Christmas Griffin - Zoe Chant Page 0,31

good. Thank God he was wearing indoor shoes.

His griffin was in heaven. To it, all of this was right. Even when he reminded it that being close to Delphine was a sure ticket to hurt, it kept trying to gaze lovingly at her through his eyes.

Hardwick kept his eyes shut. Letting her look after him like this might mean less hurt now, but it was as good as a promise for more hurt later.

He groaned again as she got him to tip his head to one side and ran her thumb along the tense cord of his neck. “Where did you learn how to do this?”

The question was a rookie mistake. She hadn’t lied to him since she’d seen him drop the meal—because she’d been busy asking questions. Make her answer one of her own, and he had no doubt she’d slip back into the lies that seemed like her natural way of being.

And she would feel him tense under her fingers and know that he couldn’t just sense her lies. They hurt him.

He couldn’t say why he didn’t want her to know that. Probably some sort of masculine dislike of appearing weak. Frankly, he wasn’t in the mood for that sort of self-introspection right now.

Her embarrassed chuckle took him by surprise. She rested her hands on his shoulders for a moment before beginning to massage them.

“It was a work thing,” she admitted. And it was an admission. It was the truth. “A professional development course for personal assistants.”

“You do this for your boss?” His eyes flew open. He was about to sit up and put an end to the stolen moment of connection when she tipped her head back and gave a gurgling laugh.

“No! No, that would… absolutely not.” She snorted, unladylike for the first time since they had met. His heart thudded. “I thought the course was some sort of mental self-improvement thing for dealing with difficult managers, and then they brought out the scented oils. The whole thing was like something straight out of the 1950s. Deal with your boss by giving him some personal stress-relief after his busy day being a big, important man.”

Hardwick didn’t trust himself to say anything to that, so he kept his mouth shut.

“I told Mr. Petrakis it was a course on mental resilience, or something. I can’t remember what. And filtered all of the company’s follow-up emails to a special spam folder all of their very own.” Her fingers dug into the base of his skull again and stayed there until his head relaxed back, supported by her hands. “I told myself it might come in handy one day, at least… and here we are.”

It was the longest she’d spoken to him without setting off explosions in his head. His griffin was drunk on her laughter, and he found himself letting go of the wariness he’d clung to since she first woke up. He even forgot about the wavering light in his heart. For a few minutes, they weren’t stalking around each other, stepping over unsaid secrets like prowling cats.

He talked about his work. Not the mistake with Jackson, but the bigger picture. Using his ability to help get criminals off the street.

“Not that it’s only criminals who lie,” he found himself saying. “Everyone does. And they all think they have a reason for it.”

“Even your colleagues?”

He thought of Jackson again. His partner was the non-shifter son of two shifter parents. He’d acted like he didn’t care, but there’d always been a halo of untruth around it. Like when he said he’d left Pine Valley only for his career, and not because a girl had broken his heart.

He was back with the girl now, though. Hardwick had left town too quickly to hear the story behind that change of heart.

But Jackson’s lies hadn’t hurt that much. Nor had anyone else. Not until the mistake.

“Colleagues, sure. When no one wants to own up to leaving their moldy coffee cups under their desks.” Among other things.

He stole a glance at Delphine. Her eyes were firmly on her work, but she was frowning.

“How do you—” she began, and then bit her lip. “How does that feel now?” she asked, and he couldn’t shake the feeling she’d been about to say something else.

He stretched his head from side to side. “Better.”

“I’ll just finish up, then.” She gently pushed his head back to center. “Let me know if I’m rubbing too hard. Like I said, this is meant to be a scented-oil thing.”

“Wasn’t planning on it