Page 25

TWENTY-FIVE

Leo flexed his claws around his cup of coffee. He'd never gone so long without shifting before, but he'd promised Mother he wouldn't, with Lily in the house, so the Felix 5000 had stayed in the cupboard and he was frustrated in more ways than he could count. Saturdays were Lily's day off, so he had to make his own breakfast today, but it wasn't like putting smoked salmon on toast was hard, so he wasn't going to complain. Well, until the gate intercom buzzed.

Three women who looked like they'd stepped out of a beauty salon got out of a car. The driver then unloaded a stack of suitcases, before driving off in a spray of gravel, leaving them standing at the gate.

Leo imagined that rideshare driver wasn't going to earn five stars, or whatever the top rating was. The women did not look happy. Instead, they looked huffy.

He pressed a button so he could hear what they were saying.

"Of course this is the right place. It said in the paper that she's the new lady of Moray Castle. It has hundreds of rooms. Plenty of space for us. She has to take us in – we're the only family she has!" the platinum blonde said. Or maybe it was just grey. She dressed like one of the members of Mother's tennis club, but her voice betrayed the fact that she didn't share Mother's aristocratic breeding. Actually, he suspected she had more in common with the rats they hadn't been able to eradicate in the old stables.

"Do they even have internet this far out? I barely have one bar on my phone, and I need to make a video for my channel or my views are going to plummet." One of the girls held her phone up in the air, as if searching for a better signal.

Something clattered to the floor and shattered. Lily stood in the doorway, staring at the intercom, her face whiter than the broken china shards at her feet.

"Do you know these people?" Leo asked.

Lily looked like she wished she didn't. "That's my stepmother, and my two stepsisters. How could they know I'm here?"

"I think our wedding photos finally hit the front page of the tabloids. I imagine everyone knows where you live now. Now, I don't know if Mother mentioned this, but our staff normally don't bring guests to the castle without asking us first, and while it's a little different for you, being the lady of the castle, at least on paper, it would be nice if you'd mentioned your family were coming to visit. Mother's been the lady of the manor so long, she'll want to greet them properly, and she'll be most put out that they arrived before she was up this morning. Next time you invite them..."

"I didn't invite them! I came here to get away from them!" Lily blurted out.

Leo understood that family could be complicated. Look at Uncle Jeremy. But he wasn't sure what to do in this situation. He'd had women try to stalk him at home before, and a quick run up to the gates in his shifted form usually scared them off quickly enough. His mother would kill him if he shifted in front of Lily, though.

Not to mention...he didn't want to scare her away. He'd reminded himself dozens of times a day that theirs was a marriage of convenience, and not the real thing, not to mention she was technically his employee, so it was all kinds of wrong for him to lust after her, but his dick had other ideas, and his dreams...oh, god, if Lily knew about his dreams...

"What do you want me to do?" he asked her. He knew what he wanted to do, and it definitely involved ignoring the women outside the gate.

"I don't know. Get rid of them. I don't want to see them. They probably just want me to come home and clean up after them!" Lily snapped.

This was the first time he'd seen her angry, and by god, she was beautiful. But she was his employee, he reminded himself.

"Clean up after them, like you do for us here?" Leo asked.

She made an angry sound in her throat. "No, not like here. The contract I signed with Alicia provides me with room and board, fair pay and time off. They want to leech off me the way they did my dad. Until he died."

"I'm sorry about your father," he said.

Lily shook her head. She looked lost. "And I'm sorry about yours, too. But I...can you just get rid of them? Trust me, you do not want them in your house."

Leo nodded. Deliberately broadening his brogue, he activated the microphone on the intercom. "Please state your business at Moray Castle."

The silver-haired one leaned in close to the camera, so Leo could see the wrinkles at the corner of her eyes that denoted her as the stepmother. "I'm here to visit my daughter, Lily. I can't believe she forgot to invite us to the wedding, but we're willing to forgive her and we've come to help her settle into her role as the lady of the house."

"My arse she has," Lily hissed.

Leo had to fight not to laugh. Good thing he hadn't activated the camera, so they couldn't see his face, or Lily behind him. "I'm afraid Mr and Mrs King are away on their honeymoon."

The stepmother swore. Then she summoned a smile. "Can you tell me when they'll be back?" she asked sweetly.

Exactly like one of those vipers at the tennis club. "Dunno. Could be weeks, could be months. They're newlyweds, you know."

She fought to keep the smile on her face. "Well, then I suppose we'll just have to wait for her to return. Can you prepare three guest rooms and send someone to pick up our luggage?"

Lily shook her head furiously, mouthing an emphatic NO.

"Canna do that, ma'am. The house is all closed up while the laird's away, and there's just me, the caretaker, and no room in my cottage for you to stay. There's only one wee bed, nae big enough for me to share with three lassies like yourselves." He pretended to perk up. "I can call you a cab to take you down to the village. The pub has a bunkhouse above the bar, but they're only allowed to use it for staff accommodation, so you might have to pour a few pints if you want to sleep there." Leo pulled out his phone, and ordered a taxi. "There'll be a car coming for you in a few minutes, ma'am. Tell him Old MacDonald sent you, so he'll know it was me." He thumbed off the microphone, before he burst out laughing.

Lily's arms wrapped around him in a hug he was already returning before he'd realised it. God, she felt good in his arms. Like heaven and forever all bundled up into the sweetest package. "You are the best actor ever! I thought you pretending to be straight on our wedding day was amazing. But this...Old MacDonald? Really?"

Leo just laughed right along with her, enjoying the embrace for as long as she allowed it. Surely she'd come to her senses in a moment, and realise this probably wasn't appropriate, but for now...wait, what had she said?

"What do you mean...pretending to be straight? I'm not gay, lass. Never was, never will be. I'm..." He stepped back, gesturing at the bulge in his pyjama pants, then turned away as he tried to think unsexy thoughts to calm Little Leo down as fast as possible. "I like ladies," he finished.

"But I thought...that's why you married me, wasn't it? So people would think you're straight?" Her voice had this slightly hysterical edge to it.

"I married you so I could keep my job as CEO of Pride Holdings. The board want someone steady and trustworthy. A family man who's looking toward the long term future of the company. The papers have been full of crazy stories, saying I'm a playboy, or I'm gay, or a porn star..."

Lily laughed. "Seriously? What movie are you supposed to have starred in?"

At least they'd stolen a screenshot from a classic. "Andy's Anal Adventures episode sixty-nine."

Lily screwed up her nose. "I haven't seen that one. Okay, I haven't watched much porn ever, to be honest. But I haven't even heard of Andy or that he had so many adventures..."

"They. Andy's genderfluid, and their pronouns are they and them," Leo said. God, listen to him. He'd watched one episode, and Andy had turned him into an acolyte. What was the world coming to when a porn star could teach the world more about non-binary pronouns than any other public figure? "I'm sure we have it on one of the streaming services, if you ever want to watch it."

Lily's cheeks reddened. "I...think I'm okay, thanks. Oh, look the car's here. Please, please, let them get in and leave..."

When the stepmother looked to be shouting at the cab driver, folding her arms and shaking her head, Leo leaned into the intercom microphone and turned it on. "If you don't get in the car, ma'am, I'll have to call the police down at the village. The laird's very particular about trespassers, and there are dangerous wild animals in the woods. You won't want to be still outside the gates come night time."

The three women dashed for the car, leaving the poor driver to load their suitcases into the back.

In a moment, they were gone.

Leo found Lily staring at him. "Alicia didn't mention anything about wild animals. What should I be watching out for in the woods?"

Him, mostly, but he couldn't tell her that, especially as he wouldn't be shifting around her. "There are a lot of deer, and we do see wild boar on occasion. It's private property, so only we're allowed to hunt them, and I don't have much time for sport lately." He wouldn't for a while, not with Lily here. Not that he needed to eat fresh venison any time soon. He was pretty sure he'd caught the last wild boar a few months back, and he doubted the ones outside his lands would be looking for new territory before autumn. "As long as you keep to the gardens and stay out of the woods, you should be fine."

Lily nodded, colour returning to her face as she knelt to sweep up the broken cup she'd dropped earlier. The shards tinkled into the dustbin, then she washed her hands methodically, like she was scrubbing up for surgery. Only when she'd dried her hands did she turn around and meet his eyes. "Thank you for sending them away. I'm sorry you had to see that. Is there anything else you need me to do? I can load the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher, if you want."

Leo shook his head. "No, it's your day off. Mrs Parker has spent most of my life training me to stack the dishwasher properly when she's away. I'll never hear the end of it if I was lazy enough to leave my plate in the sink instead of dealing with it."

Lily gave another curt nod. "I guess I'll go do whatever I was doing before we got uninvited guests." She marched out of the kitchen, and up the stairs.

Leo let out a breath he hadn't even realised he'd been holding. She'd seemed more scared of her stepfamily than the animals in the woods. He'd been this close to telling her he turned into a lion, just to see her reaction. Supernatural secrecy, blown in a second. Almost, but not quite.

Something tinked against china. Leo looked down and swore. He'd somehow extended his claws right through the salmon and the toast, and cream cheese was oozing everywhere. He'd better eat it before she came back, or he'd have some explaining to do.