Page 35 of This Wild Heart

“I know,” I said quietly.

“Yourhot wifeis very sweet,” she replied, resuming her deft work with the big, scary knife. “I was able to talk to her a while when I got here.”

“Yeah? Did she cry into her coffee? Curse my name in conversation or anything?”

She cut me an unamused look. “Not just yet. But I suspect if you give her time. We talked about her friend’s nonprofit. Pretty impressive stuff.”

I feigned disinterest. “Yeah?”

Louise rolled her eyes. “You haven’t even asked her about it yet, have you?”

“I did talk to them about it, thank you very much.” I snapped off another bite of red pepper. “I was just, you know, a little drunk during that conversation so it sorta slipped my mind. It’s with kids books or something, right? Reading?”

She waved the giant knife in my direction. “Go ask her yourself. I’m not going to be your messenger because you’re scared of your wife.”

I blew a raspberry through pursed lips. “I’m not scared of her.”

I totally was. Everything seemed so fun and easy when you woke up in the Vegas hotel room, didn’t it? But now she lived here. In my space. Bending her body in leggings in plain view and talking to Louise, who would probably end up liking her more than me when this was all over.

“Is that why you were at the facilities twice as long as usual?”

“No.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“She asked a lot of questions about you today,” Louise said pointedly.

“Of course she did. She was drunk off her ass when we had the actual conversation that led to matrimony.”

The aggrieved sigh that Louise let out was always paired with an eye roll, and I didn’t have to look in her direction to know she’d just done exactly that. “Lord, no wonder you were single so long.”

Ignoring Louise was easy enough because I had years of practice. After my empty veggie bowl was in the dishwasher, I caught a glimpse of a sketch pad on the dining room table. Sitting on the corner of the table was that fucking cat. His eyes narrowed as I approached, and I held up my hands in a conciliatory gesture.

“Believe me, I’m not coming over here for you,” I muttered.

His ears flattened, but instead of hissing, Devil Cat turned around, tail straight in the air, and hopped down to the chair, then onto the ground. It was the feline equivalent ofyou can kiss my ass, buddy.

Once the danger of my face getting scratched off had passed, I picked up the notebook.

The page was covered with sketches of woodland animals. Some were whimsical, with large eyes and exaggerated features. A few were more severe—harsh lines and stern, beautiful features. I flipped through a few pages and stopped. My thumb ran over a sketch of a deer who looked like he might jump off the paper.

Unbidden, I glanced through the sliding glass door again. She was done doing her yoga but sat cross-legged on the mat, her eyes closed and her face turned up toward the sun.

Peace. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt like that.

Louise came up behind me and tapped the sketch pad. “I love you, kid, but if you keep ignoring her, you’re probably gonna screw this up before it’s even started.”

My jaw tightened, and after one last look at Anya’s face, I set down the sketch pad and went back to my bedroom to shower.

Chapter 9

Anya

It took me two and a half days to crack. Not bad, if you think about it. Anyone can pretend to be on vacation for a couple of days, especially in a nice house with a sweet woman who shows up and cooks meals and mops the floors and talks to you when your husband is ninja-sneaking around to avoid you.

There was only so much deck yoga and napping and reading and sketching one could do before you had to admit you were hiding from all the bullshit in the outside world. Hiding from the paparazzi too, which I discovered earlier that morning when I decided to go for a run in Parker’s neighborhood.

“Anya! Anya, can we get a statement?”

---