by Diana Seere
The Billionaire Shifter’s Virgin Mate
Diana Seere
Contents
The Billionaire Shifter’s Virgin Mate
Copyright © 2016 by Diana Seere
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
The Billionaire Shifters Club Series
About the Author
The Billionaire Shifter’s Virgin Mate
by Diana Seere
Welcome to the most exclusive club in the world. The Novo Club. Novo is Latin for “change.” Our members prefer the word “shift” though.
It’s the hottest club in town.
The price of membership is your heart and your secrecy.
All you need to do to join is to be loved beyond your wildest imagination by someone powerful with an…alpha side so primal it’s in their blood.
Are you ready?
Good. Then let’s begin.
The Billionaire Shifters Club is a new series featuring the five Stanton siblings, four brothers and one sister who are all part of an ancient shifter family living in modern America. The subterranean club-within-a-club beneath the streets of Boston, Massachusetts holds secrets only the Stantons and their fellow shifters know.
McDermott "Derry" Stanton is an old-money playboy who sleeps his way through half the world, one willing woman at a time.
A bear shifter, he never hibernates alone. Sometimes even one woman isn't enough.
But when this irresistible billionaire meets Jessica Murphy, everything changes. The man who views life as a female feast suddenly acquires more discerning tastes. The only woman who can satisfy him now...
Is Jessica Murphy. He must have her. Immediately. Frequently.
Jess, however, doesn't want any man, least of all a spoiled playboy who's about to become her brother-in-law. A pre-med student with deep ambitions and a past filled with painful rejection, she's all business.
Too bad Derry Stanton is her business. A frequent customer at the Platinum Club where she waits tables, and now the best man to her maid of honor in her sister's wedding, the guy is everywhere.
And pretty soon, she finds herself everywhere, too.
In his arms, on his bed, between the sheets....
But sex is the last thing she needs.
Or it was until she meets Derry and starts hearing the Beat. And feeling a connection she'd never imagined, never dreamed, never hoped for.
It's all too unbearably good.
The Billionaire Shifter's Virgin Mate is the second book in the Billionaire Shifters Club series by Diana Seere, the paranormal pen name for two New York Times and USA Today bestselling romantic comedy authors. This book is a standalone within a series. Learn more about us on our Diana Seere Facebook page. ;)
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.
Cover design by Diana Seere
Cover photos from depositphotos.com
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Chapter 1
Jess Murphy walked through the wide doors into the opulent lobby below the Platinum Club, surprised by the butterflies fluttering in her stomach. The building was more luxurious than she’d expected, every inch of glass, steel, and marble gleaming like freshly minted coins. Well-dressed men and women hurried around her over the shiny floors.
“Can I help you?” asked a man from behind a vast reception desk decorated with fruit and flowers. He wore a black suit, had gray hair, and sounded like a British butler in a classic film.
“I’m Jessica Murphy,” she said. “I’m, uh, it’s my first night working at the Platinum Club.”
The man tapped something on his screen. “You are expected on eleven,” he said. “You can take either the public or the service elevator.”
She glanced at the posh lobby, the posh people. “I’ll take the service one. Where is it?”
He gestured at a side door behind him.
“Thank you,” she said, taking a deep breath as she walked across the marble floors.
Jess had to remind herself that this was only a waitressing job. There was no reason to be nervous; this wasn’t an important career move for her, just a way to pay for medical school. Because the club’s clientele was so elite, the job paid insanely well, and incoming staff members, at all levels, were screened meticulously.
In fact, she’d been hired almost a month ago, yet this was the first time she was stepping foot in the place. Instead of working tables right away, as she’d expected, she’d had to visit a notary and sign a dozen nondisclosure agreements—and then submit to a background check, personality test, and three phone interviews.
Now, finally, she could actually begin working.
She walked through a doorway into a space that looked older than the lobby, found a vintage-elevator call button, and popped a mint into her mouth as she waited for the car to arrive.
She could imagine her sister Lilah feeling exactly how Jess was feeling now, fighting her nerves on her first day as she thought of all the famous, powerful people upstairs.
Lilah had worked at the Platinum Club until last month, when she’d shacked up with her billionaire love god, Gavin Stanton. In fact, they were already planning their wedding. No more money worries for her.
No more worries of any kind, apparently.
The changes that had come over Lilah in the past couple of months made Jess uncomfortable. She was glad Lilah was happy, but it had happened much too fast. At one point, her sister had been so sex-crazed she’d claimed her rich boyfriend had turned into an animal.
Jess sighed. Lilah had always been too lusty for her own good, too easily enchanted by a pretty face.
Gavin Stanton certainly had that. And the rest of him wasn’t bad either. Not Jess’s type, but… not bad.
Shaking her head, Jess walked into the car—a gorgeous old thing with wood paneling—and pressed the button for the eleventh floor as instructed. Time to focus on the job at hand. Love was the last thing on her agenda. And sex was second to last. If she was going to survive the long slog through med school and internships to become a doctor, she couldn’t get distracted with trivialities. She had to keep her eye on the prize. Work, school, work, school, work. And more work.
The elevator stopped, not on the eleventh floor, but the tenth. Jess looked down at herself, uneasy with the tight jeans and T-shirt she wore. They’d told her the club would provide a uniform when she arrived. Hopefully whoever joined her in the elevator was just another wage slave, not anyone important in management. She wanted to make a good impre
ssion on her first day. Her impressively curvy figure looked respectable in formal clothes, but in a T-shirt, her F-cup chest had a knack for distracting people.
Damn, I should’ve worn a jacket. But it had been so hot today. Autumn in Boston could still get steamy.
The doors slid open, revealing an extremely tall, thickly muscular man with long black hair and bright blue eyes that slid over her body so thoroughly she sucked in a breath.
Talk about steamy. Now this guy was her type. He was huge. Dark. Powerful.
Dangerous.
She felt beads of sweat form at the small of her back, under her breasts, her arms. What had he bathed in that morning—testosterone? She could smell it. She could taste it. She couldn’t help sucking it in, breath after breath, eager for another hit.
A slow smile spread over his full, sensual lips. “Why, hello there,” he said. Was that a British accent?
Every alarm bell she had was clamoring so loudly in her head, she was amazed she’d been able to hear him speak.
“Hi,” she said, stepping aside instinctively. Getting too close to this man would be a mistake.
“I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure.” Oh, crap. It was a British accent. He held out a hand. “McDermott Stanton. My intimates call me Derry.” The way he said intimates made her toes curl.
Stanton? Her sister’s new squeeze was a Stanton and a member of this fancy club. Gingerly she took his hand. “Any relation to Gavin Stanton?”
As he squeezed her hand between two massive palms, the wine-red birthmark on her neck, presently hidden under expensive concealer, began to tingle and burn.
“If you’re here to see my brother,” he said, his slanted brows coming together in a frown, “my condolences. He’s recently become engaged.” Then he grinned, white teeth flashing, as the elevator began to rise. “But I, as it happens, have not.”
This flirting had to stop. She pulled her hand free. “Lilah’s my sister.”
His grin, however, only widened. “What good fortune, then, that we should meet.”
“I’m going to be working here,” she said. “You’ll see me all the time.”
“My fortune grows.”
She fixed him with her best balls-shriveling stare. “I won’t get personally involved with any of the members. I’ve signed a contract.”
“Contracts don’t apply to family members, surely,” he said, looking wounded. “Even Eva wouldn’t be so cruel.”
Eva was the woman at the employment agency who had hired her. “We’re not family yet,” she said. Why was the elevator taking so long? They only had to go one floor, damn it. She moved past him and stabbed the button again. At last it began to rise. So did the temperature. Turning away from him, she took a deep breath and pretended her heart wasn’t racing like a hummingbird on meth.
Being close to him made her feel strange, as if he’d sucked up all the oxygen.
“No,” he agreed. “Not yet.”
Him, a voice inside her said. She started, the word crystal clear, as if someone were standing behind her and whispering it straight to her soul.
The car came to a stop. She pressed the button to open the doors. Yeah, it was him all right—too much blue-eyed brawn for such a small, dark, enclosed space. His cologne filled her nose with an intoxicating blend of spice and leather, blanketing her brain in a rosy fog. She wasn’t a fool; she knew she could be as hormonally affected as other people. The trick was not to trigger the hormones in the first place.
As soon as the doors were open wide enough, she strode off the car into a brightly lit hallway.
“Such a pleasure,” Derry’s voice rumbled behind her, rich and smooth as honey.
She waved but didn’t turn around.
It had been pleasurable. Far too much.
Derry made a dismissive snort and shook his head twice, quickly, like a dog ridding itself of something annoying. That was quite the brush-off. He opened his hand and pressed the palm against a piece of stainless steel. Anyone who did not know about the ultraexclusive Novo Club eight floors beneath the ground would think nothing of the spot.
Derry, unlike most people, knew damn well. You had to be a bit of an animal to be a member.
Or more than a bit.
His phone buzzed in his pants. Funny how they were a little tighter than usual. That long brown hair. Those eyes. The slope of her cheekbone. The tightness at her throat as she struggled with her own arousal. He’d smelled it.
To his shock, upon entering the elevator he had felt the tingling in his nerves that signaled the beginning of a shift. Even now his tailored shirt strained against the expanding muscles in his shoulders and the hair that was thickening all over his body.
What the hell was wrong with him? He hadn’t shifted involuntarily since the first flush of puberty decades ago. He shook his head again, more roughly this time, and struggled to free his phone from his tightening pocket.
The damn thing was like a child’s dollhouse book in his giant hands. Fumbling, he finally slid the lock and barked into the mouthpiece.
“Stanton,” he snapped.
“Stanton squared.”
“Oh. It’s you, Gavin. Just met your future sister-in-law. She’s a… treat.” He sniffed the air, catching the last of her scent. Mint, dog shampoo, roses, and rubbing alcohol. Now that was a combination. Was she a veterinarian?
That would be a bit serendipitous.
“Don’t even think about it, Derry,” his brother warned. The threat was implied.
The growl was real.
“Too late. I was thinking about it long before I laid eyes on her,” Derry said airily. He loved taunting Gavin about as much as Gavin loved watching his precious football team, the New England Patriots.
“She’s off limits.”
Derry raised his eyebrows and held the phone away from his ear in mock shock. “You think that will stop me?”
“She’s not your type.”
“She has tits and a pussy, no? Then she’s my type. In fact, she could have a secret penis and—”
“We are not going to rehash that Bangkok trip. My bank account still has flashbacks. You cost me a solid five figures in bribes to get you out,” Gavin chided.
Derry sighed, Jess—Jessica?—Lilah’s sister’s scent permeating his thoughts. Something about her was appealing in a Jane Austen sort of way. She was closed off and rather prim. A career woman, he imagined. Someone who wouldn’t give a playboy billionaire rake the time of day.
And yet… why did her scent bedevil him? It should have dissipated by now. And the itch to shift into his other form was still strong, nagging with a persistence that confounded him.
“Derry? You there?” Gavin sounded annoyed. Derry knew it was less about Lilah’s sister and more about being ignored.
“Where else would I go?” Derry asked, looking around the tiny elevator. It felt like a coffin.
“You will not come on to her, make passes at her, brush up against her, kiss her, fondle her—”
“Are you reading from a contract, Gavin?” Derry asked in alarm. Gavin was the type to actually have a contract for this sort of thing.
“No. But I can have my lawyers draw one up if need be.”
See?
“I get the picture,” Derry mumbled. “Virgin sister-in-law is kryptonite. No touching.”
“No thinking.”
“You can’t censor my fantasies,” Derry insisted. Thank God.
“I would if I thought it would do any good.”
Ding! The elevator stopped, and the doors slid open as if propelled by magic. Morgan, the Novo Club’s stalwart master, stood holding a tray with Derry’s favorite drink.
Home Sweet Club.
Her.
That damn woman’s scent grew stronger. How could that be? She wasn’t here. She wasn’t a shifter.
“Derry?” Gavin’s voice held a question, and it wasn’t, Are you there?
“Fine, fine. I have hundreds of other women I can substitute for your
future wife’s sister. I’ll console myself with the runners-up for Miss Universe.”
“I’m sure you can find one to keep you occupied,” his brother said as Derry took the drink and nodded thanks to Morgan, who disappeared.
Derry took a sip of fifty-year-old Glenfiddich scotch. The slightly woody taste of dark berries, almond, smoke, and warm oak made him relax and smolder at the same time. The scotch was infuriatingly delicious.
It tasted and smelled exactly like Jessica Murphy, damn it.
“One? Oh, you think so small, Gavin. I intend to have them all. Tonight. At the same time.”
Gavin laughed and ended the call, leaving Derry with his scotch.
And the lingering scent of a woman he’d just promised he would never touch.
Chapter 2
Jess closed her eyes and took a head-clearing breath before setting out to find Molly Sloan, the woman who was going to fit her into a uniform for the evening. She hoped Molly, whoever she was, carried a wide range of sizes. It wasn’t just her chest. She was large all over. From painful experience, any job or activity that required a uniform made her nervous.
She glanced back at the elevator. Not nervous the way the huge, delicious guy who would soon be her brother-in-law made her nervous. That was a hot, sticky, thrilling kind of nervous. The kind she was careful to avoid.
No, preparing for this job made her cold and careful. If they wouldn’t accept her generous figure, tough. Lilah hadn’t said anything, but Jess was a little larger than her sister, maybe just enough to be outside their range of cocktail-server uniforms. If that was the case, she was happy to wear her own clothes. She hoped they would be reasonable.
Whoever they were. Where was this Molly person she was supposed to meet? She walked over to a door across from the elevator, which was slightly ajar, and stuck her head inside. “Hello?”
A muffled voice reached her from the floor to the left. “Sorry! Just a minute!”
Jess opened the door and walked inside a bright, airy space that appeared to be a fashion boutique. Mirrors on one wall, tons of clothes artfully displayed on round racks and low tables, long shelves of shoes, a lounge area, and small doors in the back, apparently for changing.
