Let it be Me (Blue Raven) (20 page)

“No! You cannot play to please me, you must play because that it how it is in your heart!”

She spared a glance up and saw that Oliver was not there. Strange, he was always in the room. She frowned, a little bereft at the idea that he was not watching over her. But at that moment, he came back into the music room, carrying a box in his hands.

The rap of the door closing caused Carpenini to look up sharply. He spoke very curtly to Oliver in Italian, and Oliver answered in reply, holding up the box as evidence of his ire.

Bridget had been in Venice long enough now to be able to pick a few choice words out of the dozens that flew above her head—
paper
,
account
, and
payment
chief among them.

Before she could question the brothers about their squabble, the clock chimed three, and everyone in the room visibly shifted. The lesson was over, and the next part—the best part—of the day would begin.

“Signorina, for tomorrow, practice attacking the arpeggio. Think ahead in your mind when you read the music,” Carpenini said, all fight gone out of his body.

Molly came in, Oliver put the box down, and in the flurry of activity of gathering up her music, changing back out of Oliver’s shirt, and finding bonnet, gloves, and reticule, Bridget could not help but sneak a glance at the box that had broken up the lesson. Oliver and Carpenini were engaged in a low conversation in Italian on the other side of the room; there was no reason she couldn’t peek inside . . .

Imagine her confusion at finding a box of simple paper.

Imagine her delight at finding it was ruled with lines. Lines for the musical staff. Bridget could piece together the meaning of the overheard conversation now. Carpenini must have ordered this special paper, printed with staffs for his own compositions! And there was an entire
book’s
worth of paper here.

Now Bridget could have easily gotten her own paper and lined it herself. For that matter, so could Carpenini—this was an extravagance. But since this was here, surely he wouldn’t miss a sheet or two? It would even be a help to their lessons, because she could get the tune out of her head quickly and move on to more important things, like attacking her notes with proper attention.

She was just slipping two such sheets of paper into her music portfolio (or perhaps it was three) when Oliver’s voice made her jump.

“Miss Forrester? Are you ready to depart?”

“I saw that, you know.”

They were walking through the Piazza San Marco, one of Oliver’s favorite places in the city—and now, one of Bridget’s, too. Bridget brought her head down—her eyes had been fixed on the intricate facade of the Doge’s Palace. Molly hung back a few paces behind them, always mindful of propriety, but blessedly unobtrusive. Oliver had been happily conversational so far in their ramble, but his topics were terribly mild. Until now, apparently.

“Saw what?” she asked, trying for innocence. And failing.

“I saw you hastily stuff something into your portfolio—and really, it was the hasty nature of the stuffing that gave you away.” He grinned at her. “You would make a terrible spy.”

Bridget raised her eyebrows and mentally made a note to apply to her brother-in-law for training in more covert tactics. He would likely tell her to suppress the blush that was at that moment rising over her cheeks.

“Now, what could you have stolen that would have required such haste?” he chided further.

The dam burst.

“I’m so, so sorry, Oliver, I couldn’t help it, I looked in the box and there was this lovely blank music paper and I have had this tune in my head that I simply need to get down! And if I don’t, my lessons are just going to get worse, I know it, so I thought that the Signore would not mind if I took one or two sheets out of that box, and of course I didn’t need to steal it, I am perfectly capable of making my own sheet paper, but I thought, it was there, and I could use it—do you think he’ll be terribly cross at me?”

Oliver blinked, which he tended to do whenever her speech ran on. He then took the expected steadying breath, and it steadied her, too. In a city built on water, Oliver seemed to be a grounded point.

“Bridget,” he began quite properly, as he always did when he was about to be quite proper, “do you mean to tell me that this rushed speech of contrition is because you pilfered some paper?”

“Yes,” she nodded.

“Some
blank
paper.” He clutched his hands behind his back.

“Some blank lined paper,” she corrected and giggled.

“And is your guilt the reason for your relative silence today?”

“Yes.” She frowned. “Well, no. It’s because of the tune.”

“The tune.”

She sighed and threw up her hands. “I have a tune in my head, and I have to put it down on paper to get it out. And then maybe I’ll be able to attack the notes of Number Twenty-three properly.”

He regarded her quizzically. “Is it the tune that goes like this?”

He sang a low melody, shocking Bridget, his lovely tenor making each note warm and full.

“Yes!” she cried. “How did know?”

“You’ve been mindlessly humming that tune on our walks for three days.” Oliver smiled at her, reaching out to tuck a wind-caught curl back behind her ear. His touch was careless, as if he hadn’t noticed he was doing it.

However, Bridget noticed. And the jolt of warmth that passed from his naked fingers to the tip of her ear shocked her.

“Do . . . do you think he’ll mind?” she stuttered, bringing herself back to the present, back to the piazza. “Carpenini, I mean.”

Oliver’s hand dropped to his side. “Bridget, he’ll never notice. He’s been going through paper like a newspaper press.” He gave her a quick reassuring smile. “As far as I’m concerned, you can have every single sheet in that box. I paid for it, after all.”

That last was grumbled low, under his breath. Bridget cocked her head to the side quizzically. “What do you—”

But he just shook his head. “A mix-up in billing at the
papier
’s. It’s not worth the trouble it takes to think about it.” He squared his shoulders and changed the subject. “But I did not know you composed, as well as your other talents.”

“I do not.” She shook her head. “Not really. Sometimes a melody will come to me, though, and the only way to make it quiet is to put it on paper.”

“And these are just melodies? Not full compositions?”

“Well,” she hemmed, “occasionally I amuse myself by making an arrangement out of it, adding harmonies and counterpoint, but . . .”

“That sounds remarkably like composition to me,” he interjected. “And then what—these arrangements simply sit in a drawer, never to be heard?”

“No one wants to hear what I’ve written, Oliver,” she laughed.

“I do,” he responded, quite vehemently. “In fact, I want to hear this tune that you’ve been humming for three days—because it is as much in my head now as it is in yours. I want to see what it can be built into.”

Play. One of her own compositions? For other people’s ears? The thought practically had Bridget jumping out of her skin.

“I . . . cannot,” she protested. “The very idea . . . fills me with more dread than playing naked in front of a thousand people!”

“Actually, that gives me an idea about how to combat your lingering stage fright—but I digress.” He grinned wolfishly at her. “You will not be playing naked, or in front of a thousand people. And I would very much like to hear it.”

She could say no, and she could do it so forcefully, Oliver would regret pursuing the issue. But along with the dread that felt a close cousin to when her nerves would fail her, there was a spark of something new. Of . . . hope? No. Ambition. A glimmer of that energy that drove her to want to be a great pianist. She wanted to get this tune onto paper. This tune, so much stronger in her head than the others, springing almost fully formed! It was worth being shared. It was worth being shared with Oliver.

Out of everyone, he was the one she felt safe hearing the contents of her mind.

“All . . . all right,” she said finally. “You can hear my music.”

The next morning, Bridget arrived early at Oliver’s home.

Shockingly early.

“Signorina Forrester,” Frederico said, meeting them at the gondola. “Signors Merrick and Carpenini are not yet down from breakfast!”

In fact they were not even down
to
breakfast. Carpenini was fast asleep. Oliver had been abandoned in the middle of his morning shave so Frederico could go meet the gondola. He quickly wiped away the soap that lathered his face—which had not yet been touched by a blade, so even though he came down to greet Bridget scruffily, it was at least even.

“I’m so sorry!” she cried upon greeting him at the base of the stairs. “But I could not sleep any longer! I’m not permitted to play at the hotel, and I have to know how this will sound on the keys!”

She held up her sheet music—where yesterday it was blank lines, today it was marked heavily with staccato rhythms, time and key signatures, and a bold clear melody.

“Well, let’s hear it, then,” he said, stifling a yawn, and gestured for Bridget to lead the way.

She practically vibrated with energy, he thought, watching her—it was debatable whether she had slept last night, such was her anticipation. There was a slight waver of nervousness in her voice when she finally spoke.

“Now please bear in mind, I haven’t been able to play this yet—I’ve only heard it in my head.” He watched passively, unobtrusively as she seated herself at the piano and smoothed the pages out before her.

“I understand,” he replied with a smile. “Although you may wish to remove your gloves before playing.”

“Oh,” she said, surprised to find her gloves still on her hands. Not to mention her bonnet still on her head and her lightweight spencer still on her back.

She quickly removed the gloves, although the bonnet and spencer would have to wait. And then, with one last preparatory breath, she began to play.

And Oliver let her music wash over him.

It was by no means a full, refined piece. There was too much repetition in the second half, as if she hadn’t yet figured out what to do as a counterpoint resolution to her melody. Oh, but that melody. It started quietly, peacefully, like the morning sun just touching the waters to the east of the city. Then it built with the bustle of a day spent being met by new things, surprises, happy exclamations. Then the falling into night, a quieting down again, a delighted exhaustion. It had a romantic sensibility but a classical soul. And Oliver knew as soon as her fingers left the keys where she had found her inspiration.

“That was Venice. Wasn’t it? An ode to Venice.”

She looked up at him, her eyes shining with happiness. “Yes! I hoped you would be able to tell.”

“How could I not? It sounded just like it to me.”

“Really? Strange, it sounded to me like a student who has not been practicing the Number Twenty-three.”

Both Bridget and Oliver whipped their eyes to the door of the music room, where Carpenini stood. Or, more accurately, leaned. He was hastily dressed in trousers and a shirt, much like Oliver. But whereas Oliver had been awake for at least a little while, Carpenini blinked into the light like a disgruntled bear waking from his cave.

“Is this”—his hand waved vaguely to the music on the piano—“what has been distracting you the past few days?” Oliver thought he caught Vincenzo sliding a glance toward him, but he could not be sure—what with Vincenzo’s half-closed eyes.

“Er . . . Signore, I apologize,” she began, but cut herself off. “Yes. But it won’t be a problem anymore.”

“Good,” he grunted with a nod. “Since you are here, Signorina, then we will get to work.”

Fifteen

I
F
Bridget
had hoped to have her head cleared by putting her “Ode to Venice” on paper, it was not to be. At least, it was not to be that day. Or the next. Or the next.

Bridget did manage to get ahead of the beat and attack the notes as she had been struggling to do for the last few days, even earning a few of those rare, “
si, si
”s from her instructor.

But once she had defeated these old dragons, a new one reared its ugly head.

“Signorina, how many times do I have to tell you—
appassionata!
With the heart, the fever! Build with the crescendo!”

Oliver observed from his usual perch on the worn, faded velvet settee. He was always there, always listening. Most people would find sitting through other people’s lessons boring, but he found it surprisingly compelling. He had never watched Carpenini teach anyone before—at least not this in-depth. And he had also never been privy to a student with the same talent as Bridget Forrester.

He could watch her hands move on the keys for hours. The way her brow came down as she pushed through a long, complicated run. That stray curl coming undone from her coiffure, and the way her tongue slipped out and pressed against her upper lip when she was concentrating.

Yes, watching Bridget Forrester was certainly the most interesting way to pass the time.

And watching
over
Bridget Forrester, the best.

Oliver knew he wasn’t wholly useless in his current position, because both Bridget and Vincenzo would look to him as the objective auditory party.

“That crescendo doesn’t start until here!” Bridget exclaimed, pointing to the music.

“
Si
, but is better if you start before, and slow down the build. It is in the gut, the liver. I am right, Oliver, yes?”

It amazed Oliver how Vincenzo’s Italian would suddenly get worse when he was trying to win a point. Not that his English was perfect by any means, but five years with Oliver and as many weeks with an English-only student had made him infinitely more understandable than in the past.

“I think it sounds strong either way,” Oliver said diplomatically. There was absolutely no way he was going to enter the fray between Vincenzo and Bridget—at least not when it came to music.

He could do that for her, he decided—as much as he itched to jump to her defense, to argue with Vincenzo in a way that five years of friendship had taught him would work. Instead, he let Bridget fight her own battles.

And the amazing thing was, she had begun to. She had begun to trust her own ear, and judgment, and began to play the way the piece spoke to her. It was only here and there at first, during phrases one could tell she truly enjoyed, but the fact that her confidence was building was undeniable.

“No, no, Signorina! It is weak, tired! It does not have the
appassionata
!”

What was also undeniable was the fact that Bridget was having a harder time than before beheading this particular dragon.

“Signore, I am putting as much feeling into the piece as possible,” she began, her voice rising with her ire.

“Then you do not have the right kind of feeling!” Vincenzo retaliated. “It is about making love. Falling out of love. Pain! Greatness!”

“What a marvelous number of adjectives that mean very little strung together,” Bridget replied sardonically, and Oliver could barely suppress a laugh. When Vincenzo tended toward dramatics, they were rather . . . dramatic.

He managed to catch Bridget’s eye and saw that she was hiding her own smile, too.

He would have to make a note of today’s display, to imitate on their walk home. He supposed he should feel a little guilty about making his half brother—and Bridget’s renowned instructor—the butt of a joke, but it just seemed to him that the more human Vincenzo was to Bridget, the more she would be able to relax in his presence, and the better she would play. And hopefully, the more she would enjoy the process, too. She took it, and herself, so seriously! And of course, it was worthy of being taken seriously, but not at the expense of her health or her sense of self-worth. Balance had to be met. If Vincenzo was harsh, rigorous study, then Oliver would be the counterpoint.

Thus Oliver considered it his duty to earn smiles from her. Even if it had to be at Vincenzo’s expense. He was certain that had Vincenzo known about their little jokes, he would forgive him. Especially if it helped Bridget play.

But Oliver did not know if
he
would be able to forgive Vincenzo for what happened next.

“How can I explain this to someone such as you!” Vincenzo threw up his hands, and then buried his head in them. Dramatically, it went without mentioning.

“Why do you not show me, instead,” Bridget replied patiently, indicating the keys in front of them.

Vincenzo’s head came up from his hands, as if struck by a light. “
Si
, you are right. One cannot explain passion to a virgin. One must show her!”

And with that, Vincenzo turned Bridget Forrester in her seat, held fast to her shoulders, and kissed her hard on the lips.

Oliver was out of his seat before he knew what was happening. But before he made it two steps, Vincenzo broke off the kiss.

“Now, Signorina, start the crescendo earlier—and play that feeling as you do,” Vincenzo commanded in a self-satisfied manner.

Bridget looked around the room, blinking, as if in a trance. Oliver desperately tried to meet her eyes, but their usual unspoken communication during her lessons was in no way adequate.

“Miss Forrester—Bridget,” he ventured, his voice coming out strangled.

“I . . . I’m fine,” she reassured him, and then, refocusing on the music before her, she began to play, but whether she played the crescendo as Vincenzo wanted, Oliver could not hear.

Because his blood was thrumming in his ears, and his mind rushed with words that formed thoughts he couldn’t fully comprehend.

Are you all right?
he wanted to ask.
Are you safe?
pulsed through his system. But underneath all that was a darker thrumming, an anger that could not be laughed away.

Mine
, it said.
She is mine.

It could be a surprise to no one that both Bridget and Oliver were uncommonly silent on their walk home. And remarkably slow of foot, too.

“Miss, do you mind if I walk ahead?” Molly said, breaking into the awkward quiet that covered them. “It is your mother’s day to receive callers, and the hotel’s girls don’t know their stoneware from bone china.”

“Of course, Molly,” Bridget replied. “I apologize, we should not dawdle today.”

“Do not trouble yourself, miss, I’ll just move ahead if you don’t mind.”

And with that, Molly gave a short curtsy and, elbows tucked to her sides, began to dart through the afternoon crowd.

Leaving Oliver alone with Bridget.

Either Molly was immensely sensitive to the thoughts of her employers, Oliver thought, or she was uncommonly obtuse to them and lived in a world of happy coincidence. But given the look she slid to Oliver on her way past him, he rather suspected the former.

And he was given to believe that the practical, Methodist maid was, strangely, on his side.

“Well,” Oliver began, not one to let awkwardness detract from opportunity. “That was an interesting day.”

“Yes,” Bridget mused, her eyes still on her feet, although it seemed she was not truly watching where she was going. She seemed to lag, to stumble over cobblestones, her mind clearly elsewhere.

Oliver could guess where.

“Did you feel that the lesson today was . . . useful?” His voice strangled the last word.

“Yes,” she replied, by rote. Then her head came up; her feet came to a stop. “No.”

“No?”

“No. It wasn’t useful. I don’t understand what he wants.” She slumped mournfully. “I don’t think I ever will.”

Oliver took a half step toward her but, mindfully, kept his arms at his sides. “What don’t you understand?” He tried to keep the curiosity out of his voice.

“This . . . this
appassionata
!” she exclaimed. “This inflamed gut—which, by the by, sounds like a disease”—Oliver could not help smiling at that, as she continued—“try and I try, and he still does not like the run. And then he
kissed
me, and I play the same run again, and it sounded no different!”

“Bridget—” Oliver began, his voice taking on those proper tones that made him sound like her father, not her friend. He quashed said tones immediately. “What are you getting at?”

“What does Carpenini want?” she asked breathlessly, turning her green-eyed gaze directly at him. “What does he want me to feel—to understand? Do you have any idea?”

Oliver felt every muscle in his body tense in awareness. He could count his heartbeats as he weighed his response.

“Perhaps I do,” he replied finally, his eyes never leaving Bridget’s face.

“What is it? Can you . . . translate for me? As you did with the buckets of water—er, slop.”

“No,” he replied, considering. Her face fell, an adorable plaintive look. “It cannot be explained. Not with words.”

“Oh,” she replied, her brow coming down in confusion.

“But perhaps I can show you,” he offered. Careful to keep his hands behind his back. Careful not to touch her. Not yet.

“Would you, please?” Bridget’s face lit up like she’d just been offered an invitation to a private box at the opera. One that she didn’t have to share with her sisters.

“It’s . . . a physical feeling, converted into music. That is what he’s after,” he warned her. He wanted her to have a chance to walk away. Even though it would kill him if she did.

“Is it like a touch? A . . . a caress?”

She reached out her hand and touched his arm, at the elbow, pulling his hand free from behind his back. As electric as the feeling of her hand on his coat—the gentle pressure she placed there, barely more than a bird’s weight—he couldn’t help but laugh.

“Not quite. That’s a good place to start, though.” He looked around them. “This lesson cannot be taught in the middle of a footbridge, however. Come.”

He held out his hand, and she hesitantly slipped her smaller one into it. They were in the middle of Venice, in the middle of a busy day on a busy street, where everyone could see them. Granted, most of the people who saw them would not care beyond how they blocked their path, but he did not wish to disgrace her to that small percentage that would care very much.

He pulled her down a side street and into a quiet, unpopulated alley.

“This is that alley,” she said, her voice a whisper—which the environment seemed to call for.

“What alley?”

“They one you first showed me. With sunlight on the cobblestones and impatient windows.”

He glanced around them. “So it is,” he murmured. An appropriate enough place. After all, it was just about here that the itch—that itch he was about to take the opportunity to scratch—came into being.

He dropped her hand but remained close at her side. He wanted to instruct her properly, and that meant . . . anticipation.

“So . . .” she asked, unable to come up with the rest of the sentence.

“So.” He exhaled slowly and closed the meager distance between them. “The feeling that Carpenini wants is internal. It’s a blooming feeling of love. Of lust.”

“Well, I know that,” she said, exasperated.

“Do you?” A single eyebrow flew up skeptically.

“Well, yes.” Her hands went to her hips, a defiant stance. “I’m not completely ignorant. I’ve been trying to think about that . . . emotion, while I’m playing, but it just falls short.”

He cocked his head to one side. He leaned in, ever closer, still holding himself just that barest distance apart, still holding his hands at his sides, no matter how much they ached to come up and rest on the skin at her wrists, her throat, her cheek.

“What are you thinking of, specifically, when you are playing?” His voice was little more than breath.

Bridget looked sideways, seemingly loathing to admit. “A crush,” she mumbled.

“Pardon me?” Oliver’s voice went up in pitch, his heart skipping a beat.

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, this is so embarrassing. I used to have a bit of a . . . a crush, on my sister’s now-husband. Before they were married,” she hastened to add. “I try to think of what it felt like to have a crush on him. A crush on anyone, really.”

“Well, then, that’s the difficulty.” He smiled at her, his lips shockingly close to hers. “You are not meant to think of anything at all. You are simply supposed to
need
.”

Her eyes were nearly black, with a feeling she could not yet know how to comprehend. But she would.

“Need what?” she asked.

And then . . . his lips met hers.

There was no sensation in the world quite like this. This first of all kisses, this first time when their hearts and breath would mingle, and the need to touch overwhelmed.

Oliver finally gave in to that need to touch and gently let his fingers rest at the back of her neck, threading through her dark curls. He might not be her instructor, he might not have Carpenini’s refined ear for music, but he could teach her this.