There was a battered piano on a small stage in the corner of the room that beckoned to her like an oasis in the desert. She could wait if she found something to think about other than old memories of pain and humiliation. Anna caught the eye of a passing waitress.

"Do you mind if I play?"

The waitress, looking a little stressed, paused midstride and shrugged. "It's fine, but if you don't play well, the cook may come out and ask you to stop. He makes a big production of it. Or the crowd will boo you off. It's kinda tradition."

"Thanks."

The waitress looked around the room. "Play a happy tune, if you can. Someone needs to liven up this place."

The piano was an ancient upright that had been old a long time ago. Someone had painted it black, but the paint had faded to a dull gray, scuffed on the corners and sprinkled with initials carved into it. Most of the edges of the ivory keys were broken, and the highest E key popped up an eighth of an inch higher than the rest.

Something happy.

She played the theme from Sesame Street. The piano had a much better tone than it looked as though it should-and it was mostly in tune. She segued into "Maple Leaf Rag," one of two ragtime pieces that every second-year piano student learned. The piano wasn't her instrument, but after six years of lessons, she was moderately competent.

The lively feel and fairly easy music lines of the piece made it tempting to play too fast. "Ragtime is not fast" was a favorite rant of one of her teachers. She disciplined her fingers to keep a steady beat. It helped that she was a little out of practice.

CHARLES watched Anna walk out and knew he'd sent their relationship back to the beginning. But if he hadn't stopped her, it would have been disastrous. He couldn't afford to let himself be distracted. Not by his Omega, and not by the real possibility that he'd destroyed something between them.

Most mates would be angry at being chastised in front of others. But most mates hadn't been brutalized in an attempt to break them. Anna hadn't broken, not quite.

But he couldn't afford to risk that she'd quiet Brother Wolf before she affected the Beast. Brother Wolf's aggression, his willingness to kill, was the only weapon Charles had to control the situation.

Thoroughly tired of Chastel, though he'd only been in his presence for less than a quarter of an hour, Charles called on Brother Wolf, who wouldn't be bothered about the future, to take center stage. Negotiations, as far as he was concerned, were over, had been over the moment he'd had to growl at Anna. Or maybe when Chastel had called her a pretty piece, as if she were nothing.

"You don't want to talk about my mate," he told Chastel in a very soft voice. Brother Wolf could care less about politics. This one had made him hurt Anna-and it wouldn't bother him in the slightest to kill him here and now.

Chastel lifted his upper lip-but couldn't make himself say anything, not when faced with Brother Wolf. They stood there, eye to eye for a count of four. Then Chastel dropped his eyes, grabbed his coat, and stormed out of the room.

Charles followed him out, intent on trailing the Beast to make sure he wouldn't take it into his head to go after Anna. Charles took two steps into the main restaurant before he stopped, only vaguely noting Chastel leaving the building-because Anna hadn't left after all.

He'd thought she'd be halfway to the hotel by now. Instead, she sat on a short barstool that wobbled under her and played the infamous battered piano, her back to him and the rest of the people in the room. The piece she played wasn't complex, but it was a happy little tune. Familiar. He frowned but couldn't place it beyond the thought that it was some sort of children's tune.

Automatically, he swept the room for possible threats and found none. The only people here were human-and as he watched, they were relaxing into the music. Someone laughed and someone else called for more ribs.

She hadn't left. And that meant he could clean up the mess Chastel had left behind. It would only take a few minutes, then he could come back here and protect her from... Charles stopped and took a deep breath. Brother Wolf thought he could fix this by saving her from some danger-he didn't understand women very well. That Anna was still here was a hopeful sign that Charles didn't understand them as well as he had thought he did, either.

***

SHE glanced out at the audience and saw that the unusual muted quality of the restaurant had dissipated somewhat. She also hadn't heard any sudden noise that would signal a fight, so she was hopeful that Charles had matters under control. She needed something more modern next, something appropriate to the mostly middle-aged crowd she was playing for-which on the piano generally meant Elton John or Billy Joel, both pianists who could also sing. She took the last few notes of "Maple Leaf" into "The Downeaster 'Alexa.' " It wasn't a "happy tune" precisely, but it was beautiful.

It didn't take Charles long to settle the other wolves down. Without Chastel around to prod and push them, no one was interested in a public fight.

He ordered food for everyone-the house special was limitless ribs at a per-person charge-and asked if they would wait for a few minutes while he made sure his mate was all right. The French wolves were a little restless, knowing that Chastel would note how long they lingered without him-but no one objected. Alphas understood about watching over their own.

Anna had gone on to some melodic piece. Without vo cals, it took him a few bars to pin down the song. He was a fan of Billy Joel, but "The Downeaster 'Alexa' " wasn't one of his favorites. It reminded him too much of all the people he'd known who were left floundering as time brought change that destroyed their lives. It spoke to him like the names of the dead, sending chills of memories best forgotten-but it was beautiful.

Her hands arched gracefully over the battered keys and pulled music and something more into the room. It was subtle, but he could see it in the chatter and in the way the old one who'd been hunched over his plate slowly straightened, eyes bright as he whispered something to the large young man sitting beside him. The man said something quietly in reply, and the old one shook his head.

"Go ask her," he said, his voice still quiet, but loud enough that Charles could pick out the words over the music. "I bet a gal who can play the ragtime right knows a few more old-time songs."

"She's all by herself, Gramps. I'll scare her. Aunt Molly-"

"No. No. Molly won't do it. Won't want me to embarrass myself-or exert myself. You do it. Right now." And the frail old man practically pushed the big man out of his seat.