Big Bad Billionaire (The Woolven Secret Book 1) (12 page)

Chapter Twelve

Randi was turning into a werewolf.

That, in and of itself, wasn’t something she’d ever thought to hear rattling around in the spaces of her own head like it belonged there. As if it were a serious thought which should be given its due.

This was not what she wanted.

Blake Woolven was not what she wanted.

All she wanted was to find her father’s killer.

Except that was a lie.

A dark, secret part of her wanted to be with Blake and everything the choice entailed. She wanted to believe she could marry the handsome billionaire playboy who changed his ways for her, that this kind of thing happened in real life. That they’d live happily ever after.

But something else, something dark writhing beneath her skin, too. Something inhuman that didn’t belong. Only maybe it did, because he said it had been inside of her all along. Sleeping, lurking.

The question that haunted her now was if her father knew about it all along. Was that why he’d agreed to work on the plasma gun?

She pressed her lips together hard and exhaled. Maybe he hadn’t known. Or if he had, maybe he didn’t care. She knew her father loved her. The plasma gun—it didn’t have to be about her.

Still, what if it was?

“You okay?” Drew asked from across the aisle.

Part of her wished it Blake asked, but he’d elected to sit as far away from her as possible. She supposed she was lucky she’d managed to get on the plane at all.

“Yeah,” she lied. Already, she needed Blake to feel safe, to feel strong. The very idea of needing another person for those things completely disgusted her. Self-reliance was important to her, but apparently, it was how the wolf-thing worked— gross dependence on one another.

“No, you’re not. But that’s okay.” Drew handed her his tumbler of bourbon. “Good medicine for your nerves. I hope you understand that you need to stay at the hotel during the meeting.”

“Why is that?” Of course they would try to keep her as far away as possible. “Secret wolfie business?” Randi tried to make light of it, to hide the fact she was terrified.

Drew nodded slowly. “That, among other things. You know our secret, Randi. Council law requires we Turn you or kill you. I don’t think either of those options really appeal to you.”

“And it’s obvious I know because I’m afraid. I can’t hide that.” She sank down in the chair then turned her head to look out at the clouds and wide expanse of sky.

“Fear, to our kind, is like blood in the water to a shark.” Drew was silent for several moments before he spoke again. “And you make him weak.”

“Me?” She turned to face him sharply.

“I’ll lay it out for you. His priority is you. Over himself. Over the pack. At any perceived threat to you, he won’t hesitate to take us to war. I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what the de la Lunas want.”

“Who knew that werewolves were concerned with geopolitics?” The sound of those words was completely and utterly mad. She downed the bourbon.

Equally mad was the underlying meaning in Drew’s words—that Blake would put everything on the line for her. Not just his own life, but those of his brothers, his pack. Those people who depended on him for their safety and well-being.

Randi suddenly needed to see him, just to study him, to assure herself he was the same man she’d faced when she stormed into his office and threatened to take him down. He’d invited her to try with a cocky grin that made her panties melt. She was on the other side of that now. Threats coming at them from all sides, yet he stood proud and immovable—fierce.

He would protect her no matter what.

Somehow, even though he’d said those things, they weren’t real. Not even when she’d seen him put them in action. Hearing it from Drew was different. He was someone Blake held dear, not part of their game.

“Goddess,” Drew exclaimed, wrinkling his nose. “Your distress is not a pleasant perfume.” He poured her another bourbon. “Have another.”

She accepted it gratefully and downed it. “Did you know my father?”

“I’d like to think so.”

“If he knew what you were, how did that apply?”

“I don’t follow.” Drew raised a brow.

“Blake said that if someone knows your secret, you have to kill them or Turn them.” She left the rest of the question hang, unasked—but the moment was gravid with the expectation of an answer nonetheless.

“No.” Drew shook his head. “Your father was a special case. If he was ever afraid of us, he never smelled like it. His pheromones were always even and steady.”

“Did he ever see you Change?”

Drew looked uncomfortable. “You should be talking to Blake about this.”

“He doesn’t want to talk to me right now, and I can’t say I blame him.”  She knew she’d hurt him and hated that she’d hurt him, but she was too close to stop now. He talked about going to war, but she was already at war with herself.

“Look, Randi.” He turned to face her. “I get your devotion to your family, come hell, high water and anything in between. I really do. But—”

“Is this the part where you warn me if I keep hurting your brother you’ll rip my heart out and eat it or something?” She was half-afraid, even with Blake’s promise that no one would hurt her, that Drew would just lean over and tear her apart anyway.

“My brother’s word is
my
bond. Of course I wouldn’t hurt you. But Goddess above, there is so much on his shoulders right now. If you want to succeed in destroying Woolven, stay on this path. You’re halfway there.”

“You have to believe me when I say I don’t want that.”

He pulled no punches. “Everything up until now has been about what you don’t want. What
do
you want?”

“My father.”

“Goddessdamnit, you’re like a spoiled fucking child.” Drew shook his head slowly. “Stop asking for the impossible and look around at what’s real. Then choose your path because the rest of us are damned to follow you down it whether we wish it or not.”

“What’s real? That whole dynamic changed for me, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“Don’t play the damsel in distress card with me, Randi. My brother may let you get away with that because it’s his job to save you. Makes him feel fancy in his pantsy.” He snarled low, his wolf just below the surface. “And he’s made it my job too, all of us. But do me the fucking courtesy of being worth it.”

His words struck home sharper than any blade and dug deeper than she’d thought possible. It was like a physical pain. She swallowed hard.

“You better not cry, Randi.”

She sniffed.

“Don’t do it,” he warned.

She sniffed with a bit more force, trying to stop the burning behind her eyes and the twitch in her nose that felt like a punch. Randi couldn’t help it. For all her bravado, she knew she wasn’t worth it. She wasn’t worthy of
him
. She was so fucking afraid.

Marchessa de la Luna wouldn’t be afraid, not even if she’d been human. Randi wished she was more like her in every way.

She wished she were strong, powerful, thin…

“You better get a grip on yourself, little girl, or Blake is going to lose his shit at thirty-nine thousand feet. Our private jet has been outfitted for such instances. This one, not so much. So if you don’t want to get us all killed, settle down,” he said in a clipped tone.

“If he has such a tenuous hold on control, how is he an Alpha?”

Drew’s eyes goggled as if he couldn’t fathom her question. Then he took a deep breath. “I thought he would’ve explained this to you in the interest of keeping everyone breathing. The honeymoon phase for mates is kind of like…” He looked around, seemingly for inspiration. “Puberty.”

“Excuse me, what?”

“Hormones running amok. It’s especially worse if one mate isn’t our kind. You’re perpetually in danger, to our way of thinking if you’re not Turned. It goes against every instinct. The human can only keep the wolf down for so long.”

She looked toward the back of the aircraft and found Blake staring at her, his eyes amber and bright.

Randi bit her lip as her breath caught in her throat. She was afraid, but that wasn’t anything new. She was aroused, too. Drew was right. It was just like puberty—all of these strange sensations. Part of her, primal and dark, demanded she go to Blake, push him against the wall and fuck him right there.

She wanted him inside her.

She wanted his teeth at her throat.

And more so, she remembered what it was like to feel his flesh between her own teeth, to bite down and mark him.

“Gross,” Drew grumbled. “Can you… not?”

She cringed, remembering that he and everyone else knew exactly what transpired between them
all the time
. Randi blushed. “It’s not my fault you have super senses.” Then she wrinkled her nose. “And it’s not gross. That was a shitty thing to say. I don’t have girl-cooties. We’re not twelve.”

“No, but just as your bond with him grows, your bond with Parker and Warner and even me will too. So, you’re like my sister. I really… no.” He shook his head.

Suddenly, Blake loomed over them. “I can’t concentrate with you spraying your pheromones all over the place. What exactly is the problem?”

“I was just edifying your mate as to the exact nature of the problem, brother.” Drew grinned, the previous tension in his features melting to genuine amusement.

“Well, stop it.” He growled.

“I’m really surprised that anyone doesn’t know what you are, Blake. You growl all the time.” Randi grinned.

“That’s because True Love, trademarked—” he made finger quotes in the air “—is like rabies.” Drew laughed, obviously pleased with himself.

Blake roared and half-shifted to his warrior form. “You think this is a fucking joke?”

Randi knew it was no joke. “Jesus, Blake. He’s just trying to break the tension.”

He turned on her, his jaws dripping and his lips curled back on his muzzle. “Don’t defend him. That puts him between us.”

Something an Alpha couldn’t tolerate.

“You’re scaring her,” Drew said, his voice even and calm.

“Good!” He snarled. “She should be afraid. I told her to stay home. I told her run. And we’re quickly reaching event horizon.” His voice was more animal than human. In fact, Randi couldn’t see the man any longer. He was all beast.

This was what she was under the skin, too. What she would become if she didn’t get away from him.

His gaze fixed on her, and her increased heartrate seemed to make his eyes glitter with a predatory need. Or maybe that was just her imagination. Except suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. His breath was hot on her throat and the blades of his teeth scraped against her skin.

She shivered and she didn’t know if it was fear, anticipation, or desire.

Randi didn’t want it to be desire. She was supposed to be afraid of him.

But the thing was, she was so tired of being afraid.

She took a deep breath and pushed him away. He snapped at her wrist, but pulled himself back before he closed his terrible jaws around her flesh.

“Don’t try to take yourself away from me when I’m like this,” he warned.

“Or what? You’re going to bite me? Is that what you were doing?” she asked softly. “Even though you know I don’t want you to? For all your talk of being the good guy, you’re really not.”

“I never said I was. In fact, I told you I was king of monsters.”

Drew got up slowly, and backed away carefully, making sure not to make eye contact with his brother.

“And because you’re having some hormonal fit, you’ll endanger us all.”

“If you want to place blame,” his face slowly took human shape, and his clothes fell in tattered rags around him. “We could say the same about you. Because you’re afraid of what you are, you’ve endangered all of us.”

“Don’t put this on me. You choose your actions, just like me. Maybe you have instincts, all of us do. But that doesn’t make you entitled to take something from me I don’t want to give.”

“Because it’s all about you, isn’t it? It doesn’t matter what this does to my pack. It doesn’t matter what it does to me.”

Her lip quivered. “That’s not true.”

“It is. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”

If he’d still been angry, it would be easy to dismiss his words, but he wasn’t. He was just a man in incredible pain. Randi could hear it echoing in his every word. She started to doubt her choices and her own motivations.

“Everything just got so twisted so fast, Blake.”

He touched her face gently. “I know.”

She realized that, even now, he was still trying to protect her. For all of her talk about instincts and what she deserved, what her father deserved, he never should’ve brought her among his pack—his family. She was toxic to him. The way he’d snapped at her…Christ. What would he have done to someone who wasn’t her? Someone he thought was trying to take what was his? In that moment, when he’d restrained himself yet again, he’d proven to her all that he said was true.