Page 12 of Her Lion Lover

First was the fact that he was more excited about finding his fated mate than saving Pride Holdings from Uncle Jeremy. Did that mean that Uncle Jeremy was right, and that he wasn't the most suitable person to lead the company?

Dad had always done a brilliant job. He'd instinctively done the right thing, fighting for projects that no one believed were possible, and delivering them on time and on budget. He'd turned Pride Holdings into what it was today, and Hea Sanctuary had been his pride and joy, his personal retirement project. He'd said that as soon as the place was built, he and Mum would move there and retire, leaving the company and the family home to Leo.

Mum wouldn't move there without Dad. After Dad died, she'd taken on more and more of the housekeeper's role as Mrs Parker's hair turned from salt and pepper to solid white. Even her fur stayed white when she shifted now, instead of changing with the seasons, like a normal arctic fox. When she retired, which she'd probably have done years ago, if not for Mum, Mrs Parker would be hard to replace. Finding another shifter who was both a capable housekeeper and someone who had the discretion to keep all of their family secrets...though that would probably be Mum's problem, not his. Mum had been an HR manager, and Pride Holdings still employed many of the staff she'd hired, long after she'd retired from the role.

But if Mum no longer wanted it...would it be such a bad thing to let Dad's dream die with him? The Hea Sanctuary was so plagued with delays that even he'd begun to doubt that it would ever be a reality. Maybe Dad had been wrong about it. In a lifetime of always being right, it had to happen once, right? At least he hadn't lived to see it.

But he had wanted to see it. The concept art for the sanctuary was still all over his office walls, just the way he'd left it. He'd used words like magnum opus, passion project, dream come true...the sort of stuff that had made Leo look at the house plans, to see if he might be able to justify buying a small cottage there, too. Not a home, but maybe a holiday home, for when he came to visit. Somewhere cosy to sleep after running around as a beast for half the night, hunting.

Maybe he should take Dad's dream as his own. Claim the house he and Mum were going to retire in, sell his shares in Pride Holdings to Uncle Jeremy or whoever else wanted them, invest the money and live off the proceeds. Maybe create an online startup or two if he wanted to keep working, though he wouldn't need to. Let Uncle Jeremy do whatever he wanted to with the company while Leo settled down to a comfortable life with his fated mate. He could be a stay at home dad, bringing up their cubs while his mate did...whatever she found the most fulfilling. Knitting. Oil painting. Fishing in the lake. Dancing, seeing as she was pretty good at it, if last night had been anything to go by.

Leo lay back in bed. He didn't even know her name, let alone what her passions were, but he couldn't wait to find out. She'd be perfect for him, as all fated mates were. Like a fairytale.

He should thank Uncle Jeremy, for helping him see so clearly. If it weren't for his betrayal, Leo might never have gone to Tremotino's ball, or met his fated mate. Thanks to Uncle Jeremy, now he'd get to settle down in the heaven that would be Hea Sanctuary, without worrying about project deadlines ever again.

Or council approvals, or lining up the right contractors, or dealing with the million and one details that made Pride Holdings projects the best.

But first he had to stick around long enough to see Hea Sanctuary built. He couldn't retire until Dad's dream was a tangible reality.

Which meant even if he wasn't the right choice to lead Pride Holdings into the future, he couldn't leave just yet. Couldn't let Uncle Jeremy or Tremotino win.

He had to realise his dad's dream. Take the concept all the way to reality. That's what he and Dad had promised the shareholders on the project, many of whom were the contractors who'd pledged to build the place. Because it wasn't just Dad's dream. A whole lot of other shifters were counting on him, too, sinking all their savings into the project. If he let Uncle Jeremy permanently shelve the sanctuary, they'd all lose a lot of money. Maybe all they had. Not everyone was like his family, or the Argyros family – rolling in old money that they'd carefully invested over the centuries. He had to see this through, no matter what.

He wasn't sure how, though. Talking to Tremotino was out, seeing as he was already in bed with Uncle Jeremy. Confronting Uncle Jeremy was out, too. What with Uncle Jeremy's inability to shift, the age-old rite of fair combat couldn't happen, and Uncle Jeremy would probably just deny the whole thing anyway. He'd be right, too, because Leo didn't have any proof of his uncle's duplicity, except for the conversation he'd overheard.

If he wanted to turn the tables on Uncle Jeremy and have him kicked off the board of directors, he'd need rock-solid proof to show the rest of the board. And he had no idea where to look for it. What he needed was a private investigator – someone who did know where to find evidence of wrongdoing. Finding a good investigator, though...hiring good people was Mum's forte, not his.

Leo blew out a frustrated breath.

He ached for his mate. Dancing with her, then that glorious chase...if he'd caught her, they'd still be making love right now. They'd be holed up in this motel room for a week, not wanting to leave.

Which would only prove Uncle Jeremy right – that Leo was more of a playboy than a suitable CEO.

What if Uncle Jeremy was right, and he'd never live up to his dad's expectations? Hea Sanctuary was his dad's greatest dream, bigger than anything Leo had delivered by himself before. What if he couldn't do it?

Round and round it went in his mind, until dawn finally broke through the motel window's worn blinds, and Leo fell into an exhausted doze.

SIXTEEN

As Lily lugged her suitcase up the stairs to the room at the top of the tower, she considered whether she should have claimed one of the guest rooms on the lower levels of her parents' house. Well, her stepmother's house, now.

But that would mean sleeping closer to her stepsisters, Courtney and Chloe, and being surrounded by the bland, impersonal furniture her mother had deemed fit for guests, while the tower had been fitted out for their little princess, with a custom made bedroom suite topped with crowns and crenelations that her mother had hand painted.

So when she threw open the door and breathed in the musty air from the untouched room, she told herself the tower was nowhere near as high as the looming edifice at Tremotino Castle, and she'd be fine here, thank you very much.

Once she'd taken down all the dust sheets, made up the bed, and set off the robot vacuum cleaner that had delighted her mother since the day her father had brought it home as a gift, Lily had no desire to sleep anywhere else. Not even her room at Mirror Academy had ever felt this much like home.

The robot played a little tune to tell her it had finished vacuuming, so Lily picked it up, to take it downstairs to empty the now rather full dust filter.

She made it all the way to the kitchen rubbish bin before the stench hit her. Worse than the dumpster outside the Academy kitchens on a hot, sunny day, just before the rubbish truck came to collect the waste. Not the sort of smell she'd ever expected to encounter in her mother's kitchen. Had someone murdered her stepmother and stepsisters, then left their corpses here to rot?

A quick search behind the benches revealed no corpses, thank goodness, but between the overflowing bin, and the dishes piled up in the sink and on every available surface, she wasn't sure if dead bodies could smell worse.

Well, at least there wasn't a flood of blue milk all over the floor, Lily told herself as she set to work.

Four dishwasher loads later, she'd handwashed the rest, disinfected all the surfaces and the sink as well, and brought down the vacuuming robot to start on the floor. The mopping robot was still charging, but by the time the vacuuming was done, it would likely have enough power to do the kitchen, at least.

Rubbish collection day wasn't until tomorrow, but she'd filled up the bins already, so she took them out to the kerb, ready to be emptied in the morning.

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