The Billionaire Shifter's Second Chance (Billionaire Shifters Club Book 3)

by Diana Seere

  Her arms never moved, resting by her sides as he rinsed her, then carefully, perfunctorily cleaned his own naked body, removing all traces of the fight from the surface, save for her bandages. The wounds would take time to heal, some leaving scars.

  The memories, alas, would never retreat.

  Wrapping her long hair in a turban, he then dried her body, patting her gently like a china doll. She let him.

  He was grateful.

  And then he guided her to the enormous four-poster bed, with its European duvet, the feather mattress cradling their bodies as they sank into the wondrous oblivion of being together, tangled and tight, limbs intimate without passion, bodies needing connection more than release.

  As sleep took over, he heard Molly murmur his name and then:

  “I always knew you were out there. I felt it. I felt you.”

  “I’m here,” he whispered into her hair.

  Her soft fingers wrapped around his arms. “I think I’ll always be able to feel you. When you’re away—”

  “I’m never going away,” he said fiercely. “Never.”

  Seeming to find this amusing, she smiled drowsily. Within two breaths, she was asleep.

  Edward stayed awake. He would never stop watching over her.

  Chapter 29

  One month later

  Molly lit a massive scented candle and set it on the kitchen table. The man might have his own house, nestled in a remote corner the Stanton’s Montana estate, but it needed a little help to make it a home.

  Their home.

  They’d driven out a week earlier in a luxury tour bus with Sophia and Asher, who was still too weak to risk air travel. The other Stantons had flown ahead, setting up medical staff and equipment to keep him comfortable as he recuperated. Asher, unhappy with what he’d called Sophia’s “intolerable cosseting,” had said little and had spent the hours on the road—when he hadn’t been blissfully asleep—listening to music on noise-canceling headphones. Now that they were in Montana, Asher kept to his own private house, and Edward and Molly kept each other company in Edward’s large cabin.

  No, their large cabin.

  She enjoyed living at the ranch. Very much. At first she’d thought she’d miss her friends in Boston, like Carl, but every cabin on the Stanton property in Montana had the latest tech devices and the fastest internet speeds, and sharing frequent video chats was fun and easy.

  She laughed now to think she’d almost suspected Carl of something that day she’d been abducted. His mysterious behavior with the computer had been just what he’d said—stock statements—inspired by a painful breakup. But he wasn’t talking about retiring anymore. Eva had hired a new waiter just last week… and Carl’s view on life was looking up.

  Amazing what love could do.

  “You do realize,” Edward said as he walked through the front door, returning from his daily visit with Asher, “that firefighters hate candles? Especially during the driest months of winter?”

  Molly frowned at the massive vanilla-jasmine-scented candle she’d just lit. It sat on a beautiful stained-glass plate and smelled heavenly. But she didn’t want to burn the cabin down. “Oh,” she said sadly. Stifling a sigh, she leaned over to blow it out.

  He embraced her, halting her movement. “Just kidding. We’ll be careful.”

  “You don’t mind?”

  “If you set the dwelling on fire, I’ll extinguish it. I’ve got years of experience.”

  She grinned up at him. “I’ll get LED candles next time.”

  “Really, dearest. You want candles, you shall have candles.”

  “They smell good, don’t you think?”

  He buried his nose in her hair. “You smell good.” After a few minutes, he had her shirt off and her jeans around her ankles.

  “How did you manage to do that so quickly? I’m still holding the lighter.” She threw the device onto the table before stretching up along his body, delighting in the feel of his hands sliding up and down her naked back, hips, bottom.

  The panties slid down.

  “Molly,” he said, his voice husky, “I can’t get enough of you.”

  “Mm.” Smiling, she unfastened his jeans. “Good thing there’s so much of me then.”

  With a growl that sounded too wolfish for a mountain lion shifter, Edward lifted her off the ground and began walking toward their bedroom. “When we get back to Boston, I’m going to have trouble sharing you with the rest of the world.”

  Giggling, she tickled him under the chin. “You’re going to let me sleep with other guys?”

  He didn’t laugh. Jaw set, he threw her on the bed, put his hands on his hips, and looked down at her. “I regret to inform you that will not be a characteristic of our relationship.”

  “I’m happy to inform you I don’t want it to be,” she said, stretching her arms over her head and arching her back. She knew he couldn’t think clearly when she did that.

  “Relieved to hear it,” he said.

  “Besides, we’re going to live here. And no offense, but I don’t find Asher even remotely tempting, and he’s the only single man I’ve seen in thirty miles.” She made a face. “Except for Morgan, of course. That man has bachelor written all over him. But he doesn’t really count since he’s going back East soon.”

  “As are we. I’ve just informed Asher we’ll be leaving him the day after tomorrow. He assured me he’s more than strong enough to live here with only a dozen servants swarming around him day and night.”

  Molly sat up abruptly. “Day after tomorrow? Why?”

  His gaze was fixed on her bare chest, making a serious conversation impossible, so she pulled the covers over herself. After a remarkably determined effort, he gave up trying to unwrap her nakedness and finally gave her his full attention. “It’s a surprise,” he said.

  “I don’t want any more surprises,” she said.

  “It’s a good one.” He smiled, looking as pleased as a little boy.

  “Please, Edward. I’ve had enough surprises for a lifetime. Just tell me.”

  “You’ll understand when you see it—”

  “No, I’m serious. Don’t hide anything from me, good or bad. I can’t bear it.” She grabbed his hand and put it over her beating heart. “Do you feel that? That’s a stress response.”

  “I thought it was because I took off my pants.” He grinned, moving his hand down over the swell of her breast, lightly capturing her nipple. His voice lowered as he moved in closer. “And yours.”

  Damn the man, he was a master at distracting her. “Tell me.”

  He didn’t speak until she’d pushed his hand away and crawled out of reach.

  “We’ve built a new boutique for you below the Platinum Club,” he said.

  She was too confused to respond.

  “Molly?” he asked.

  “You did what?”

  “We made a boutique, just for you. Eva said you’d need work of your own and couldn’t simply enjoy my demanding company day and night for the rest of your life.”

  Molly snorted. “And you believed that?”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  “Eva wants me to go back to work at the Plat, and you’re cool with it?” Molly had been looking forward to quitting the club. The money had been great, but the hours could suck.

  And she wasn’t quite ready to return to Boston just yet. Not with the blood donations to LupiNex and all the memories.

  Not with Tomas still out there.

  “You wouldn’t work at the Plat,” Edward said. “You’d work for yourself. You’d have your own business as a personal stylist. Your clientele would be whomever you wanted it to be. Eva said, with your talents, you could command the highest fees and pick and choose the elite clients who could benefit from your genius.”

  Molly’s cheeks felt warm. “She said that? Eva?”

  “She has the highest regard for you.” He lifted his chin. “Second to me, of course.”

  The thought of such a business filled her w
ith joy. But…

  She wasn’t ready. Not in Boston.

  “Do I have to be there?” she asked. “What if I build my clientele from people around here first?”

  His eyebrow quirked. “Here?”

  “It’s not entirely uninhabited.”

  “You want to improve Asher’s fashion choices?”

  She laughed. “Ah, no. I think he’s annoyed as it is with people fussing over him.” She picked at the covers, admitting to herself that the ranch was too remote for the kind of business she fantasized about. “I’ve always wanted to travel,” she said quietly.

  He crawled up the bed and put his arms around her. “Then we shall travel.”

  “What about LA? Chicago? Denver? Houston? Seattle?”

  “There are large numbers of people in those places, from what I’ve heard,” he said. “Quite a bit more needy and eager of your talents than Asher.”

  “You wouldn’t mind if I traveled around, dressing people?”

  “As long as you understand I’ll accompany you,” he said, unwrapping the sheet from her midsection. “Undressing you.”

  He was completely nude, long and lean, his face so serious. The beard made him seem older, more sedate, and his hair was thick, a little long around the collar. Recovery from her wounds had been a simple, linear process. Flesh healed.

  Her heart had too.

  But the mind was tricky, and as Edward’s warm forearms slid against the skin around her ribs, his palms slipping lower to fill with the curve of her ass, she sighed with contentment as his warmth met hers. The sensitive tips of her nipples brushed against the solid muscle of his chest, making her press harder.

  More. She just wanted more of him.

  His fingertips traced a small scar on her shoulder, a remnant from the horrors of Tomas and Webb last month. The corners of his mouth turned down, memory plaguing him. Their shared experience would be etched in their bodies forever. He had his own scars. They all did.

  But the bond between them all would overcome the worst.

  “I love you,” he whispered, kissing the jagged line of pink on her skin. Her own fingers sought similar lines on his belly, the angry welt now a thin, pink scar beneath his navel. So close, the doctor said. So close to permanent damage.

  She knelt and kissed the tight flesh. He groaned.

  “Lower,” he whispered, burrowing his hands into her mussed hair.

  Molly obeyed, taking his swollen tip into her warm, wet mouth with a smile, her teeth grazing him with enough pressure to make him inhale sharply.

  And enough soft, lapping suction to make his knees buckle.

  “Jesus, Molly.” His voice rumbled down to a sound that tapped into her blood, her heart speeding up as she reached behind his knees, his thick leg hair a masculine terrain as she trailed up with her palms to grab his tight ass, one hand slipping under to cup his balls.

  “Not like this,” he grunted as she dipped down to take his entire shaft in, the back of her throat widening, accepting. Pulling back, she left a slick trail before tipping her chin up to meet his eyes.

  He grabbed her and threw her on the bed with a methodical, urgent motion that made wild heat blossom through her body, her knees tingling. She clenched, shivering at the brush of his thigh against her wet clit.

  Edward’s hands split her legs wide open as he gazed at her, taking in her naked pussy. “You’re beautiful,” he noted, hands massaging her inner thighs, stroking lightly at the soft skin behind her knees.

  “While the praise is nice,” she cooed, “your mouth is even nicer when it’s on me.”

  She could see the cat in him as he smiled, his eyes slanting slightly with the grin, and then his beard tickled her labia, his tongue a perfect brush stroke, his lips sucking her clit with a perfectly calibrated eroticism that made her unable to speak.

  One finger, then two—oh, three—slipped inside her, hooking up to find the spot that drove her mad, his precision as tantalizing as his tongue, the effort he put into her pleasure equally arousing as the actual joy that came from her body’s response.

  She melted, then exploded, pushing against his mouth and fingers with a release borne of pure trust as she rode wave after wave of unrelenting ecstasy, all from him.

  From him.

  Edward knew what Molly wanted next, not even asking, pulling her legs up as he prowled, slow and sleek, rubbing his cock against her calf, her thigh, riding up the length of her body until he slipped into her with one breath.

  “I love watching you come,” he said, eyes shining with victory, his mouth soft and alluring. He smelled like her, like him, like them. “Knowing I’m doing that to you. Knowing you give me permission to watch you in your most intimate moment.”

  “Like right now?” She forced herself to hold his gaze and tightened, clenching as she arched her hips, knowing the move drove him mad.

  Half-lidded eyes met hers, but he held steady, beckoning with his own gyration that made her gasp. His head dipped down to suckle one nipple, his forearms stretched on either side of her head, his pelvis impossibly torqued to stroke her from the inside out.

  “Yes,” he murmured from her breast. “Like now.”

  “But you’re not”—she gasped—“watching me.”

  He looked up the length of her, leaning on one elbow, his mouth full of creamy skin, tongue flicking her into senseless oblivion.

  I’m always watching you.

  The words were in her head.

  And then all the words floated away on a breeze as he sat up and drove home, sliding in and out as the fevered-pitch of friction and rhapsody combined inside her, her body played to perfection, her cries of climax yet again too much but not enough. Edward alternated between athletic prowess and stolen kisses, nipping her neck, her ear, her collarbone until his own orgasm overpowered him, the push push push into her like burying his treasure inside her soul.

  She raked his ass with her fingernails, pulling him closer, needing his heat, his seed, his heart to be etched like scars on her, permanent.

  A memory.

  Forever.

  Coming down, they panted, the sheets twisted between them like a puzzle left to solve. “I cannot get enough of you,” he murmured, the weight of him a comfort, the hard lines of his arms so easy to trace with her trembling fingers.

  “You have me now.”

  “We have so much to untangle. You live in Boston. I live here. Your blood, Tomas, Lilah and Jess are your sisters, and—”

  “Hey there,” she said, covering his lips with her fingers. Rough, wet whiskers poked at her knuckles. “Let’s just take this one moment at a time, OK?”

  He opened his mouth to speak.

  And then:

  Tap tap tap.

  The door. Molly laughed at the groan that came out of Edward, a perfectly modern sound of frustration that was so casually male she couldn’t hold back her giggle.

  “Excuse me, sir?” It was Adriana, the young maid, calling out from the other side of the front door. “Your brother would like another word with you.”

  “His timing is exquisite,” Edward muttered as he kissed Molly’s belly. His lips vibrated on her sensitive skin as he called out, “Again, Adriana? I just met with him.”

  “He says that there is new information he needs to discuss with you.”

  “He couldn’t just text you?” Molly whispered, her voice turning to a low gasp as his beard tickled her mons. He wanted another round? Already? She reached down casually, almost as an afterthought.

  And found him hard.

  “Asher? Text? The man refuses to use a cell phone at all. He would sooner cut off his tongue than text.” His neck muscles tightened as she wrapped her fingers around his shaft, his eyes dark, his look pained.

  “Is that an option?” she asked as he rolled off her, the chill of his heat dissipating an unwelcome feeling.

  “Tell him I’ll be there shortly,” he groused, raising his voice for Adriana to hear. The sound of receding footsteps on the sto
ne path made Molly sigh.

  “Can’t you go later?” she asked, hopeful.

  His eyes ate her up as she stretched, trying her best to be so inviting as she spread her naked body all over the rumpled bed.

  “Better he interrupts us now.” His voice traveled over three octaves, settling on a low bass she felt in her clit. “You can rest. I have plans for you later.”

  “What plans?” He made her feel like a bottomless pit of need.

  “Plans,” he repeated.

  She batted her eyelashes.

  “Delicious plans, my dear.” He shoved his legs into jeans, zipping and buttoning with a finality that told her he’d made his decision. “You’ll see.”

  She fake pouted. He kissed her nose, then slipped his feet into shoes, running out the door.

  Only when she was alone did she realize that whatever made Edward leave her must be important information.

  Climbing out of bed, she wandered to the kitchen, trying to distract herself, opening the fridge.

  Unlike a few months ago, she wasn’t worried.

  Edward shared everything with her now. No secrets, no subterfuge.

  What a life.

  What a love.

  Her eyes spotted a jar of maraschino cherries. A brand-new bottle of chocolate sauce.

  A can of whipped cream.

  “Edward,” she whisper-laughed to herself.

  The man did have plans.

  “What now?” Edward demanded, marching into Asher’s office. “Did you really have to interrupt me for some update that could have waited an hour?”

  Asher sniffed. His face hardened. “I see. An hour? Perhaps fifteen minutes…” One eyebrow quirked.

  Wait. Was that—did Asher just make a joke?

  A joke about sex?