AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Before she could grab her shoes and dash for something to binge on, her cell phone rang. Glancing at the caller ID and recognizing the New York City number, she immediately began to smile, now knowing another sure-fire way to escape-at least mentally-from her troubles.
“V!” she exclaimed as she answered.
“Girl-friend!” was the reply. “It has been for-evah, where have you been?”
Plopping down on the sofa, Izzie kicked her feet up and leaned back, so happy to hear a voice from her old life, she wondered if fate had sent Vanessa’s call as some kind of mental gift. Vanessa was a good friend from her Rockette days. The striking, long-legged African American woman had been Izzie’s roommate on the road and the two of them had hit it off from their very first hotel stay, when they’d both decided to call for room service French fries at two in the morning, despite the matron’s orders to go to sleep by eleven o’clock.
“I’m still in Chicago.”
“Still doing that bakery thing?” Vanessa asked, sounding completely shocked. “I can’t believe you’ve lasted this long.”
“Join the club. I sometimes forget I haven’t spent the past seven years with my arms in cookie dough up to my elbows.”
“How’s your father?
“Getting better every day, already pestering my mother to let him go back to work.”
“That’s great. And as soon as he does you can quit.”
Yes, she could. Why that idea would send a shot of sadness through her, Izzie didn’t know. It wasn’t as if she liked working at the bakery. Even if she had made friends with all the staff, gotten on a first-name basis with their restaurant clients and the regulars who stopped in every day for breakfast.
Well, maybe she did like it. A little. But certainly not enough to want to stay there permanently.
Vanessa laughed softly. “And then you can come home. You still thinking of choreographing, or teaching?”
She had been, though, not as much lately. But she didn’t tell Vanessa that.
Fortunately, her friend quickly moved on. “You’ve got to come back soon. You are so missing out.” Launching into an explanation of all the things that had been going on-with the Rockettes, and in her personal life, Vanessa soon had Izzie laughing so hard she had to wipe tears from her eyes. The other woman was a wild one, and the ballsiest female she’d ever known.
The stories were entertaining, particularly when told with Vanessa’s flair. But even as she laughed, Izzie couldn’t help wondering whether her friend was truly happy. She sounded a little…empty. Lonely. Bored.
Which made Izzie suddenly remember the way she’d been feeling right before she’d hurt her leg.
Very much the same way.
All the things Vanessa had been describing were things Izzie had been doing the past few years in New York. She missed none of them. Honestly, all she really missed were her friends and her apartment. The lifestyle she’d already begun to outgrow even before she’d been forced to leave it.
Going back to it didn’t sound very palatable.
She shook off that crazy thought-not go back to her life? Insane. Like she had anything better going on here? “So which guy did you shove in the fountain?”
“The French dude. Pierre from Paris. Only, I think his name was probably really Petey from Poughkepsie or something. He wasn’t French any more than my dry wheat toast was French this morning.” Sighing, her friend added, “Why do men suck so bad?”
“Not all of them,” she said before thinking better of it.
Vanessa caught the tone in her voice and leapt on it. “Talk. Who is he? What’s he do? When did you start doing him?”
Having had no one to truly confide in since she’d been here…about her feelings, her relationship with Nick, even a bit about her sexy weekend job, she found herself spilling all of it to Vanessa. She must have talked for a solid five minutes without letting her friend get a word in. Finally realizing that, she whispered, “You still there?”
Vanessa murmured, “Oh, honey. This is serious.”
Yes. It was. Very serious.
“This Nick, I remember you talking about him.”
Izzie was afraid of that. Nick had always been-for her-the dream guy she’d never landed.
Now she’d landed him. She just didn’t know if she was going to get to keep him. Or if he even wanted her to, considering he hadn’t been able to bring himself to watch her dance again at the club.
“He might be a man worth settling down for, Izzie. Giving up your dancing…wait, what the hell did you say is the name of this place you’re dancing at?”
She should have known that would interest her friend more than any potential romance. “It’s called Leather and Lace.”
