The Griffin's Mate (Hideaway Cove 1)

Which was what had brought her back to Hideaway Cove.

Lainie took a deep breath. You can do this, she told herself, mouthing the words. You’re a grown woman now. And this is business. You’re good at business.

“And as for you,” Lainie said out loud, glaring at the steering wheel, “I did not pay through the nose for a rental just to have it die on me! Come on…”

Holding her breath, Lainie turned the key in the ignition. The engine revved—and revved—and turned over. She sighed with relief.

“One night, and then you can leave all of this behind you,” she promised herself. “A fresh start without Hideaway Cove.”

CHAPTER TWO

HARRISON

Harrison squinted into the afternoon sun as he stepped out onto the main street of Hideaway Cove. Behind him, the front door of Sweet Dreams Ice Cream Parlor swung shut on a cacophony of children’s excited screams. He ran a hand through his hair, grinning at the scene he’d just left.

As he stood on the sidewalk, enjoying the afternoon sun on his face, the door swung open and shut again behind him, jingling merrily.

“How does it feel being the hero of the day, Sparky?” he said, looking sideways at the man who’d just followed him out.

Apollo Jenkins—Pol to his friends, and Sparky to his boss, at least when his boss was deliberately teasing him—was tall and lanky, with blond hair that flopped over his face when he didn’t keep it tied back.

Harrison always felt strangely land-bound when he hung out with him. His human form was heavy and sturdy beside Pol’s loose-limbed frame. He supposed they looked an odd pair, though oddness was nothing strange here in Hideaway.

Pol’s human body sometimes looked almost as ethereal as his shifter form, with his Legolas-like hair and pale golden eyes. Next to him, Harrison couldn’t look more ordinary. Brown hair, crooked nose, tanned skin. His work often left him a bit grimy, with wood shavings curled into his hair or oil rubbed into the lines of his hands.

Harrison wasn’t sure whether Pol had ever actually worked with his hands in his life. He certainly didn’t now. His particular talents meant he didn’t need to touch so much as a circuit breaker to look after Hideaway’s electrics. Which was why, while Harrison had been re-hanging the sign over the door that had come loose in the last storm, Pol hadn’t even taken a toolbox in with him to fix the broken ice cream freezer.

But for some reason, right now Pol didn’t seem to be properly appreciating the fact that all he had to do was wave his hand over broken electronics to fix them.

Pol groaned dramatically, and glared at Harrison over the top of a triple-decker cone piled high with sprinkles.

“I think that just took ten years off my life. One per ear-shattering screech. Why didn’t we leave that job until tomorrow, again?”

Harrison laughed. “If we’d left the job any later, Tessa Sweets would have taken twenty years off your life. The first real sunny day we’ve had in weeks, and the parlor’s ice cream freezers break down? Every kid in the town must’ve been breaking down her door since school let out. Imagine the chaos if the ice cream ran out.”

Pol shivered elaborately and took a long lick of ice cream. “Well, frankly, I don’t know what their hurry is. It might be sunny, but have you noticed how the sun isn’t actually warm yet? Tessa had better gird her loins for public complaints if any of the little tykes get too cold and go crying home—oh, hello.” His expression of put-upon misery evaporated, and was replaced by a keen grin. “There’s fresh meat around. Ooh. Apollo likes.”

“What are you on about?” Harrison raised an eyebrow at Pol, whose eyes were narrowed in concentration.

“Oh, just a little exotic interloper. Weren’t you expecting an out-of-towner this weekend?”

“Not until tomorrow. This must be someone else.” Harrison frowned. If an outsider was arriving in Hideaway, the residents had to be warned. Not least the excited kids in the ice-cream parlor behind them. “What’ve you got?”

Pol closed his eyes. For a moment, his expressive face was still as he concentrated.

“Hmm… oh nice. Sleek little body, small but punchy once you get going. A real smooth ride. And All-American, too.” He sighed and opened his eyes. “Only two-wheel drive, though. Whoever’s in the driver’s seat had a bit of trouble getting her over the ridge.”

Harrison snorted. “What, at the town boundary? Was that your work, or the car’s?”

Pol’s affinity with electrics was good for more than just fixing broken freezers. The summer before, he had set up a sort of blockade around the small shifter settlement of Hideaway Cove, to make sure no newcomers could arrive and catch the locals unawares. A drained battery or misfiring engine in the newcomer’s car gave the townsfolk time to shift back into human form, or swim out beyond the waves and out of view.

It also gave Hideaway Cove a reputation for being a pain in the ass as a tourist destination. Who wanted to vacation somewhere where your phone (and only your phone) gets no reception, the WiFi keeps turning off, and your electronics kept dying on you?

“A little from column A, a little from column B,” Pol replied absently. “As for whether our visitor is human or not, we’ll have to wait until she’s in sniffing distance, same as everyone else. But better safe than sorry, right?” He pulled out his cell phone, gave it a stern look, kissed it, and stuffed it back in his pocket. “There. The news is out: Beware, incoming potential human!”

He repeated the warning telepathically, for the benefit of anyone not permanently attached to their phone: *Human visitor in town! Bewaaaare!*

Harrison snorted. His own phone chirped in his pocket, and he knew everyone in the town would be receiving the same alert. “That’s the official wording, is it?”