Page 41 of Liar For Hire (For Hire 1)

Her request surprised him. He’d always hidden his wings. What was the point in showing them off? Previously, the others hadn’t seen his wings. They sensed he was damaged and knew he had fallen a long way down from the former glory of his position.

“Why?”

“Please?”

He spotted tears in her eyes and knew she hurt for him. While he didn’t want pity, he felt pain radiating from her. If she could come to accept that this was his life, and know that he could deal with it, she might feel better.

He rolled over, facing away from her, and exercised his shoulder blades. Carefully, he drew them out and allowed them to grow. “It’s okay, Nessa. It doesn’t hurt much.”

A sob escaped her. She stroked a small curve beneath the arch of his injured wing. To his surprise, pleasure erupted in his body. No one had ever done that before, and he couldn’t have imagined it would feel that way. Perhaps it was because it was Janessa’s touch.

“It breaks my heart. I imagine you were so beautiful, Declan. I’m not saying you’re not beautiful now because boy oh boy you are.”

He snorted.

“You don’t deserve this or their ridicule. You were a child, and you acted in the way your parents raised you. There’s nothing wrong with hating to fight.”

He couldn’t respond.

“Don’t you have shifter doctors?”

“Not for us.”

“What do you mean?”

His face warmed. She might think he was sharing fairytales. “We’re healers. There’s no illness that’s ever fallen upon our people. Injuries are rare, and when they occur, we simply heal. It’s in our nature.”

“So why…?”

“I don’t know. A curse maybe.”

“Curse! You have curses?”

“No, it’s just what I told myself when I was still a boy, when I looked at the reflection of my wings and they didn’t heal. At first I hated myself and what I was. And then I accepted it.”

He continued to explain the ways and wonders of being a dragon shifter, and a strange warmth started in his wing. He assumed it was because she never stopped stroking it, soothing him with her words.

Then a twitch began, an odd sensation in the joints of his injured wing that made him jump and flinch. He rolled his shoulders and looked back at the wing, frowning. What the heck was wrong with it now? Was it getting worse, ready to fall off completely?

He sat up, heart pounding. God, he didn’t think he could take any more of this. It was bad enough that she saw him this way. As he explained what he should have been before the injury, he was glad he faced away from her. The last thing he could take at that moment was her pity. Still, he heard it in her gentle voice, the pain she felt on his behalf.

She rose when he did and wrapped her arms around him from behind. Her ear pressed to his bare back, she kissed the gnarled wing. “I love you so much, Declan. I wish with all my heart that we could be together forever.”

The warmth in his wing jumped a hundred degrees or a thousand. He bit off a cry and fell to one knee, almost taking her with him.

“What’s wrong?” She moved around in front of him, but he averted his eyes. He had to get space between them. He wouldn’t allow her to see him so weak.

Whirling around, he took two steps and wound up in the rafters. Before he could crack his head on the dilapidated barn ceiling, he put a hand out and caught one of the beams. A loft drew his attention, and he swung that way to land in a crouch.

“Declan!” she shouted from below. “What in the world? How did you…? Did you jump that high?”

He panted, running a hand over his moist face. She didn’t see because of so little light, but he felt it.

“Declan? Are you okay?” She shielded her eyes as if that would help her to see him.

“I’m okay. Give me a sec.”

“You don’t have to be so scared to show me when you’re upset. I won’t hold it against you. How many times have I cried on your shoulder?”

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