“Let’s just say you may want to keep the lad in big old T-shirts and the like for a while,” Griff said ruefully, tilting his head to indicate the abandoned, shredded remnants of Danny’s best—and only—dress shirt and pants. As I recall, most of my sisters spent the best part of a year running around in the cheapest, baggiest shifts my da and ma could find.”
“He’s going to shift every time he gets too excited?” Hayley gasped, her hand flying to her mouth as a horrible thought struck her. “Oh God, he’s got kindergarten tomorrow. And I’m a teacher, I can’t just phone in sick and keep him at home.”
“Ah now, don’t fret.” Griff put one hand on her shoulder, his golden eyes warm and understanding. His strong fingers squeezed lightly, reassuringly, before letting go again. “That’s one of the reasons I’m here. I can make sure he doesn’t go lion in public.” He hesitated, his expression turning more serious. “I need to ask your permission, though. I should really have done so earlier, up in the tree, but things were…a mite hectic.”
She could still feel the brief touch of Griff’s hand, a heat that raced through her blood. It ignited a long-forgotten fire deep in her belly, so distracting that she very nearly lost track of what he was saying. “Um…what?”
The man must think I’m an absolute idiot. Pull it together, Hayley!
Griff absently flexed his hand, and Hayley had the sudden mad thought that maybe the brief contact had made his skin tingle too. “I’m an alpha lion, ye ken.” His accent had thickened, the Scottish brogue becoming more pronounced. He cleared his throat. “That means I can influence Danny’s lion. With your permission.”
“Oh.” She scrabbled to try to appear like a competent, functioning adult and not a hormone-addled woman who hadn’t had sex for five years. “So…an alpha’s like an authority figure? You can set a rule he has to follow?”
Danny put his ears back. He hissed.
“Only with your permission too, lad,” Griff told him. His tone turned deadly serious, with an odd undertone of compelling power that made chills run down Hayley’s spine. “A true alpha never forces anyone. You remember that, always.”
Danny seemed a little overcome by Griff’s sudden intensity. He hunkered down a little, his body language reminding Hayley of a worried dog, and whined.
“Baby, this is real important,” Hayley said, crouching down so she could look Danny straight in the eyes. “If someone saw you turn into a lion, they might get scared and want to lock you up in a zoo. You wouldn’t like that, would you?”
Danny’s eyes widened. He cuddled up against her, pressing his broad fuzzy head against her side as if trying to hide.
“I’d never let anyone take you away,” Hayley said hastily, worried that she’d scared him too much. “But it would be best if no one finds out what you are. Like…like you’re a superhero, okay? And you have to protect your secret identity.”
He peeped out from under her arm, and Griff chuckled as if at something Danny had just said. “Aye, just like Spiderman. Danny, all I want to do is to make sure your lion has to check with you before taking over. You’ll still be able to shift when you want. I’ll just make sure you don’t shift when you don’t want. That sound okay to you and your lion?”
Danny’s ears flicked back and forth a few times, as if he was considering it. Then he padded trustingly over to Griff and bumped his forehead against the firefighter’s legs.
Griff’s golden eyes went very soft as he looked down at the cub. “Aye,” he said, a catch in his voice. “And I’ll try to be worthy of that.” A little stiffly, he knelt. “Now, we’re going to do some practicing today to improve your control, and I’m going to get my lion to give yours a little nudge sometimes to help. But first, I want to see if you can shift back all by yourself. You remember how we did it yesterday?”
“I made more cookies,” Hayley volunteered. Unable to sleep, she’d spent hours last night baking after Danny was in bed. “Just in case.”
“That was good thinking,” Griff said, and she felt ridiculously pleased at having won his approval. “But let’s see if he can do it without one actually in front of him first. Danny? Just focus on the memory of the cookie.”
The lion cub’s nose wrinkled up in concentration…and a moment later, a stark naked Danny leaped into Griff’s arms again. “I did it Mr. Griff! I did it all by myself!”
“Danny!” Hayley could have died of embarrassment. She seized Danny round the waist, whirling around to try to hide him from sight. “Get your clothes back on right this second!”
Behind her, Griff burst out laughing. “Ah, don’t fash yourself, Hayley. We shifters are pretty relaxed when it comes to nudity.”
Nonetheless, he politely looked away as Hayley wrestled the protesting Danny back into underwear. “But Mommy, I don’t wanna get dressed! I wanna be lions with Mr. Griff!”
“He does have a point,” Griff said to Hayley, apologetically. “Some types of shifter can include their clothes in their transformations, but lions can’t. And I do need to work on his shifting with him. If you want, I could wear a blindfold?”
“No, no!” Griff didn’t set off any of Hayley’s finely-honed protective mama bear instincts. “I don’t think you’re a pervert or anything like that. I mean, you’ve already done more in one day to help than-”
Hayley cut herself off. She never, ever disparaged Reiner in front of Danny. Even though Danny had never met him, he was still his father. “Anyway. If you’re fine with the, um, lack of clothes thing, then so am I.”
If Griff was going to teach Danny about shifting, would he have to…? Hayley blushed furiously, unable to suppress a tantalizing mental image of the firefighter stripping off.
Griff cast her a rather amused look, a sly gleam in his golden eyes. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep my clothes on.”
Hayley wanted to sink through the floor. Was she that easy to read?
“But Mr. Griff!” Dan
ny tugged on Griff’s hand, looking worried. “If you keep your clothes on, you’ll rip them up and then your mommy will be mad.”