For the next week, Laina fell into a routine with Kyle. She’d wake him to work with Milo in the morning, then meet him again at the end of the day. To her wolf’s dismay, Kyle took her request to maintain a professional distance to heart. She found his door closed in the morning and his conversation, although open and friendly, completely appropriate for mixed company.
Milo thrived on the routine. Since she’d come to Hunt Club, the mastiff hadn’t destroyed anything but the daily chew toy Kyle gave him for that purpose. Laina would care for the dog during the day, in between helping Gerty with her chores. The housekeeper had become her good friend.
And reluctantly, she had to admit, so had Kyle. After they walked Milo in the evening, it had become a habit for them to stay up until the wee hours of the morning talking about anything and everything. His favorite food was Korean barbecue. He’d played baseball until the tenth grade when he’d sprained his wrist. He spoke French and just enough Spanish to survive in an emergency. And he was completely addicted to HGTV.
She’d shared things with him too, those things she could share. He knew she liked to drive fast and loved the beach but hated the sand. She’d rather eat a steak than a slice of chocolate cake and had spent a summer in Europe with her parents before they were killed. He knew she was a sucker for animals and gave an unholy amount of money to the ASPCA each month. Only on this night, a storm had moved in, and the thunder and lightning had cut their usual walk and post-session talk short.
“Are you tired?” he asked. Of course she wasn’t. It was nine o’clock, and she wasn’t eighty years old. Sherlock Holmes, she was not, but it was obvious he was giving her an out if she wasn’t interested in his company without the excuse of Milo.
“Not yet,” she said. With the full moon in her rearview mirror, her wolf’s voice had quieted, and she could be in Kyle’s presence without the aching need she’d felt before.
“Come on. I want to show you something.”
He led her to the back of the house, to a room with floor-to-ceiling books, saddle-brown leather furniture, gold fixtures, red tapestries, and a shiny black baby grand piano. “It’s a beautiful library.”
“What do you like to read? Let me guess…” He tapped his chin and studied her. “Jane Eyre.”
She snorted. “Why would you say that?”
“Jane breaks out on her own, would do anything for a friend, makes a life for herself. Seems like a character you could relate to.”
“I like your thinking, but I’m more of a Mary Shelley fan.”
“Oh,Frankenstein?” He knit his brows.
“She published it anonymously, you know, because no one in 1818 would read a book written by a woman. But the entire tale is a work of feminism. It’s a warning about what would happen if a man tried to create life without a woman.”
“Hmm. I never thought of it that way. I always read it as a warning that just because we can do something scientifically doesn’t mean we should.” He sat down on the piano bench and started playing a simple, plodding version of Bach’s Prelude in C.
“How about you? What do you read?” she asked.
“Financial reports, theWall Street Journal, legal documents.”
She giggled. “What do you read for fun?”
“It’s been a long time. Maybe I’ll pick upFrankenstein.” He stopped playing, and a heaviness settled over him that made her heart ache.
“I know what it’s like.” She slid in next to him. “I buried myself in school and work for years. It starts as an escape. It’s safe. There’s routine. But eventually, it takes over, and that’s all there is.” He frowned at her. “I say we make a pact, right now, to do something fun every day for as long as I’m here.”
The corner of his mouth curved toward his ear, and he arched a brow. “Deal.”
She threaded her fingers and stretched them over the keyboard. “Fun thing number one, I am going to show you what this bad boy can do.”
“The piano? You play?”
“My parents insisted all three of their children suffer refinements that included music. I chose piano.”
He scooted to the end of the bench to give her room.
With a deep breath, she positioned her hands and allowed her fingers to dance across the keys, playing Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 16. She was cheating, she knew. As a werewolf, she was endowed with unnaturally fast speed and agility, which made the finger positioning far easier for her than it would have been for him. But she held nothing back, showing off to her full potential, at one point leaning her head back to smile cheerfully at his awestruck face. By the time she finished what she could remember of the piece, he’d stood up and was staring openmouthed.
He slow-clapped through her final note. “Take a bow, Laina. That was truly extraordinary.”
She shrugged. “I try.”
His laughter faded to an expression far more serious. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“I’m training your dog.”
