Snippet #2470007

Beethoven was too depressing. Leanna didn’t mind playing slower music, in fact, she usually found it relaxing, but Beethoven was too intense and heavy to play on just the piano without the symphony accompany to balance it out. She appreciated Chopin better, though she’d probably enjoy playing his work more if she could play the violin. She enjoyed playing pieces by modern composers better, which would make her mother’s eyes roll to hear, and today she felt like playing some of Sean Beeson’s work. She’d been in the back music room playing for a couple of hours, as it was one of the few rooms in this home she really felt comfortable in. Leanna didn’t normally live at the pack home, and she’d always felt a little trepidation about entering her alpha’s ancestral home. She had enough self-confidence to not feel inferior to her pack mates, but Leanna had always carried a persistent sense of not really belonging ever since she’d joined the pack as a teenager, and stepping foot in a home filled with such history had always had a way of making Leanna feel dirty and small, like she was sullying the pure werewolf ground she walked on by merely being present.

In the music room that feeling wasn’t so bad. Here she could make music, and there was a beauty in that which helped her feel cleaner, more worthy. She also wasn’t willing to allow herself to leave Michael and the kids while they were in a home filled to the brim with vampires. Michael was the alpha, and as strong as werewolves come, but having that many vamps in the house still put Leanna on edge, and brought out her more ferociously protective instincts. She understood the reasoning for their presence here, and she wasn’t about to argue with Michael on the issue, but Leanna had never liked vampires, and a bitterness had grown in her as a child toward the race of bloodsuckers who’d killed her father. Vampire were wolf killers, or at least they had to potential to be, and Leanna wasn’t about to let her guard down around them, especially with Janelle and Michael Jr. in the house.

She was interrupted mid song by the sound of Michael howling for Scarlet. It was getting later, so Leanna decided it was time she made an appearance. There really was no point hiding out back here for the rest of the day, especially since their fanged guests would be awake soon. Carefully sliding the cover back over the keys, Leanna stood up from the stool and began making her way toward the kitchen. On the way, she crossed paths with Janelle and Michael Jr., and her eyes softened a bit. Little Mike did not look particularly happy, and Leanna imagined it had something to do with his less than subtle crush on Scarlet. It seemed the entire Molinelli clan was enamored with their pack sentinel Leanna thought fondly. Scarlet was the kind of person who just naturally attracted people she supposed. Sometimes Leanna envied that about her, but Scarlet wasn’t the kind of person Leanna could ever dislike. She reminded Leanna too much of her mother for that.

“Rough day?” Leanna asked kindly, extending one of her rare soft smiles.





Contrary to popular belief, vampires didn’t necessarily like cramped dark spaces. Darcy in fact, hated them, which was putting it mildly. Coffins were stupid, and anyone who thought she'd willingly take a nap in one of those velvet covered pine boxes was deluded. For a week now, she’d been forced into this tiny space with seven other vampires, and internally, Darcy was a mess of tension and anxiety. She didn’t do well with confined spaces, and the last thing she wanted to deal with right now was a bunch of inconvenient flash backs. The second the sun started going down Darcy was out of the bed, moving around a bit erratically just to prove she could. There weren’t any chains, she was fine. The walls here were made of wood, not stone, and the only blood she could smell was coming from the guest kitchen. Astrid was up Darcy thought with a wry grin. Darcy didn’t really socialize much with the other vampire, but the woman had style. Focusing on the present also helped to stave off the encroaching remnants of the past, so she made a beeline for the guest kitchen where the other coven members who were up and about seemed to be convening.

It seemed Jack and Zak had already joined Astrid, and the smell of booze and blood made Darcy head straight to the vodka, which she mixed with a bit of B+ before downing it quickly and pouring another. Darcy usually wasn’t this quiet, but the prolonged confinement really was starting to get to her. After finishing off her second drink, Darcy turned toward Zak, who she was arguably the closest with her. “Are you going stir crazy too or is it just me? We keep this crap up and I think I’m gonna start breaking stuff.” Darcy said sourly, sounding a bit too serious to be her normal self.