When You Look at Me (A Pleasant Gap Romance Book 2) Read online

  “No, no. Of course not.” He shook his head. It was perfect. I want to spend the rest of my life listening to you. He cleared his throat again. “I… It was only that I thought we could discuss music for”—he looked behind him and lowered his voice— “the engagement party.”

  Her eyes widened, and she stood, the oak-finished grand remaining between them.

  He stalled his approach, but she rounded the edge of the instrument, her palm resting against it, almost as a support.

  “Oh yes, that’s an excellent idea.” Her attention slid back to him. “It’s so important to make a beautiful memory for the two of them, and I can only imagine how special Wes will want to make it. After all, it’s a lifetime declaration of true love.” Her voice shook with the slightest vibrato. “No pressure there, right?”

  “No, not at all.” His slight laugh caught them both off-guard. “Only forever ingrained in their minds.”

  Her smile tightened into an expression of mock terror. “Piece of cake.” She redirected her focus from him and reached for the chain around her neck, waving toward a bookshelf nearby. “I…I’ve considered a few pieces. But is there something in particular you’d suggest?”

  He advanced a few more steps, planning through the next conversational turn. “I know one song Wes has requested. A jazz piece entitled ‘That’s All.’”

  Her brows crinkled, and she tightened her hold on the chain around her neck, a signature movement of hers that he was beginning to recognize as one that mirrored her doubt or nervousness. He hoped, in this case, it meant the former rather than the latter.

  “I can’t recall that one.”

  “Um…” He gestured toward the piano. “May I…”

  She blinked and followed his movements, then looked back to him, her smile blooming in welcome. “Oh. Oh yes. Of course. Please.”

  She stepped forward at the same time he did, nearly colliding with him. His hand came out to steady her. Her arm shot forward to balance herself, and the subtle scent of wisteria washed over his senses.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” She pushed back away from him with a little stumble.

  “P…pardon me.” His fingers tingled from the trace of her skin, her unexpected closeness. “Are you alright?”

  “Yes, just clumsy.” She slid passed him, leaving the way to the piano bench open and a whimsical fragrance in the air.

  He slid onto the bench, his head down, and as soon as his fingers touched the keys, his body relaxed. Comfort. Confidence. Without another look to the beauty watching him, he began the intricate chords, adding some of his own improvisation to the music. This was the world he knew. Nat King Cole’s voice crooned the words to the melody in Henry’s mind.

  I can only give you love that lasts forever

  And a promise to be near each time you call.

  And the only heart I own for you and you alone,

  That’s all, that’s all…

  He couldn’t help the smile those words inspired. The author said things much better than Henry ever could. This song spoke of Wes’s heart, his love for Eisley, a fitting tribute.

  Henry had seen Wes come to life in an entirely new way since meeting Eisley and her family. Her love for him and her family’s ready yet somewhat unconventional acceptance of him kindled an almost-enviable joy and belonging in his friend. Love fit the chords of life together perfectly, each beat blending two hearts into a single song.

  Henry’s unfortunate romantic disasters, paired with his mother’s domineering personality, had deterred thoughts of a romantic future. She never failed to remind him of his inability to master the social dance and the long-term impact of his poor choices on his family’s social standing.

  Not to mention the continual reminder that relationships required well-honed conversational skills, initiation, and at least a tiny bit of charm. Who would have the patience for him in his bumbling, reticent state?

  He looked up at the woman standing near the end of the piano, her expression filled with such gentle welcome that fairytales almost seemed possible. Fairytales and happily-ever-afters, even for introverted, awkward, and observant men who knew the right notes but had difficulty turning the melody into a duet.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  Julia stared at the man playing the piano. As soon as his fingers pressed the keys, the quiet, hesitant Henry Wright gave way to a confident, almost passionate counterpart. His stature broadened, his face relaxed into an expression of coming home, and his previous reticence bent beneath a boldness that held her captive.

  Could music make a man more handsome? Or…braver?

  She stepped closer, resting her hand against the top of the piano, examining his fingers as they fitted into chord positions or danced along the ivories with fun skips of their own. As he played, the melody became more and more familiar, but he added his own special touches —a bit playfully, even, teasing her senses to life with curiosity and... something else. She recognized this pleasure, this passion, the complete abandon of losing oneself in the music, but sharing that same magic with another person? Someone else who understood?

  As if remembering her presence, he brought the song to a close, keeping his focus on the keys as the last strains lingered in the room.

  Her breath had grown shallow, her face warm. The power in the moment compelled her to speak. “That…that was beautiful.”

  His swift gaze came up to meet hers before returning to the piano. “It's what I know.”

  She didn’t believe for a minute that was all he knew, not with the way he watched people around him, but maybe he believed it was true. A false truth contorted the way a person viewed the world. She’d learned that through months of therapy.

  Quiet fell upon their conversation in the wake of the piano music. Henry glanced up at her, tentative, the reluctant hero returning to the scene. His reticence calmed her and somehow inspired a gentle need to… rescue him. “Music has always been a part of me—a piece of who I am.”

  His attention shot back to her. “The same with me.” He shrugged a shoulder, his smile crooked. “I’ve never been the outgoing sort. Always bumbling. Never sure of what to say in most company. It was only when I could create music that I felt as if I’d found a part of myself. A way to express what I struggled to say.”

  Her thoughts turned to how piano playing had been therapeutic for her after the rape, her rage too large for words, her wounds too scathing for description. Hammering her fury on the keys gave her a power and means of expression her words had failed to achieve.

  Yes, she understood.

  “Music has a way of giving deep emotions a voice, I think.”

  “Exactly.” His whispered response mirrored the softness in his eyes.

  They were such a curious feature, his eyes. Changing—gray? Green? Somewhere in between? And his hair kept an approachable unkempt look, like a disorganized professor’s. She tempered her rising smile at the thought and tapped the piano. “I think I’ve heard that song before. Maybe we could attempt a practice now? Just to get it beneath our fingers?”

  “I don’t have the sheet music, but we could search for it online.”

  “That’s all right.” She rounded the piano, closer to him. “The chord structure is fairly simple, and it’s a slower tempo, which will be forgiving. I think I can figure it out as we go.”

  His smile spread full to the other side, tempting hers to respond. “I’ll fetch my violin. We can see how the song works as a duet.”

  A duet? Why did that usher a strange shiver through her? Was it fear? No, not exactly. “Sure. We might as well practice while we can, right?”

  He dipped his head in acknowledgement, pushed up from the piano bench, and slipped from the room, leaving the scent of amber and…something else. Her face turned to identify the other smell. Something creamy and warm, like hot chocolate. It was vanilla, like the first time they’d met.

  She balanced herself with a palm to the piano and settled down on the bench. Voices on both sides of her situation
warred to be heard. The wounds from having her heart and humanity plundered beat against the truth that she was still whole and loved—and worthy of a good man’s care. She forced that knowledge to a more prominent podium in her head. The right man would take her and her child as she was—would see beyond the circumstances of her life—but was she ready to find out if Henry was a man like that? Was it wrong to even imagine?

  Every fear rose and screamed too soon, or he isn’t to be trusted, but beneath the roar, a still, small voice whispered.

  Fear not. I am with you. I have called you by name. You are mine.

  Was she brave enough to listen to the right voice?

  Chapter Seven

  E isley Barrett took the back steps of the bakery to the suite of her favorite Brit. Having him this close after six weeks of separation felt a little like a daydream, and she wanted to make that daydream a regular occurrence. Who would have imagined after their somewhat unfriendly first meeting during her research trip to Derbyshire that they’d be an “item”, as her mom said? The little girl in her offered an internal squeal of delight. She was an item with actor Christopher Wesley Harrison. The man had to be crazy. But she was okay with that.

  Yep. Woohoo! Bring on the fairytale.

  Before she could knock on the suite door, Henry Wright rushed out with violin case in hand and almost bowled her over. “Pardon me, Eisley.”

  “Whoa, Henry.” Her palms came up with her laugh. “Where’s the fire?”

  His brow pinched with a quizzical expression then cleared. “Oh, yes.” He grinned. “I’m off to…” His eyes widened in another of his awkward pauses. “Well, you see.” He cleared his throat. “Your sister was playing the piano, and I thought I’d join her.”

  Odd behavior, even for people-make-me-nervous Henry. “That sounds…nice.” Jazz chords proceeded from downstairs corroborating his plan. Jazz? Really nice.

  “It was at her suggestion, of course,” he offered.

  Eisley blinked Henry back into view as if he’d spoken in Swahili. “She asked to play with you?”

  “Yes, we were discussing…” Henry looked away again, rubbing his palm against the side of his leg. “Jazz music and…and things progressed, you see.”

  Oh, she was beginning to see for sure.

  “Well.” Eisley took a slight turn away from him, trying to piece together this interesting development. Julia? In a room alone with a man she barely knew? Eisley swung her attention back to the quiet man, examining him with fresh eyes. He was handsome, but that wouldn’t surmount Julia’s caution—in fact, it would probably deter her even more. Peyton had been a stunner. Henry didn’t talk enough to draw a lot of attention to himself, so that seemed an unlikely reason.

  Her gaze dropped to the violin in his hand and realization pierced the fog.

  Music, of course! He was a composer, after all, and Julia loved music. Gentle? Yes. Enough to put her sister at ease?

  “I guess you’d better get on down to her then, huh?” Eisley waved toward the stairs. “It’s a big compliment to you, Henry, that she’s so…comfortable with you.”

  His smile took on a boyish charm as he left her. It was one of the sweetest sights she’d seen.

  “Good morning.” The bass tones of her charming Brit warmed her skin with a happily-ever-after flush.

  Talk about sweet sights…She grinned over her shoulder at the dashing man, and his dimpled smile almost distracted her from her musings about Henry Wright and her sister.

  To make her mental focus worse, Wes slipped an arm around her waist and placed a chaste kiss on her cheek. “My day just improved exponentially.” The kiss took a slightly less G-rated turn toward her ear. “How are you this morning, pet?”

  The glorious haze of romance started its decent over her thought processes. “You really are the best distraction in the whole world. Do you know that?” She touched her lips to his, and in the stillness of their mingled breaths, the strains of a violin joined the piano.

  She jerked back and grabbed the lapel of Wes’s jacket. “Do you hear that?”

  His stormy, blue-gray eyes narrowed as he inclined his head. “Music?”

  “Yes. Music.” She seized his hand and pulled him down the hallway, her volume on stealth-mode. “But not just any music.”

  “Eisley, what is going on?”

  “Shhh.” She turned with a finger to her lips and continued her march down the steps. “Something is…I don’t know. They seem strange.”

  Her handsome hero gave her a look as if the musical pair on the first floor weren’t the only ones. She sighed. He’d fallen in love with her as the crazy woman she was, so he shouldn’t be surprised, really.

  “They?”

  “Julia and Henry. Something is…different.”

  “Different.” He repeated the word like a befuddled parrot.

  A swoony, cleft-in-his-chin befuddled parrot. She slipped on a step, but he was quick to steady her against his spicy-leather-scented sweater. Mama mia, what a man!

  She stopped at the bottom of the stairs to reward his chivalry with a smooch—or two—before she tugging him to the doorway of the music room. Like the amateur sleuth she wished she were, she peeked around the opening.

  Julia sat at the piano, looking up at Henry with something like wonder on her face as he played his violin to… Ugh, Eisley couldn’t recall the name of the song, but at least she remembered she liked it, whatever it was. Ever since the horrid rape, her sister had kept more to herself than ever before. Quieter. Retreating to her music and baking. But in this one scene, a glimpse of the former Julia—smiling and confident—resurfaced. For Henry?

  Oh. My. Goodness!

  “Look at that.”

  Wes’s lips took a crooked this-woman-is-crazy turn, and he examined the couple again before returning his attention to her. “And?”

  “Do you see what I see?”

  His smile slipped into an adorably confused pucker, and if she’d not been so curious about the couple in the next room, she’d have been tempted to kiss the look right off his handsome face. How was he clueless?

  “You are a romance actor for goodness sake and one of the swooniest men on the planet! Julia and Henry. There.” She gestured with both her hands in karate-chop form, lowering her volume before she got too carried away. “Fine, happy, talking.”

  Wes shrugged. “Doesn’t it make sense that two kind-hearted, reserved, musically gifted people would end up getting along?” His gaze flipped to Eisley, eyes widening. "Together!"

  She nodded like a caffeinated chipmunk, her grin widening so far that her face hurt. “Together”—she snickered— “in perfect harmony, even.”

  He rolled his eyes at her pun then examined the pair again. “They play as if they—”

  “Were made for each other.” Her voice squeezed the words into a higher pitch.

  “I was going to say as if they’d played together before, but your theory is an interesting one.” Wes studied his friend. “I’ve never seen Henry like this with a woman. He’s so nervous and reserved around them, even those he’s dated in the past. Always has been. Most likely because of that terrifying mother of his and all the expectations to please her, but this? Over music? This is new.”

  “And it gives me a great idea.”

  “Oh dear.” He slipped his palm back around her waist and she snuggled in close. What a keeper!

  “Sometimes two people are too fearful to see when they’re a perfect match.”

  “Yes?” He squinted, almost as if he were suspicious of her. Hmm…Perhaps he knew her just a bit too well.

  “We had some loving matchmakers help us find our way to each other.”

  “Eisley…”

  “And since the two of them are so reserved and quiet, they could probably use the help.”

  He raised a brow in challenge, and she tugged on his jacket. “Don’t you remember how people—like Lizzie and your Dad and even my mom, once she got over the shock—loved us so much that they knew we’d
make a great match?” She sighed and patted his chest. “Which is still kind of hard to believe from this country girl’s standpoint, but you’re not allowed to change your mind. My whole heart, all three of my kids, and even my dad are invested now.”

  He kissed her forehead. “I’m not going anywhere, pet.”

  She searched his face, then flashed him a renewed smile. “Perfect! Then let’s figure out how we can pair one introverted, music-loving girl with one introverted, music-loving guy. Imagine what their happily-ever-after could sound like.”

  “You really are incorrigible.” His chuckled and kissed her head.

  “I’m so glad incorrigible works for you.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  Evening darkened into early morning before Julia finally crawled into bed. Her head and heart spun from the past two days inventorying furniture in Aunt Millie’s house and working with a home inspector as well as finalizing paperwork for the sale of the bakery, but her body, though weary, refused to settle down for the night. It didn’t really matter. She wouldn’t sleep long anyhow. Within a few hours, she’d be up to go to the bathroom or uncomfortable from her sleeping position or Little One would wake up and play the mamba on her ribcage.

  Later pregnancy note: naps may save your life…. or the lives of other. Take them.

  She rubbed a palm against a little heel or elbow, that was distorting her abdomen in a way that freaked out her nephews. The one time they’d seen the strange occurrence, eight-year-old Nathan’s eyes had widened behind his glasses and, with brilliance only a child could claim, he’d exclaimed, “It looks like you have an alien in there!”

  Six-year-old Pete had scrunched his nose in confusion…or concern? Julia still wasn’t sure. He followed his brother’s statement with, “I think you better let your baby out, Aunt Julia, because if he breaks your tummy open it’s going to be really messy. You had oatmeal for breakfast.”