The candles in Isadora Capri’s office burned low, their wax dripping down into curling pools upon her desk. The room smelled faintly of cedar and varnished wood, every corner filled with stacks of sheet music. She sat behind her desk, posture poised yet softened by the hour, the silk of her blouse catching the golden flicker of flame. Her soft red curls falling just above her shoulders—framed her face in restless waves, and her sharp dark eyes darted up at the quiet intrusion she had long since anticipated.

Isadora was a werewolf, and her senses never betrayed her. Even before the door eased open, she had already felt the familiar presence—so different from the rest of Nevermore. The scent of a woman who was no stranger to sneaking into her office. A woman who taught History of Outcasts by day and belonged only to her by night. Their meetings always came at this hour, carved from secrecy and desire, each one a ritual neither could abandon.

She closed the leather-bound ledger on her desk with deliberate calm. “You’ve made quite the habit of testing my hearing,” she said, her voice carrying that delicate balance of warmth and reprimand, like a melody sharpened by dissonance. The lilt of her accent and the wit always stitched into her words never dulled, not even at this hour.

Her hand hovered briefly over the sheets of music she had been annotating before she abandoned them entirely, leaning back into her chair. The movement stretched her frame, highlighting the faint ripple of tension in her shoulders—the kind that came not from work but from what this relationship demanded of her. She had chosen this path willingly, but the secrecy pressed on her all the same.

Her gaze flicked upward, holding steady. There was nothing docile in the way Isadora looked at her lover; it was equal parts hunger and calculation, the wolf in her recognizing the woman as a potential mate. The corner of her mouth tilted into the faintest suggestion of a smirk, though her eyes betrayed something softer, unspoken.

“Tell me,” she murmured, reaching out to let her fingertips brush the rim of the candle nearest her. "Have you missed me?"