“Here.” One corner of his mouth lifts in a smile.
“Here, in Lafayette?” I ask, confused.
Amusement sparks in his dark eyes. “Right here. AtLa Fête.”
“Mr. Hebert taught you?” I squawk.
Beau chuckles at my surprise. “He and my mom.”
I blink. “Yourmom?Does she teach here too?”
“She used to,” he says, his smile slipping. Then his hand presses into me again and all thoughts of ballerinas flit from my head. “Now breathe. Big this time.”
I do, making the mistake to look down as my belly rounds under his hand.
“Ugh,” I mutter.
“Look up. At me,” he commands.
So I do. He’s so close, and his gaze falls on me, into me. It’s so heavy it’s hypnotic. I immediately stop breathing.
“Breathe, Iris.”
I breathe, stretching my diaphragm, filling my belly.
“Good. Again.”
I do it again and again and again. And then keeping the hand on my middle, he uses his free one to clasp my wrist, and he sweeps it up as I breathe in.
“Heels down,” he reminds me when I tip forward.
I anchor in the heels and raise both hands. Ramon and Sally, who’ve been silent witnesses since Beau touched me, start moving in tandem with us.
We breathe, sweeping our hands up, and after half a dozen times, I realize that my arms no longer feel like they’re made of popsicle sticks. Instead, it feels like they’re moving through water.
Gracefully.
“Great. Great.” Beau gives a tight nod. “We’ll begin with some kind of warm up every time.”
Then he steps back. His hand leaves my belly, and it’s like someone has ripped away my blanket while I dreamed. Instinctively, I cross my arms over my middle to try to recapture the lost heat, but it’s gone.
“Okay.” Beau picks up his phone again and suddenly, Bill Withers’s melted caramel voice is replaced by a cranky Cajun accordion.
Have I mentioned that I’m not much of a Cajun music fan?
This may not be the most politically correct thing to admit—so I haven’t said it out loud—but Cajun music is to the ear what a wood chipper is to, well, wood.
Okay, maybe I exaggerate. My ears are still intact at the end of each lesson, but my nerves are mulch. Most Cajun songs sound like cat sex with a beat. Like someone put a slow country song—which I heard plenty of growing up in Oklahoma and can only appreciate now that I’ve listened to Cajun music—through a hand-crank coffee grinder. While two cats go at it.
Yeah, I’m not a fan.
While I sulk on the inside, Beau turns to Ramon. “Did my uncle teach you the Two-Step?”
Ramon gives him a dry look. “Mr.Landry,” he says, emphasizing Beau’s last name. “I’m Puerto Rican. There isn’t a dance move anyone on this hemisphere could teach me I don’t already know.”
Beau chokes on a laugh. “Okay, Bernardo,” he scoffs, pointing toward me, “let’s see what you got.”
I frown at Ramon.“Bernardo?”
