Chapter 2 - The piano faded.
For one heartbeat, the entire Velvet Note remained silent.
Then applause erupted.
Sienna stepped backward.
She wanted to leave.
Immediately.
But she looked toward Lorenzo once more.
He was standing.
Matthew stared at him.
Lorenzo never stood for performers.
Never.
He descended from the booth.
The applause weakened as people noticed.
Sienna's stomach dropped.
Phillip appeared at the side of the stage, looking terrified.
Lorenzo walked through the tables.
Nobody stopped him.
When he reached the stage, Sienna instinctively stepped backward.
He stopped several feet away.
“Where did you learn that song?”
No greeting.
No compliment.
Just the question.
Sienna's face lost color.
“My mother.”
Lorenzo stared.
“What was her name?”
Sienna hesitated.
“Why?”
“What was her name?”
His tone remained controlled, but Matthew could hear the strain beneath it.
Sienna looked around the room.
People were watching.
“I don't think this is the place.”
Lorenzo glanced toward the audience.
For once, he agreed.
“Office.”
Sienna immediately shook her head.
“No.”
Phillip looked ready to faint.
Nobody told Lorenzo Bianchi no.
Lorenzo studied her.
Then, unexpectedly, his voice softened.
“Please.”
That frightened Matthew more than anger would have.
Five minutes later, Lorenzo and Sienna stood inside his private office.
Matthew remained near the door.
Sienna kept several feet between herself and Lorenzo.
“Your mother's name,” Lorenzo repeated.
“Marie Holloway.”
Nothing.
Lorenzo didn't recognize it.
“When did she teach you the song?”
“When I was a child.”
“Where did she learn it?”
“I don't know.”
“You changed the final phrase.”
Sienna stared at him.
“My mother always sang it that way.”
Lorenzo walked toward the window.
Sophia had changed it that way too.
It could be coincidence.
It had to be coincidence.
Then Sienna said something that made him turn.
“My mother didn't actually write the arrangement.”
“Who did?”
“A friend.”
“What friend?”
Sienna hesitated.
“She called her Sophie.”
Silence.
Matthew slowly straightened.
Lorenzo's face became unreadable.
“Sophie what?”
“I never knew.”
“When?”
Sienna frowned.
“When what?”
“When did your mother know her?”
“In New Orleans. Years ago.”
Lorenzo stepped closer.
“How many?”
Sienna began calculating.
“I was maybe fourteen when Sophie stopped visiting.”
Ten years.
Lorenzo had met Sophia nine years earlier.
His pulse accelerated.
“What did she look like?”
“Dark hair. Tall. She drew buildings on everything. Napkins. Receipts. Grocery bags.”
Matthew looked at Lorenzo.
That was Sophia.
Sienna noticed.
“What is happening?”
Lorenzo opened a drawer and removed his wallet.
Inside was an old photograph.
Sophia laughing beside Lake Michigan.
He placed it on the desk.
Sienna stared at it.
Her mouth opened.
“Oh my God.”
“You know her.”
“My mother knew her.”
Lorenzo said nothing.
Sienna picked up the photograph carefully.
“She stayed with us.”
“When?”
“For a few months before she moved to Chicago.”
Lorenzo felt as though the floor had shifted.
Sophia had rarely discussed the period before they met.
He knew she had spent time in Louisiana working with a restoration firm.
Nothing more.
Sienna's expression changed.
“There was something else.”
Lorenzo waited.
“My mother gave me a box before she died.”
“What box?”
“She said it belonged to Sophie.”
“Where is it?”
“My apartment.”
Matthew interrupted.
“Lorenzo.”
Lorenzo understood the warning.
Don't frighten her.
He looked at Sienna.
“Would you bring it to me?”
She studied him for a long moment.
“Why?”
Lorenzo looked toward Sophia's photograph.
“Because Sophie was Sophia Romano.”
Sienna's eyes widened.
“The woman you lost?”
He looked at her sharply.
Apparently even new employees knew.
“Yes.”
The following afternoon, Sienna returned to the Velvet Note carrying a small wooden box.
Lorenzo had been waiting since morning.
She placed it on his desk.
“My mother told me never to throw it away.”
Lorenzo opened the lid.
Inside were photographs.
Sketches.
Letters.
And a small cassette recording.
His hands stopped.
Sophia's handwriting covered the label.
Matthew found an old player in storage.
Lorenzo inserted the cassette.
Static filled the office.
Then Sophia's voice emerged.
Young.
Alive.
Laughing.
Lorenzo closed his eyes.
Sienna watched his face.
The recording had been made years before Sophia met him. She and Marie were experimenting with arrangements for local singers.
Then Sophia said something from the tape.
“Marie, if I ever become unbearably serious, remind me that music is supposed to make people feel alive.”
Marie laughed.
“You? Serious?”
“One day.”
Sienna lowered her eyes.
Lorenzo did not move.
The recording ended.
For almost a minute, nobody spoke.
Then Sienna noticed something.
Lorenzo was smiling.
Barely.
It wasn't happiness.
Not yet.
It was grief remembering what happiness had felt like.
But it was unmistakably a smile.
Matthew turned away, pretending to examine the window because his eyes had suddenly become wet.
Sienna smiled too.
“There you are,” she whispered.
Lorenzo looked at her.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
But something changed after that day.
Not quickly.
Lorenzo didn't suddenly become cheerful.
He remained demanding.
Private.
Intimidating.
But he began visiting the Velvet Note for music rather than business.
And Sienna began singing once every Thursday night.
Only one set.
She refused offers to perform elsewhere.
“I already have a job,” she told Phillip.
“You're cleaning rooms for twenty-four dollars an hour.”
“And I'm excellent at it.”
Lorenzo overheard.
The corner of his mouth moved.
Sienna pointed at him.
“That almost counted.”
“What?”
“A smile.”
“You're imagining things.”
Weeks passed.
They talked after performances.
At first about Sophia.
Then about New Orleans.
Then about Noah.
When Lorenzo learned why Sienna worked so many hours, his instinct was immediate.
“I'll cover the hospital expenses.”
“No.”
He stared at her.
“You don't even know the amount.”
“Doesn't matter.”
“Why?”
“Because I don't want to owe you.”
“You wouldn't.”
“Powerful men always think that.”
Lorenzo almost argued.
Instead, he nodded.
“Fair.”
He didn't pay the bills.
But three weeks later, Northwestern announced a new anonymous fund helping families with extended treatment costs.
Sienna suspected him.
She never proved it.
By winter, employees noticed Lorenzo lingering near the stage whenever Sienna rehearsed.
Matthew noticed more.
“You like her.”
Lorenzo didn't look up from his paperwork.
“No.”
“Excellent argument.”
“She's twenty-four.”
“And?”
“And nothing.”
Matthew smiled.
“You're terrified.”
Lorenzo raised his eyes.
Matthew wisely left.
But he was right.
Lorenzo was terrified because Sienna had become something he had promised himself never to have again: someone whose absence would hurt.
That frightened him more than any enemy.
So he withdrew.
For two weeks, he avoided the Velvet Note.
Sienna noticed.
She pretended she didn't.
Then one Thursday, she finished her set and found him waiting backstage.
“You disappeared,” she said.
“I was busy.”
“Liar.”
Lorenzo almost smiled.
“People usually don't speak to me like that.”
“Maybe that's your problem.”
He looked at her.
“What do you want from me, Sienna?”
The question caught her off guard.
“Nothing.”
“Everyone wants something.”
“I wanted more shifts.”
“You got them.”
“I wanted Noah to get better.”
“He is.”
She stepped closer.
“And now I want you to stop treating caring about someone like it's a death sentence.”
Lorenzo went still.
Sienna immediately regretted the words.
“That was unfair.”
“No.”
He looked away.
“It wasn't.”
Then he said quietly, “The last woman I loved died because of me.”
Sienna's expression softened.
May you like
“She died because somebody chose to hurt you.”
“Same result.”
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