“That was sick,” Max says, his breath puffing out in a white cloud. “I was like the fucking Energizer bunny, but like, if the bunny was a hellhound. DuVille was practically cumming in his shorts.”
I return his grin.
It’s no lie that we ran circles around the rest of the team.
As we turn the corner to Electis Tower, we see Cosmo. He's doing some post-run stretching while displaying a giant frownie-face.
“Don’t think Cos got quite the same buzz we did,” I say to Max, who puts his fingers in his mouth and wolf-whistles.
Cos looks up with an expression of intense annoyance.
“It was you, Larsen,” he snaps. “I know it was.”
“What did you do now?” I ask Max.
“Could be one of a million things.”
He shrugs the winks at Cosmo. “Care to clarify, old chap?”
“I know you messed with my workout playlist.” Cosmo glares like a maniac. “I had a perfect sequence planned, and you put fucking Miley Cyrus in the middle of Arvo Part? Requiem for a Dream, interspersed with Wrecking Ball? I swear, I’ll fucking kill you if you mess with my Musify account again.”
Max gives an unrepentant grin. “It was a remix, bro. You need to open your mind.”
Cosmo’s jaw tightens. “No, I needed to find some peace, because for the rest of the morning I’m supposed to be squiring Jordan to various hair and nail appointments.”
Shit.
I look at Max, and even he has a look of regret on his face. “Sorry, man. That fucking sucks. I’ll make it up to you by giving Joey a pedicure myself if that helps.”
“Of course it fucking doesn’t, asshole.” Cosmo runs a hand across his face and suddenly looks far older than his twenty-one years. “Look, Max, just don’t push me today, I swear I’m hanging on to my sanity by a thread.”
I put a hand on his tense shoulder. “We’re here for you, bro. Can’t you just drop her off at the appointments, then hang with us?”
I wait for an answer, but Cosmo isn’t listening. His eyes are fixed on two people walking along the gravel driveway. Alexis and Theo, hand in hand.
That’s not what makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
It’s the wave of primal energy that hits me.
“Do you feel that?” I say in an underbreath.
Cosmo nods, and it almost seems like his skin is rippling with dragon scales. “He’s shifted. My dragon is not happy.”
“Yeah, same here,” I reply. “But what the fuck is he?”
The three of us stare as Tee-Tee gets closer. She’s smiling up at Max’s cousin like he hung the moon for her. A flash of jealousy burns through me, but at the same moment, I bat it aside.
Be chill.
The ‘couple’ stop in front of us.
Her hair is messed up, and her lips look swollen from kissing. It gets my dick hard just to look at her.
“Guys, guess what?”
“Nooo, don’t tell us,” Max yells. “Let’s have a shifter reveal party; I’ll order a cake.”
Theo rolls her eyes, grins, then gives the announcement. “He’s a gryphon!”
