by Diana Seere
The man just blinked.
“Excuse me?”
While Zach rubbed his jaw and tried to get blood to return to his painfully numb chin, he watched the two of them going at it with a wry sense of amusement. They were oblivious, weren’t they? The raw sexual charge between them might as well have been arcs of electricity on a Van de Graaff machine, Sam’s righteous indignation a fair match for Asher’s cold domination over all things shifter.
“You,” she said, punctuating the word with her finger poking Asher’s chest, “turned a perfectly reasonable scientific discussion about fertility and sperm samples into a dirty joke in my presence, and then you have the gall to blame Zach? You’re a piece of work, Asher Stanton.”
“As are you, Samantha,” Asher said in a low voice. “Your response leaves much to be desired.”
“Oh? Really? Tell me. What am I supposed to say when you punch Zach like that?”
“A cultured woman would say ‘thank you’ and recognize it as a gesture designed to protect your reputation.”
“My what? Did I blink and we’ve gone back two hundred years, Mr. Darcy? Good grief. My reputation is built on my academic and science career, you chauvinistic, anachronistic, out-of-touch ass!”
Asher gave Zach a look that shouldn’t have happened, but did. It was a look he’d seen before between men.
“Now apologize,” Sam demanded.
“No, really, Asher,” Zach started, palms up.
Asher held up one finger to silence him, then said, “I apologize for openly referencing your penis in front of Dr. Baird. It appears she has never had a conversation about cocks before and is scandalized. I am sorry to have caused so much trauma to an obviously virginal woman with such delicate sensibilities,” Asher said, his voice so deadpan Zach didn’t realize what he was doing until it was too late.
Sam’s already-red face turned an obscene shade of purple as she took in the words.
“That’s—that’s not what I meant!” she screeched.
“And Dr. Baird, I assure you that your academic and scientific achievements have been well documented and trigger great admiration in me. Any insecurities you may feel about defending the honor of your intellect are yours and yours alone. Perhaps they originate in some form of Imposter Syndrome from which you suffer?”
“You! I! What?” she huffed.
Asher pulled Zach aside, leaving an apoplectic Sam standing a few feet away, making sounds of outrage that were rising in intensity.
As if she didn’t exist, Asher faced Zach calmly and said, “I came here to warn you about Tomas Nagy.”
“What about him?”
“Based on information I am receiving, he has developed an interest in you.”
Zach went cold.
“What?” Sam overheard the conversation and gasped. “Tomas knows about Zach?”
“Of course he does,” Asher said, looking annoyed. “The man has spies everywhere, just like we do.” He returned his attention to Zach. “Beware. When you return to Boston, always act as if you’re being followed.”
“By him?”
“By him. And us. We’ll have extra security set up for you—”
Zach cut him off fast. “Absolutely not. No.”
“You don’t have a choice,” Asher replied.
There was that phrase again.
“Asher,” Sam said, trying to get his attention. He acted like she wasn’t there.
“No, Asher. You don’t have a choice. I’m done here.” The memory of Sophia’s exit made his heart hurt. “Done. I’m going back to Boston, back to my old life.” He gave Sam an uncertain look as she tried again to get Asher’s attention. “I think I’ll start job hunting. LupiNex isn’t exactly the best environment for me.”
“What? No! You can’t leave,” Sam cried out. She turned to Asher again, waving her hand in his face. “And I am trying to speak to you, Asher!”
“You do not need to work,” Asher said crisply to Zach, ignoring her. “Gavin’s company provided more than enough money to keep you in the lifestyle to which you are accustomed. It’s the least he could have done.”
The trust money. Zach knew about it in theory, the lawyers and financial advisors explaining it all while he was hospitalized at LupiNex, but…
“I’m a working man, Asher. I’m not one to tolerate being idly rich.”
Asher sniffed. “I would hardly call your settlement ‘rich.’”
“It is eight figures.”
“And your point is?” Asher looked confused.
“Never mind.”
“Oof!” Asher winced and suddenly bent down, just slightly, as Zach saw Sam’s high heel spike drive itself into the tip of Asher’s dress shoe.
“And you! You are a beastly, self-centered jerk who thinks he has the right to control other people, but you don’t, Asher Stanton!”
“I see I’m not the only person who cannot help using violence to make a point, Samantha,” Asher replied, giving her a look with so much repressed lust Zach nearly blushed.
“You are impossible!” she exclaimed, turning away, practically running down the stairs in the second display of an irate woman leaving the boathouse that Zach had personally witnessed in the past fifteen minutes.
“Is she gone?” Asher asked, not turning around to see for himself.
“Yes.”
“Good. Now I can have the real conversation I came to have with you.”
“Me? You started the conversation with a sucker punch. I’d hate to see what’s next.”
Asher blinked rapidly, his face a mask again. “I am relieved you denied my sister her wish, and I want to commend you for it.”
“What?”
“She has Baby Fever. It is a strong force and usually one that only comes when you find true love, but you yourself told me you did not feel the Beat, yes?”
“Right,” Zach repeated, lying again.
“A relief.” Asher gave a slight smile. “Sophia is likely on her way to Boston by now. I assume you’ll return there too?”
“Yes.”
“And you will leave her alone.” It wasn’t a question.
“I’ll—what?”
“Man to man, shifter to… whatever you are,” Asher said pointedly. “Sophia is a billionaire heiress with a steel will who is also a bear shifter. It will take a very, very special shifter to meet her needs. Not a human who was injected with a small amount of serum and whose future remains uncertain.”
Uncertain.
“What do you mean?”
“Zachary, let me be blunt.”
“If this is you pussyfooting around the truth, what the hell does your version of blunt look like?”
“You don’t know whether you can father children.”
“So we’re back to talking about my cock?”
“And we don’t know how much of the DNA has actually become part of you. Webb didn’t die at our hands, you know.”
“But you said—”
“I said he was dead. Not that we killed him.”
Stunned into silence, Zach just stared at him.
“Webb died after shifting into a multi-animal creature of barbaric proportions,” Asher explained.
Edward’s question made so much sense suddenly. “How many animals do you become?” took on a deeper meaning.
“Oh God,” Zach murmured, horrified.
“And then he… devolved.”
“Devolved?”
“His body collapsed in on itself as he shifted back into something not quite human. It was as if he had turned inside out.”
Zach became sick to his stomach.
“I tell you this not to alarm you and not to be cruel. You are a man of science. You respect facts and truths.”
“I do.” His belly roiled. Some facts were nearly unbearable to hear. He steeled himself for more. “And?”
“And what?”
“What else should I know about the only other human who ever took the serum?”
“He was a slimy, unctuous, deceptiv
ely evil piece of excrement who became Tomas Nagy’s henchman.”
“Got it.”
“You are still an unknown variable, Zach. You’ve proven yourself here, on the ranch. I thank you from the bottom of my soul for your help in delivering the babies. But being with Sophia would be a tragic mistake. Your body could experience changes we cannot predict. You could experience health crises, be targeted by rival shifters, or—”
Zach held up a palm. “Got it. No need to elaborate.”
“I’ve already called Roger. A second plane is ready to take you to Boston. Sophia commandeered the earlier jet.”
“Only two in the Stanton family?” Zach joked, trying to distract himself from the harsh reality of Asher’s facts.
“It is time for a third,” Asher said seriously, taking Zach’s comment at face value. “I never could have predicted my siblings’ deep connections to Boston and need to jet between Montana and Massachusetts.”
“Well, I just need a one-way ticket. I’m never coming back, Asher.”
“For everyone’s sake, good.”
“And don’t worry,” Zach said quietly, talking around the lump of emotion in his throat. “Given all the unknowns about my body, my future, my life, I agree. Being with Sophia is the worst action I could take, for us both.”
“Indeed. It is, I must say, a joy to converse with a man so rational about his emotions.”
“It is?”
“My siblings all lack such common sense. They’ve paired up with humans in spite of my orders not to.”
“They seem like they’re all in love.”
“That is beside the point.” Asher put his hand on Zach’s shoulder. “Love is the single most destructive force in the universe. Using it to guide one’s choices is a fool’s errand.”
“We can’t choose who we love,” Zach argued.
“No. But we can choose whether to give in to those emotions. Sometimes the best way to love someone is to let them go, for their own good.”
For their own good.
Zach closed his eyes for a second. Two seconds. Five.
And heard only his own heart beating.
Chapter 15
One week later, in the back seat of her Boston limo, Sophia applied another layer of mascara and a swipe of lipstick. She had one thing on her mind.
Tradition.
Until this year, she’d spent every autumn of her postpubescent life seeking out sexual partners to slake her thirst for the quiet winter months ahead. Like a squirrel, she felt the urge to stock up on nuts. Lots and lots of nuts. Why should this year be any different? Just because she’d heard the Beat with a creature incapable of returning the favor didn’t mean she should sob, pitiful and alone, in her big, empty cabin in Montana. Quite the opposite. What better time to return to the habits that had kept her happy all these years?
Forcing a smile, she got out of the car and looked up at the luxury skyscraper that housed the Platinum Club.
“Looking beautiful as ever, Ms. Stanton,” the driver said. “Shall I wait here or come back at a particular time?”
She took off her jacket and flung it into the car, leaving her only in heels and a sleeveless crimson sheath dress with a high-altitude slit up one side. If she’d been wearing underwear, it would’ve ruined the effect. “You’d better wait. I’ll be returning home with a companion or two very soon.”
“Very good,” he said.
It better be, she thought as she went into the lobby, her stilettos pinging on the marble. She checked her face one more time in a mirrored wall before taking the private elevator up to the Plat. It was a Thursday night, not the best time for hookups, but she’d never worried about days of the week and wasn’t going to start now.
The Novo Club downstairs would have shifter men who might be more adventurous, but she knew most of them too well already. Tonight she wanted the bliss of anonymity. Or at least a man who was anonymous to her. Everyone at the Platinum knew Sophia Stanton. It made life easier for her when she didn’t have to explain what she wanted.
Sex. Now, her place, no rules, no strings. Unless she was the one tying the knots.
“Evening, Ms. Stanton,” the bartender said from behind the bar.
“Please call me Sophia, Carl,” she said absently, scanning the lounge. She’d told the Plat’s bartender to use her first name many times, but he insisted on keeping it formal, as if she might be misled about his sexual orientation if he got too personal. The man was clearly interested in the same gender as she was. In fact, she’d relied on his observant gaze for years. She leaned against the bar, letting her long, exposed leg flash everyone around her. “Any particularly tasty fish in the pond tonight, darling?”
Shaking her martini, he glanced over her left shoulder. “How many?” he asked quietly. He poured her cocktail, knowing to skip the olive, which she hated.
She picked up the glass and plastered a hungry grin on her face she didn’t feel. “Two, I think. Three if they fit together nicely. I’d hate to break up a set.” She’d fake it until she made it. She sipped the martini and tapped the bar to let Carl know she’d want another. For some reason she felt the need for chemical stimulation tonight.
That damn Beat. That damn serum. Damn it all for ruining a good life.
No. It had almost ruined her, but she was fighting back.
“Those two over there aren’t too bad,” Carl said. “One of them has a hit series on HBO. The other is an Australian surfer who’s making a fortune in licensing deals.”
It was easy to pinpoint the two men he meant in the crowd. Both were gorgeous, one dark, one blond. “I don’t care about his money,” she mumbled, looking into her glass. The buzz would be too slow to come, so she set it down, impatient to get her business over with. Once she captured her prizes and got them home, she could enjoy herself. They were watching her now, their hungry eyes betraying their obvious interest. “Anyone else trying to get a hook in them tonight?”
“Eva seemed to appreciate the surfer,” Carl said in a low voice, chuckling. “But it was doomed from the start. She hates the water.”
Sophia smiled. Eva, a distant cousin who managed the club, was a cat shifter. Carl was human but knew a lot of secrets about their family. Sophia suspected his discretion had earned him quite a fortune of his own.
“Wish me luck,” Sophia said with a sigh. She pushed away from the bar.
Before she’d taken two steps, Carl said, “Sophia?”
She turned, surprised by his use of her first name. “Yes?”
“Are you all right?”
The genuine concern in his voice and the tender goodwill in his kind eyes made her pause. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Just wondering. I’d hate to see my favorite Stanton unhappy.”
“I’m fine. Thank you.”
But when she turned away to resume her hunt, she had to blink away tears.
No. Stop it. You can do this.
Pushing her hair over one shoulder, she walked up to the men who stood around a small, high table. “Good evening,” she said. She looked directly at one man, then the other.
The fair-haired one flushed a delicious shade of sunburn. “Hi,” he said.
She wasn’t impressed. Cute but not exactly articulate.
“Beautiful dress,” said the other man, the actor. He added a leer to give it emphasis.
Oh come on, was that as good as they could do?
“I’m Sophia,” she said.
“We know,” the surfer said. His Australian lilt should have charmed her, but she had to stop herself from rolling her eyes.
“We were hoping to meet you,” the actor said. “Came here for that very reason, in fact. Had to wait in line for an hour to get into this part of the club.”
Instead of pleasing her, she found the information nauseating. What was she, a new iPhone? A shiny trinket to brag about online? Would they expect photographs with the famous object for proof of purchase to impress their friends, the
world?
She looked away and took a deep breath. This wasn’t their fault. They were gorgeous, sexually vital creatures who were looking to satisfy their needs, just as she was. Just as she’d done many, even countless, times in the past.
Attitude determinedly restored, she turned back to the men. “My limo is waiting downstairs. Feel like going for a ride?”
They glanced at each other like two teenage girls about to break curfew and crash a frat party, weighing the payoff against the danger.
“Absolutely,” the actor said first.
“Oh yeah,” the surfer agreed.
She pivoted on her heel and headed for the public elevator, not even bothering to look behind her and confirm they were following. Honestly, she didn’t much care. Somebody would follow her. Other men had noticed her arrival and were enviously watching her progress with these two men. If they chickened out, others would accept the challenge.
She jabbed the elevator call button.
Once, a man had said no. Right here at this elevator. He’d looked as hungry as the rest of them did, but something had stopped him.
She clenched her fists. She wouldn’t think about Zach. When the elevator arrived, she put an arm around each of the men’s waists and escorted them onto the car, bumping her hips against theirs, piercing them with sexually suggestive looks.
Doing anything to make herself feel something.
When the doors closed, the actor slid a hand under the slit in her dress, over her thigh, far enough for his fingers to graze her pussy, and squeezed.
Before she knew what she was doing, she’d decked him.
Zach stared at his bank balance. He should be smiling.
He wasn’t.
It had been a week since his departure from Montana, and he was still processing everything he’d been through. LupiNex had, indeed, given him a generous settlement. He never, ever needed to work. Being idle wasn’t in his nature—even his new, primal nature. Boredom was a kind of illness, Zach succumbing every day he had nothing to do.
And while boredom never actually killed anyone, it could cripple.
Sam had made it clear that if he wanted his old job back, he could have it. While Zach doubted she possessed the authority to make that decision, he found it intriguing. Asher Stanton would love to have Zach back at work, he was sure. Back at LupiNex, under surveillance he could monitor via his brother Gavin.
