Let It Be Me

Twenty-one

BRIDGET and Oliver were not in the theatre when it happened.

Nor were they standing in the hall after the concert.

Indeed, they were in the carriage, on the way back to the town house, when Bridget finally trusted herself to speak again.

“Five ovations,” she whispered. “Five.”

“Each one earned,” Oliver whispered back, equally awestruck. He reached out and took her hand between them. Opposite them, Amanda leaned her head against the wall of the carriage, clearly exhausted. So Oliver did not hide his actions when he reached out and took Bridget’s hand, holding it close against his side. She knew it was not a sensual touch or an attempt in any way to seduce. It was a need for contact, for grounding. And Bridget offered that to him.

Just as he offered it to her.

The evening had begun as expected. A carriage ride that would have taken a half hour on a normal day had doubled as they waited in line for their turn to disembark. Bridget had been nearly jumping out of her skin, eager for the music that was to come. Even Amanda, who had not given up on her sulk—likely thinking it would help sway them to her proposed outing to the Schönbrunn Palace tomorrow—could not help but become enthused with all the nervous energy around them as they finally pulled up to the Kärntnertortheater, the Imperial and Royal Court Theater of Vienna. And the building lived up to that name.

A beautiful structure of yellow brick, it was lit on the inside by a hundred lamps, making the space glow with light. Bridget had felt in awe of La Fenice—and indeed, this space was similar in proportion and decoration. But while her one experience at La Fenice had been of a middling opera by Gustav Klein, the packed crowd at the Kärntnertortheater positively buzzed with excitement. And that excitement was not about who was attending with whom and in what box, or about what the ladies were wearing. No, that excitement was for what they were about to hear.

Oliver led them to their seats on the main floor.

“I apologize, there were no boxes available at such a late date,” Oliver said low under his breath, blushing a little.

“Oh, Oliver, don’t you realize?” Bridget shook her head. “I’m too excited to care where we sit.”

Indeed, even the main floor seats were filled with people of rank and substance, as evidenced by their clothing. Every ticket that could be had that evening had been taken. Bridget watched, waiting anxiously for the curtain to be drawn as Oliver nodded to acquaintances and introduced Bridget and Amanda to those who were within reach. There was a young Miss Unger, who was mingling with guests before she was due to sing—and was found by the Kapellmeister and pulled backstage forthwith. They greeted a Signor Barbaia, who seemed to manage the theatre and whom Oliver called Domenico, as their conversation slipped into Italian. It had not escaped Bridget’s notice that Oliver was truly in his element. Nor had it escaped Amanda’s.

“Lord, does Mr. Merrick know everyone?” she had said under her breath, as they turned away from the latest in a string of introductions. “My head is spinning.” Then, a delightful thought striking her, she said, “Do you think he knows Herr Beethoven?”

“Why Amanda, I thought you had no interest in the music or the musician,” Bridget had teased.

“Well, I cannot help it, if every single person we meet—and we are meeting quite a number of them; Mother will be so terribly jealous to have missed it—mentions that Herr Beethoven is here, and in public for the first time in over a decade.”

The idea of Beethoven being in the room, after she had spent the last two months in the company of his No. 23, had Bridget’s nerves on the rise again. But she did not have to mount the stage, so the queasy energy that moved like wings in her breast was too strange to be credited. And all too soon, people were taking their seats, and the conductor—not Herr Beethoven, Oliver whispered to her—took the stage to formal applause.

From the first moment, she was enthralled. Two pieces were played before the new symphony, but Bridget had heard neither and therefore let them wash over her. The Consecration of the House was followed by the first three movements of Beethoven’s Mass—Missa Solemnis. They were transcendent beauty, the pinnacle of traditional composition and orchestral music. But Bridget—and Oliver, and yes, the entire room—was waiting with bated breath for what was to come.

As the end chords of the Missa Solemnis floated through the air, the applause began impatiently, everyone eager for the chorus to leave the stage and let the orchestra reset themselves for the symphony. But the chorus did not leave the stage.

“It’s a choral symphony,” Oliver breathed in realization.

The buzz began around the room before the music did. A symphonic oratorio. This was something new and interesting already.

The music began so slowly it was hard to determine where it started. A few notes, as if the violinists and cellists and flutists were simply warming up their instruments. Then a dark theme emerged, an urgency. The intensity of the allegra ma non troppo pushed at them from behind and told them all to hurry up and listen! The first movement transitioned with jarring nerves into the second, timpani and staccato violins waking up the room—as if it needed to be awoken, her mind scoffed. The darkness of the second movement mirrored the first, but it was more complex, had more wilderness to fight through. But the scherzo of the second movement gave it a structure, a plan of attack forming amid that wilderness.

One felt as if some darkness was chasing at one’s back, getting nearer and nearer. But the third movement was quieter, a reflection of peace through oboe and string. An adagio, it let light and peace and hope into Bridget’s heart; she knew instinctively, without the darkness of the first two movements, that such hope could not have been achieved.

And then . . . the melody emerged. A simple beauty, as basic in rhythm and key as a child’s tune, layer upon layer, instrument upon instrument, joy bursting forth like flames from the fingertips of the players.

Bridget felt tears begin to sting her eyes. She could not for the life of her stop her heart from pounding in time to the music, nor did she want to.

So often, she had found herself transported by music. She would get lost, lose herself to the time and fullness of the tones, the way it conjured up air around her as she listened, or as she played. But this, she thought, one did not get lost in this music.

One was delivered by it.

By the time the fourth movement came, Bridget did not know what to expect. She had completely forgotten that the chorus was still on stage until the bass soloist stood and began to sing. He sang a poem, a German poem, that Bridget could not hope to translate, but voiced a definitive, authoritative sense of goodwill. Then the contralto—Miss Unger herself!—joined in, making a round of music. Then the tenor, then the coloratura soprano, and then the chorus, all lifted their voices in this amazing melody of simplicity and harmony. It built and built on all the themes, all the feelings the first three acts had conjured up, until it was almost too large for the theatre, for the heart, for all of Vienna.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, Bridget saw someone move, breaking into her fixation on the music. A small white-haired man rose to the stage, taking hard-won steps. He began to gesticulate, to conduct, his back entirely to the audience. His furious gesticulations marked him as more passionately involved in the music than anyone else in the room.

“Who—” she whispered to Oliver.

“That is Herr Beethoven,” he answered, with a squeeze of her hand—a hand that she had not noticed he was holding. Because he was such a constant presence, to have him not holding her hand would have felt more strange. Would have made her bereft.

Bridget had watched as Herr Beethoven moved his head, his hands in time to music he could not hear. The worst-kept secret in the musical world was that the great master was nearly completely deaf. The pounding rush, the whirlwind of the melody, spun the listeners like a pirouette until they were dizzy with it—until, building into triumph, the last notes were played with hard strikes against strings.

The room had burst into applause, clamoring to their feet. Bridget was the first among them, her eyes still wet and her heart still pounding. Beside her, Oliver and Amanda were equally enthusiastic. Oliver especially; Bridget chanced a look away from the stage to glance up at his face. He was flushed, his eyes glazed with passion.

He must have known it, too—known as instinctively as she did. That the symphony—Beethoven’s Ninth—was unlike anything the musical world had heard. It was too much to process—it filled the heart and then burst it.

No wonder it had taken until the carriage ride home for Bridget to speak. It had taken Oliver that long, too. One did not feel moved by it—one felt changed.

“When he kept conducting,” Bridget shook her head, her eyes still wet, still filled with wonder, searching for something to focus on inside the carriage. For Beethoven had kept conducting, long after the piece ended. His eyes closed, the music played on infinitely in his head.

“I know,” Oliver replied hoarsely. “And then Miss Unger stepped forward, and turned him to the crowd . . .”

“That look on his face . . . it was so humbling,” she breathed.

“It was joy,” Oliver finished for her.

“It was.”

Her eyes turned to his then, sought them out in the darkness of the carriage. Her feelings—the music, the night, being with him—overwhelmed her . . . Much the way that his hand on top of hers grounded her. But then, keeping his eyes on hers the whole time, Oliver gently reached over and unbuttoned her glove at the wrist. Then, with painful delicacy, he pulled the soft material off her fingers one by one.

She could hear music in her head. The music that had filled her that evening and left her bared.

He removed her glove as the carriage rolled on into the night. Then he lifted the naked hand to his lips, pressed them against her wrist. She gasped with the sensation. It was as if all the power and passion of the music from that night could be transferred by that simple touch, skin to skin.

Bridget wanted to pull him closer, so she did. She wanted to take her hand and let it revel in the short curls at the base of his neck, so she did.

She wanted his lips on hers, wanted to share in the power of the night and the darkness of the carriage . . .

“What’s going on?” Amanda sat up suddenly, a rut in the road jolting her into bleary consciousness.

“Nothing!” Bridget cried, she and Oliver pulling away from each other so quickly that they practically slammed into opposite sides of the carriage. Luckily it was dark in the interior of the carriage, but Amanda was mere feet away.

Thankfully, it seemed she was also half-asleep.

“Oh,” her little sister sighed, leaning back against the cushions again, her eyes closing as her body relaxed back into sleep. “That’s good.”

“We will be home soon, Miss Amanda,” Oliver said, trying for blank civility, as his hand sneaked across the gulf between them and took Bridget’s. “We just crossed into the Widmerviertel area of town. The roads will be clearer—it should not be long now.”

“Oh,” Amanda mumbled, through a yawn. “That’s good.”

Indeed, they rumbled to a stop in mere minutes. Which was all for the best, because if Bridget had to endure any more of the sweet torture of having Oliver’s hand play with hers, hidden in the folds of her cloak in the darkness of the carriage, and not be able to do what she wanted—to do more . . .

The footman handed her down, followed by a deeply sleepy Amanda. Oliver took Amanda’s arm, as it seemed likely she might fall asleep where she stood.

“I don’t know if it was the music or the travel that took all the verve out of her,” Bridget mused as they made their way into the house.

“I think it was the travel, finally taking its toll. After all, she was applauding as loudly as the rest of us,” Oliver whispered back to her as they entered the house and moved toward the stairs. The entryway was lit, and the housekeeper waiting up to attend them.

“Send the household to bed, Frau Reinhaltz, and yourself as well,” Oliver said in soft tones. “Just send one of the girls up for Miss Amanda—she’s too tired to undress herself.”

“Very good, Mr. Merrick,” the housekeeper replied, in a thick Germanic accent. “I hope you enjoy ze concert.”

Bridget maneuvered around to the other side of Amanda so she could help Oliver with her up the stairs, but his tall strength was quite capable of taking on the weight of a dead-tired practically sleepwalking sixteen-year-old young lady—leaving Bridget to fall behind and do what she could to not admire his form.

Indeed, her nerves were in a strange state of utmost awareness. As if every creak of the steps were something to take notice of, every footfall on plush carpet. Everything, especially, having to do with Mr. Oliver Merrick.

So she tried to distract herself on that endless walk up the stairs and down the corridor to Amanda’s room. Tried not to think of the way Oliver’s trousers cut across his thighs. Tried not to think about the way his lips had felt—soft and strong at once—against the delicate spot of her wrist. Tried not to remember the way his body had felt wrapped around hers in the gondola during a starlit sojourn . . .

Really, how long was this staircase?

Soon enough, however, they were depositing Amanda at her door, where they were met by the same German-speaking maid who had attended Bridget earlier in the evening.

“Danke, Greta,” Oliver said, handing Amanda over to her. “And good night, Miss Amanda.”

“Goodniiii—” Amanda yawned, and allowed herself to be ushered into her room.

Once the door clicked closed behind them, Bridget found herself unable to move, and unable to turn her gaze away from Oliver.

They were alone. For the first time all evening. For the first time in days.

“So,” she breathed, her voice coming out in a loud squeak.

“Shh,” Oliver admonished with a smile. “I should hate to wake your mother—or disturb Amanda before she finds her way to her pillow.”

“I told you, my mother sleeps like the dead. And Amanda . . . I do not think even hell itself could keep her from her sleep now,” Bridget returned with a smile. But suddenly it felt awkward, uneasy. She had reached this point in the evening—this strangely important, transformative evening—and she didn’t know what to do now, except feel bereft at its ending.

They began to move slowly toward Bridget’s room, a few doors down the long hall, keeping a breadth of space between them. She picked at her gloves—half off since the carriage ride—until they came away, to be folded and turned over in her hands.

“I suppose you must be as tired as your sister,” Oliver offered by way of conversation.

“Quite the contrary,” Bridget replied. “I doubt I have ever felt so awake.”

He gave a strange cough. “I, too, am strangely awake.”

“I do not know what I shall do to fall asleep. Perhaps try to read some German book—there are a few in my room.”

“I know,” Oliver replied. “Books are in every guest room.”

They had reached Bridget’s door.

She turned and gave as graceful a curtsy as she could manage. “Well, good night, Oliver. Thank you for the most incredible night of my life.”

She expected him to give a quick nod, or a short bow. She thought perhaps he might raise her hand to his lips again, and kiss that spot on her wrist.

But she was wrong.

There, in the darkened corridor of a borrowed town house in Vienna, Oliver Merrick took one languid step, closing the gap between them. He stood there, hovering in her space, letting her revel in his warmth. Then he reached down and took one of her shaking hands.

When had her hands begun shaking?

“Come with me,” he whispered, his warm tenor aching with want.

“Where?” Bridget replied, her voice shaking as much as her hand, but her gaze never faltering, never wavering from his.

His other hand reached up, pushed an errant curl behind her ear, then came to rest gently at the back of her neck. Coaxing. Calming.

“Bridget,” he said again. “Come with me.”

A thousand thoughts rushed through Bridget’s mind. A thousand thousand words in reply. But after that long moment, that endless aching, Bridget finally replied with the only word that made any sense at all.

Her gloves fell to the floor as she reached out and took his hand.

“Yes.”





Taking her hand, Oliver led Bridget down the hall to another staircase, this one leading to the west wing of the house, the family rooms. He moved with speed, with purpose, but had to be gentle. He did not wish to frighten her with his need. He simply wanted to unleash hers.

They made their way to Oliver’s room—a masculine space with dark woods and heavy green velvets that he would take the time to appreciate and compliment the staff for their hard work on at a later time. Right now, all that he cared about was that there was a fire in the hearth, a bed turned down, and Bridget.

He let Bridget go once they reached the room. He let her walk around, explore the surroundings. Get her bearings. She inspected the fire in the hearth, the portrait hanging above the mantel. Then her eyes took in the large, comfortable bed that dominated the center of the room.

She could run, he realized. She could run, and he would let her go. But he knew she wouldn’t. She was too brave, too headstrong. She was after all, the girl who had come to Venice, chasing a dream from a letter.

Eons from now, after this night had passed, and a thousand like it, someone would ask him the question of how he had known Bridget Forrester for who she would be—and the answer would be simple. That she was the one person in the whole world he had ever met with who had the gall, the temerity, and the absolute directness of feeling to carry her across a continent on the vague promises in a single letter. Her determination, her talent, and above all, her trust, was something to which he aspired, and it made her shine.

But that was not the foremost thought in his mind. Right now, the only thing he could think was that Bridget was here, she was with him, and she looked very nervous.

“This is your room,” she said softly, her voice a bare squeak.

“Yes,” he intoned. “We do not have . . . that is, we have all the time—”

“Oliver, will you do something for me?” she interrupted with as much authority as she could muster.

“Anything.”

“Will you kiss me?” she asked, betraying her vulnerability. “Just to get it out of the way.”

Oliver was not one to refuse such a request. In two quick strides he crossed to the hearth where she stood and wrapped her in his arms. The kiss was deep, an inhale of the life she had and the soul she was so willing to share. She reciprocated, pressing herself into him until he could feel all of her against all of him.

And all it did was drive him crazy.

He thrust his fingers into her hair, letting loose a torrent of pins, each one hitting the soft carpet with a dulled ping. Her hair streamed down her back in a mass of dark curls—so soft!—falling to her waist. He let his fingers run down until they could play with the ends, his hands grasping her tiny middle, lifting her against him. And all the while, never ever breaking that requested kiss.

He was rewarded for his diligence, for his patience. She relaxed in his arms, all sense of nervousness gone. Indeed, as the kiss deepened, as her hair came down and she pressed herself against him, stealing his warmth, her enthusiasm grew. Then it was her hands that threaded into his hair . . . it was her hands that ran down the back of his coat. And her enthusiastic hands that reached under his coattails and plucked at his shirt, seeking the satisfaction that only skin-to-skin contact could bring.

“Wait,” he cried, breaking their kiss as her cool hands brushed against the warmer planes of his back.

“What is it?” she asked, biting her lip, unsure. “What did I do wrong?”

“Nothing!” he hastened to assure her, planting a kiss on that delicious lip. “I don’t want to rush you.”

“I . . . I don’t feel as if I am being rushed,” she replied, cocking up a brow. “In fact, it could go a bit faster, if you like.”

“Well, perhaps then I do not wish to rush myself. I want to enjoy this.” He leaned into her ear, whispering. “Savor it.”

He could feel through the hand on her back as a shudder of anticipation ran down her spine. He watched as her eyes turned from jade to black with desire.

Delicately, he released his hand from her waist and set her back at arm’s length. “We are going to do this slowly. Properly.”

“If we were doing this properly, it would be on our wedding night,” Bridget said glibly, and then, eyes widening in horror, slapped her hand over her mouth.

Oliver froze. Met her eyes.

“I . . . I didn’t mean that,” she said, shaking her head. “I was only trying to be funny, and it did not turn out terribly funny, did it—oh blast, now I’ve ruined everything and you won’t—”

Her nervous ramble was worthy of her sister, but Oliver reached forward and silenced her with a kiss.

“Do you want to wait until that day?” he asked hoarsely. “I will happily, if you want me to,” he grimaced, unable to lie. “Well, not precisely happily, but I shall.”

“No,” she said, kissing him back. “I do not wish to wait. But you will have to tell me what to do. I do not know this dance, you see.”

He kissed her again. Breaking the connection between them, that had been his mistake. If he just held her, her nerves could not overcome her. If he held her—she was the bravest woman imaginable.

“You know this dance,” he answered. “Or, if you don’t, at least you know the music.”

Slowly, carefully, he pulled back enough to let his arm come up between them and rest on the easy neckline of her evening gown. Running his knuckle gently against the swell of her breast, he let his lips fall against that sensitive spot just behind her ear. She gasped. He took it in.

“I do not wish to rush,” he murmured. “Nor do I wish to frighten. All I want to do is wander.”

And so he did.

He wanted to let his hand graze against her breast, so he did. She wanted to let her hand trail down to his rear and press against that strong flank, and so she did. He wanted to undo the buttons at the back of her dress, and so he did.

“Do you know how often I wanted to peek behind that screen?” he whispered, as his fingers deftly worked open one small button, then another. Her dress fell loose against her front, exposing those delicate rosy nipples through her thin chemise. “As Molly was opening up the back of your dress and putting you into my shirt? I wanted to see this piece of skin, right here.” His thumb hit the spot in the center of her back, where her chemise began. “See if it was as freckled as the rest of you.”

“You never peeked?” she asked.

To that, he only grinned against her mouth.

They began to wander again. To meander, to dilly-dally. His fingers finished with the buttons at the back of her dress, leaving her exposed, her dress hanging from the shoulders. Her fingers took up the call, and threaded themselves beneath his dress coat, pushing it off his shoulders. Putting only as much space between them as necessary for gravity to work, he let his coat fall away at the same time as her dress. Then her fingers, always languid, always following the rhythm he laid out, began to play with the buttons of his shirt, at his throat, at his chest.

Bridget let herself explore, with the curiosity borne from inexperience and delight. Her fingers trailed down the hard planes of his stomach, a contrast with his soft skin and the downy fur of a man in his prime. The firelight let her see only so much; the rest she had to imagine.

She had to feel out the notes.

Like that line, a scar under his ribs—where had that come from? And the way his muscles dipped, the way his shoulders rounded toward her smaller self, as she pushed the shirt off his skin and let it fall to the floor, next to his coat, her gown, and everything else that had come between them, pooling at their feet.

Slowly, Oliver began the dance away from the fire and toward the bed. Bridget moved with him, following his beats, his music, and making it her own.

Shoes, both his and hers, fell away as they climbed onto the bed. Careful to never break that connection, never let themselves be away from each other, not even for a second. Stockings followed, pantaloons, a chemise. Until they lay together, naked, unable to hide.

She did not yield. Did not shy away. Bridget knew, deep down, that the only way through this bit was to hold on to Oliver and not let go. So she didn’t. Instead, she let him, and that melody, that insistent melody that had infected her brain and apparently infected Beethoven’s, play in her head. It chased her, spurred her. Drove her into not letting him stop until that part of Oliver—that part of endless curiosity, that part that elders never tell young ladies about, but they manage to find out about anyway—had found its way deep inside her.

Then, and only then, did the music stop.

“Do not worry. Do not worry, my love,” he murmured, kissing her hair as he did so. “The pain will end in a minute. It will go away,” he promised.

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask how he had such knowledge, but somehow, in the blinding haze of feeling, she managed to remember what had happened the last time she had answered with glibness, and held her question. She was rewarded with a rain of kisses, on her face, her cheek, her neck . . . and slowly, surely, the pain did go away.

“It is all right,” she answered finally. “After all, what is pleasure without pain?” Indeed, what was the last half of Beethoven’s symphony—the quartet of voices, the melody raised in chorus, in instruments—without the first two movements? The pain of running, or fear, gave way, adjusted, so easily to hope. Just as her body so easily adjusted to his.

“It’s all right,” she promised him, returning those reverent kisses, giving him the permission he needed. “It is all right. I can hear it again.”

He held steady, looked down at her, quizzical.

“Hear what?”

“The music,” she replied. That melody of hope, of joy, was slowly coming back to her. Oh yes, it was.

“Are you sure?” he asked, hesitant.

“When I look back on this moment”—she bit her lip, but still was resolved—“I will not see fear. I will see only you.”

And indeed, she could hear the music. The pace he set, the rhythm in three-quarter time. The delicate way they moved against each other, their own symphony playing, a mutation, a culmination of everything they had heard before.

It was touch—the plucking of strings. It was sound—the soft cries of one blending into the other. And it was sight—seeing the road before them and not faltering; in fact, welcoming the journey to come.

She let him lead their dance, but he had been right—she knew this music. This music written before time was written down.

And when they finally reached the end, those high, powerful notes, Bridget and Oliver both heard the strain of the music taking over their senses, clasping them in its racing grip and then floating away, letting them fall back to earth, with only each other to hold on to.

And there they held, listening into the night, until the last chords died away . . . clasped, holding tight to each other, unable and unwilling to let go.