Beauty And The Billionaire Bear: A BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance Novella (The Shifter Princes Book 2) Read online

  Beauty And The Billionaire Bear: A BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance Novella

  The Shifter Princes, Volume 2

  Sable Sylvan

  Published by Sable Sylvan, 2015.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  BEAUTY AND THE BILLIONAIRE BEAR: A BBW BEAR SHIFTER PARANORMAL ROMANCE NOVELLA

  First edition. July 24, 2015.

  Copyright © 2015 Sable Sylvan.

  Written by Sable Sylvan.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek: Sleeping BBW And The Billionaire Bear

  About The Author

  Chapter One

  Photo Attribution

  The bear photo on the cover was found on Flickr. Scott Calleja posted his image, “Grizzly Bear”, on Flickr, under a Creative Commons 2.0 license. The picture of a rose is a public domain image found on Flickr. The image has been altered.

  Rose Charleston had been waiting for her father’s return for weeks. Ever since her mother had passed, her father had been the rock that held her family together, even when he was far away, working at the tree farm upstate far from their small town, Big Sky, Montana, a few miles outside of Bozeman . Rose had ran their small house while her father was away for the last three years. She’d taken care of her two younger sisters, but even though Eliza and Dory were in high school, she was still their surrogate mom.

  Rose looked at the clock. Her father, Jake, was supposed to have arrived home already. He worked three hours away, so he only came back down for the weekends, usually, but he had been working more weekends up at the farm to make extra money. She’d spent hours preparing the family’s favorite foods. For Eliza and Dory, there were Caesar salads, as they were watching their figures, but for Rose and her father, there was a large pot of spaghetti waiting to be drenched in olive oil and pesto sauce.

  As Rose blended the pine nuts and mixed them with the basil, she frowned. It wasn’t like her father to be late, and she had been looking forward to his return. Of course, so were Eliza and Dory. Every time their father came back from his job up at the Asher Lumber Mill, he returned with gifts for the family. Eliza and Dory were too young to realize that asking their father for expensive things wasn’t smart when they were all saving money for the two girls to go to college. Rose had asked for wildflowers from the tree farm instead. Her father had told her about how the flowers up there were bigger and brighter than the flowers down in their small town.

  “Rose?” said Eliza, walking into the kitchen. She wasn’t holding her cell phone, which was usually glued to her hand.

  “Hey, Eliza, what’s up?” asked Rose. She looked up. Her sister’s eyes looked scared. Rose put down the mixing spoon. “Eliza, honey, what’s wrong?”

  “Daddy’s home...and he says he wants to see you,” said Eliza. “He’s in a limo outside.”

  Rose wanted to ask Eliza if she was joking, but she knew she wasn’t. She took off her apron and walked out towards the entrance. She was scared but couldn’t let her younger sister see it. “I’ll be right back,” promised Rose.

  Rose opened the door. Parked on the street was a long, black stretch limo. As she walked towards the car, the window rolled down. “Dad?” she said. She looked around. Her father was sitting in the car, his head in his hands. “Dad, what’s going on?”

  Rose’s father got out of the car. An older man with greying hair, he was past his prime and looked more harrowed than usual. “I...I really messed up this time, Rose,” said Rose’s father, looking up at her, his eyes red from crying.

  “Dad, what did you do?” asked Rose.

  “I...I took something that didn’t belong to me, and now, the family might be sued,” said her father. “I’m going to have to go to jail. The Asher Lumber Company said I could see you and the girls one last time, before I go to the station.”

  “Dad, they can’t do that, what did you do?” asked Rose.

  “I took...this,” said Jake. He lifted up his hand. In it was a rose, thorns and petals and all, wilted from the car ride. “I know you don’t ask for much, so I took the rose, and I thought you’d like it, but...”

  “But it wasn’t his to take,” said a man, exiting the car. Tall, burly, wearing a pair of dark sunglasses even though it was the dead of night, the man in the black suit towered over both Rose and her father. He looked like he belonged at a nightclub in Ann Arbor as a bouncer, not in this podunk town with her father as his hostage. As much as Rose hated to admit it, he would have been exactly her type...if she’d met him under different circumstances. “Your father is guilty of theft and destruction of property.”

  “Over a rose?” asked Rose, going up to the man. He was tall and intimidating, but she wasn’t scared of him. The only thing she feared was losing her father. “I don’t know who you think you are, but you can’t go throwing people into gulags over flowers.”

  “It was no ordinary flower,” said the man with a growl, taking the flower out of Rose’s father’s hands. Rose noticed for the first time the marks on the man’s hands, and they sent a shiver down her spine. She knew what the dark paw marks meant: this man was a bear shifter. “And there’s enough footage to put your father away for years, so if I were you, I’d start begging for my forgiveness instead of yelling at me over things you don’t understand, little girl.”

  Little girl? Who was he, to call her ‘little girl’? “You have no idea who you are messing with,” said Rose, getting in the man’s face the best she could. “I will do whatever it takes to ensure that you don’t take my father away from me. We have nobody else. You take my father away, and my sisters and I will have nothing. Nothing.”

  “You’ll really do whatever it takes?” asked the man, taking off his glasses. His eyes were dark green, the green of the forest at night. They flashed as he looked over the curvy young woman in front of him. There was no way her name was actually Rose, no way that she was the one he’d looked for, all these years. His cock twitched as he took in her curves and ate her with his eyes. “Do you have any idea who I am?”

  “No, but I don’t care,” said Rose, frowning at the man who was giving her the once-over. She could tell he was judging her. She didn’t care. She knew that shifter women were tall and graceful and thin, and that she looked human. She was human, and proud of it. It didn’t matter that this man was judging her. “How much was that flower that my father picked? I’ll take out a loan and pay you back.”

  “I doubt you have a quarter of a million dollars in your checking account, sweetheart,” said the man, raising an eyebrow. He hadn’t expected the curvy girl to be so sassy. To be fair, he hadn’t met a woman, shifter or human, who hadn’t known who he was before. “But...I can tell you care about your father, so I’ll strike a deal with you.”

  “Anything,” said Rose, getting up close and in the shifter’s face. She wasn’t usually one to be aggressive, but when her family’s safety was on the line, she’d do whatever it took to protect them. “I’ll do anything to save my father.”

  “Work for me, to work your father’s debt off,” said the man. “And then your fathe
r will be a free man. I won’t press any charges.”

  “Done,” said Rose.

  Rose’s father held her back. “No, Rose, you can’t do this!” he said. “You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into!”

  “Dad, you need to take care of the girls, I won’t be around to do it,” said Rose, looking at her father. “Get a job in town, get them through school. I don’t know when I’ll see you again...but I need you to be there.”

  Rose turned back to the big shifter in front of her. “Do you have a name?” she asked.

  “You don’t need to know my name,” said the man. “But you can call me...Beast.”

  “A fitting name,” said Rose, narrowing her eyes as the man opened the door to the limo. She sat on one of the dark black leather benches and the man entered after her, closing the door behind him, and as the man buckled in, the driver drove the limo away from the house, Rose’s father staring as the limo left.

  Rose stared out the window at her father until he became a dot in the distance before she started crying. Tears streamed down Rose’s face as she realized what she’d done. She had no idea who this man was and she was in a limo with him going to only God knew where.

  The man didn’t reach out to comfort her. He pulled out a cell phone and tapped at the screen awkwardly. He didn’t dare touch the girl. This wasn’t how this was supposed to go. This wasn’t how anything was supposed to go.

  ***

  By the time the limo entered the dark forest roads of upper Montana, Rose had stopped crying. The limo pulled off the main road and went down a dirt road. Rose panicked for a second but the limo’s lights illuminated a sign: “Property Of Asher Lumber Co., No Trespassing”. She realized she’d seen the sign once before in one of her father’s pictures from work, and she’d seen the name in the papers and on her father’s checks. This was the placed he’d been working at for the past three years.

  The shifter pocketed his phone as the limo was let into the property and drove down a hill, away from the mill, a road that became gravely and then paved again. Rose looked out the window over the shoulder of the man across from her. Something was shimmering in the distance, over the tree line, something long and flat and still. She squinted. It was a lake.

  “Checking me out?” asked the shifter with a smirk.

  “Of course not,” said Rose. “Just trying to figure out where I am.”

  “Flathead Lake. Upper Montana. Coordinates are forty-seven point nine oh seventeen degrees north, a hundred and fourteen point one oh forty-two degrees west. You need me to repeat that, princess?” asked the bear.

  “Why did you tell me?” asked Rose.

  “I didn’t kidnap you, Ms. Charleston, you came with me,” said the bear shifter with a growl. “Willingly, if I recall.”

  “Willingly? I did it for my father,” said Rose angrily, balling her fists, resisting the urge to beat the bear shifter right in the face. “I half expected you to be driving to Mexico to sell me to some cartel as a sex slave.”

  “I’m a beast, not a monster,” said the shifter, resisting the urge to turn into his shift and roar at Rose.

  “Then how exactly do you expect me to be worth a quarter million dollars to you?” asked Rose. “I’m just a high school graduate. I’m not an engineer or a doctor, and I’d be useless working at the mill.”

  “I don’t expect you to work at the mill, Rose, and yes, it’s obvious you’d be useless there,” said Beast, looking over the curvy woman in front of him.

  Rose noticed the once over and frowned. “What, because I’m fat?”

  “No, because you’d be a distraction to the men,” said Beast.

  Rose blushed. Was that a compliment? There might’ve been, but it was buried under layers of passive aggressive junk. “Whatever,” said Rose. “So what do I have to do?”

  “Keep me company for a month,” said Beast.

  “A month?!” asked Rose. “So I was right, I’m going to be a sex slave.”

  “Did I say anything about sex?” asked Beast, resisting the urge to rip off his clothes and show her exactly why she was there. “As badly as you want me, sex is not on the table. Did I stutter? I’m a beast, not a monster. Company, that’s it.”

  “So you just expect me to live with you for a month?” asked Rose warily.

  “That’s right,” said Beast. The limo parked and Beast got out, keeping the door open for Rose. “And this is where you’ll be staying.”

  Rose couldn’t believe her eyes. In front of her was the largest house she’d ever seen up close. No, it wasn’t a house. It was a mansion, and the Gothic architecture made it look like a castle. Small lanterns were lit along the walls and a pair of double doors that were proportional to her tall host’s size flanked the entrance.

  “And...what happens at the end of the month?” asked Rose.

  “I’ll take you back down to Big Sky...if you want me to,” said Beast smugly. “Come on, I’ll show you to your room

  Rose looked up at the big mansion and then back down at the man. The mansion dwarfed the man who towered over her, and it made Rose feel small, for one of the first times in recent years. She took a deep breath. “Lead the way,” she said, and Beast opened the door to the hall and led her in to his abode.

  The mansion had damask wallpaper with wood paneling, but Beast wasn’t taking Rose on a grand tour. He walked up a flight of stairs with her and led her to a room, opened the door, and flicked on the lights. Rose audibly gasped. The nightmares she had in the limo were set aside as she took in the room.

  This wasn’t a dark dungeon. There were no racks, no chains, no seats of leather and concrete floors, with bars on the windows.

  Instead, the room was bright. Cheery. The dark wood floors were covered with a big, fluffy white rug with a rose pattern, complete with small green leaves. Against one wall was a white couch, covered in pillows, each throw pillow in a satin case: a case with small rosettes made of folded fabric stood out the most. Against the wall opposite from the entrance was a large bay window with a pale green cushion, and sheer curtains in white lace draped the bay window.

  The walls were painted dusty rose but small flecks of gold stood out, lit by a pale white chandelier, an ivory color, with warm bulbs. The bed stood out the most. The full sized bed was fit for a queen, resplendent with bed skirts and more pillows than any other bed Rose had ever seen.

  Next to the bed was a crystal vase which looked milky, home to bunches of pink roses which scented the room with their strong floral odor: upon looking closer, Rose saw that the vase was filled with pearls.

  Beast didn’t dare walk into the room. “Check the closet,” he ordered.

  Rose looked at the man, who was now more of a puzzle to her than ever, before walking over to the wall across from the bed and sliding the paneling aside. The paneling, painted to blend into the dusty room, had hidden seams and the closet doors slid away and out of sight, soft bulbs automatically turning on as each panel tripped secret switches in the door track. The bulbs lit each of the closet’s separate compartments, from the rows of dresses to boxes filled with individual pairs of shoes, mostly heels and flats which glimmered in the light. This was nothing like Rose’s small, cramped dresser back at her home in Bozeman, in the room she shared with her two sisters.

  “Why did you do all this?” asked Rose, turning back to the man who still hadn’t given her his real name. Tall and rugged, he was unlike any of the other handsome men she’d met in her life, because his eyes weren’t cocky, but sad.

  As Beast shut the door to the bedroom, he said, “I told you before: I may be a beast, but I’m not a monster.”

  Chapter Two

  For the first time since this strange night had started, Rose actually wanted to talk to the mysterious man, to actually talk to him rather than to shout at him and argue, but by the time she got to the door, the man was gone.

  Rose shut the door and went back to the closet. She opened the various drawers and found clean bras and underwea
r as well as pantyhose. They were all fancy and frilly, nothing like the practical underwear she was still wearing, so she picked a single pair of new panties and balled them in her hand as she looked for something suitable to wear to bed.

  In one of the drawers near the undergarments she found a set of pajamas, neatly folded. In baby pink with white polka dots and matching trim, the pajamas weren’t too sexy. The capri pants and a button up top with a lapel were of breathable cotton, but the weave was thicker than Rose expected.

  Rose got changed and got into bed: she was too tired to stay up any longer, after her long day of cleaning and cooking for her family and after the stress surrounding her father’s scandal. As soon as Rose’s head hit the pillow, she was out like a light...but before she fell asleep, she swore she heard a bear roar outside, in the distant woods.

  ***

  Rose was woken up by the sound of bells. “Good morning, Ms. Charleston,” said an unfamiliar voice.

  Rose rubbed the sleep out of her eyes: it wasn’t the voice of Beast, a voice deep and distinctive, a voice she’d recognize anywhere. She squinted. “Good morning.”

  A woman wearing a black polo shirt and a black tennis skirt was standing in her doorway. “I hope I didn’t wake you up too early. It’s already noon, and I wanted to make sure you had something to eat,” said the young woman who was wearing thick glasses, her blonde hair pulled back into two curly pigtails. “My name’s Hannah, and my boss said that you might need a hand maid, lady in waiting, whatever you wanna call it, I’m your girl Friday!”

  “Your boss?” asked Rose. “Do you know your boss’s name, Hannah?”

  “Yep, but I’m under strict orders not to tell you his name,” said Hannah with a big smile. Rose was weirded out. Why was the maid so happy to see her? “Did you take a bath yet?”

  “No,” admitted Rose. “I wasn’t shown where the bathroom was.”

  “Oh, it’s inside your closet,” said Hannah, walking over to the wall as Rose got out of bed.