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"If you weren't such an insufferable ass, maybe I wouldn't have been giving you the cold shoulder." I bat my eyelashes at him, all too aware that the Luna is watching us from the front window—something that Dominic seems to have missed.
I run my hand down the front of his shirt. He lost the glasses, but the button down still looks nice.
"We have an audience," I explain when he raises a questioning eyebrow.
He captures my wrist. "If you try too hard, she'll be suspicious."
"You're right." I jerk my wrist from his grip. "No one in their right mind would believe I'm hanging out with you because we're so madly in love we've somehow managed to overlook our rejections of each other altogether."
Dominic starts toward the house, and I fall in beside him. I can feel her eyes still on us, but he pauses just as we're starting up the stone path alongside the garden.
"Tess…"
"What?"
“I’m not stupid. I have wolves covering every direction once we leave here. If you decide to make a run for it after dinner, you should be forewarned that you better do it before we leave the Luna's sacred grounds. Once we hit the line of neutral territory, you'll be outnumbered again."
I freeze where I am, blinking stupidly at him as he starts toward the house once again. And here I thought my plan was solid.
I force my feet to move, following Dominic even though I feel like someone's poured cement in my shoes. That was the only plan I had, one I thought was foolproof. What the hell have I been doing playing nice if it wasn't going to help let Dominic's guard down?
The man is insufferable.
I'm so distracted by this newest revelation that I barely notice the woman who opens the door to greet us until I'm practically on top of her.
"Luna," her title leaves my mouth like a gasp. Suddenly unsure of protocol, I bow my head slightly in greeting.
The tall, older woman chuckles. Dominic stands closer to her, but she bypasses him to greet me at the bottom of the steps that lead up to her small front porch. Her nearly white hair hangs long around her shoulders, making her look like she stepped off the pages of a fairy tale story alongside her garden.
"You're a Jarreau?" she asks, surprise clouding her voice.
“Uh, yes?”
“You’re smaller than I expected,” she muses, tilting her head to get a good look at me. I try not to shrink under her stare. “Don't worry, I'm sure that comes with its own advantages. Now, the two of you come on in, I'd say we have some things to discuss—wouldn't you?"
She gestures us into the house ahead of her, and I'm transported to a whole other world.
Vibrant art lines the walls, paired with plants that seem to sit on every surface. It's an eclectic dream house. If I thought the outside was surprising, this space is even more so. We pass what seems like room after room of books and cozy spaces. Every chair is overstuffed, begging for me to find a book and curl up in one.
"This is stunning," I murmur.
"Thank you. This is generations and generations of shifter history you're seeing here, dear," the Luna Sovereign explains. She touches my shoulder gently to stop me from following Dominic down the hall. "Look here," she says.
She points out a painting on the wall.
The woman in the painting is in thick, bold strokes. Beautiful. And over that, an overlay of her transforming into a wolf. That layer of paint is so thin it's almost translucent. The whole thing looks magical, reflecting the light of the hall in a way that makes me feel like I'd like to step inside the forest in the painting myself.
"It's beautiful," I tell the Luna sincerely.
She points a bony finger at the bottom right corner of the painting. "A family heirloom, I guess you'd say."
Jarreauis scrolled prettily in the corner, claiming the artwork. I glance at the Luna, almost not believing what's right in front of my own eyes. A long time has passed since I've felt any connection to family beyond my siblings.
"Really?" I ask, my voice barely a breath.
"Really?" Dominic echoes, suddenly so close behind me I can feel his chest bump my back as he tries to lean closer for a better view.
"Of course. That would have been…" She thinks for a moment. "I guess your great, great, great grandmother? Though, I could be doing the math wrong. It's hard to keep track anymore." She smiles wryly, and I can't help but notice she's starting to look a little winded even though all she's done is greet us and pause here for the painting.
