Daddy Shifter's Fake Fiance (Stonybrooke Shifters)

by Leela Ash

  ***

  Leandro whistled to himself as he emerged from the bathroom. The world suddenly seemed brighter. He felt more cheerful and happier than he could remember. He was interested in finding out more about Alexandra, he wanted to know everything! That was a first for him, most women he dated, he barely knew more than their first names. There was just something unique about her. As much as he was captivated, it also that scared the hell out of him. At some level though, he thought, maybe that’s what I have needed – someone who can really see me.

  He loved her, he realized. He waited to feel choked or trapped but all he felt was exhilarated.

  He would tell her the truth today, he decided.

  “Alexandra?” he called as he dried his hair with a towel, looking around the room. It was empty. Where had she gone? He strode into the adjourning bedroom, but she was not there either.

  A niggle of unease trickled down his spine and he immediately swung about the room, searching wildly for something. He didn’t know what it was but he couldn’t shake the sudden feeling in his guts that there was something he should look out for. His eyes fell on the open briefcase and with a sense of dread, he walked closer. Instantly he knew what had happened. Dammit, he thought to himself. She had found the pictures and the bid. What a mess. He had not gone through the papers yet, but he knew, essentially what he had asked his people investigate for him. He picked up the first document and his jaw tightened as he read what was written on it; the idiot had even detailed where she shopped for lingerie!

  Had she seen these? Of course she had.

  Hurriedly he shoved his legs into his pants and dragged a tee-shirt over his head. He barely remembered to shove his foot into his loafers before he was barreling towards the elevator. He reached her room and shoved open the door; it was just as he had feared! All her belongings were gone.

  Cursing in rapid Spanish,”Mierda, mierda, mierda” Leandro rushed downstairs, his heart in his throat as he looked over the crowd for any glimpse of her.

  “Where is she?” he demanded of the receptionist.

  The young woman took one look at him. All of the staff knew exactly who he was. She responded without asking who he meant, “She left Sir. She checked out.”

  “When?” he bit out so furiously, that the startled receptionist drew back.

  “A few minutes ago Sir. She was in quite a hurry.”

  “Did you see which way she went?”

  “No. But I’ll take a wild stab and say she was heading for the airport.”

  Leandro didn’t wait to hear more; he left at a run, searching even as he headed for the door. But she was already gone. Weakly, he sank onto the pavement in front of the hotel. Whatever brightness had illuminated his day a scant twenty minutes ago had gone out completely.

  Chapter Six

  Alexandra Jordan was a mess. It had been seven weeks since she’d left Hawaii and while Lead Inc had not contacted them at all, she had been unable to get its conniving CEO out of her mind.

  She had also been a nightmare to be around at work because she was so sensitive these days that the least thing set her off. In a single day, she had berated her CFO, fired a janitor and sent two new interns crying from her office after an intense scolding.

  Three weeks after she had returned, the tension around her had been so palpable that Claire had pulled her aside and reminded her she was supposed to have gone on the break to relax and not to return an ogre. She had the temperament of a bear with a sore paw and she knew it.

  When she had noticed that her normally stoic secretary now blanched every single time she so much as looked at the woman, and that even Claire was giving her a wide berth, she had gone home and had a good crying session just to get it all out of her system. These days she was more withdrawn and quiet which was a decided improvement from her earlier raging-bitch persona.

  The past week, she had forced smiles until her cheeks hurt. She had smiled for real though when she learned that Beautiful Designs had somehow clinched the Alistairs Plc contract. Things were looking up, she had thought as she joined her colleagues for a toast in celebration.

  But just when she had started to convince herself that Leandro was not worth her tears, her doctor had delivered what might have been amazing news under other circumstances, but felt pretty grim as things stood now; she was pregnant!

  She had lost some weight, rather than gain some as one might expect, and the bags under her eyes were so prominent they threatened to dwarf her nose. She hadn’t been sleeping much either, she admitted but all that had to change now that she had a baby to think of. She looked around at the park; it was midday and she was pretty much alone. A few kids played in a nearby swing set while adults sat on some benches similar to hers, watching over them.

  Alexandra’s hand rested both pensively as well as protectively on her stomach as she leaned back against the park bench and shut her eyes. She wasn’t showing yet but she already loved the tiny human being inside of her with all her heart. It wasn’t its fault that its father was a two-faced rat! But still, this was not how it was supposed to be!

  “May I sit?” an achingly familiar voice said from right in front of her.

  Alexandra’s eyes flew open disbelievingly. She couldn’t believe her eyes. The two-faced rat was standing right in front of her looking so unbearably handsome that she unconsciously started to grind her teeth. He was wearing a pair of well-washed jeans and a tee-shirt with simple sneakers and yet somehow he managed to look utterly respectable, male and delicious. He was also slimmer than she remembered; he actually looked a little gaunt.

  “What are you doing here?” she whispered, her throat almost closing up. She had been torturing herself with images of his handsome, lying face since Hawaii but seeing him in the flesh was even more painful than her fevered anticipation had imagined.

  “I need to talk to you Alexandra. You left the Island in a hurry and I had no chance to ”

  “To seduce me further just so you could get me to reveal secrets about my business? Well you failed; we got the contract!” she cut in acidly.

  “Cara mia, I’ve hurt you but you will let me make amends yes?” he said, his Spanish accent thicker as he dropped his long frame onto the bench beside her.

  Alexandra felt as though the entire air around them reverberated with the very force of his presence and vitality. She edged away from him a little on the bench.

  “Alexandra? Come on, don’t avoid me, Cara mia,” he pleaded, his hand grabbing hers to still her nervous movements.

  “You have a lot of nerve showing your face here,” Alexandra spat jerking her arm from his light grasp. “So all you wanted was a contract and you had to sleep with me too? The humiliation couldn’t just end at me warming up to you? You could have simply asked me to withdraw as a friend and I would have considered it. You didn’t have to pretend to like me and actually fucking take me to your bed!”

  Pun was really not her strong suit, she thought distractedly.

  “It looks bad I know, but I swear it was nothing like that,” he said gruffly, taking her hand in his.

  She sprung to her feet, flinging off his hand, her heart racing as she said frigidly, “Leave me the hell alone.”

  Something glinted fleetingly in his dark eyes but was gone before she could ascertain what it was and he said, “I can’t. I have tried a thousand times to let you go but I can’t. I tried to forget you. I can’t undo what is done.”

  “You’re damn right you can’t! I hate you and I curse the day I met you,” she lied.

  Leandro looked weary and deflated all of a sudden and Alexandra felt her heart constrict in her chest as she looked at him. In this moment he didn’t look the part of some corporate raider as she had painted him; he looked almost like a little boy whose heart was breaking.

  “I never set out to seduce you. I came to Hawaii to persuade you to withdraw Beautiful Designs from the bid. Lead Inc has been trying to take over some companies, mostly subsidiaries of Alistairs Plc an
d this contract would have been like a leg in the door for us. Before I met you, it was just business, but once I saw you, I had to have you. I wanted to be with you, I should say. Seducing you was never my agenda. I swear it. I tried everything I could to stay away but I just could not forget you. Now that I know you exist, nothing is the same. All that I have accomplished means nothing without you. I was going to tell you everything that last day but you found out on your own before I had the chance.”

  “Yeah you should have done a better job of hiding the papers I said,” she said bitingly.

  He sighed, “That was the worst day of my life.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet.”

  “Alexandra, I pulled Lead Inc out of the bid. That was the first thing I did when I returned. You can verify from them, I swear. I didn’t want to take it away from you; not if it meant I would lose you.”

  Her heart thudded in her chest. He had pulled out of the contract when it meant so much to his company?

  Alexandra took a quick step back as Leandro rose to his feet and took her hand in his once more. “I’m sorry Alexandra. Please forgive me? I feel like I know you as much as I know my own self. Can’t you see? You are a part of me and I am a part of you. Our meeting was a gift. Can’t you see that?”

  “You only know so much about me because you read it up in some report!”

  “I never read the report. In fact I had only just printed them out that same morning. I never read them I swear. Our connection surprised me too. You are the funniest, kindest, sweetest, most beautiful woman I know.”

  His dark eyes stared into hers, open and searching and she read the blazing sincerity and remorse in his gaze. She believed him, she realized.

  Her resistance melted away and she nodded, “Okay fine. No harm done.”

  “There’s something else.”

  “Huh?”

  Before her surprised eyes, he went down on one knee and pulled a little black box from his pocket, his dark eyes gleaming as he looked up at her. Alexandra’s throat closed up as she stared at him, her hands flying to her mouth when the box opened to reveal the biggest and most amazingly cut diamond she had ever seen in her life.

  “I love you Alexandra. I know I absolutely do not deserve you but will you make me the happiest man on earth and say you’ll marry me?”

  “I I’m pregnant,” she blurted instead.

  His eyes widened in surprise even as his gaze automatically dropped to her flat stomach before flicking up to her face.

  “You’re” he began hesitantly.

  Alexandra nodded, happy tears springing into her eyes as she grinned down at him. He rose to his feet immediately and gathered her into his arms, his hands encircling her waist as he crushed her to him.

  “You’re perfect. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted,” he breathed against her lips. His kiss was tender and gentle. His tongue stroked hers sweetly sending waves of a calm and soothing peace shooting through her nerve endings as she clung to him. An almost indescribable feeling of happiness washed over her.

  “You never answered my question,” he reminded her, lifting his head and looking into her eyes with all the love in the world shining from his.

  “Yes Leandro, I’ll marry you. I love you too,” she told him.

  As she kissed him, all the walls around her heart melted away completely leaving her free to embrace this wonderful love that was hers to savor forever.

  THE END

  Wealthy Famous Hot and Mine

  Katrina Bliss

  Copyright ©2016 by Katrina Bliss. All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic of mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Chapter 1

  Erin, to the displeasure of her family and now her best friend Alicia, never liked the beach. Even as a child, she had always been a mountain person. To arrive at a compromise with Alicia, they picked a cabin at the foot of a valley, beside a lake, as their vacation spot. Not that Alicia accepted it as much of a compromise.

  They were sitting in rocking chairs on the balcony of the cabin with a view of the mossy green, serenely quiet lake before them.

  “Isn’t this charming?” Erin asked and took a sip from the steaming mug of hot chocolate she had been cradling in her hands. She saw Alicia roll her eyes. “What? What now?” Erin asked, shaking her head.

  “Where are the waves? The half-naked chiseled men showing off their torsos? The frozen margaritas and the sunscreen lotion? This is for middle-aged people, Erin!” Alicia drained her own hot chocolate into her mouth and sighed. Erin couldn’t help but smile, her best friend had always had a knack for drama.

  “You haven’t even given it a chance yet, Alicia. We’ve been here exactly what? Ten hours? And you’re making it sound like we’ve been stuck here forever. Besides, I’m nursing a broken heart and should be made to feel warm and comforted.” Erin pouted her lips. If Alicia knew how to exaggerate her misery, Erin had a few of her own tricks up her sleeves. Alicia sprang up from her chair and lunged towards Erin to give her a tight hug.

  “I’m sorry, cutie. Forget I said anything. You’re right, we need to concentrate on you.” She had crouched down beside Erin now and the two girls exchanged smiles.

  “I hope you haven’t been going through the messages again, Erin?” Alicia straightened her back, stood up and tightened her wrap around her shoulders. Erin sighed and shook her head.

  “No, I haven’t been doing that. I’ve taken the battery out of my phone and hidden it at the bottom of my suitcase.” She watched Alicia make her way back to her rocking chair and settle down.

  “How does that help? You’ve not exactly hidden it from yourself if you know where it is.” Alicia reached for Erin’s mug of hot chocolate.

  “No, but in my moment of weakness, having to take all my clothes and stuff out of the suitcase to reach the battery will give me enough time to calm myself and change my mind.” Erin allowed the mug to slip out of her hands and rubbed her palms together. If the temperature dropped any further, the caretaker of the lodge promised that the lake would freeze over. Erin secretly wished that would happen. She wanted the lake to freeze, for translucent icicles to drop down and then freeze mid-way from the pine tree leaves around them. She was hoping that the bitter cold would numb her heart and muscles and stop herself from physically aching.

  She hadn’t realized when Alicia had reached out and was gently rubbing the side of her arm. She threw her friend a gentle thankful look.

  “Thanks for coming, Alicia. I really do appreciate it.” Her voice squeaked as she spoke and she saw how Alicia flinched. Neither of them was accustomed to Erin being the one in need of support and comfort. They had been friends since Kindergarten and Alicia had always been the one to throw a fit, cry over the men in her life. Erin was the stoic one.

  “I really hate him. I hate Steve. If I see him I’d ̶ ” Alicia was spitting the words out and Erin interrupted her.

  “Forget it. Let’s just not talk about it.”

  “But we need to talk about it, Erin. The guy cheated on you, had been cheating on you for several months. You can’t just pretend that you’ll be able to distract yourself from it for the rest of your life.” Alicia was still drinking Erin’s hot chocolate.

  “I just don’t want to talk about it now, that’s all.” Erin couldn’t keep the annoyance out of her voice. She knew Alicia was trying to help, was trying to be a friend but she didn’t want to turn into a cranky cry baby.

  “This is exactly the reason why you end up going through old messages and emails. Because you’re not venting.” Alicia handed the half empty mug of hot chocolate back to Erin and stood up from her chair.

  “Where are you going?” Erin was predicting a dramatic quarrel between the two of them. A day would never be complete if they didn’t go through one of these.

  “
I’m going to have a long hot bath, drink some wine and then try and persuade Ms. Carter to light the fire. I’m freezing out here.” Alicia was already halfway back into the cabin. She held the door open with her other hand fixed on her hip.

  “You coming in?” she asked Erin, but only got a shake of the head in response.

  “Just don’t stay out here too long. Come find me soon?” She sighed as she went inside and Erin grinned and drank some of the remaining bits in her mug. Despite their differences and their quarrels, there was nobody else she was more comfortable with than Alicia. In fact, Erin had always believed that if they hadn’t met in Kindergarten and she hadn’t punched a boy in the face when they were six because he was teasing Alicia, they might have never become friends. They were the opposites in school and everybody around them wondered what kept them together. The skinny blonde Cheerleader and the geeky nerd with the braces who always aced every exam, including the surprise ones.

  Erin was smiling to herself as she thought about their friendship through the years, subconsciously grateful that she had something else to think about rather than Steve.

  “Sorry, is someone sitting here?” Erin was jolted out of her thoughts by the voice of a man she had not noticed had now joined her in the balcony. She looked up to find him hovering over the chair that Alicia had been sitting on, her discarded wrap was still lying on the seat of the chair.

  “No, please go ahead. My friend was but she’s gone in now.” Erin spoke too quickly, slightly embarrassed to be caught in the middle of deep thoughts. How long had he been there? Had she been smiling and rocking herself like a fool this whole time?

  She watched as he picked up the edge of the wrap with one hooked finger, like it was something that could infect him with a fatal viral disease. He held it away from his body as he walked the short distance with it over to Erin’s side and then gently flung it over the back of her own chair. She wanted to laugh, just the sight of him made her want to burst out laughing.