her breaths coming hard and quick. She had to go back to the island. ASAP. Hurrying into her father’s room, she found a nurse feeding him. “Hi, Dad.”

  The nurse excused herself and left the room.

  “Hi,” he managed and patted the bed next to him. Lifting the dry-erase board, he wrote, “I want to talk to you.”

  “What is it?”

  “I love having you here,” he continued in shaky letters. “But go back to Greece. Work things out.” He erased the board to start writing again. “You aren’t happy, now.” Again he erased the board. “Your happiness lit up the room when you were with him. Like your mother’s when we were together.”

  She wiped a stray tear from her father’s eye. “Daddy.”

  He patted her hand and erased the board. “Go to him.”

  “I love him,” she admitted.

  “Go,” he coughed out.

  She stayed a few more minutes before heading out of the hospital. In the lobby waited the twins. She did not want to deal with them now, she only wanted to find a flight back to Leo. The stood as he approached. “Please forgive our sister. The news came as a shock.”

  “You left the island shortly after the fight with Cedric, right?” Silas asked, well at least she thought it was Silas.

  She nodded unwilling to tell these two she had run out of fear.

  “That explains it.” The other man blew out a breath in relief.

  She rubbed her temples. “Explains what?”

  “Everything,” they said in unison.

  “The fight was only a couple days in to Leo’s rule. She hadn’t been on the island long enough.” She had no idea who spoke and was sure her head might explode from confusion.

  “See I told you Liam there was a bloody good explanation.” Silas turned to her. “I know the fighting seemed a bit barbaric but it’s tradition.”

  She stayed for a few more minutes as the twins went into great detail as to the history of the challenges. The ringing of her phone saved her. She made her excuses and tried to stifle her disappointment when she answered to find it only her brother Nathan. After a brief conversation with she phoned the number on her ticket. “I need the first flight to Greece.”

  Forty hours later, the rocky shoreline of the island came into view. She’d brought three large suitcases with her and hoped she hadn’t blown it with Leonidas. As they approached, a familiar face came into view. Jaison waited, arms crossed. “Kalista.”

  She offered him a smile as warm as his greeting was cold. Turning to the ship’s captain, she asked, “How long will the boat be here?”

  “I have been told I’m to wait for you to return,” he said with no small amount of pity in his eyes.

  “I see. Then I suppose we should leave these suitcases here.” She disembarked with only her purse. “I take it he’s aware I’m here, Jaison?”

  “He knew the second you stepped foot on Greek soul.”

  They hiked the rest of the way in silence. She didn’t miss the uncertainty in the faces of those they came across, though his secretary met her with, “Oh, thank the goddess.”

  Jaison sat in the corner and picked up a magazine.

  She knocked on the door but didn’t wait for permission to enter. It took a minute for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. A small lamp on his desk focused any light on the blotter. She could make out his silhouette but little else. “Hi.”

  “Kalista.” His focus remained on the papers he made notes on.

  “Do you want me to come back?”

  “No. I’m sure whatever brought you all this way, you can say now. I’ve ordered the boat to wait for you. This way you don’t need to spend any more time than necessary on the island.”

  Ever so slowly, her eyes adjusted, and the lines of his face came into view. “You think I came all this way to say something and leave.”

  “You came all this way to give me a check once. I have ceased to understand the workings of your mind.”

  The silence stretched as he refused to look at her.

  “You’re angry.” No response. “I should have let you try and explain. Talk to me. I left in a hurry.”

  He threw his pen on the desk and leaned back in his chair. She couldn’t see his face any longer, but his eye burned into her. “You think it’s about you leaving?”

  “What else?”

  “It’s about being ignored.” He leaned into the cone of light from his desk lamp, his voice full of anger. “You couldn’t give me the decency of answering one of my calls. I had to call Nathan to assure you arrived in one piece.”

  “I didn’t know what to say.”

  “No, you didn’t want to hear anything I had to say. You ran. You ran from me and from us, and you didn’t give me a chance to explain.”

  “I’m sorry I acted like a child, confused and upset.” She almost took a step but thought better. “I’m not pregnant.”

  “You came five thousand miles to tell me something I already knew? I told you you couldn’t be pregnant already.”

  “Well, you aren’t a doctor, are you?”

  “Oi. I can’t get you pregnant unless we are bonded.”

  “There is the word again.”

  “What word?”

  “Bonded.” Even if she left the island, she would do so knowing what the hell bonded meant.

  “Where did you hear the term bonded?”

  “I ran into Liam and Silas in North Carolina.”

  “What the hell were they doing there?” he demanded.

  “I guess their sister is a doctor at the hospital…anyway, not important to the story. Well, it is, but not to this part, just the later part, which we can…”

  “Spit it out, Kali.”

  “You lied to me.”

  Now he got to his feet and came at her. “Repeat that.”

  As soon as he touched her, she felt the connection again. Unlike before, when his touch sent her into a sexual frenzy, this time he overwhelmed her with his emotional heart-deep pain. It gave her hope, strength. “You lied by omission. The twins kept saying you haven’t told me something. They seemed to think I would understand the quick healing and challenges as being a part of life. These fights were crucial, not some gang-bangers’ initiation.”

  “What do you want?”

&nbs
p; “I want you to be totally honest with me.”

  “Why? So you can leave again?” His voice reached a near roar.

  “No, so I can understand what I am getting into. So I can understand you.” She reached up to touch his face, unable to stand the pain etched in it. But he jerked back.

  “Fine. Let’s get this over with so you can be on your fucking way.” He pulled at his tie and yanked it from its knot. The shirt came off next with a spray of tiny mother of pearl buttons.

  “Why are you getting naked?” she asked in a voice far huskier than she imagined. To swallow became a chore, as her mouth ran dry.

  “Because, this.” Leonidas stepped out of his pants and the next moment dropped to the floor in the shape of a lion.

  “Well, then,” Kali said because what else could she say. She turned to the door.

  “Kali?” Leonidas’s voice, soft behind her, sent heat to her belly.

  She opened the door. “Jaison, could you have someone get my bags off the boat? Have them brought…” She turned to Leonidas and asked, “Your room?”

  “Our room.”

  “Our room.” She closed the door and leaned against it for support.

  “You’re staying?” The vulnerability in her alpha male broke what little resistance she had left.

  “If you’ll have me.”

  “You aren’t freaked about the shifting thing?”

  She crossed the room and cupped his cheeks. “This pretty well explains all the weird stuff since I first stepped on the island.”

  He kissed her palm. “I should have showed you earlier.”

  “No. I think I needed a week away. I needed to miss you without this bizarre connection between us overwhelming me.”

  “It will ease.”

  “When we bond?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, can we get on with the bonding, please?”

  “Do not joke about it.”

  “I’m not. Why didn’t you do it before?”

  “We weren’t far enough into the Leo’s rule yet.” And, for some reason, with his explanation, everything fell into place. They were tied to the zodiac. “We had to be seven days in.”

  “We are past seven days in.”

  “Oi. And tonight is the full moon.”

  “Does the moon matter?”

  “No, but in your romance books, it does. I thought you would find it romantic.”

  “You didn’t…did you read them?” She couldn’t imagine her alpha male curled up in the corner, reading one of her novels.

  “Jaison read the entire series already and spent the last week, sitting in this office, telling me all about how to woo you back.” He groaned. “He even dog-eared pages he thought I should read for suggestions.”

  “His cold shoulder at the dock almost had me telling the captain to turn around.”

  “It wouldn’t have worked. The boat couldn’t set sail again without my permission.”

  “Let me guess.”

  “He was never getting my permission.”

  “But you were so cold.”

  “I was controlled because the other option was throwing you over my shoulder and locking you in my room until you agreed. I didn’t think acting like a caveman would go over well with my modern human mate.”

  “You could try it and find out.”

  “If we go to bed now, we will bond. Do you understand what that means?”

  “I think so,” she lied. She had no earthly clue what it meant. But it had to be important. She also knew it involved both of them.

  “It means we will be married, but for us there can be no out clause, no divorce.”

  “I don’t want one. But what do I mean to you? Is it only because we are bond mates?”

  “Your question makes no sense to me. If a human said you were his soul mate, would you question it? We just happen to sense immediately who we’re supposed to be with. It isn’t a choice for us because the moment we recognize our mate, they are it for us. Heart, body, and soul. Do I love you? Of course? Is it because the fates decided it? Probably, but does it matter?”

  Could there be more perfect words? Not to her. “Do I have to stay here on the island?”

  “No, though I hope you will. Danial works away for weeks at a time. And there will be times when I have to travel and it might not be to the safest areas of the world, so your traveling with me would be unacceptable.”

  “I’ll love this island even more when it’s only us and I don’t have to be in Jaison’s charge. Once everyone is gone, I’ll have some freedom, won’t I?”

  “At the end of this month, we’ll have weeks where we’re the only ones on the entire island. Freedom from Jaison, yes, but not from me.”

  “I don’t want freedom from you.” She bit her lower lip. “But I do need to help my father while he is in recovery.”

  “I’ve already checked into rehabs on the mainland and, once this month is over and he is ready to travel, we’ll be able to move him into the village.”

  “But how?”

  “This will be the last time Haruo the Asian alpha will be on the Island.”

  “Why? Was he banished?”

  He chucked but sobered immediately. “No. He is very old. In fact, the oldest of our kind at the moment, at 1384 years old.” She stumbled, and he eased her into a chair. “We are not immortal, but we live a long time.”

  “How old are you?”

  “I’ll celebrate 112 on Saturday. Cosima will be seventy-seven in two weeks. Helena is thirty-eight, I think. Her birthday is on the last day before Virgo comes into the power.”

  “Helena is older than I am?”

  “In physical years, yes. But our kind age slowly, for my kind, she is still in her teens.”

  She tried to take in the massive meaning of it all. “So, is Haruo dying?”

  “He and his mate have decided to take the long rest. For us, we decide when we will go. At about nine hundred and fifty years, our bodies begin to age, and many decide then to rest.”

  “Rest?”

  “We take to a tomb deep in the ground and go to sleep in each other’s arms, never to wake up.” He brushed her hair from her eyes. “We have centuries before we even think about this. But Haruo is at his end and happy to have a strong, kind alpha to take over his pride. His apartments in the village are handicapped accessible and perfect for your father’s need. I discussed with him our situation, and he suggested how best to accommodate your family. I have offered to build something new for the Asian alpha to compensate.”

  “You would do all this for me?”

  Brushing her lips, he whispered, “I would give my life for you.”

  “Silas said you should have killed the man in the ring, but you chose banishment instead.”

  “Cedro is banished back to his pride, and Anton is banished from ours at least for the next year. And then, it is up to you if they return to the island.”

  “Why me?”

  “They challenged me over their hatred of humans. My mate, their queen, is human. Their insult is to you.”

  “Is Cedro paralyzed?”

  “No. He climbed into the boat on his own four days ago. He took longer to heal than I thought necessary. I would have preferred he left the next morning, but their alpha came to me to request a delay in his banishment. His alpha and I do not speak unless it’s necessary since I beat him for the position of prime when my father was killed. I have to admit he took a hell of a beating then and has never challenged me again.”

  “Cedro is walking?” He’d said he climbed into the boat, but the nurse in her screamed no one walked away from that kind of fight.

  “Of course. I thought the twins told you about the quick healing.” He indicated the couch. “Let’s move to the sofa. I know this is a great deal to take in. We are shifters of the zodiac sign Leo.”

  “So every sign has its own shifter?”

  “Yes. Once we guarded the gods. Gifted with long life and other abilities, we have survived. Others
like the Minotaur, sphinx, centaurs weren’t so lucky. But we have been able to blend in with the human world. Are you still with me?”

  “I think so.”

  “My parents died thirty-six years ago, both over five hundred years old.”

  “That’s a lot of candles on a cake.” She tried to joke, but the room started to spin. “And you’re going to be 112?”

  “On Saturday.”

  “Happy birthday.”

  “Moró mou, lay down, your color’s not so good.”

  “The room is spinning.”

  “Maybe we should stop for a bit.”

  “No, tell me everything now.”

  He positioned her so her head lay in his lap. “You want me to keep going?”

  “I think so. So, while I grow old, you will stay young and gorgeous.”

  “Humans and shifters mating is new, but we think your life force will merge with mine. Danial is, after all, sixty years old.”

  “Danial is like me?” She opened her eyes. Bad idea, as the room started its circular pattern again.

  “He is.” Leo laid a hand on her forehead, and the spinning stopped. “And there are a few more but not many. What we have figured out so far is human mates tend to be demi-sexual, meaning they aren’t interested in intimacy until they find their mate. Then it’s…”

  “Like being in the center of a firebomb.”

  “Danial described it much the same way. Even twenty years later, he remembers.” Brushing his knuckles down her cheeks, he continued, “There is too much to go through in one sitting, but, if you have any questions, I want to answer them.”

  “I need to know how you feel about me.”

  “You are my other half. The half I have been hunting for decades.”

  “Yet, you let me sail away.”

  “For the time being. My plan had been to follow you tomorrow. Make a day trip after tonight’s moon.”

  “I thought the moon didn’t affect you.”

  “It doesn’t, but there are a great many people who still like to be married under the moon.”

  “Married.”

  “My job isn’t just to beat the crap out of people who challenge me.”

  She covered her face, embarrassed. “I didn’t handle seeing you at the fight the other day well.”

  “There was a reason I asked you not to come.”

  “They said you had lost the fight.”