Complete Me (Book Three of The Kirkland Family)

Complete Me: Chapter 24

Chapter 24

The engagement with the accountant went rather well, according to Cole. Although he insisted that he didn't need free access to the business accounts, Rose was rather adamant that his name was written in. And she did so with such grace.

Afterward, Cole asked if she wanted to meet for dinner later that evening. And with the same grace, she declined. "I have some music I want to work on," she said, blushing slightly. "So, I'll take a raincheck, Cole, if you don't mind."

"Well, no, I don't mind," he replied as they entered the store together. "I shall enjoy listening to you play."

She stopped short, and he walked right into her.

"Oh!" she said, stumbling forward and turning around at the same time in a sort of awkward pirouette.

"Sorry, Rose," he said, catching her arm to steady her. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. What do you mean, listening?"

"I can hear you from upstairs," he answered.

She blinked and smoothed the hair out of her face. "Oh, right, upstairs. I thought you meant...well, that you would sit down here and listen."

"I can do that, too," he said.

She blinked again. "Um..."

Cole chuckled. "I'm kidding with you, butterfly." He lightly touched her cheek, in lieu of a kiss, and headed to his apartment. Around the store's closing time, he shut down his computer, fixed himself a sandwich for dinner and cracked open his door to better hear her play.

For the next several hours, he listened while he tended to some minor housework and tried to read. It was the same song over and over, but he had never heard her play it until the night before when he prepped for their rooftop date. Now, as he listened, he noticed differences. Tonight, there was more emotion to the composition. Yet, she still seemed to struggle.

She played. She paused. She played. Sometimes, she stopped in the middle of a bar and started again. Sometimes, she played until the notes jumbled or careened off melody, and she'd bang out a few keys in frustration, backed up several measures and repeated. Sometimes, a chord would slowly fade away, and the silence behind lingered forever.

It was during one of those silences, Cole dared to head down with another sandwich to see if she wanted to take a break and eat. The music room had begun to darken, but a small lamp illuminated the music sheets leaning on the piano's rack. And there was Rose, her head tilted to the side, eyes closed, and a deep canyon of concentration forged between her eyebrows. Her fingers moved soundlessly over the ivories, composing internally, yet unable to stop her muscles from performing.

And slowly, gradually, a new movement drifted from the strings, sadder than the one before. Something he had never heard her play. Then in steady increments, the tone curtailed and parried with a flurry of harsh notes. Her head moved with the music, and the frown deepened, but when a small smile began to curve upon her lips, the melody sweetened, pulsated and grew slightly erotic. Cole arched an eyebrow, standing there with her sandwich on a paper plate.

She opened her eyes and saw him in the doorway. Jerking to a stop, she said, "Cole! You startled me."

He walked over to her, brandishing the ham sandwich. "I thought you might be hungry."

"Oh, um...thank you." She stood and shuffled her sheet music, flipping it over to hide it from him. "What time is it?"

"After ten," he answered and set the paper plate on top of the piano. "What were you thinking about just then? While you were playing?"