Balfour
Nik entered my office without knocking, closed the door behind him, and planted himself in one of the two office chairs I kept in front of my desk.
“You ever plan on leaving this office?” He gave me a hard stare, one black brow raised in question.
Looking away from my spreadsheet, I frowned at him. “I leave. I left yesterday to go down to the sleigh barn.”
“To gripe at my mechanic elves because you think they can make the sleigh go faster.”
“Well, we need to add time. The world population has grown, and you barely made it to all the houses.”
“How would you know?” He drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair, irritating me. “You weren’t even here. You were with your omega, enjoying his heat.”
“He’s not my omega,” I hissed through gritted teeth. “And you knew I was going to go over Anderson’s reports with a fine-tooth comb. I know everything. Did you need something or did you just come here to harass me because you are bored. Go botheryouromega.”
“He went shopping with Diana,” he gave me a cool smile. “They needed some stuff for the new house. They are leaving most of their furniture there. For Kendrick.”
My brows knitted together in a frown. “His apartment is pretty small. I don’t think most of their furniture will fit. They do know you can magic it here, don’t they?”
Nik’s Christmas magic could be used for many different things. Just like he could use it to change his appearance on Christmas Eve, so that he looked more like the commercial version of Santa, he could magic the Mallory’s furniture and belongings here if they wanted.
“They are gifting him their house.”
“Oh,” I said, “I wasn’t aware. I thought the plan was for them to sell it.”
Nik crossed one long leg over his knee. “Plans change.”
We stared at each other over my desk, and I knew Nik well enough to know he was hiding something. We had been best friends for a few hundred years, after all.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Nik sighed, loudly and dramatically, which wasn’t like him at all. “Look, you did not hear this from me. I mean it, if Keegan asks you, do not bring my name into the conversation. My marriage may depend on it. Though I kind of think he wasplanning on me doing his dirty work, so…I don’t know. Just, to be on the safe side for everyone involved, do not mention me.”
“What in all the realms are you babbling on about?”
Honestly, could no one leave me in peace, with my precious spreadsheets, and out of whatever mini dramas they had going on?
“Kendrick is pregnant.”
Nik’s words hung in the air, thick and heavy, sucking all the oxygen from my lungs.
Pregnant.
Kendrick was pregnant.
And he hadn’t told me. Why hadn’t he told me?
Probably because I hadn’t bothered to answer any of his text messages after we had “broken up”. Because it had been too hard to act like nothing had changed between us. To act like I could still just be friends with him. To act like I didn’t want him with every fiber of my being.
“What?” I finally managed, the word barely more than a whispered, strangled croak.
“Look, the story Kendrick told Keegan, Diana, and Merv is that he and Sadie went out New Year’s Eve and he hooked up with some rando alpha. That it’s not your baby.”
“What?” I repeated, this time the word was a growl.
I knew the story Kendrick was telling was a lie because I might have used the special snow globes we kept in the warehouse to spy on him, after I had taken him home. Not spy exactly, just check up on him. If anyone found out I had used the globes for personal business, and not for research for the naughty and nice list, I very well could lose my job.
But Kendrick had been so upset and sad by his parents’ news, I had needed to check on him. He had been sitting on his couch, watching the ball drop on TV, eating pizza in his pajamason New Year’s. He definitely hadn’t been out clubbing, getting it on with some asshole alpha who wasn’t me.
