Chapter 10 #2
"Oh, you're here about Penelope's tab," Vanessa says, looking up from a stocktaking notebook. "Yeah, she owes me about four hundred and seventy dollars. Bought a lot of expensive lingerie. High-end stuff. Imported things. Really nice pieces, actually. She has good taste, I'll give her that."
"Any idea what she was using the lingerie for?" I ask, even though I have a pretty good idea.
"Honeymoon, probably," Vanessa says, shrugging.
"She kept talking about how her husband-to-be needed to see her in certain things.
How she needed to look perfect for him. Standard bride stuff, really.
The problem is that she hasn't paid a single bill, and when I asked her about it, she said she'd settle everything after the wedding. After she came into money."
By the time we leave Silk and Sin, Sharon has calculated that Penelope's total debt is somewhere in the neighborhood of two thousand dollars, and that's just what we've found so far.
"She must be doing something with all this stuff," Sharon says as we're walking back toward the office. "The books, the alcohol, the lingerie. Nobody just buys that much stuff without a plan."
"Well, the lingerie is pretty self-explanatory," I say, squeezing her hand gently.
"The alcohol could be for the wedding or for drinking through the stress of the wedding or for drowning her sorrows after the wedding falls apart.
But the books about manipulation and business and psychology?
Those aren't for personal use. Those are research. "
Sharon stops walking, and I can see the exact moment the puzzle pieces click together in her head. Her eyes go wide, and her scent shifts to something that smells like understanding mixed with alarm.
"She's researching how to manipulate Ben," Sharon says slowly. "And how to start a business. And how to do real estate development. She's not just trying to marry him for money. She's planning something bigger. Something calculated."
"Which means we need to go back to the office and see what else we can figure out," I say, already pulling out my phone to call Cassian and Pine. "Because if Penelope is planning something this elaborate, we need to know what it is before she actually goes through with it."
Sharon is holding my hand the entire time as we head to her office, and every once in a while, she looks up at me determined, even though she knows doing this could derail her entire chance at taking over Bourbon Bliss Weddings.
"Penelope is not going to be happy if she finds out we've been investigating her spending habits,” I say as I can see Sharon beaming from all the news as she unlocks the office door.
"Let her be unhappy," Sharon says, and there's something fierce in her voice that makes my alpha brain sit up and pay attention. "She's using psychological tactics that she specifically researched. She deserves to be investigated."
We sit down at Sharon's desk, and she pulls up her browser.
I'm watching her work, watching her fingers fly across the keyboard as she navigates to Ben's social media profiles.
She clicks through his photos, his posts, his tagged locations, and suddenly she's saying something that makes everything click into place.
"Look at this," she says, pointing at the screen.
"Ben's posts have shifted. He went from posting about wedding planning to posting about real estate investment opportunities.
He's talking about developing property in Pine Hollow.
He's talking about building resorts and vacation rentals and commercial spaces. "
"And Penelope bought books about real estate development and how to start a business," I say, the pieces falling into place. "They're planning to do something to this town. They're planning to buy property and develop it, and they need Ben's family money to do it."
"Which means the marriage is just a steppingstone," Sharon says quietly. "It's not actually about love or commitment. It's about access to money and resources and Ben's connections."
"We need to tell Cassian and Pine," I say, turning back to face Sharon as I stand by the window. "We need to tell them everything we've found out."
"Jessica has the day off," Sharon says, gesturing around the empty office. "She's been sleeping in and doing nothing because the heating situation exhausted her. But she's going to want to know about this too."
"I'm really into you," I say, and it comes out before I've really thought about it. "And you're into this investigation, which means I'm into this investigation because that's what pack does. We support each other. We go on weird detective missions together. We figure things out."
I move around the desk and pull her up from her chair.
She comes easily, and suddenly I'm holding her close, my hands on her waist, my face close enough to hers that I can smell her scent.
Strawberry and honey, a dizzying and delicious combination, seemingly wrapping around us both.We're standing in her small office, the door locked behind us after hours of chasing down leads on Ben and Penelope's fraud scheme.
The overhead fluorescent lights cast harsh shadows across the cluttered desk, but all I can focus on is her.
Sharon's leaning against the desk, cheeks flushed from the adrenaline of discovery, her curls escaping from the ponytail she tied back this morning.
"You're kinda hot when you investigate," I admit, closing the distance between us until I'm standing directly in front of her.
My voice drops lower, rougher. The confession pulls itself from somewhere deep in my chest. "I must admit it kinda turned me on, being with you today.
Watching you piece everything together, seeing that sharp mind of yours work. "
I reach out and tuck one of those escaped curls behind her ear, letting my fingers linger against her jaw.
"The way you bit your lip when you were concentrating," I continue, my thumb brushing across that bottom lip she's been abusing all afternoon.
"The way your scent spiked every time we found something new.
Strawberries getting sweeter, honey getting thicker.
You have no idea what that does to an alpha. "
Her pupils dilate, swallowing the warm brown of her irises until they're nearly black. Her breath hitches, coming faster as I crowd closer into her space.
"Kiss me," she demands, her voice rough with need.
My alpha purrs at the command, at her boldness, at the way she's not afraid to ask for what she wants.
"Damn, slow down tiger," I say, but I'm already moving.
In one sweep, whatever's on her desk becomes a thing of the past. Papers scatter and flutter to the floor like snow. Her laptop slides across the wooden surface. The stapler hits the ground with a sharp clatter. I don't care about any of it.
I grip her hips, my hands nearly spanning her entire waist, and lift her onto the desk. The wood creaks under the sudden weight. She gasps at the movement, at being manhandled so easily, and the sound goes straight through me.
Her legs wrap around me instantly, pulling me into the space between her thighs. Her body is soft and warm against mine, curves pressing everywhere we touch. The way she clings to me, desperate and needy, makes something primal roar to life in my chest. My alpha is screaming mine, claim, keep.
I've been starving for this since the moment we started this investigation.
Every minute spent tracking down fraud felt like foreplay leading to this exact moment.
My hand slides up to cup the back of her neck, fingers threading through the silk of her hair as I tilt her head back, exposing the long line of her throat.
I pause there for just a second, breathing her in. Strawberries and honey and arousal so thick I can taste it in the air between us.
Then I take her mouth.
She opens for me immediately, an invitation I don't hesitate to accept.
My tongue slides against hers, and the taste of her floods my senses.
Coffee from the cup she nursed all afternoon.
Honey like her natural scent made flavor.
Something sweet and warm that's purely Sharon, purely omega, purely perfect.
She meets me stroke for stroke, her tongue dancing with mine in a rhythm that makes my blood run hot. The kiss turns hungry fast, all the tension from hours of working together exploding into desperate need.
My tongue explores her mouth with an urgency I can't control, claiming every inch while she claims me right back. She tastes like heaven and sin mixed together, and I can't get enough. I angle her head further back, deepening the kiss until I'm practically devouring her.
Her hands are everywhere. Fisting in my shirt hard enough that I hear fabric strain. Sliding up my chest, nails scraping lightly even through the cotton. Gripping my shoulders like she needs the anchor, like I'm the only thing keeping her grounded.
Sharon makes a sound against my mouth, something between a whimper and a moan that vibrates through both of us. Heat floods through me, my cock hardening against the zipper of my jeans where it's pressed between us.
My free hand finds her hip, gripping the soft flesh there before my thumb strokes the strip of skin where her shirt has ridden up. Her skin is fever-hot under my touch, smooth and responsive. She shivers, pressing closer, and I can feel the heat of her core even through our clothes.
Sharon’s everything I never knew I was looking for.
Her scent spikes again, sharper and sweeter. Strawberries crushed under pressure. Honey warming in sunlight. And underneath it all, the unmistakable musk of omega arousal that makes my alpha howl with satisfaction.
When I finally force myself to pull back, we're both breathing hard. The air between us is thick with pheromones and want.
Her lips are swollen and pink from my mouth. Her hair is completely mussed from my hands, the ponytail holder lost somewhere in the chaos. Her shirt is twisted and riding up, revealing the curve of her collarbone and the gentle swell of her breasts where I desperately want to put my mouth next.
She's breathless and beautiful and completely wrecked from just a kiss.
Her scent has shifted to something warmer, deeper. Something that smells like desire and trust and belonging all mixed together in a combination that makes my alpha rumble with possessive satisfaction.
Something that smells like mine.
We walk inside, and I can hear Cassian and Pine in the kitchen, apparently arguing about whether they should order food or cook something.
Standard evening routine for those two. They both look up when we walk in, and their expressions shift from casual to alert in about half a second flat.
Pack instinct. They can tell something's up.
"You two look like you have something to tell us," Pine says, his eyes narrowing slightly as he takes us in. "And based on Sharon's scent, it's something that involves either a lot of excitement or a lot of trouble."
Probably both.
"It does," I say, pulling Sharon close to my side. My hand settles on her hip, claiming and protective. "We investigated Penelope's spending habits and discovered that she's planning some kind of elaborate fraud scheme involving real estate development and psychological manipulation tactics."
The look on Cassian's face is worth every moment of worry I've had about investigating this in the first place. His mouth actually drops open.
"You did what?"
Sharon starts to answer, but her phone buzzes in her pocket. She glances at the screen.
Text message from Savannah: "Sharon, the babies are coming early. Well, not early. I'm having contractions, but they're not real labor. False alarm. The midwife says I'll have them on the 24th like we planned. But my nerves are shot."
Christmas Eve. Babies. Wedding. Fraud scheme probably exploding. All on the same damn day.
"Well," Sharon says, her voice going soft in that way it does when she's trying not to panic, "I guess we're about to have the most interesting Christmas Eve in Pine Hollow history."
I grunt. "Interesting is one word for it."
Chaotic is another. Complicated is a third. But what I know is this: Christmas Eve just became the day everything either falls apart or comes together.
And we're going to make damn sure it's the second one.