Page 29 of Crescendo

“That was—”

We both started speaking at the same time, and she stopped, biting down on a smile and a quiet apology. I moved without thinking about it, laying a hand on top of hers in the middle of the keyboard.

“Let’s have lessons more like this from now on,” I said, and she blushed, smiling wider through it.

“Is that really okay? I’d hate to monopolize all your time…”

“If anyone’s going to monopolize my time, I want it to be you,” I said. A little too flirtatious. The gleam in her eyes saidshe knew that too, and that she didn’t mind, giving me a charged look, and I thought I wouldn’t mind too much if she kissed me right now, even though—

The doorbell rang, and Ella and I jolted away from each other, both of us up to our feet turning back to the door.

“God, it’s already dark out,” she said. “Our friends have probably been wondering where we’ve disappeared to.”

“No one can go long without my company, turns out,” I said, and she paused at the door, glancing back at me with a gleam in her eyes.

“Least of all me,” she said. I raised an eyebrow, and she turned back to the music room door, opening it and walking into the foyer. “More lessons like this one sounds… I think it sounds wonderful.”

Hm. This woman could be trouble.

I didn’t mind that.

Chapter 8

Ella

“What are you doing here?” I asked, staring wildly at Alisha and Sian. Standing on my doorstep.

Sian shot me a deadpan look. “You’re falling apart on us at breakfast, having a shit day, and then you suddenly stop answering our messages. I don’t know, what could we be doing here?”

“You’re checking up on me.” It was deeply unnecessary for me to spell it out, but, well, I wasn’t sure I was in my right mind presently. I had just made a… flirtatious remark to the woman who’d found me being a mess at the piano, had me playing more music than I had in a long time, probably just had a moment with me, and then we’d been interrupted by my best friends. Best friends who were bound to see everything I was feeling around Lydia.

This was going to be mortifying.

“Yes, we’re checking up on you. Now, let us in. It’s freezing out here.” Sian moved to walk around me and into the building.

“No, it’s not.”

Alisha shook her head. “It’s really not, Sian.”

She turned to scowl at us before heading straight for the flat and Lydia. Alisha followed after her.

I needed to stop her, to intervene, to do… something.

But, apparently, the universe hated me, because there wasanotherring of the doorbell, and I heard Lydia laugh through the open door as I reluctantly turned to answer again.

“Hey,” Clara said, a light smile on her face as Bansi beamed over her shoulder. “Did you two get lost?”

I blinked, feeling like the room was spinning. “Oh. Erm. Yeah, sorry. We were… doing homework and then two of my friends just showed up…”

Clara frowned. “Are you okay?”

“Never better.” That was a lie. She knew it, I knew it. Bansi probably knew it. “But, come on in. I guess we’ve got two more joining us.”

“Two more friends who don’t know how to take a hint?”

“What?”

She laughed, stepping aside to let Bansi in first. “Don’t worry about it.”

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