Page 24 of Beau and the Beast

"Then why do you look like you're bringing me bad news?" he asked.

"I don't know if you're going to like what I have to say. I've made... a lot of decisions by myself since you went to bed last night."

No, he didn't like the sound of that at all.

"I want you to start at the beginning," he said, no hint of friendliness in his voice.

Violet began by telling him about a security breach. Someone had pictures of him, she said.

The hair on the back of his neck bristled and for a moment it felt like all of his skin was too tight. It took everything in his power not to growl and shred the first pillow he could lay his hands on. He let his long tail thump on the mattress next to him, not reaching to still it.

"How?" he demanded in a gravelly voice.

She bristled right back at him, setting her jaw as if she was prepared for a fight.

"Youleft the penthouse," she said, "not that I need to remind you after it took the whole staff to drag you back to your room the other night."

"Not on purpose," he said. "Geoffrey's job is to defend me against—"

"Geoffrey's job was based on the idea that you wouldn't go waltzing out into the hallway chasing invisible dreams," Violet said, cutting him off. Her words were sharp. "Everybody is operating on the rulesyouset up—exceptyou, Wolfram. So before you rip Geoffrey's head off, you should think a minute about your own role in this."

He frowned at her choice of words, but the fact that she had met his anger with anger somehow helped him to cool off. It was rare for Violet to lose her level head.

He knew that his sleepwalking presented a danger to them all. It had weighed heavy on his mind since it began—but he didn't want to be drugged and he didn't want to be locked up like an animal. A better solution had yet to present itself.

"And what part of this, pray tell, is good news?"

"It set off a chain of events," Violet said.

She went on to explain about the hacker, the brother who had come as his proxy, the brash way that Alfie had jumped the gun to take the man down, the search through his pockets, and the discovery of his name. He didn't interrupt as she put forth her theory that this man Beau Blake would break their curse, the huge sum of money that he'd been offered to stay, to meet Wolfram, to write.

"He's the key," she said resolutely. "This is what's going to fix us."

He sighed, laying back down on his side but still facing her.

"A writer isn't the key," he said softly.

"You don't know that."

"Telling my story isn't going to change anything. No one is going to feel more sympathetic about what happened, and that damned hag who cursed us certainly isn't going to change her opinion of me."

"Youdon'tknow that, Wolfram," she repeated.

"Writing a book won’t bring the witch’s sister back. I won't do it. When he wakes up tomorrow, give him some money for his trouble—twice whatever you promised his brother—and tell him to go."

He expected her to be mad, to rail against him.

He was prepared for her to berate him, to tell him that he was being selfish and obstinate, to lecture him as she had many times before about the way that he had locked himself up and now seemed to wait to die.

But her anger didn't come. All of the fight had left her face. She was looking down at her hands, laid softly in her lap.

When she finally looked up at him, her expression was one of deep sorrow.

She leaned forward and before he could stop her, Violet had placed a hand on the side of his face, against one of his massive jaws. She stroked the downy fur there, drawing her thumb over the plane of his cheek.

He should've drawn away. To be touched was to acknowledge what he had become.

But for the slightest moment, he leaned in. He let himself enjoy the rare sensation of human contact. His eyes fluttered shut. And then her hand was gone.

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