“Please, make yourselves comfortable,” West said as they entered his apartment from the lift. It was late, and his staff was asleep. “Can I take your jackets? Get you anything to drink or to eat?”

“I would like some tea,” the woman said coolly. “If you have some.”

“Certainly, I have tea. Almost any kind you want.” West pulled off his coat. “Let me think. There’s Earl Gray, English breakfast, orange jasmine—”

“Orange jasmine, please,” the woman said.

“I’ll make it,” Asher volunteered as he disappeared down a hall toward the kitchen.

“Please, sit,” West encouraged, gesturing to an expensive sofa.

But the woman wandered toward a piano in the corner instead, stroking its frame. “What a lovely instrument. Can you play it?”

“Yes.”

“You must play for me before I go.” She sat on the bench. “I don’t have the skill, of course. I was raised in Selkirk. In the wilderness.”

“Asher tells me Manitoba is beautiful,” West said, sitting on the arm of the sofa closest to the piano bench. “Especially Selkirk. He’s always telling me to visit.”

“Times have been hard for our clan,” the woman said, her slender fingers ghosting over the keys. “There’s a wolf cull. The humans have shot several of our young men.”

“I know,” West said gently. “I’ve heard. Ash has told me about it.”

She pressed a key and a note cut the air. “We’ll endure it. We’ve weathered worse through the long years, including many a cull. No, I’m here to see how Asher lives and whether I can convince him to come home. We need men.”

There was little to no chance of that. There was nothing Asher loved better than knocking back microbrews, getting wild at The Bowery, and sleeping with beautiful, dyed-hair human girls. He wouldn’t go back to Selkirk for a long time yet.

“I see.” West rubbed his chin, which was rough with a thick layer of stubble. Designer stubble, Asher joked, although as he sported a trendy beard himself, he should keep his mouth shut.

“And I wanted to meet you, Weston Croft,” the woman continued. “You’ve been a good friend to our clan son. To Asher.” She pressed another sharp note on the piano, seeming to enjoy the sound. “I wanted to see if you would influence his choice—if you would convince him to come back to us.” Another glass-sharp note. “And I wanted to meet the kind of man who leaves his clan for life. You are not like other shifters.”

For life stung. “I might go back. Someday.”

The elder gazed at him. There was a long silence.

“My name is Hyssop,” she finally said.

“Elder Hyssop. I am honored.”

“Do you have a woman, Mr. Croft?” she asked.

“West, please, Elder. And no.” It pained him to say it, but no was the truth. He was too busy and the shifter women in New York too few. There were only three he knew of, and they were all the wrong kind—a fox, a lynx, and a black bear. No grizzlies. “No, I have no woman. I hope to . . . someday.”

“You’re young,” she said consideringly, “and very handsome. Some would tell you that you have time.” Her eyes narrowed. “But I sense your loneliness. Don’t delay your mating. A shifter man needs a woman even more than a human male needs a woman.”

“I know,” he said quietly.

But where would a shifter woman come from around here? And how would she fit into a New York life of cocktail parties, choking traffic, and business calls? Was there a shifter woman alive who would understand him?

“You don’t think you can find a woman. I see it in your eyes. Perhaps you should use the computer. The . . . web. MeetYourMate.” She gazed at him intently before turning back to the piano. “There are two girls in our clan who did it that way. They drove to a human town and used the computers in the town’s library.” She was playing many keys at random now, testing them out. “In my day, we waited for the summer Gathering and met our men like that.” Plink, plink, hummm. “But sometimes, the right man isn’t there for a girl, or she’s impatient, or her clan is so remote there’s no Gathering to be had. So young people can use MeetYourMate, now, if they need it. I think it’s good. You should consider it.”

He had considered it. Chicory, the black bear girl who lived in Chelsea, had raved to him and Asher about MeetYourMate. It was a website for shifters looking for mates. She’d gone to meet a man, a black bear, and now she’d decided to mate with him for life.

It made a compelling case to try the site himself, he had to admit.

“Tea!” Asher said suddenly, coming back into the sumptuous room with steaming mugs. “I went through your fridge and cut up some finger food, too. Hope you don’t mind, man.”

“I don’t mind.” He didn’t worry about the cost of food. He didn’t worry about the cost of anything.

West stood, and Hyssop grabbed his wrist.

“Would you play something?” she asked, the silver in her eyes as bright as jewelry. “Piano music is so lovely.”

He was exhausted and out of practice, but he was a gentleman.

“Of course I will, Elder. Is Chopin all right?”