What He Never Knew (What He Doesn't Know, #3)(41)

I laughed, but couldn’t ignore the sting in my chest as I imagined a literal cloud pouring down constant icy rain on Reese. It might as well have been the truth, for what he’d been through. I didn’t know the details about his family, but I knew they were gone. Add in the fact that he still had to see the woman he loved, the woman who didn’t love him in return, on a daily basis?

I didn’t know how he was still standing.

Realization trickled down my spine like water from a leaky faucet.

Maybe part of my discomfort with my newfound happiness came from it feeling so one-sided.

Reese had helped bring me to life, had given me a new purpose, new goals to chase and new recognition when I achieved them. He’d transformed the piano for me, helping me tap into feelings I’d been trying to subdue, to run away from. And in the process, I’d found joy again in the one thing that had always mattered most to me.

My relationship with the piano was on the mend. And it was all thanks to him.

I wanted to do something for him, too.

A flash of us sitting together at his piano sparked in my mind again, and heat rose on my cheeks as I remembered the way the air had grown thicker, the way I’d felt when I realized how close his lips were, how easy it would have been to touch them with my own.

I almost rolled my eyes, knowing it was a childish thing to desire. It was all too cliché that the first male I fantasized about in months and months of my libido being deceased was my ridiculously attractive and irreversibly broken piano teacher. We were spending all our time together, putting ourselves in vulnerable situations, opening up to each other so we could take that vulnerability and transfer it to our music.

I didn’t actually want to kiss him, I convinced myself. But, maybe I did want to repay him somehow, to help him find a new happiness the same way he’d helped me.

And as my uncle dragged me to the kitchen to indulge in my aunt’s famous baking, I realized I knew just the way to do it.





“You need a dog.”

Reese paused where he’d been pouring me a glass of water, the Brita pitcher still suspended mid-air and glass half full as he glanced at me from across his kitchen island. “What?”

“A dog. You know, the furry, four-legged things that wag their tails and lick your face? You need one.”

He blinked, watching me a moment more before he turned his gaze back to the task at hand, filling my glass to the top. He filled his own next, stashing the pitcher back in the fridge before he acknowledged what I’d said.

“I don’t need a dog.”

“I firmly disagree.”

He chuckled at that. “I haven’t had a pet my entire life, Sarah.”

“What?” I blanched, not bothering to hide the dramatic drop of my jaw. “You never had a pet? Ever?”

Reese shook his head.

“A dog? Cat? Rabbit? Hamster? Fish?”

He just kept shaking his head as I listed off all the possible pets he could have had in his lifetime.

“That’s absurd,” I finally said, still shocked. Then, I held my head higher, straightening my spine where I sat. “And all the more reason for you to get a dog.”

Reese slid my glass of water toward me with an amused smile. “Dogs are a lot of work. I can barely keep myself alive, let alone another living, breathing thing.”

“Right, because you’re just so busy that you don’t have time to pour dry food into a bowl or open that door to let a dog outside while you smoke your cigarette.” I pointed at the sliding glass door between us and his backyard in example, but Reese just watched me, taking a sip of water.

I huffed, verbally confirming the frustration I felt inside. I had thought all night about the proposition, about what I could do to bring a little joy into his life. A dog was a great stepping stone. It was a step forward, a new relationship, a new beginning.

I had to make him see that, too.

“Look, it’s been two years since everything went down between you and Charlie. You go to work every day with her, see her happiness, and sometimes even spend time with her family. Her entire family,” I pointed out, and Reese’s face sobered at that. “And then, you come home to this big, empty house that’s entirely too large for a bachelor. It’s sad, and as much as the broody, broken sad boy image might be great at getting you laid, it’s time to make some moves forward. And a dog is step number one.”

Reese’s brows had slowly climbed the more I talked, and they shot all the way up into his hairline when I mentioned him getting laid — which, admittedly, had also made me blush fiercely once I’d realized what I said.

“Does broody, broken and sad really come off as appealing to the opposite sex?”

I rolled my eyes. “Like you don’t know that that… that… thing,” I finally said, hand flying up toward his face. “That you do with your eyebrows is ridiculously enchanting.”

He smirked. “I do a thing with my eyebrows?”

“We’re getting off topic.”

“I think I like this topic better.”

I shook my head, biting my lip against the smile that threatened to break. “I think we should go to the shelter and adopt a dog,” I said firmly. I pulled my shoulders back, eyes meeting Reese’s with confidence. “Today.”

Reese’s amused smile warped, concern etched in his features as one hand reached back for his neck. “Honestly, Sarah — I really don’t know the first thing about taking care of a dog.”