by C J Burright
The fluttering went wild, and she swallowed, pressing harder into the solid door. She wasn’t ready to be kissed by him, wasn’t ready to let someone else into her life, didn’t know if she’d ever be ready. Finding the deadbolt by feel alone, she turned it.
The click seemed to snap his somber moment, and he straightened, removing his hand from the door.
She rushed into the cold night without looking back.
Chapter Fifteen
Another two weeks watching Garret woo her kids with his music while denying his persistent, invasive charm drove Adara to the edge. She needed to run, to burn off the various frustrations, all converging into the perfect storm. Cursing her sore ankle, she limped from the kitchen to the living room to her bedroom and back again. For some reason she couldn’t name, she hesitated outside Joey’s room. She hadn’t gone in since after the funeral, when she’d stashed everything of his, every picture, memento, instrument and stray rosin container inside, set a bouquet of white roses on his dresser and shut the door, sealing it like a tomb.
It was a tomb, everything Joey decomposing inside.
Her hand trembling, she touched the cool doorknob. She missed him so much, but opening the tomb, remembering, would crack all her pieces. She wasn’t sure she could put them back together again.
A hushed scrape, no louder than a mouse bumping an empty box, came from within.
The hair on her nape lifted. Considering that she hadn’t cleaned Joey’s room for over a year, a rodent infestation wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility. There hadn’t been any signs, no poop pellets or nibbled packages. Goosebumps prickled down her arms. What if it was something else, like spiders? Cockroaches?
Joey’s restless spirit come back to haunt her?
The doorbell boomed Beethoven’s Fifth, and she jumped with a gasp. One hand pressed to her hammering heart, she gimped for the door. Maybe there was such a thing as too much alone time.
She opened the door and her stomach somersaulted. Garret stood on her porch, his hair neatly pulled back, the blazer, white button-down and jeans combo an upgrade. His beast was parked in her driveway, still rumbling. It was so unexpected, finding him there on her porch as if her discontent had conjured him, that her mind freeze-framed.
His eyebrows bunched. “You didn’t just open the door without checking who waited on the other side, did you?”
She tried to look innocent.
“Adara”—he said her name like a reprimand—“you need to be more careful. A small town isn’t a protection. Always, always look before you open the door. And for God’s sake, keep it locked.”
Maybe she should be annoyed, but his concern was kind of…nice. “You’re right.” Tucking her hands behind her back, she made sure her tone was sweet. “Next time I see it’s you on the other side of the door, I won’t answer. For the record, there hasn’t been a murder in Graywood since at least 1902, but statistics show harassment by traveling musicians is on the rise. Speaking of, why are you here?”
“I agreed to play at the college tonight for students and their guests.” He straightened and dropped his chin, the seductive look sparking heat all the way to her toes. If he had any idea how much that look affected her, he’d use it more. “Will you go with me?”
“Nope.”
He exhaled, long and slow. “I need someone there for support.”
“So take London or your BFF Ian.”
“Ian wouldn’t last past the first song before pissing someone off. London canceled five minutes ago. Bob and the kids are all sick with the flu.” He gave her puppy-dog eyes. “Please?”
“You play professionally but need a posse for support?” She planted a hand on her hip and gave him a hard stare. “You’re the most confident person I’ve met. Not buying it, not going.”
“Okay. Fine. I’ll reveal another deep, dark secret if that’s what it takes to convince you.” He swiped a hand down his face, his fingers trembling slightly. “My mother demanded that London and I excel at our natural gifts. For London, it was gymnastics, and me? Well…” His mouth twisted. “She laid the violin in my hands and pushed me to perfection. Relentlessly. We weren’t allowed to even think the word ‘quit’, and second place was a curse word at the Ambrose residence.”
If Garret had smiled at all while he spoke, she might have questioned the believability of so stringent an upbringing. But he hadn’t, and with each word, her heart wrenched tighter.
“I fought for her approval, of course, but in her role of pushing, I think she forgot the art of encouragement. She’d criticize, never compliment. Once she pointed out my mistakes, she made me practice until I could perform the song flawlessly—for hours, until my arms shook.”
“Mother drill sergeant?” She tried for humor, an out he didn’t take.
His throat worked. “I often questioned whether she actually loved me or London, let alone liked us. But that’s not the point I’m trying to make. I continued with my lessons and applied to Curtis Institute. I wanted her to be there for my audition, not only for encouragement in a time when I really needed it, but also so I could show her that I’m worthy of her approval.” His voice snagged and stumbled on. “She refused. She informed me that Juilliard was the only acceptable school for an Ambrose.”
Adara swallowed hard. Joey had wanted to study at Curtis, and she’d accompanied him to the audition. Despite rocking his performance, he hadn’t gotten in. The rejection had hit him hard, made him question his talent and path in life. It had taken him almost a year to bounce back, then he’d got sick.
“I was accepted into Curtis,” he continued in a soft tone, “but I’ll never forget the empty chair in the front row. It was her silent censure, a sign that, no matter my accomplishments, I’d never meet her expectations. She died suddenly of a heart attack a week later. I know it’s not true, but I sometimes still feel it was her final refusal to give me her blessing.”
She smoothed her sweater, fighting a losing urge to give him a hug. How could anyone, let alone his mother, watch Garret play the violin and not be awed?
“I know it’s irrational. I’m a grown man, a successful musician, and I’m confident in who I am. I don’t need anyone’s approval, yet sometimes I can’t push her words or that empty chair from my head.” He stooped and looked her full in the face, his eyes shadowed with memories. “Tonight, if you don’t come, there will be four empty chairs—no family, no faces I can use to buffer that image. Adara, I need you. Please.”
Crap. She understood the emptiness when someone you expected to be there was suddenly gone, the lasting effects of that absence. Despite the potential consequences, she couldn’t let him go alone. Still wearing her teacher clothes, she fingered her pencil skirt. Calf-length flat boots hid the prescribed ankle brace and a sweater made up her ensemble, good enough to wear to a community college concert. She met his gaze. “How long is it supposed to last and how many classical songs will I have to endure?”
His smile came to life, brilliant and just for her. He threw his arms around her and squeezed a squeak from her. “No longer than an hour,” he murmured against her temple. “Thank you.”
Standing stiff in his arms, Adara tried to ignore his warm, solid strength and how good it felt to be held, held by him. The consequences were starting already.
“Grab your coat, Miss Dumont. It’s cold.” His breath brushed the rim of her ear, hot and intimate. “And don’t forget to lock your door.”
Screw the door. It was the iron bars protecting her heart she needed to worry about.
* * * *
Fifteen minutes later, Adara perched on a hard, plastic chair in the college auditorium. Three empty chairs lined up beside her, tagged with ‘reserved’ signs, and she considered taking them down. Then again, if she did that, other people would sit close to her, want to talk, make her pretend to be sociable. She could handle only so much at one time, and dealing with an hour of classical music and a barrage of Joey memories were enough.
The audience beh
ind her hummed, their excitement an infection. Apparently, Garret had a reputation in other places this side of the pond. The chairs, music stands and a drum set looked deceptively small and innocent on the stage. He’d mentioned that he’d hand-selected the students who were playing with him tonight, which she supposed only added to the community interaction. The smaller venue he wanted for inspiration.
She clasped her trembling hands in her lap. The cello, viola and violin crouched beside the chairs, shadowed assassins ready to strike. Part of her normal life when Joey was alive had included lounging around on the couch reading while he whirled around the house with his violin, unable to sit still. Tears burned her eyes and she blinked them away before they pooled. The music hadn’t even started and her seams threatened to split.
Staring at the velvet maroon curtain hiding other horrors behind the stage, she focused on everything Garret had told her. The fact that he’d continued with his violin in light of his mother’s influence only showed what sort of person he was. He could have focused on the bitter journey that brought him to this point, rejected his natural talent and taken a different road. Instead, he embraced both the positive and negative moments and used his pain and triumphs to bring joy to the world. He stayed true to what he loved. He cared about others. Whatever he committed to, he was all in, devoted all the way.
Blasted man. Annoying, persistent, bane of her life. He was impossible to dislike.
The curtain stirred, and the crowd quieted as the sections parted. The selected students filed in one by one, Garret coming in last to a rippling applause. He paused and bowed, wearing one of his pure sunshine smiles.
Dang, he’s breathtaking. He was made for the spotlight and owned it unapologetically. Had he chosen a different instrument to master or picked an alternate career, it wouldn’t have mattered. He’d be front and center, completely involved, no matter what he did. And since he was on the stage and she was part of the audience, it was her obligation to admire him from afar. Or twentyish feet, the space between the front row and the stage. She could handle that.
He launched into an introduction speech, and maybe she should’ve listened but she needed to prepare for the musical onslaught, and Garret made that challenge a little easier. The long hair, jeans and Gothic jewelry gave the proper blazer and button-down shirt a dangerous edge, reminders that he might rock your socks off as easily as play a lullaby. He didn’t let anyone leash him into any category.
She liked that about him too.
Even more, she liked how natural it was with him, how easy. He didn’t remind her that she wasn’t normal. He didn’t give her those sad, knowing looks that everyone else did, as if she couldn’t see them. He didn’t try to fix her. Instead, he let her just be. Only Joey had ever done that.
Garret stopped talking and lifted his violin.
The already-sizzling tension in Adara’s body wrenched tight. The cello thrummed to life, a deep heartbeat, the viola quickly threading in, and a tremor ripped at her defenses. Garret and the other musicians faded into the background. She didn’t need to hear more than a measure to recognize Vivaldi’s Winter. Joey had adored the Four Seasons. Summer was his favorite, Winter second best. The smooth violin took over the melody, but the past morphed the music, stealing Garret’s particular, sleek flavor and replacing it with one more familiar, more painful—an open wound on her soul.
Visions of Joey sawing on his violin filled her head, the way he’d perch on the back of the couch swaying in time to the music, his fingers flying, his eyes closed. His smile had always been vicious when he played Vivaldi, as if he himself was the seasons released on the world to do as he wished.
Adara sucked in air through her closed throat, released it. Two sucked in, two out. Winter didn’t last more than four minutes. Four minutes. Two hundred and forty breaths. As much as she wanted to run, the music paralyzed her, holding her prisoner. She was vaguely aware of clamping the chair edge to stay upright. The hairline fracture in her shell lengthened with each beat, seconds away from cracking completely, leaving her defenseless. Time passed in sharp, endless movie clips.
Joey in his ratty U2 T-shirt, spinning, spinning.
Don’t crack.
Joey jumping on her bed while she read, doing his best to annoy her.
Breathe.
Her, breaking Joey’s bow in a tussle. He hadn’t talked to her for a week.
Focus.
Joey and Gia cackling at some tasteless joke, Joey on stage at Curtis in his Converse and suit, his heart in every note, Joey dragging her to the piano, Joey wearing his brave face, Joey so pale, crushing her hand.
Joey dying.
The last note rang, a canyon echo from far off, and Garret’s voice replaced the music, his words indecipherable through the buzzing in her head. The stage and auditorium blackened with nightmare shadows, desperately surreal.
Bass started up with cymbal, then drum, and the viola kicked in with the next beat. Note by note, she was hauled free from the mire of the past. Not classical at all. Not music usually played for professors and music snobs. Hard, in your face rock, and not any random song.
Enter Sandman.
Adara sucked in a deep breath, her relieved sob drowned by the drum. She lifted her gaze. Blurred by her tears, Garret stood on the stage directly across from her, as if simply waiting patiently for her to confirm she was with him before moving on. He winked once, and the music again swept him away.
‘What if we create new emotional ties, you, music and me?’
Only a few weeks ago he’d asked that, beneath the planetarium stars, crafting a memory she could cling to, as if he’d known all along that this moment would come, that he’d need to drag her back to the present. Numb, she watched him coax a smile from the serious viola player. He did this for her, disrupted custom, risked his local reputation to rescue her from herself.
Something inside her snapped, whether into place or breaking free, she wasn’t sure. All along, she’d thought he was lost in the music, but she was wrong. He was the music, a harmony that inexplicably tethered her, there for as long as his focus remained on her.
The terror in that realization didn’t come.
Chapter Sixteen
As the last college stragglers filtered out, Adara slumped beside a colorful corkboard offering student services. She ripped a paper strip off a poster titled “Going Solo? Take a Wookie.” Single or not, everyone could always use a Chewbacca sidekick.
Since Garret was her ride, she had no choice but to wait around for him, not that she minded much. She needed some transition time. Returning to the echoing silence while music still rang in her soul would be too much.
She proffered an appropriately polite smile to a passing couple and let it slip away when they turned the corner, their voices fading in the distance. More than an hour of music, misery and memories and she’d survived—not because she’d been tough enough, though. Over and over, Garret had flung her a musical lifeline. To top it off, the undeniably snooty classical music audience had given him a standing ovation. She had too, once she’d gotten her legs working again.
He’d seduced another sliver of her, and she didn’t know how to get it back—or if she even wanted to. She was too emotionally drained to determine if she was stronger without it or more brittle.
“There you are.” His violin case strapped to his back, Garret strode down the hallway toward her. “I thought you might have ditched me.”
“It’s too far to limp back.” She surrendered to another few seconds of admiring him from afar. It would help her resistance if he resembled Shrek instead of Apollo, but even if he did, she had a sinking feeling she’d still be here, leaning against the wall, unable to look away as he drew ever closer. He was magnetic.
Soon enough, he stood right in front of her, too close to openly ogle without being awkward. “You could have called a cab,” he said softly, “or Gia.”
She shrugged one shoulder, still relying on the wall for support.
H
e cocked his head, studying her with those dark eyes that seemed to see everything. “I’m not sorry that you came with me instead of my family.”
“That’s cold. I’m sure each time they barfed, they were thinking about you.”
“Not what I mean.” His grin was hardly more than a twitch. “I realized something tonight. As I looked out into the crowd, it was your face I searched for first and last, your approval I wanted.”
She straightened, her pulse picking up speed. He was tiptoeing close to forbidden ground, prepping to talk about emotions and uncomfortable stuff. She could feel it. “Didn’t you see me clapping along with everyone else? Kick-butt moral support, empty chair-filler extraordinaire.”
“It wasn’t about moral support or memories or battling ghosts. I wanted, more than anything, to find you there every time I looked.” He paused, as if making sure she listened. “Only you.”
Dealing with more feelings tonight was beyond her capacity. She turned for the hallway and the safety of the door around the corner.
He stopped her escape with a gentle grasp on her coat sleeve. “It’s okay to be affected, Adara.”
Not really. Not when her pieces, if broken again, might never fit back together. “I’m sure your fan club membership shot up tonight. Ready to go?”
“Are you honestly claiming you felt nothing tonight?” A hint of defiance invaded his expression. “Not even for a minute? Not for the music?” His voice dropped to a husky murmur. “Not for me?”
Wildly beating wings erupted inside, and it took all her teacher discipline to hold his unblinking gaze and keep her mask on. “Your version of Enter Sandman was decent.”
The performance must have erased his sense of humor. Deadly intensity replaced his trademark smile. He stepped forward, forcing her to backtrack. It was either that or stand toe-to-toe with him. Already, his heat licked her skin. Any closer and she might combust.
