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She would not dance with him. Would not.
He didn’t give her a chance to protest once they reached the dance floor. With both hands still grasping her waist, Ty spun her around and, holding her much too close for comfort, started to glide her across the floor.
Fuming, she pressed her hands at his shoulders, trying to put some space between them. Enough to make an escape. His hold was firm, and the cocky grin on his face wilted her persistence.
“Yee-haw,” someone shouted. “Even Norma Rose is on the dance floor.”
“And she’s all mine, fellas,” Ty said, “so watch out.”
Laughter echoed around the room and Norma Rose pushed on his shoulders again, though not overly hard—she didn’t want people to notice. “I am not yours,” she hissed.
Ty merely grinned.
She returned one as false as his.
“Twyla, did you slip your sister a Mickey?” someone else asked.
“Of course not,” Twyla answered.
Norma Rose twisted to find her sister, but Ty glided them deeper into the crowd, forcing her more tightly against him.
“This was all Norma Rose’s idea,” Twyla said, somehow appearing next to her. “To get this night drumming.”
“Did your daddy skip town?” Twyla’s partner asked, who just happened to be Jimmy Sonny. “Or do you girls have him locked up somewhere?”
“No, and no,” Twyla answered, steering Jimmy in the opposite direction.
Whatever else she’d said was lost in the noise.
Ty’s hold eased up a bit, but before Norma Rose could take advantage of it, he grasped her hands. “You do know how to do the bunny hop, don’t you?”
“The bunny hop?” she repeated, rather appalled. The dance was said to mimic rabbits mating. She’d seen it performed, and had practiced the moves in her bedroom alone, as she did with all the other popular dance moves. Once in a while, she’d accept an offer to dance, but very rarely. Her sisters were always looking over the railing, and she hadn’t wanted one of them to make a scene. Which is what would have happened if they’d caught her on the dance floor. They were all on the floor now, and couldn’t make a scene. Or could they? Twyla certainly had got the crowd keyed up.
“Yes, the bunny hop,” Ty said, with a full openmouthed smile. “Follow me. I’ll show you.”
“I will not follow you and you will not show me anything,” Norma Rose insisted. Yet, considering half the room had noticed her and was watching, she didn’t hold true to her protest. Instead, she followed him. And mimicked him. She kicked out one foot and hopped three times on the other before sliding toward him until their stomachs touched, which jolted the air right out of her lungs.
“That’s my girl,” he said as they broke away, to kick the opposite leg and hop three more times before gliding into one another again.
“I’m not your girl,” she said, trying not to enjoy how close he held her.
“Then pretend you are,” he said into her ear. “You’re good at pretending.”
Whoops and hollers echoed above the music, and she didn’t even try to answer him. She was good at pretending, as good as him.
The drinks Twyla had encouraged Wayne to swig had helped his playing, or the toast had, because he was now pounding out a tempo the dancers loved.
When they slid together again, Ty’s arm wrapped around her, locking her stomach and hips against his, and Norma Rose put on her best smile, laughing along with the rest of the dancers. Ty’s eyes flashed a challenge as he turned his face sideways. She was up to any challenge he wanted to send her way, and did the same. With the side of his cheek pressed against hers, he led them forward, past other dancers to the edge of the floor, where he twirled her around and started back in the other direction, his cheek to hers.
It was exhilarating, being part of the crowd rather than watching from the sidelines, and Norma Rose let the excitement in, gave it free rein to continue working its magic.
In the center of the floor, Ty released her, but took her hand as they kicked, hopped and glided back toward one another. By now, Norma Rose had found the rhythm in every step and discovered newfound freedom in performing each one.
The two glasses of hooch she’d had must have gone to her head. Why else would she be participating instead of protesting? Then again, not participating would suggest she was against the crowd having fun, which she wasn’t. However, she shouldn’t be dancing with Ty.
They crisscrossed the dance floor, arriving at each corner cheek-to-cheek, and stopping in the middle to kick, hop and glide into one another, only to sweep back over to another corner, again cheek to cheek.
Her heart raced, her feet felt as light as feathers and the euphoria floating inside her was incomparable to anything she’d ever known. It was like she was a bird, released from its gilded cage to soar at will. And she was soaring.
Wayne barely paused between songs, and as others started tapping their heels, and shuffling their feet back and forth while dancing side by side, arms stretched over each other’s shoulders, Norma Rose watched eagerly.
She’d seen people doing the Charleston, but had yet to try it—outside of her bedroom.
“Later,” Ty said next to her ear as they once again glided to each other. “We have to pace ourselves if we want to win.”
A splattering of reality hit Norma Rose like drops of cold rain. “I am not dancing a full hour with you,” she said, while their cheeks were pressed together. She plastered another smile on her face as they passed other dancers.
“Yes, you are,” he said.
“No, I’m not.”
They’d reached the edge of the dance floor and his brief pause made her wish she hadn’t protested. He swung her around and headed back in the other direction.
“Oh, yes, you are,” he said before they reached the center of the floor. “I didn’t win that snow globe for you to give it away.”
“How do you know it’s the same one?” she asked, kicking one leg.
He waited until they’d hopped and glided together before saying, “I saw the way your sister looked at you, asking permission.”
“This was all very impromptu,” she admitted. “People were leaving.”
“I saw that,” he said, gliding her toward another corner.
Her cheek was hot, throbbing and more sensitive than ever. Between dancing and talking, she was breathless, and other parts of her had grown highly responsive, and throbbing, and hot. She truly didn’t know breasts did such things.
Pulling her mind off her body, she asked, “From where? You weren’t in the ballroom or dining room.”
“Looking for me, were you?”
“No.”
“Yes, you were,” he insisted. “I saw you watching out the window when I took my truck around to my cabin.”
They were once again in the center of the room, kicking and hopping, doing it all without thinking. Which gave room for other thoughts to return. “I know who you are,” she said.
He lifted a single eyebrow. “Ty Bradshaw, private eye.”
“More like Ty Bradshaw, a snitch.” Her breathlessness as she pressed her cheek against his took the sting out of her words.
He laughed. “Is that worse than being a fed, or better?”
Dancing made it difficult for her anger to renew itself, and Norma Rose couldn’t find an answer. She wanted to feel anger strong enough that she could chew on it, taste it, but instead, she felt the rumble of Ty’s laugh again and the heat of his body. The smell of his cologne was getting to her, too, as was the touch of his hands. With each dance movement, he touched her someplace—her back, her waist, her shoulders, the palms of her hands—and every touch had her craving more.
“When are you government people going to realize it’s tax money, our tax money, that pays your salary?” she asked, hoping to dredge up a bit of the loathing she’d earlier experienced.
“I do realize that,” he said. “I thought of it the entire time I was overseas.”
The song switched again, and this time it was a slow one, giving the dancers an opportunity to catch their breath. A few couples collapsed on chairs around the tables next to the floor, worn out from the exhausting moves of the Charleston.
Ty curled an arm around her waist and folded the fingers of his other hand around her palm, holding her arm in the air as their steps naturally flowed into a slow, easy two-step.
“The entire time I was in the army, I remembered my payment came from taxes paid by people who were pouring their own blood, sweat and tears into their private businesses back home. That’s what kept me going—knowing I was protecting them.”
He’d changed his clothes from earlier in the day. Now he wore a gray shirt that shimmered in the pale lights overhead, and Norma Rose had a hard time pulling her gaze off his shoulder to meet his eyes. Several local men had served in the war, including Uncle Dave, and she knew firsthand that they didn’t like talking about what they’d seen, what they’d experienced. But there was more to it than that. More to why she was afraid to look him in the eye. She might get pulled in again. Start thinking of him as someone other than just a federal agent. Like the man who’d helped her look for her sister all afternoon. The one who’d won her a snow globe and bought her cotton candy.
