The PlayLion Billionaire: A Paranormal Billionaire Romance (10 page)

CHAPTER NINE

Olivia sat at her desk, contemplating whether or not to go to lunch. She had managed to keep her mind mostly focused on her work through the morning but she still hadn’t figured out what to say to Robert, or how to feel about him, and the trouble of not knowing lingered in her mind. Instead of confirming her opinion about whether or not to stay with Robert—to become his mate—the date she’d had with him a few evenings before had left her more confused than ever. She had been touched, pleased beyond measure, by the gestures he had made. She had even decided to wear the necklace and earrings to work. But something in the back of her mind still gave her pause. Something about their conversations, something about the fact that Robert—for all his charm, for all his gorgeous human body—was indisputably a lion, with everything that was involved in that, still gave her pause.

He would kill someone on my behalf,
she thought dazedly, staring at her computer. Part of her was flattered, even almost thrilled, by the fact that Robert was willing to do that. Another part of Olivia’s mind was horrified. She sat back at her desk, glancing at the time listed in the bottom right corner of her screen. Lunch was about thirty minutes away; maybe she could spend it with Robert. Olivia worried at her bottom lip. How was it possible that she could feel so ambivalent about someone and yet want to spend time with them, even want to have sex with them repeatedly? Olivia felt as though her feelings towards Robert had never really been entirely clear. The first day they had met—when she had had sex with him the first time—she hadn’t been entirely certain about how she felt about him and her emotions were even more muddled now.

She knew he wanted to kill the people in his Pride who had been involved in her abduction—not only because they had abducted her, but because they had tried to overthrow him as Alpha of the pride. Olivia shivered. She was realistic enough to understand there was no way to bring due process into the situation. It wasn’t as though Robert could go to the police and tell them that he was the leader of a group of shape-shifters who were trying to usurp his position. It would be a one-way ticket to a mental institution if he did. He couldn’t even accuse them of the kidnapping without bringing their dual nature into it because without the piece of knowledge that these were a Pride of lions as well as a group of humans, there would be nothing to give the police in terms of motive.

Olivia took a deep breath and sighed, scrubbing at her face. She liked Robert, she had known she liked Robert halfway into their lunch interview, when the questions had started to turn more personal. She had known she liked Robert when he had saved her from the lioness about to murder her. What she didn’t know was whether she liked Robert enough to be able to handle the other side of him. What she also didn’t know was whether or not she was willing to agree to spend the rest of her life with him. She closed her eyes.
I’ve only been seeing him for a couple of weeks, actually seeing him. How can I make a decision like that?

As they had been lying together in bed, after their date, Robert had tried to explain to Olivia. He had tried to get her to understand how it was that he could absolutely know that she was the right person for him. “It’s instinctive,” he had said, holding her, his hands wandering over her body in a way that was oddly appealing—possessive, but not in a threatening, domineering way. “I knew even before we’d had sex but especially once that happened.”

“Is it—is it like, some kind of scent, or some kind of…” Olivia couldn’t find the words for the question she wanted to ask.

“It’s a combination of your scent and my reaction to it. And the way it felt to be with you. I’ve never felt that way when I’ve had sex with anyone else and I have to believe you feel it too.” Robert had slid his hand down between her legs and Olivia had shivered, smiling in spite of her confusion.

“Okay—yeah, I can admit that it was the best sex I’ve had in my life,” she said, grinning slightly.

“And has been every time since then, right?” Robert had raised an eyebrow. Blushing, Olivia had nodded, burying her face against his chest. She had been fighting the sense that circumstances were pulling her closer and closer to Robert ever since the night she had awakened in the hospital. It seemed inevitable she would choose him and yet, she didn’t want it to be. She wanted it to be something that she could control, a real choice instead of inevitability.

Olivia opened her eyes, looking blankly at her computer screen. She should probably meet with Robert for lunch, she decided. If she was going to make a decision of her own free will as to whether or not to become his mate—to become part of the Pride—she needed as much information as possible. The only way to get that information was through talking to the man himself. Robert had suggested she would probably want to meet some of the other members of the Pride; members that he knew he could trust, people other than his mother and himself. Olivia knew, intellectually, that the were-lions had to be mostly normal people; they lived among normal people, worked normal jobs but she couldn’t quite make herself believe it. The only were-lions she had met were Robert himself, who was a billionaire and CEO of a huge company, his mother, who had been the wife and mother of billionaires and the people who had abducted her.

She knew, too, that there were members of the Pride employed by Lowe Freight, that they were involved in the inner workings of the company, trusted individuals who reported more or less directly to Robert, although their roles within the company might be anything from a receptionist or secretary to a manager to an executive. That very fact was part of what had led to Robert’s situation, and part of the danger involved in his losing the position of Alpha. He could not be CEO without being Alpha and now, with the stakes raised, whoever wanted to overthrow him would have to kill him.

Olivia didn’t know how many people within the company knew for certain that she and Robert were seeing each other. During work hours, they were visibly professional, and her meetings in Robert’s office always had a non-personal purpose. Those employees who were also members of the Pride almost certainly knew but they were keeping their mouths shut, as far as Olivia could tell. No one had made any comments to her, no one had dropped any allusions to the fact that she—a new hire, a seemingly menial employee—was dating the CEO. The main objection she had had to their relationship from the beginning had failed to materialize, and the lack of rumors about her dating or sleeping with the boss made her more irritable, more uncertain, and more uneasy than any amount of gossip could have. Even the receptionist for her department hadn’t seemed to have any idea where the gift Robert had had delivered had come from.

Olivia’s thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of one of her coworkers. Amelia had walked up to her desk, bearing a takeout tray of paper cups from Starbucks. “You look like you could use a boost,” Amelia said with a smile.

“Not sleeping much these days. Stressed out about getting everything finalized for this project,” Olivia said, returning her coworker’s smile weakly. “They definitely threw me out of the frying pan and into the fire with this.”

“Not a bad gig though, overall,” Amelia pointed out, leaning against the wall of Olivia’s cubicle. “I mean, working directly with the CEO on a major project has to land you some big-time points, right?” Olivia shrugged.

“Not if I fail at it,” she pointed out with a little grin.

“Do you really think he would have gotten you on the project if he thought you’d fail?”

Olivia chuckled, shaking her head. “What he thinks I’m capable of and what I actually am capable of may be two different things.” She thought not of the project, which she knew she was actually capable of accomplishing but the underlying issue: whether or not she could become Robert’s mate, with everything that entailed. Olivia gave herself a little shake. “Not the time for self-pity,” she said with cheerful firmness. “I wish you’d told me you were making a coffee run, I’d have given you money for something for me!”

Amelia grinned, plucking one of the cups from the safety of its cardboard base. “Actually, I was given orders to grab coffee for the department. Cream and sugar okay?”

Olivia’s eyes widened appreciatively. “Whoever had that idea, bless them,” she said, reaching out to accept the paper cup. “Unless this means that they expect us to work through lunch today.”

Amelia laughed. “Nah, it’s some kind of ‘everyone is doing a great job’ kind of deal. Positive reinforcement.”

Olivia set the cup down. For an instant she thought she saw something flicker across Amelia’s face, something like annoyance, with a mixture of odd interest mixed in, but it disappeared so quickly that Olivia thought she must have imagined the shift in her coworker’s expression.

“This is just what I needed,” Olivia said, smiling. “And of course it’s great for you—gets you out of the office for a little while, right?”

Amelia’s smile broadened. “Yeah, it does,” she said. “I guess I should probably move on, distribute the last couple. Enjoy the coffee!”

Amelia lingered for just a moment, and Olivia wondered if there was something that her coworker wanted to say but thought she couldn’t, something having to do with Olivia’s plum project working directly under the CEO of the company, perhaps. But then Amelia was away, walking to the next desk in the department and Olivia shrugged, dismissing the flicker of suspicion. She glanced around to make sure no one was watching her, and took her phone out of her purse.
I assume we’re on for lunch,
she wrote to Robert.

His response was immediate.
Of course we’re on for lunch. I have to deal with being away from you too much to not have lunch with you.
Olivia blushed, shaking her head with a little smile. While she might not know whether or not she wanted to stay with Robert for the rest of her life, she couldn’t deny that his attentions were flattering. She thought that even if he hadn’t been a billionaire, with the resources to take her to the best restaurants, buy her gorgeous jewelry, and get tickets to the events she craved to see, he would be difficult to resist.

Olivia remembered the coffee as she put her phone away and turned her attention back onto her screen. She reached out for it blindly with a practiced grab, and brought the to-go cup up to her mouth even as she read the information she was supposed to be reporting on later in the week.
One thing I have to grant him, Robert is good at keeping professional things professional,
Olivia thought as she took a long sip of the warm—but not too hot—coffee.

She frowned; there was something weird about the taste. Olivia nearly called Amelia back over to ask if she had used something other than regular cream. There was a bitter taste that had nothing to do with the coffee itself. Olivia took another sip, trying to identify it and found that her tongue was numb.
What the hell?
She looked at the cup, frowning again. The numbness started to spread out from her tongue to her cheeks, down her throat. Olivia took another sip—even though part of her mind said that it was a stupid idea—and the numbness continued to spread.

Her heart started beating faster and faster in her chest as panic overtook her. Even more alarming, the world around her began to look hazy, blurry—rapidly darkening. Olivia licked her lips and the numbness spread there too.
What is going on? What the hell is in that coffee?
She tried to stand but found her balance was completely shot, her legs rubbery underneath her. Olivia drew a breath to try and call for help, but the world swooped and dove around her, leaving her reeling, grabbing at the desk in front of her to try and steady herself. As everything started to go darker and darker, she realized she must have been poisoned somehow though how, and with what, she couldn’t think, and as she saw the ground coming up in her dim, dark vision, it suddenly wasn’t relevant.

CHAPTER TEN

Robert was in the midst of a conference call with a potential business partner when the door to his office—which should have been firmly locked—opened. He looked up from his computer, his hand moving instinctively to mute the phone so that he could chew out whoever it was that had dared to interrupt his work, only to see Alexis, looking pale and deeply worried. “Just a second, Jack,” Robert said quickly. “My assistant has something for me to look at—you aren’t the only guy I’m courting right now.” Jack chuckled and said that he’d hang loose for a minute or two. Robert put the call on hold and turned his attention to Alexis.

“It’s Olivia,” Alexis said. Robert grabbed his cell phone. Olivia had just sent him a message less than twenty minutes before.

“What happened? Don’t tell me some son of a bitch abducted her right in the building.” Robert’s voice came out in a growl, the animal inside of him briefly overcoming his natural control.

“She was poisoned at her desk,” Alexis said, her eyes wide. “They’re taking her to the hospital right now, but…” she shrugged.

“Poisoned?” Robert’s blood ran cold and then fiery hot in his veins, and he felt the change crackling along his bones. Instinct—pure, animal hindbrain—told him to transform into his lion form and immediately find the source of his mate’s poison, kill whoever it was without a single thought to the consequences. He took a deep breath. “Who was it?” he asked, clenching his teeth and slowly gaining control over his animal impulses. He had to be human; he had to think and reason. This was not the time for him to give into his more bestial nature.

“Someone in her department; girl named Amelia.” Alexis shook her head. “Katarina has her in the security office right now but I don’t think she’s going to talk.” Robert scowled, still able to feel the electric impulses of his other nature dancing through his nervous system. Images of rending Amelia—who he barely knew—limb from limb, the smell of her blood filling his nose, flitted through his brain in weirdly colored relief. Robert gripped the arms of his chair tightly.
Get control. This is what they want. They want you taken out.
He took slow, steady breaths, conquering the animal within, reasserting human control of his brain. His mate was under threat; the only way he could fix the situation was to stay in control.

“Amelia’s not part of the Pride,” Robert pointed out.

“We know that,” Alexis said, frustration rising in her voice. Robert growled and she assumed a more submissive posture, slinking backwards one or two steps. “Katarina is going to see what she can do but…” Alexis shrugged. Someone—a human—who wasn’t a member of the Pride, was going to be difficult to persuade. Robert couldn’t take direct action against the woman. Certainly he couldn’t take his other form and attack her or even attack her in his human form.

He had to think. Robert took a deep breath, closing his eyes, struggling to retain his humanity. He exhaled slowly, assuming deeper control over his mind. He had to act, but he had to act the right way. He had to make the right decisions. “Go to the hospital and meet her there,” Robert said, opening his eyes.

“They may not let me see her,” Alexis pointed out. “I’m not family.”

Robert shook his head. “You’re a representative of the company. Play it as work comp, whatever—just make sure you’re there to keep her safe.”

“Should I alert the rest of the Pride?” Alexis asked.

“No. We’re keeping this close for right now. They’ll know soon enough. Just get there and make sure no one else gets to her.”

“Where are you going to be?”

Robert smiled slowly. “I am going to be in the security office with Katarina,” he said. “Until the police get here, I am going to be… talking to her.” He took another breath to keep his body from going into the change that rippled just within reach.

“Just don’t do anything that will get the elders on your case,” Alexis said, reading his demeanor. “If you start to lose control, leave. Katarina can take care of it.”

Robert nodded. “I am not going to jeopardize us over this. That’s exactly what they want—whoever they are.” Robert growled lowly, imagining shadowy figures threatening him, his mate, his Pride. “If Olivia is still unconscious when you get there, call the elders and tell them what’s going on. But do not leave her side for a second.”

“Understood.”

Alexis opened the door and Robert propelled himself from his chair, stalking out of the room. He made a beeline for the elevator, sensing Alexis in his wake. She would take the stairs, he knew. He knew, too, that he could trust her to keep his mate alive, to keep her safe. She would make sure someone they could trust saw Olivia. Rage boiled away in the back of Robert’s mind as he stood in the elevator, waiting impatiently for the machine to reach the subterranean floor that housed the security offices. He had to remain calm, as much as he could. But he was determined he would find out who had put Amelia up to poisoning his mate. He would drag it out of the woman even if they had to evade the law—say that Amelia had escaped and interrogate her privately.

As the elevator descended, other thoughts fought for prominence in Robert’s mind.
I have to kill whoever is behind this. In order to do that, I have to get Olivia to commit to me. I have to get her to join the Pride.
That was the last thing Olivia would want to do after being not only kidnapped but also poisoned. There was no doubt in Robert’s mind whatsoever the poisoning was the work of whoever was looking to overthrow him. Robert’s thoughts wheeled. He wished he could be with Olivia right now—he wanted to chase down whoever had harmed her and kill them. He wanted to know who to kill. He wanted to know who to eliminate from the Pride. Olivia would have Alexis there at her side but Alexis was a stranger. She would not be nearly as comforting as he would be, as his mother even would be. But Robert also wouldn’t involve his mother in the situation.

The elevator chimed and Robert stepped through the doors the moment they opened, turning obliquely left and heading through the corridor. The animal within him wanted nothing more than to leap through his skin, rend the threat to himself and his mate limb from limb. But Robert asserted control. If he couldn’t hold himself back, he was not Alpha material. He would keep his humanity but he would not even consider letting Amelia out of his sight, even in the company of police, until he got the answers he needed.

He could hear voices raised—shouting—as he approached the door to the security office. Katarina was questioning Amelia. Amelia’s voice was cracking, creaking as she shouted answers. It was obvious to Robert that Amelia only knew so much about the situation and that Katarina was slowly working through the other girl’s defenses, driving Amelia to confess. Robert opened the door and strode through it, still able to feel the animal pulse of thoughts throbbing in his head, crackling along his bones. The change was right there—right where he could taste it. He had to keep control.

Katarina looked up when Robert closed the door behind himself, staring at the two women alone in the tiny room. “Hey, boss,” Katarina said, her voice level and casual.

“What have you found out?” Robert asked, not looking at Katarina but instead at Amelia. The girl’s cheeks were streaked with tears, her expression angry and guilty all at the same time. Stress pheromones were thick in the air—acrid anger, yellow fear. Robert breathed shallowly. If he let himself scent the pheromones too strongly, he might begin reacting.

“She won’t give up who put her up to it,” Katarina said. “We were just getting around to what would happen if she didn’t tell me before the police got here.”

“You can’t just kidnap me!” Amelia shouted. “You’re not above the law.”

Robert smiled unpleasantly, shaking his head and taking a few steps closer to the captive employee. “You know,” Robert said slowly. “Attempted murder charges—along with conspiracy to commit murder—are pretty bad. But I think you’ll find that if we tell the police you ran off, they won’t believe anything you say about what happened before they apprehend you.”

“Of course they will!” Amelia said, frowning in uncertainty. “I’ll—I’ll have marks from whatever you did to me.”

Robert shrugged.

“But if everyone involved keeps to the same story, there won’t be anyone to back you,” Katarina pointed out. “No evidence that it was anything other than something you pulled in a desperate attempt to keep from being brought to justice. Besides, do you really think they’re going to take the word of a poisoner versus the CEO of a major company?”

Amelia’s fear-scent intensified.

“You already got her to confess that she wasn’t just working on her own?” Robert asked, barely glancing at Katarina.

Katarina shrugged. “She had no motive to do it on her own free will,” Katarina pointed out. “She barely even knew Olivia.”

“But she told you,” Robert insisted.

“I’m not telling you who put me up to it,” Amelia said. “I’m not stupid.”

Robert laughed, the sound coming out almost like a growl. “You are stupid if you think it’s a great idea to go down on your own for someone else’s idea.”

Amelia smiled but her expression was as uncertain as ever. “I’m not going to go down,” she said quickly, licking her lips nervously. “The—the person who put me up to it—they said that they’d get me the best attorney in the country.”

“You believed them?” Robert laughed. “How much were they paying you to do this?”

Amelia looked away. “I’m not telling you anything,” she said. “And anyway, the cops are going to be here any minute.”

Robert glanced at Katarina. Amelia was right, the police would only be a matter of time. Olivia was probably already at the hospital.

“Well then we’ll need to make a decision quickly. You’re either going to tell us now, or you can take your time in a more private location...but you are going to tell us, one way or another,” Robert told Amelia firmly. He could still feel the prickly heat of his lion form just beneath his skin.