Page 37 of Guarded by My Gargoyle

He continued saying nothing.

“Garrick Stonehaven.”

“Good night, Flora.”

“You haven’t!”

He turned towards the door.

“She put on a dress!”

He kept walking.

“She did her eyes!”

“I noticed.”

The porch went silent behind him, and he stopped and looked over his shoulder. Flora’s mouth had fallen open. Aidan had the expression of a male who had just been handed an unexpected gift, and even Sam looked impressed. He considered his options and found there were none. Flora’s mouth closed, and then the smile began.

“Not one word,” he said.

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Your face is a word.”

“My face is delightful.”

Aidan bent over the rail laughing, and Garrick reached for the door.

“Garrick.”

Flora’s voice had changed. Not much, but enough, and he looked back. For once she wasn’t grinning.

“Just go inside,” she said again.

No explanation, no prophecy, no claim that she knew something he didn’t. Just that.

He looked through the glass in the door. He could see the edge of Maris’s table from here. A flash of green. Robin’s auburn hair. Sylvie gesturing with both hands as she told some story, and Sara laughing.

He still didn’t know what the pull meant. He didn’t know why his eyes changed around her, or why he’d kissed her in the greenhouse after a whole night of telling himself the first kiss had been a mistake. He didn’t know what he was doing with a human female who had a five-year-old son who called him Mr. Garrick and worried about him being alone. He didn’t know what came next.

But he knew he didn’t want to stand on the porch. He opened the door.

“Garrick,” Aidan called after him, and he paused. “Try not to do the eye thing at the tourists. They pay Ben’s rent.”

He shot the other male a look and ducked under the doorframe, out of the cool darkness and into the loud warmth of the tavern.

The tourists were still at their table. Maris was still at hers and she turned before he was halfway across the room. He didn’t know how she knew he was there. Maybe someone else at the table saw him, or maybe seven-foot gargoyles simply weren’t built for subtle entrances. But she turned, and her eyes found him in the crowd, and something in her face changed—soft and startled and, unless he was imagining it, glad.

For years he’d entered rooms and found the place where he could stand without becoming part of them. A wall. A corner. Somewhere he could watch until it was time to leave. His corner was still there, and it was empty. She smiled at him, and he crossed the room. Not towards the corner this time. Towards her.

Behind the bar, in the long mirror, he caught a tiny figure in a hot-pink tracksuit raise a glass, toast no one in particular, and smile with all her teeth.

CHAPTER 12

“He’s staring at you again,” Sylvie said, not bothering to lower her voice.

“He’s not.” Maris didn’t look. She’d promised herself she wasn’t going to look, and she’d already broken the promise four times, which felt like enough for one night.