Chapter Twenty-Four

Not wanting to be distracted by the studio construction, they moved their practice to the Lewis High School gym. It coincided with Patrick’s class, and he had a feeling watching Anita dance would be excellent motivation for his kids before the competition.

Though after two and a half hours of trying to perfect a show dance in record time, Patrick wondered if it would be better just to cancel his class. If only for the sake of his glutes, which were one step away from rioting for an ice pack.

This had been either the best or worst idea of his life.

He had thought originally he could contain it. Keep his complete schoolboy undying love separate from the dance.

He was a complete and utter idiot. At this point, he just needed to tell her how he felt and run like hell if she did not feel the same. He only had a few more days before his self-imposed deadline.

The showcase was working. He was surprised so much of it came back to him. It was impossible not to get swept into the drama, the romance of the music itself. Still, it was incredibly physically challenging, almost all tricks and lifts and complicated footwork. Particularly for Anita.

She dropped into a split and let out an “oof!”

“Are you okay?” Patrick panted. He reached out a hand to help her.

She rubbed the back of her right thigh through her black leggings. “I’m fine, just pulled it a little too tight. I forgot how complicated this routine is.”

Complicated and so sexy it was difficult to keep his hands to task.

He motioned for a break. They rested on the metal bleachers, the cold soothing his sore muscles and—other sore parts. When he was in high school, he had always wondered if cold bleachers were somehow a method of enforced abstinence. It was not entirely unhelpful at the moment.

Anita sipped deeply from her water bottle. “Can I ask you an awkward question?”

Do I love you? Yes. “Shoot.”

She looked down at the ground, her long ponytail falling over her shoulder. “Do you think it’s too…I don’t know, risqué? For a memorial showcase?”

The air sparked around them. Did she remember? Did she remember how the world had contracted to just the two of them, the air between them so electric it felt like firecrackers on a hot summer’s night? They had been so young. He had found himself outside her room later that night, trying to work up the courage to knock on her door, but never doing it.

Missed possibilities and timing. He was an idiot.

“Honestly, Nikita would have liked it.” He smiled at her in a way that he hoped was reassuring. “She would have loved the burlesque aspect.”

Anita laughed. “The costumes would definitely have appealed to her.”

“You don’t still have that dress, do you?” He vividly remembered the lines of her body in the crystal bustier, the feel of the red satin negligee skirt whispering through his fingers. God, he hoped she had kept it. And also no, because he needed to be an educator to impressionable youths in a very short period of time.

“Nope. It was Gabriella’s dress. I gave it back to her.”

Something tickled the back of his memory. Gabriella had torn apart her dorm room after that weekend, looking for that costume but never finding it.

Anita tilted the water bottle to her mouth, and the memory faded before he could analyze it. That curve in Anita’s throat, like Nefertiti. She had tasted of mocha and buttery shortbread.

Get a damn grip. You are a professional.

Maybe there was something about high schools. All of the hormones just leeched into the air until you were as powerless around them as the adolescents who actually attended the school.

Fortunately, at that moment, the school bell tolled like a military call to arms. The gymnasium doors clanged open with a squeak and squawk, and four teenagers in various attire interrupted.

Showtime. Repressing the ache in his gluteus and back, Patrick clapped his hands boisterously. “Jess! How are the jive flicks coming along? Tim! You ready for Friday? You guys are going to be great.”

Before the second bell rang, the group swelled to eight, five girls and three boys, all eager, hormonal, looking for somewhere to fit in and finding it here.

This was the best part of his week. Apart from every single moment spent with Anita, obviously.

“Should I head out?” Anita packed her bag. She didn’t seem to notice how the kids all stared at her, murmuring excitedly in their tightly knit group. So he might have built up her skills a little. He had not been exaggerating.

“No.” He reached for her hand. “Come on, let’s show them what ballroom is all about.”

He pulled her beside him in front of the kids. “Everyone, a lot of you already know Ms. Goodman, from Lewis Dancesport downtown.” Anita waved shyly, somewhat uncertain. If she believed in herself the way he believed in her, she would be a world champion. “She will be heading to Keystone as well on Friday, and so we will see ALL of you there.” He gave them all a fake stern look. They all already had their tickets, even if they weren’t going to be competing. He made sure his group knew how to support one another. “Ms. Goodman and I will also be competing there this year, for the first time. Up to now, she has always refused to dance with me.” A few of the kids tittered politely. “I thought maybe today we could give you guys a little preview.”

“Patrick, what are you doing?” Anita hissed at him.

“Go put your skirt on.” He pulled out his phone and cued the sound system. “Hurry up.”

She arched an eyebrow at him, but did as he had asked, pulling a black skirt with an asymmetric frill out of her bag and over her leggings.

Patrick smiled wolfishly at her. “All right, kids, enjoy! The ssssssamba.”

The drum beat of Sergio Mendes thumped through the gym, filling the wood floors and metal bleachers with rhythm. Anita and Patrick both posed, smiling, moving their hips, until the song began in earnest and they did batucadas reversing away from one another. As the song sped along, Patrick swirled closer to Anita. Nothing brought out her inner goddess like samba. The bass of the drumbeat seemed to control her hips, her arms, the staccato punctuation of her head movements and flicks. He ducked her into a samba roll, promenade and counter promenade runs, turn-turn-turn-cruzado walks. Dimly, he could hear the kids cheering, but he was too in the zone. The music moved too quickly to think. Patrick relied on muscle memory and the electrical hum of Anita, spurring him onward.

The dance finally ended with a huge dip, and as the drums faded away, Patrick realized he and Anita were laughing, and his kids were on their feet for a standing ovation.

****

“It’s not a problem,” Anita told the teenager. Lucy Knight was fourteen, and Keystone was going to be her first competition. “I fixed the paillettes and sequins so it’s all ready for you. You’re going to be wonderful.”

“Thanks, Ms. Goodman.” Lucy gave her a quick hug. She was shorter than Anita by about five inches, her tidy brown hair streaked through with hot pink. Anita hoped her enthusiasm would last—the girl had talent and drive. “And you’ll be there on Friday?”

“Of course! I wouldn’t miss watching you all for anything.”

“You too, Mr. O’Leary?” She turned to Patrick, who had just finished coaching Lucy’s partner, Daniel Riley.

“Absolutely. Wild horses couldn’t stop me from coming.”

It had been a while since she had seen Patrick in action. She waved as Lucy and Daniel left the gym, then turned to Patrick. “You have a bizarre and inspiring talent with today’s youths.”

“Everybody’s good at something.” He threw his shoes and extra brushes into his dance bag. “They’re good kids. I just let them dance.”

“Well, there is something to be said for giving them a safe space to work out their hormones.”

“As we know from experience.”

A thrill shot through her, and Anita grimaced in order to try to control her blush. “I mean, when we were teenagers, of course.”

“Right, right, of course.” Teenage hormones must be contagious.

She kept her hands to herself as they walked outside the gymnasium, neither saying a word.

In the parking lot, Deputy John Flaherty reclined against the closed door of his police cruiser.

“I had no idea how fun it is to drive a police car at a school.” A huge grin crossed his face, crinkling the corners of his dark-brown eyes. “I swear I saw one kid literally dive behind that tree when I pulled up.” There was a rather terrified-looking freshman pretending to play a video game, hunched behind a large chestnut and furtively checking on the deputy every few seconds. It would help if John were built less like an NFL linebacker.

“So glad you take your civic responsibility seriously,” Patrick joked.

“I heard you guys were over here and wanted to give you an update. I went by the studio first. It looks like the new door is almost done.”

Something loosened in her chest. At least that was heading in the right direction.

“We weren’t able to pull any fingerprints off anything,” John told them. “I’m working now on some of the names you both gave me. It’s a whole cast of characters, isn’t it?”

“Did you find out anything?” Patrick asked.

“Nothing concrete yet. The two women are unusual to be sure, but I still need to do some digging, verify some things. I tried calling your former partner a few times, Anita, but no word yet.”

It would be just like Mikhail to ignore a police officer. He tended to discount anything that did not serve his personal image of himself as a living god.

“Hey, John.” Patrick glanced over at Anita. Was he nervous? It was stinking adorable. “Look, I’ve been doing some social media dives into a few people. Nothing too in-depth yet, just trying to cross-reference likes and tags and geo tags and all that.”

John’s eyes widened. “Wow, I didn’t realize you had the blog, the brawn, and the brains, O’Leary. Triple threat, am I right, Anita?”

She smiled weakly and tried not to yawn. If they were going to have a male self-congratulation session, she would rather be napping.

“Anyway, I’ll send you what I have,” Patrick responded.

“Great! You two have a good evening. Keep your eyes open and your doors locked.” He waved to them both, then climbed into the cruiser. He pulled slowly out of the parking lot, doubtlessly turning on the cruiser’s lights just to torture the teenaged populace.

Anita smiled. “It’s like some men never leave the sixth grade.”

“John’s a good guy, just a little immature at times.”

They climbed into Patrick’s car for the short ride back to Main Street. Anita tapped her fingers rhythmically on her thigh, watching the familiar sites of her hometown flick past.

“A quickstep, maybe?”

Her fingers stilled at the joke. “It was clearly a cha-cha. That’s how out of practice you are.”

“I’m sure you can whip me into shape.”

Her mouth went dry. Did she imagine the sultry huskiness of his voice when he had said that? He couldn’t possibly have meant it that way. This was all way too confusing. Things had been so much easier when she knew exactly how to define their relationship.

Before she had much more time to ruminate, they arrived at the studio. “Can I come in?” he asked quietly, his eyes on her. “I still don’t really like the idea of you being alone with the stalker out there. And we need to figure out costumes, maybe work on the suspect list.”

Anita barked a nervous laugh. Could she be more of a spaz right now? He was so calm, and that samba and those kids…She had forgotten how much fun dancing could be when it wasn’t all work. “Suspect list? Is this the Lewis Detective Agency now?”

“Hey, I’d make a damn fine Sam Spade.” He smashed his face into his best impression of Humphrey Bogart. “ ‘I don’t mind a reasonable amount of trouble.’ ”

Anita could not help herself from giggling.

“That’s okay, I don’t need a knight in shining armor to protect me.”

“I know you don’t. But I like being there for you.”

Anita sat in the passenger seat, gazing out at the new studio door, the brand-new, very expensive glass covered in brown paper tape.

“Thank you.” The sound of shattering glass thrummed through her once again. “I’ll be all right. I have to finish Lucy’s costume and hem a pair of pants for Shawn. It will be a quiet night, just me and my sewing machine.”

He paused, then took her hand gently in his and brought it to his lips. “You know I’m only a phone call away.”

It took her an age to pull away from him, but at last she opened the door, straightened her spine, and went up to her apartment alone.

****

She watched from the safety of her car across the street. Good, that bitch was going in alone. Not trying to seduce him today. She frowned at the new studio door. It had gotten fixed sooner than she had anticipated.

Her phone buzzed insistently, but she refused to look at it. That damned deputy would not leave her alone. She wouldn’t be surprised if he were following her, the dick. She had been so careful to this point. Just another few days and everything would work out. She just needed to avoid the deputy and any trouble.

She fought the urge to leave the blonde bitch another message, but the thoughts of him, of PATRICK, would not leave her. Even now, slouched in her car so he could not see her, her fingers itched to message him. She had to talk to him, had to make him see her. He was the only one who would understand that everything she had done had been for him.

That bitch would not do ANYthing for him.

She glanced at the phone. Four missed calls. Four voicemails.

Maybe just one quick look. She had a new account that he hadn’t blocked yet. She could see what he had posted that day, what he had eaten, any inspirational quotes or sly jokes. Just one. A little taste to whet her appetite.