Page 57 of When He Fights
Her fingers hovered over the harp strings.She wouldn’t play tonight.Kane needed his rest, and, even with the bedroom door shut upstairs, he might hear the music and wake up.Her shoulders sagged a little bit as she turned away from the harp.Instead of touching the strings, her fingers reached out and tugged open the drapes in front of the nearby window.One of the big, floor-to-ceiling windows that sat in the front of her house and gave her such a beautiful view of the beach.On full moon nights, she’d leave her drapes open while she played.She’d look out and see the reflection of the moon on the water, and peace would settle in to chase out the fear that she felt.
“Are you going to play something?”
Ana jumped.She whirled around, with her hand flying to cover her heart.
Kane stepped off the staircase.“Sorry.”Gruff.“Didn’t mean to scare you.”
How could someone so big move so soundlessly?It should have been impossible for him to sneak up on her.
“I was worried when you left the bed.Wanted to make sure you were all right.”He advanced slowly, inexorably toward her.“You still wake up every night around two, huh?”
Of course, he would remember that.Ana’s hand fell away from her heart.“I’m sure I’ll stop.Eventually.”
“Will you?”Soft.
“I had a shrink who offered to prescribe medicine so that I could sleep through the night.”
“But you didn’t take the pills.”He kept advancing.
“But I didn’t take the pills.”He was nearly right in front of her.Wearing his sweats again.They hung low on his hips, and his bare chest was close enough to reach out and touch.They’d had sex, insanely wonderful sex, butthatfelt like a dream.Embarrassed, shy, unsettled, she eased away and sat down on the stool that she used when playing her harp.Her fingers stretched out and strummed lightly over the strings.
“Why didn’t you take the pills?They could have helped you.”
“They would have knocked me out completely.If someone came inside when I was taking them, I might not be able to wake up.”More soft strumming.Music drifted in the air.Beautiful, but sad.She hadn’t intended to play anything sad.Her fingers stilled.“If I can’t wake up, then I’m too easy of a target.”
“Do you still dream of the dead man?”
The victim she’d seen.With the knife shoved into his throat and the blood pouring down his shirtfront as he tried to scream.A sound that would never break from him.“I dream that I arrive too late, as always.The knife is in him, the blood is everywhere, and the man I’d been sleeping with is the one who is the monster.”
Kane crouched beside her.“It’s not your fault that man is dead.He was involved with the mob, too.He’d stolen from the wrong people.Gotten on Logan’s hit list as a result.The man could have gone to the Feds.He could have turned on the power players.He could have gotten a new life.”
“Like me?”
He reached out.Tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.“You’re not like him.”
Because she wasn’t dead.Didn’t have a knife shoved into her throat.Check.But she had turned on Logan and his associates.She’d worn a wire.Done the undercover bit.Sent Logan to prison.
Got a new life as payment.
A muscle flexed along Kane’s jaw as he crouched before her.“Does it help you to play?”Careful words.A careful touch of his fingers against her cheek.“When you tiptoe down here in the middle of the night and you go to your harp, does it help?”
“Music therapy.”A wan smile tipped at her lips.“It can soothe the soul.I play and the demons leave me and the fear goes away, and, after a while, I can go back upstairs and close my eyes again.”That was her long-winded way of saying…yes.Yes, it helped.More than anything else ever had.
“Music is supposed to soothe the savage beast, isn’t it?”Kane lingered before her.“Pretty sure that’s an old saying.”
“It’s, um, a little wrong.”
He lifted a brow.
She licked her lips and quoted, “Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.”
He blinked.
“Breast, not beast.”She smiled at him.A real smile.“It’s something we all get wrong.It came from a really old play, one calledThe Mourning Bride.I always figured it was talking about how music can soothe anyone, even those with too much pain and rage in their hearts.”
A nod.Considering.“I always thought I was the beast in our story.”
She sucked in a surprised breath.“Our story?”
