The solution was simple. To best the shrew, he had to learn everything about him. What he ate for breakfast. What he did in his spare time. What his triggers were. What put him in his happy place. Did a shrew even have a happy place?

Jogging the last streets home, Pax eyed Cliff. The flexing of his tight calves, dusted with light hairs. The upright posture, broad shoulders pulled back, chin up. The T-shirt that clung to an obvious six-pack. The I’m the boss gaze staring down the rest of the world.

“Why are you staring at me?” Cliff asked without so much as a glance his way.

Crazy peripheral vision, too.

Pax slapped him on the back, meeting damp, warm cotton and firm undulating muscle. “Reconnaissance, baby.”

Cliff slowed to a walk, stopping intermittently to stretch out a hamstring. “What will you do with the information you gather?”

“Use it against you, of course.”

Cliff laughed dryly. “Good luck with that.”

“Tell me things.”

Cliff lifted his shirt and dabbed the sweat from his face. Pax had been right about the six pack. What surprised him was the tanned skin, which suggested a level of sun-baking relaxation that he wouldn’t have guessed Cliff had in him. The T-shirt snapped back over his outie belly button. “What things?”

Pax lifted his eyes to Cliff’s steady ones. “What were we talking about?”

Cliff’s eyebrow twitched a fraction upward.

Pax gave him an easy smile. “Kidding. How did you know the retired Lions’ running group would be charging past at that exact minute?”

“They walk through that clearing around quarter to six every Saturday and Sunday. We exchange hellos before I sprint home.”

“Are these the women that find you fascinating?”

Cliff clutched Pax’s left shoulder, bracing against him as he stretched his quads. Heat palmed his skin and the thin strap of his tank top. Fingers shifted as Cliff evened his balance.

“Mostly, yes.”

Cliff swapped his hand to plant firmly against Pax’s other shoulder as he stretched his other leg. Evening sun caught on Cliff’s watch, and he shifted his angle to read the digits. Five past six.

Cliff caught his glance. “Making you run for an hour has been supremely satisfying.”

“Satisfying. Yes,” Pax agreed, trying—and likely failing—to keep the sarcasm at bay. “Best fun in years.”

Cliff leaned in, breath skating over Pax’s cheek. “Much deserved, don’t you think?”

Pax narrowed his eyes. “Are you saying you were killing me for a misplaced apple?”

Cliff squeezed his shoulder. “Not the apple.”

“Then what?”

“For messing with my rules regarding my sister.”

Pax’s pitch scaled. “What are you even talking about?”

Cliff let go of him and turned onto their street.

He had met his match, all right. In the space of one day, friending the shrew had moved from a professional pursuit to a personal one.

Pax loped next to him, keeping stride down the hill, pavement glowing amber in the setting sun.

“Don’t play me for a fool,” Cliff said, profile framed by their neighbors’ dainty lawns. “I knew the minute you asked about Bianca jogging with us that something was up. Ten bucks says we’ll rock up to my house and find that tree-climbing boy of yours delivering corny lines to my sister.”

“You don’t know that,” Pax said. “Luca might be speaking Italian.”

“I rest my case.”

“You know, preemptively punishing people is mightily arrogant of you. What if you were wrong? You would have killed me for nothing.”

“If I was wrong, the run did your health some good.”

A laugh bubbled out of him. Equally frustrated and amused. Recon, recon, recon. “Is studying and being a possessive dickhead a weekend thing? Or can I look forward to this Monday to Friday as well?”

“Monday to Friday as well.”

“Oh, you’ll make a swell friend.”

“And you, a roguish one.”

They stared at each other for a long second. Pax swallowed.

Cliff jerked his head toward their approaching houses.

Their steps stuttered as they faced an empty front lawn. No Shakespearian prose battling modern come-ons. No Henry or Luca in sight at all.

Cliff quizzically side-eyed Pax, expecting an answer. Pax was equally confused.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Pax said. “I thought they’d be out here bantering, too.” Cliff fumbled with the gate latch, and Pax hindered his effort by squeezing between him and the gate. Cliff didn’t give an inch, his body a warm wall at Pax’s front. Gate pickets poked his ass from behind. “Look at me. You need to calm down.” Cliff gave him a heated glare. He struggled to swallow a grin. “They’re probably bumping uglies in her room. Or his.”

Cliff cuffed his large hands on Pax’s upper arms and shifted him to the side. The slight tremor in Cliff’s grip jolted through him, and Pax stopped smiling. He used his hip and bumped the gate open.

Cliff strode through, and Pax lunged for his elbow, halting him with a tight press to smooth skin. “Wait. Cliff.”

Cliff stilled, inspecting the house as if he had x-ray vision and could see into each room, when all that was visible was the outline of an unadorned Christmas tree inside.

“They had fifteen minutes to make an impression. No one’s in bed with anyone.”

As if to punctuate his statement, piano music clunked from within the house. Relief relaxed Cliff’s shoulders.

A few off-key notes, and Cliff mirrored Pax’s wince.

“She could use a music tutor, though,” Pax said.

“Are you offering?”

Not really, though he had taken enough piano lessons to be a professional pianist. This was an opportunity to jump from the skin-tingling serious moment to mayhem. “Not me. I was thinking Luca.”

A toneless laugh.

“He’s an exceptional musician. Into the classics. Tutors heaps of students around here. Has flyers and everything. I’m surprised you haven’t heard him play. He practices daily.”

Cliff eyed him suspiciously. “When?”

Um. . . . “Early mornings. Very early.”

“Flyers, you say?”

Pax nodded, mind racing to sell this line. To make it convincing. “Look, sleep on it.”

“Hold up,” Cliff said, crowding Pax toward the fence. All that heat leaning toward Pax had him rocking up a startled brow. Cliff’s green eyes stayed on his. “You don’t have to do it with me again.”

“Do it with you?”

Was that a quirk of his lips? “Go running.”

Oh, Christ. That. Cliff expected him to jump at the out, but Pax couldn’t let it happen. “I’d love to do it with you, and on a regular basis.”

Cliff halved their distance, becoming a wall of heat again. He reached for something at Pax’s side, but Pax’s attention was rooted to Cliff’s slow smile. He had dimples. Didn’t seem right for a shrew to sport such a smile.

“Weekdays, I run mornings. Probably around the time your friend practices his piano.”

Oh, it was so on.

“Excellent. You’ll hear how well he plays, and when you do? You’ll hire him.”

Light danced in Cliff’s eyes. “Breakfast entertainment. I look forward to it. And then I look forward to our run.”

“Me too. Both those things.”

“See you out here at six.”

Six! This man was an insult to humanity.

Cliff slipped Pax’s shades onto the bridge of his nose. Cool air lurched between them as Cliff stepped back and turned for his house.

“And, Apollo? Shorts won’t suffocate your junk. Think about it.”

The minute Pax stepped inside his house, he shoved off his heavy jeans, dealt with his boxers, and fanned air over his chafed inner thighs. Lord, his skin burned. Throwing his pants over an arm, he ouched to the kitchen for a bucket of water and, thirst quenched, wended through the house toward the promise of a shower. At the base of the stairs, heated conversation had him backing to the living room.

He pushed his shades to the top of his head.

Luca and Henry each sat in a beanbag, controller in hand. Crash Team Racing lit up the giant screen, and they angled their bodies in time to the curves while bitching at each other.

“What a sight.”

Henry glanced over. “One might say the same.”

Luca scowled at the screen and dropped his controller to his lap. Henry scoffed. “Told you I’d win. Just as surely as I will win Bianca.”

Pax leaned against the blessedly cool doorframe. “You used your time to maximum effect, I hope? It was hard won.”

Luca grinned over Henry’s head. “I spoke English, so it’s looking rather good.”

Henry rolled his eyes and mocked him. “‘Can you grab my arm, so I can tell Pax I’ve been touched by an angel?’ Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.”

“I don’t have chickens. And my line was better than yours.” Luca met Pax’s gaze. “He did the whole summer’s day speech. Rough winds and shaking butts of May.”

“Buds,” Henry said, pushing to his feet. “Though I like the butt idea.” He strutted toward the door. “We didn’t get much out of the moment, but Bianca is on board with you distracting her brother.”

“Super on board,” Luca agreed. “Eyes lit up and everything.”

“Because she wants our attention,” Henry said, stopping brazenly in front of Pax.

Luca gave a hesitant reply. “I think she wants her brother getting out of his study.”

“Maybe both?” Pax suggested. His instinct was to agree with Henry. She was after the attention. He knew that feeling well. Beyond the first instinct, however, was the lingering feeling that she was doing this for a bigger reason. Beyond herself.

Something worth . . . admiring.

Looking up to, perhaps.

He shook it off. “Cliff needs to leave his study. It’s summer and Christmas, and it should not be spent slaving over books.”

Henry bid them goodbye. “Keep up the good work, Pax Polo. I see a future for you yet.”

Pax pressed himself against the frame lest that velvet jacket brush him on his way out.

Henry turned in the hall, buttoning his jacket. “If I’m sharing time with Luca, I want you distracting Bianca’s brother longer.”

Pax swallowed a few retorts and smiled until the door shut behind him. “Thank fuck he’s gone.” He dropped his jeans and pointed at the freed spot. “Give me ten minutes to shower. Then play another round?”

Luca nodded, and a quarter of an hour later, a vanilla-fresh Pax slumped onto the beanbag and scrolled through the video game settings.

Beanbag filling popped and crackled as Luca swiveled to face him.

“What’s up?” Pax asked.

“What does Shakespeare have that I don’t?”

Pax tapped the buttons on his controller and then balanced it on his knee. “Look. I have a plan to weasel you some non-Henry time with Bianca.”

“Tell me more.”

Pax elaborated on the small lie he’d given Cliff.

Luca ditched his controller and leaped to his feet. He held an arm for Pax. “I don’t play piano. Neanche un po’. But it sounds perfect.”

Pax stared forlornly at the screen. He wouldn’t have minded playing Crash Bandicoot, but it was time to work.

He grabbed Luca’s hand and the guy hauled him up with one swift pull. Thirty seconds later, he was lounging on the swivel chair in Luca’s room. A corner room with windows on two sides that conveniently overlooked the Wilsons’ front yard. The rest of the room was a typical nineteen-year-old guy’s room. Tousled bedsheets. Overflowing hamper. Mugs of unfinished coffee.

Luca powered up his computer, and Pax eyed the busy desk: textbooks full of computer code, parts of a computer lying to the side, and Luca’s unique pencil. “What’s with the Troll doll?” he asked, picking it up.

Luca’s fingers were flying over the keyboard as he mocked up a tutoring flyer. Pax caught Luca’s grin reflected in the monitor.

“My youngest sister gave it to me before I left. Her favorite possession, and she wanted me to have it. Big hearts, my family.”

Pax swallowed and set the pencil down carefully. “How many sisters do you have?”

“Four. I’m in the middle. The only boy. My sixteen-year-old sister? She’ll freak when she hears you’re living with me.”

“I’m known in Europe? You sure know how to grow a man’s esteem.”

“Sorry to bust it so soon. Not known, no. I wanted to learn everything about New Zealand before I came. I heard of Serenity Free and listened to you for months. My sister too.”

Oh well. One day he’d be known in Europe. Play gigs in Berlin. “I can hook her up with a signed T-shirt if you want?”

Luca shook his head. “No, no, Pax Polo. You’ll have to do better for my sisters.” He leaned over the desk and the printer hummed to life. When the dozen flyers were done, Pax picked them up and lined them on the windowsill.

Luca had used a funky font and a 3D image of a grand piano. It looked good. But wasn’t quite right. Pax grabbed the nearest mug with a few mouthfuls of coffee left in it.

“Excellent.” He moved to the windowsill and tipped the last dredges over the dozen sheets.

Luca gripped the sides of his head. “What are you—?”

Pax winked, and smeared the liquid over the paper. “A night sleeping on the sheets, and the flyers will be perfect.”

“Perfect?”

“Convincing.” If they looked too fresh, Cliff would smell the lie a mile off. “That gets that part done.”

“And now?”

Pax palmed Luca on the shoulder. “Now I find some pants, and then we steal a piano.”

“Where can we find a piano on Sunday night?” Luca glanced at him from behind the wheel of his mint van. “And . . . when you said steal . . .?”

“Borrow”—

Luca relaxed in his seat.

—“without any intention of giving it back.” At least, not until after Christmas.

Pax directed Luca to park across from the neon-lit club, Untamed. Once upon a time, the building had been a beer factory and it still held that vibe. Concrete blocks with copper piping, long since tagged to death with graffiti.

A long line fringed the building. Busy for a Sunday.

Pax felt the music throbbing through the club even from their vehicle. It should have felt welcoming, but it tingled his bruised skin.

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Luca said, “but stealing’s a crime here, sì?”

“Yes, it is. Ready?”

“As a friend, I should tell you this is a bad idea.”

“The worst.” Pax clicked open his belt and slipped out of the car.

Halfway across the street, Luca scrambled to his side. “I cannot leave a scrawny man like you alone.”

Pax halted between dashed white lines separating the street. “Scrawny? I have the moves. I have the hair. I have the whole package.”

A car reeled past as Luca tapped a pointed finger under his eye.

“Yes, well,” Pax said. “Maybe not the muscles.”

“Scrawny.”

Pax glared at Luca’s amusement, and sighed. “I will need your help lifting.”

He strolled past a chatty line toward the bouncer, Buster, a tall, broad-shouldered man who wore a permanent scowl.

Buster waved a trio of women inside the club. “Go,” he said as they passed. “Sip your soul away in tequila sunrises.”

A dude in line had the guts to snicker, and Buster turned on him—and the whole crowd behind him. “You’re all going to die divorced and dead of heart.”

Luca’s step faltered, and Pax tugged his sleeve and dragged him to the front of the line. “The pin to my inflating ego! I’ve missed you.”

“Pax Polo, who the fuck messed with your face?” Buster greeted him with a smacking handshake and shoulder bump before yelling at a couple smoking weed slipping into the line. “Put the joint out if you want to join in the fun.” He pulled back and met Pax’s eye. “Thought the crew ditched your sorry ass.”

Pax didn’t need reminding. “They’ll miss me soon enough.” His stomach lurched to his knees at the quip. Fact was, none of his mates had checked in today. Had they called Blake?

Nah. Wouldn’t make sense. Pax was the one who could get them covering the gig with Lone Whistle and the Deserted.

Besides. It’d only been a day.

Pax introduced Luca and asked Buster if he would open the practice room around the corner, the one Serenity Free rented. It had all the instruments they needed for jamming, including a spinet, a small piano.

None of their current songs used a piano, so it wouldn’t be missed.

“Lend us keys?” Tony had their only set.

Buster eyed him. “Sure you want to go in there?”

Pax shoved up the sleeves of his jacket. “We’re on a mission.”

Buster planted a handful of cold metal keys in his palm. “Lose them, and I cut off your balls.”

“Fair deal.” Pax indicated for Luca to follow and hoofed it around the corner.

Luca shuddered. “You were right. You will have no trouble with the shrew.”

Pax cast him a conning smile. If only it were true. As it was, Buster was a walk in the park compared to the infuriating specimen that was Cliff Wilson.

Music ricocheted around the back of the club. At a metal door tagged to death with graffiti penises, Pax slid the practice room key in the lock, twisted, and pulled open.

Light blared from the room and Pax halted.

If he’d paid attention, he might have placed Blake’s signature bashing through the door.

He stared into the room, at the Three T’s. At Blake wrapping up a solo on the drums. Blake. Surfer dude, messy brown hair, shell necklace tight across his throat. The guy whose fist fucked Pax’s face. Whose words had fucked with a lot more than that.

Pax’s hollow laugh rang out.

Tim caught sight of him first and shot a tight look to Ted. The music wheezed to a halt.

No one spoke. So fuck it, he would. “Practicing Sundays now?”

Tony shrugged. “Got more gigs around Christmas. Got to bring it.” He set his bass guitar on the stand. “How you doing on that gig?” He lifted an eye that suggested not everyone knew about the gig yet.

“What’s Blake doing here?”

Luca flanked him for support.

Blake drummed an obnoxious beat. “Picking up my gear. What are you doing here?”

The rest of the band shrugged in agreement.

Pax wouldn’t let the hiccup in his chest affect him. Spit out the truth. “Just grabbing the piano.”

He waltzed in and Luca moved to the other end of the small piano.

“Bro,” Tony said. “That’s the band’s.”

“I remember pitching in a hundred bucks. I’m getting my money’s worth.” He nodded at Luca, and they hefted the two-hundred-pound piano. “I’ll bring it back when I return.” He met Tony’s eyes with solid determination. “Gig in tow.”