~

 

“Well, you took it like a champ, I’ll give you that.” Keri chuckled as she tossed a towel at the alpha and tried to keep her eyes from roaming over his wet, solid shoulders, and his broad muscled chest.

It was harder to do than she wanted to admit to herself.

Griffin snatched the towel from the air, and for a long moment, his eyes followed the little girl that had started the whole hullabaloo. She had a stuffed toy that was almost as big as she was under each arm, and her mother, looking somewhat less harassed, was cuddling another.

“I got railroaded into it,” Griffin reminded her.

“But, under such pressure, you performed with grace…” her eyes were sparkling with laughter in the sunlight.

“Grace?” Percival snorted his contempt for that on his way by them. “The man has about as much grace as an elephant doing the tango.”

“My,” Keri sneered at the vampire. “There’s a thought.”

She was in no doubt that she wanted the vampire to keep walking, and he did. She didn’t much care for vampires or their ways – and obviously that included their feeding habits.

She was sure she wasn’t going to strike up a damn friendship with that man either.

“You’ve never seen me dance.” Griffin growled low enough for the vampire to hear, but not for the humans.

“There’s that thunder again,” Edna said to herself, shaking her head, and walking towards the cake stall with her offering that she was keeping under wraps until the great reveal. “Better not rain on my creation,” she muttered, and Griffin frowned as he watched her go.

“Nothing wrong with her hearing,” Percival tossed back over his shoulder.

“Hmm?” Edna asked in the vampire’s general direction.

“I stand corrected,” he bit out. “Nothing, dear. Talking to myself,” he said loudly.

“That’s the first sign of madness,” she informed him.

“Oh, I’m way past the first sign,” he offered back, giving her a devilish grin.

“Or is that hairy palms?” She asked, trying to remember.

“That’s a conversation I really don’t want to have,” Percival said. “Someone else want to take this one?” He queried, and Griffin chuckled as his mate buried her face in her hands snorting small gasps of laughter.

“Oh, no … wait. I know what hairy palms is!” Edna announced. Then she eyed the vampire from head to toe and scowled.“Shame on you!”

“Me?” Percival shot her a look of pure disbelief. “What’d I do?”

“You know what you did!” Enda nodded emphatically as she started to quicken her step to get away from the man as fast as possible.

“I’m guessing I can’t put her out of her misery?” He muttered towards the alpha and got a long, hard growl in return. “Fine. Let the poor dear suffer – see if I care!” He threw up a hand and stalked away.

“Welcome to my world,” Griffin said turning his attention back towards his mate as she peeked out from between her fingers. She snapped her hands down and scowled back at him.

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” she demanded.

“Excuse me?” Griffin looked confused, and it reflected perfectly exactly how he felt.

“Don’t think taking a few sponges in the face means we're going steady or anything,” she told him, placing her hands on her hips and eyeing him with contempt.

“Ok, first of all… going steady?” He gave her a long look of disbelief, and she snorted. “Secondly, that’s not what I meant.”

“Sure it wasn’t,” she shot back with another sneer.

“Oh, go fish,” Griffin growled, and she shot him a surprised look as her perfect eyebrows reached for her hairline.

“What?”

“You heard me,” Griffin grumbled.

“I heard.”

“Well then.”

“Well, then what?”

“What?” he looked confused again. She guessed it didn’t take much – the poor dear.

“Go fish!” She reminded him of his words to her.

“Fine…” he grumbled, stretching his body to its full height and thrusting out his chest with good effect. Her eyes dropped downwards. “I will!” he growled. “Females.”

He tossed the towel back at her and stalked in the opposite direction. He didn’t notice that the towel landed perfectly over her head. Or the way that she reached up and snatched it away.

Neither did he notice the death glare that she aimed at that solid, muscled back of his, even as her brain was picturing the rest of him naked as his backside swayed and stretched the material of his tight jeans.

Keri heard a rumble in the back of her own throat, and it slapped her around the back of her head. She snapped rigid in place, and her eyes shot around the area to see if anyone was looking.

Of course, it would have to be Penny!

 

~

~

~

 

Penny had been watching the alpha trying to woo her friend. From what she could tell, things weren’t progressing smoothly.

She’d also been caught once more being nosy, and the fact that she had a giant grin on her face probably hadn’t gone down to well with Keri.

“Whoops,” she muttered, busying herself with the tin cans that she was stacking up on the high plank of wood that ran the length of the stall.

Then she felt the presence of the supernatural hit her shields, and she eyed the area looking for signs of her own mate appearing like a bad smell. Unfortunately, or fortunately, she wasn’t entirely sure which, she found that the vampire was standing at the edge of the stall instead.

“It’s not a blood bank. It’s a kid’s game.” She gave him a long look up and down his; black on black ensemble that he wore from head to toe. “Nice outfit – nobody could tell you were a vampire.”

“I could be an undertaker,” he offered back as if butter wouldn’t melt on his fangs.

“Same thing.”

“Slander,” he offered, waving a hand in the air, and she snorted.

“Take me to court and sue me,” she gave him a smug grin.

“I’ll … pass.” He rolled his eyes upwards in his head and considered it for a long moment. “It’s the screaming and running bit that annoys me so.”

“What’s that? When they get a look at your face?”

“My, aren’t you the bitchy one?”

“Better than being the dead one, no?”

“The day is young,” he offered back, and a deep, warning growl rumbled through the air and made her ears prick up as the vampire gave a dramatic roll of his eyes. “Oh, good – the family pet’s here.”