From the Ashes

by Janet W. Butler

  But the moment that man at the front of the room spoke, her knees went to jelly, like they had years ago the first time she’d heard him play — and, truth be told, fallen in love with him from afar. That was a happier, illusory time, before she knew what he was capable of. Before he’d all but destroyed her.

  Four years, it had been, since that fateful master class. Four years since the Professor had brought her out to play for Goodwin, the visiting artist, and had it backfire so horribly. Four years was a long time, and Melody thought she’d forgiven him and moved on. But the hurt had stayed with her. It was what made her peers think she was tough and invulnerable. It was what made them call her “the rock of the School of Music.” It was what kept her on an even keel in a place that routinely chewed people up and spit them out.

  Or at least it had been, until now. Until one man from her past said two sentences and put everyone in the place seemingly into a state of temporary amnesia. Everyone but the person with whom he would be working most closely. She could remember all too well. And she was not looking forward to more of the same.

  “Thank you so much,” he continued, “for this gracious welcome. I had a speech prepared…” On that, he took out what appeared to be a small folded piece of paper, but then as he raised his hand, it unfolded, accordion-like, to a length of three feet or more. The crowd roared. “But in the interests of getting us all out of here before we turn into pumpkins, I’ll just say thanks to all of you, especially to my grandfather, for your vote of confidence in me. I will do my best to live up to it.”

  With that brief word, Goodwin and the Professor embraced, and seemingly as one the room rose to applaud again, but Melody couldn’t make her legs work well enough to do it. Instead, she sank further into her chair, wishing she could melt through it and disappear.

  But one thing she knew for sure. With Goodwin on campus, it wasn’t a question of whether someone would get hurt…only a question of when. On his first visit, Melody had learned that lesson the hard way. But this time she knew she wouldn’t be nearly so malleable nor so vulnerable. This time, Melody Rowland wouldn’t be the one left in shreds on the floor.

  No, Mr. Goodwin had better have his own supply of bandages on hand if he tried going for her jugular again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  “Cheer up, my girl. I’m sure it won’t be as bad as you think.”

  Melody glanced up from her coffee cup as Hattie spoke, tempted to glare at her aunt, but then decided to keep her irritation in check. Boarding with her father’s sister had its advantages, like being able to live rent-free in exchange for a few household chores. But there were times when Melody wished she hadn’t grown up with so many stubborn redheads in the family — Hattie chief among them — and this was one of those times.

  “Hattie, you know it’ll be bad. It was bad Friday night, and it’ll be bad today.” She swallowed the last of her coffee. “That guy is going to give me fits. I can feel it.”

  Hattie shrugged. “Sometimes, a second chance can make all the difference.” As she spoke, she set a plate of hot biscuits on the table, then eased her stocky frame opposite Melody, the freckled face lit up by a smile.

  Melody wasn’t about to smile back. “If you ask me, he’s already had enough chances to outlast most cats’ lives. Why should I give him any more?”

  “Two reasons. One, he’s your boss—”

  “Don’t remind me.”

  “—and two, you were raised to do the right thing, which this is.” Hattie nodded toward the plate. “Now, eat. Unless you plan on filling up on crow later.”

  Melody grimaced, but didn’t hesitate to select two biscuits, slathering them both with butter and grape jam before digging in. Her aunt’s cooking covered a multitude of sins.

  “Mmm,” she said between bites. “You’ve done it again, Hattie. Breakfast of champions.”

  Hattie snorted. “Not the way you eat, it’s not. You don’t have but one or two biscuits every morning.”

  “It’s all I have time for.” Melody chewed the last of her second biscuit, drained her coffee and rose from the chair to carry her cup to the stainless steel sink. “I promise I’ll have a good lunch, okay? My last class is over at noon. Shall I come home and let you have your culinary way with me?”

  “Just see that you do.” Hattie stirred a generous teaspoon of half-and-half into her coffee. Then, belying her gruff words, she smiled again, bright as the sunlight outside. “Now have a good day at school, my girl.”

  As her aunt spoke, Melody shouldered into her jacket and backpack. Twenty-four years old, and I’m still her girl, she mused with a smile, and a moment later was waving goodbye and sprinting off over the frosty backyard toward the campus green.

  Maybe Hattie was right, she thought on a deep breath of the crisp morning air. With such a glorious start to the day, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad after all. Friday night could certainly have been worse. Thank heaven they hadn’t called her up on the dais and asked her to make a welcoming speech for her new teacher. She wouldn’t have been prepared to temper her words enough to sound polite, that was for sure.

  But she’d been emotionally unsettled all weekend, and that wasn’t like her, either. One look at a man she hadn’t seen in four years, and Melody had come undone. Why? It wasn’t like she couldn’t deal with pressure. Years ago when she’d lost her parents, and she’d had to come live with Hattie, now, that was a hard row to hoe. But it had also helped form her discipline and her character. Hattie had seen to that. She hadn’t had a setback since — until James Michael Goodwin made his unwelcome mark on her life.

  Still, she should have been over that long ago. Why wasn’t she?

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Hattie had soothed her on Friday night. “You had a big surprise, and it was an emotional night. Everyone will understand if you’re a little off speed for a while.”

  But comforting as that reassurance had been, it also marked the beginning and end of Hattie’s sympathy about the incident. Once a new day dawned, she hadn’t got away with wallowing in her muddle long before it was pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps time and back to work again. Melody supposed she should be grateful for that work ethic — it certainly had put her head and shoulders above the rest of her class. But oh, for once, to have the time and space and leisure to think her emotions through. Even having a friend who wouldn’t turn into a drill sergeant with her would be a nice change.

  She’d leaned on the Professor before this, but she could hardly go to him and complain this time. Barb looked up to her; even the dean treated her more like a colleague than a student. And as for her new teacher? No leaning on that one. No, sir.

  What was his game, she wondered. Why would James Michael Goodwin consent to take an academic position in the first place? Granted, he’d gone from blazing international star to virtually dropping out of sight over the last two years, with little by way of explanation. Maybe the traveling life had gotten old. He wouldn’t be the first performer burned out by the road. But he was certainly among the first ever to land in one of the premier music schools in the nation, with virtually no academic credentials, and be hired on the spot. That’s how strongly the Professor’s reputation was regarded in the music world; his word alone was enough.

  As for her new teacher’s words…well, that was another story. She doubted she’d get a good word out of him for the entire semester.

  After ducking down a side street and cutting through the commons, she pulled open the main door to the music building and paused to adjust her eyes to the darker corridor light. With a pleasurable twitch of her nose, Melody appreciated the lemon-oil polish on the ancient mahogany paneling and the scent of Barb’s coffee already brewing from down the hall. But that was when her comfortable routine did an abrupt U-turn.

  The Professor had habitually breezed in at precisely one minute before her lesson time, knowing she would let herself in with her key and warm up prior to his arrival. This morning, however, a full thirty minutes early, sh
e law light pouring into the hallway from the last doorway on the left and knew the Professor’s studio was already wide open.

  “Great,” she muttered. “Just…great.”

  She’d always liked getting to school with the birds, for the sake of the quiet, the solitude it afforded her. But apparently James Michael Goodwin wasn’t cut of the same cloth as his grandfather, and she wouldn’t have that luxury anymore. With a sinking feeling, she sensed this change was only the beginning.

  Braced for battle, Melody resumed her stride with such purpose she almost didn’t see the tall figure emerging from the studio as she turned to enter it. She pulled up short one step away from a collision, caught by a strong handgrip on her arm to steady her balance.

  “Whoa!” Goodwin laughed low. “I guess we need a traffic light here.”

  She wanted to come back with a glib return line, with some of the snappy wit people told her she had in abundance. But she couldn’t, not with that touch sending warmth through her whole body, not with him so close she could feel the rhythm of his breathing.

  And if his voice had been devastating to her equilibrium on Friday night, his touch was one step shy of deadly today. Not to mention that morning certainly agreed with him. Oh, boy, did it.

  Okay, so he was handsome. Sexy, even. She’d known that going in. Knew it four years ago, when he’d first stepped into her life — and all over her self-esteem. From the top of that black hair, now salt-and-peppered with early gray, down that trim, athletic body, to the soles of those polished loafers, no photograph had ever done him justice. Not one. But that didn’t make him attractive in any way that counted. He’d thought less than nothing of her abilities; she didn’t think much of the way he’d treated his next of kin. They were even…sort of.

  Only she doubted she had anything near the disastrous effect on his senses that he had on hers.

  Today he looked rested and fresh, his hair ruffled as if he’d just stepped in from the wind and forgotten his comb. He wore jeans whose very cut whispered expensive, but they were also well-loved; his hunter-green turtleneck sweater molded to that lean body with the ease of a long-time favorite, and in a way no tuxedo could ever imitate. She had a sudden crazy urge to reach out and take a handful of the fabric in her fingers to see if it was as butter-soft as it looked, and only barely stopped herself in time. As if Goodwin could read her thoughts and was amused by them, he smiled slowly.

  “Well, you must be Melody Rowland. Am I right?” He gave her arm a slight squeeze before releasing it.

  She nodded.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to meet you the other night,” he went on. “I would have liked to. Grandpa had nothing but good things to say about you. Things got a little hectic toward the end, and—”

  “Not to worry.” She began unbuttoning her coat. “It’s to be expected. You’re the new big shot on campus, and you’re going to have a lot of important people who want your time.”

  The moment she’d come out with the words, she regretted them. Nothing like sounding like a smart-aleck right out of the gate. And he didn’t miss that, either. She knew it when his eyebrows rose slightly. But he didn’t take the bait and scold her, as she probably deserved. Instead, he looked thoughtful, almost sad, when he answered.

  “New big shot? Is that how you see me, Melody?”

  Melody ran her tongue over her lower lip, then wished she hadn’t when she realized it drew his attention to her face. “Well,” she said with a shrug, “how I see you isn’t really the point, is it?”

  He shook his head before he answered. “That’s where we’ll have to disagree.”

  One beat of time, that’s all it was, after he spoke. But it was enough to send an odd shiver through her. This wasn’t the arrogant, cocky James Michael Goodwin she’d met before. Who was this guy?

  “Plenty of time for that discussion, though.” He was speaking again, brisker now, and she roused herself to pay attention. “First things first. Put your coat away, and then I have my first official question for you.”

  “Okay.” Melody eased past him into the studio and removed her jacket. But just as she would have hung it on the antique coat rack in one corner, Goodwin held up his hand.

  “No, don’t use that,” he said. “Not until we get it fixed.”

  “Fixed?” Melody echoed. Then she understood what he’d meant. “Oh, no, Mr. Goodwin, it’s okay—”

  “James.” His voice was so quiet it was almost a whisper.

  “Pardon?”

  “I said, call me James.” He half-smiled. “Mr. Goodwin is my father, and I promise, you call me that, I’ll never answer. As for this coat rack—”

  “It’s fine.” This time it was her turn to chuckle. “Watch.”

  Deftly she grasped the center pole of the rack with her left hand, tilted it slightly, then positioned her coat on one curved wooden arm and let the whole thing settle back into place. James just stared, openly expecting a collapse — and so clearly flabbergasted when the rack stayed up that, despite her nervousness, Melody laughed again.

  “I know it looks like a wreck,” she added. “But it’s not. It’s just a little unsteady. Been that way for years. We’ve all learned to live with it.”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets, frowning.

  “But can’t it be repaired, so you don’t have to baby it anymore?”

  Melody shrugged. “The Professor explained to me one time — it’s such an antique that it has special pegs holding it together, and the only people who know how to work with those fasteners are way up in Maine somewhere. He figured by the time he shipped it there, it’d be in pieces, and the cure would be worse than the disease.”

  “Been there,” Goodwin whispered. “Done that.”

  Melody blinked. For the second time already that morning, she heard an unmistakable undercurrent beneath the words, one that sliced like a blade. Even if the pain hadn’t been audible, though, she could see it in the shadow that flitted through his eyes. She knew that shadow all too well. She’d seen that look enough times staring back at her from the mirror in weak moments when she thought about her parents and wished for what might have been, if they’d only lived past her sixteenth birthday…

  What was that shadow? What burden was James Michael Goodwin carrying on those lean shoulders?

  At that thought, Melody felt a twinge of irritation at herself. She didn’t want to feel sympathy for this man. She didn’t want to feel anything for him. She just wanted to do her job, get her degree, and not look back. For all she knew, this could be a soft-and-vulnerable routine he was pulling to get her guard down before he showed his true colors and zapped her with that imperious temper.

  No, sir. No, thank you. Not again.

  She was still musing along those lines as he followed her lead toward the rack, carrying a black leather jacket over to hang it up. Without much thinking about it, Melody focused on his hands. She always noticed hands, being a pianist herself. Like most pianists she knew, James’s hands were long and supple, graceful and strong at once, with economy of movement and capability.

  Except…

  She frowned, watching him more closely as he secured the leather jacket onto the coat rack’s second arm at a slightly skewed angle, then straightened it, in direct imitation of what she’d done. But his motions seemed different. Slower. More deliberate. Was she imagining the hair’s-breadth pause he took before releasing the center pole, as if he were consciously guiding each movement? Or the way, even as his hands dropped to his sides, his fingers seemed unable to stop flexing and straightening?

  “Well, so much for my first question.” He turned back to her, smiling faintly. “On to the second. Where can I get a decent cup of coffee in this place?”

  “You mean here? In the building?”

  “Yes. Besides from Barb, of course. She’s threatening to charge me a quarter a cup.”

  Melody laughed despite herself. “That’s our Barb all over. But there is a good reason. We’ve got our
own little hotpot back in the file room.”

  “You mean that little metal contraption?” He was incredulous. “You call that a coffeepot?”

  Melody bit her lip. “It works great,” she said, more sharply than she intended. “Let me show you.”

  Picking up the mini-percolator, she carried it out to a nearby janitor’s closet and switched on the tap. First the coat rack, then the coffeemaker. What would he want to redo next, her hair? Hadn’t he ever heard of growing into a new job gracefully?

  Then she thought again of the stark pain she kept seeing in his eyes, on his face. Maybe he was feeling as uncomfortable as she was; academia was hardly his normal stomping ground. He may well have had a bevy of servants to wait on his every whim for the last several years. As far as real life went, this guy was probably a babe in the woods.

  She sighed. For the Professor’s sake, if nothing else, she had to get along with him. She owed it to Goodwin, she supposed, to remember he was kin of a man she thought the world of. She’d have to make a few allowances.

  But she had to admit, she didn’t have much capacity beyond a few.

  “Okay,” she said briskly as she re-entered the studio. James hadn’t budged from the spot where she’d left him. “If you’re a coffee hound—”

  ”Unrepentant,” he agreed in mock solemnity.

  “—then you’ve got to know how to make your own. I didn’t wait on the Professor hand and foot, and I don’t plan to do it for you.”

  “Of course not. I wouldn’t dream of demanding such a thing.”

  She refrained from comment, since she probably couldn’t have come out with anything that sounded remotely gracious at the moment anyway. Instead, she set herself to the task of acting the part of the model graduate assistant. She showed him the tiny cabinet with coffee and supplies, switched on the machine, then half-smiled triumphantly.