A storm was biding its time, waiting to happen.

The morning was a raw one, with the wind knocking at the windows and sneaking in to chill the cottage. He had a fire going in the kitchen hearth and his tea was hot, so he didn’t mind the wind. He liked the arrogant music it made while he sat at the kitchen table, nibbling on biscuits and toying with the lyrics for a tune he’d written.

He didn’t have to be at the pub for an hour yet. But to make sure he got there at all, he’d set the timer on the stove and, as a backup, the alarm clock in his bedroom. With no one there to shake him out of his dreams and tell him to get his ass moving, he tended to forget the time altogether.

Since it irritated Aidan when he was late, and gave Darcy an excuse to hammer at him, he did his best to stay on schedule. The trouble was, when he was deep enough in his music, the buzzing and beeping of the timers didn’t register and he was late in any case.

He was swimming in it now, in a song of love that was young and sure of itself. The sort, to Shawn’s thinking, that was as fickle as the wind but fun while it lasted. A dancing tune, he decided, that would require fast feet and flirting.

He would try it out at the pub sometime, once it was polished a bit, and if he could convince Darcy to sing it. Her voice was just right for the mood of it.

Too comfortable to bother going into the parlor where he’d jammed the old piano he bought when he moved in, he tapped his foot for rhythm and refined the lyrics.

He didn’t hear the banging at the front door, the clomp of bootsteps down the hallway, or the muttered curse.

Typical, Brenna thought. Lost in some dream world again while life went on around him. She didn’t know why she’d bothered to knock in the first place—he rarely heard it, and they’d been running tame in each other’s houses since childhood.

Well, they weren’t children anymore, and she’d as soon knock as walk in on something she shouldn’t.

He could have had a woman in here, for all she knew. The man attracted them like sugar water attracted bees. Not that he was sweet, necessarily. Though he could be.

God, he was pretty. The errant thought popped into her head, and she immediately hated herself for it. But it was hard not to notice, after all.

All that fine black hair looking just a bit shabby, as he never remembered when it was time for a trim. Eyes of a quiet and dreamy blue—unless he was roused by something, and then, she recalled, they could fire hot and cold in equal measure. He had long, dark lashes that her four sisters would have sold their soul for and a full, firm mouth that was meant, she supposed, for long kisses and soft words.