I wove a new melody into the existing structure, something that captured the transience of that life. Moving from place to place, staying nowhere long enough to be safe or known.
“There was an older man,” she said, her voice softer. “In December, when it was so cold I couldn't feel my fingers anymore. He walked past me every morning on his way to work, never stopping, never looking at me. But one day he came backin the evening with a blanket. A good one, wool, probably from his own house. He just handed it to me and walked away before I could even say thank you.”
The memory seemed to cost her something. I could hear it in the way her voice thickened on the last words, could see it in the way her hands clenched tighter on the sheet music she was still holding.
I let the music shift into something warmer, something that held gratitude and the particular ache of unexpected kindness from strangers. Major chords now, but with minor notes woven through them, because kindness in that much suffering was both beautiful and heartbreaking.
“I still have it,” she added, almost whispering. “The blanket. In my tent.”
The music gentled further, became a lullaby of sorts, something that honored the importance of that single act of compassion in a life that had clearly held too little of it.
We continued like that, her sharing fragments and me responding with music, building a dialogue that was both verbal and melodic. She told me about singing for groups of teenagers who'd laughed at her but still dropped coins in her cup, about a restaurant owner who'd let her use the bathroom in exchange for a song.
The music became a conversation in its own right, my hands on the piano offering responses to her words, asking gentle questions through melody, providing support through harmony. When she shared something particularly painful, I stayed in minor keys, acknowledging the hurt without trying to minimize it. When she shared moments of small victories or survival, I lifted the melody into something lighter, celebrating her resilience without making it feel like I was dismissing the cost.
Our eyes met briefly across the piano, and I saw something in her expression that made my breath catch. Not trust, not yet,but the possibility of it. A tentative wondering whether maybe, perhaps, this could be safe.
And then I saw it.
The faintest curve at the corners of her mouth. Not a full smile, not even close to one. Just the barest suggestion that her lips wanted to turn upward, that something in the music, the moment or the gradual easing of her fear was creating the impulse toward something other than the grim endurance I'd seen in her expression since she'd arrived.
My heart stuttered in my chest.
I'd been looking for this, hoping for it. But seeing it, actually witnessing that tiny transformation in her face, hit me with an emotional force I hadn't prepared for.
The moment lasted maybe three seconds before she looked away, but it was enough. Enough to show me she was seeing me as something other than a threat, that the careful patience I'd been offering was registering, that music really could speak the things words couldn't reach.
Chapter Nine
Jasmine
Kade found me in the music room an hour after breakfast, where I'd been sitting on the piano bench running my fingers over the keys without pressing them hard enough to make a sound. He stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets, his posture deliberately casual in a way that told me he was working to seem non-threatening. “I'd like to show you the studio,” he said, his voice quiet and even. “If you're ready.”
I wasn't ready. I wasn't sure I'd ever be. But I nodded anyway, because saying no felt like it would disappoint him, and some part of me still operated on the logic that disappointing Alphas led to consequences I couldn't afford.
He led me through the penthouse, past the leather couches and glass tables, down a hallway I hadn't explored yet. The carpet under my bare feet was thick and soft, absorbing sound, making our footsteps nearly silent. I tracked his movements from three feet behind, watching the way his shoulders moved under his button-down shirt, the way his hands stayed visible and loose at his sides. Non-threatening. Always non-threatening. But my body remembered other Alphas who'd seemed safe right until they weren't.
We stopped at a door near the end of the hall. Kade pulled a keycard from his pocket and swiped it through a reader. Thelock clicked open with a sound that made my pulse spike, some primal part of me reading locked doors as potential traps.
“After you,” he said, pushing the door wide and stepping back to give me space.
I moved past him into the darkness, and then light flooded the space as he flipped a switch behind me.
The studio sprawled before me, larger than I'd expected, the walls covered in geometric acoustic panels that reminded me of the music room but more extensive, more intentional. The panels absorbed light and sound, creating a space that felt both intimate and vast. The far wall was glass, revealing a control room beyond with equipment I couldn't identify.
But what caught my attention first was the silence.
Not the absence of sound, exactly, but the quality of it. The room swallowed noise, damped it, created a hush that felt almost sacred. I took a breath, and even that sound was muted, gentled by whatever acoustic magic the panels provided.
“It’s sound-proofed,” Kade said from behind me, and I jumped slightly. His voice sounded unfamiliar here, more present somehow, each word distinct and clear. “Triple-layered walls, specialized insulation. You could scream in here and nobody outside would hear a thing.”
His words blanketed me, and my throat tightened. I could scream, and nobody would hear. My body heated, palms fisted, ready to defend myself.
Kade must have read something in my posture because he moved to the side, putting himself in my peripheral vision rather than behind me. “Hey,” he said, “you’re safe here... with us.” I swallowed and forced myself to take a deep breath, then nodded, hoping the words he spoke were true.
“Come see the console.” He gestured toward the control room.
I followed, my feet silent on the industrial carpet. The control room was smaller than the main studio space, dominated by a massive steel mixing console that looked like it belonged in a spaceship. Rows of knobs, faders, and buttons, all arranged in precise patterns I couldn't decode. LED meters glowed in vertical strips, their lights pulsing in shades of green, yellow, and red.
