“Probably not.” He shrugged. “I like movement, and it’s really technical. I enjoyed it.”
“Well, look at you.” Miss Leslie clapped her hands together once.
A few moments later, she had us standing face-to-face directing Jamison to show her his frame. His eyebrow twitching and a slight hesitation were the only signs that he had any nerves before his arms came up in a firm pose with his shoulders straight and his spine slightly arched back.
“Very nice,” Miss Leslie commented. She directed me to take a step closer. I edged half a step forward.
“Closer still.”
I shuffled a few inches nearer to the strong arms waiting for me. The memory of those arms, of his touch, was far too recent and bright. I couldn’t imagine how it didn’t hit me sooner that Jamison and I wouldhaveto touch. I would feel the shift of his muscles under my hands. I would be in his hold.
I should just walk right into it, make it less awkward, but I couldn’t.
She placed her fingertips on my shoulders and urged me the last few inches I needed to take. I looked up and up to meet Jamison’s eyes, but his gold framed glasses caught the overhead light obscuring his brown gaze. He fit his right hand just under my shoulder blade. A nervous thread tugged from below my ribcage unraveling and fraying my control. Due to Miss Leslie’s instruction, I straightened. With only a little hesitation, I placed my right hand in his much larger one—curling my fingers over and pressing my palm to his. My other arm used his as a guide until my hand rested on the bunched muscles of his shoulder.
“Now, this is just a starting place.” Miss Leslie used her hands when she spoke, and even those movements were graceful. “No one will be critiquing your frame. This isn’t a competition. Find what feels comfortable for the two of you.”
His throat worked, and his Adam’s apple bobbed.
He let out a slow stream of breath, and some of the tension lessened beneath my palm, the arm supporting mine lowered, the hand on my back inched slightly toward my spine and down toward my waist. Even through my sweatshirt, my skin burned where his touch trailed.
Bending his elbow, he took our entwined hands closer to our shoulders but his grip didn’t loosen.
“That’s lovely,” Miss Leslie remarked. “You two look great together.”
I didn’t dare look for myself. Instead, I avoided the mirror wall by staring daggers into the day’s growth on Jamison’s jaw. It was lighter than his hair, it caught gold in the light. The feel of it under my touch, against my skin, between my thighs was a memory I couldn’t ignore but I didn’t want.
She turned her back to us striding to the stereo. “Let’s get some music and you two can just move together for a bit. Learn each other for a minute or two.”
I didn’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t “Earned It” by The Weeknd to pour through the speakers. I was no expert, but it seemed there were degrees to creating comfortability between two people’s bodies, and we’d just jettisoned past Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” into the deep end. Was the next song “Like an Animal”by Nine Inch Nails? Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get it On?”
Jamison swayed, his movements guiding me to follow. A sway that I didn’t have to think about, I almost didn’t register the tighter press of his hand on my back but then he took a step forward, his foot falling between mine. On instinct, I hooked my arm around his shoulder for balance pressing my chest into his as I took a step back. There was another step, followed by a side-to-side. His hips leading mine with a gentle urging.
Then he took two steps backward. We swayed. Again, I followed.
It was so recognizable.
The way my body knew and understood his was muscle memory.
We had almost gone all the way through the movements a second time before I recovered enough to see through the fog in my brain and remember I wasn’t supposed to be following so easily. I’d been lulled into the comfort of his presence, but I wasn’t supposed to relax there.
I didn’t actually want to hurt him, just ruin his flow. So, I waited for the right moment to pick my foot up a bit too high and bring it down in the general vicinity of his toes.
I must have given something away—a new tension in my back, or a change in my balance—because as soon as I went to land my foot on his, he pulled me flush against his stomach. His arm across my back was like an iron bar, I couldn’t have pushed away from him if I’d wanted to. And even though I really should, at that exact moment, with every inch of his long torso holding me, searing my nerve endings, I didn’t want to. Our joined hands extended over my head, and he lowered me into a dip.
For the first time since we’d gotten inside, I could see his eyes. They glared down into mine, a crease between his brows. His lips pinched in disapproval.
“Don’t,” he whispered a warning that I felt like a lightning bolt in the pit of my stomach.
He had to be able to hear my heart thundering.
God, being a little shit had backfired drastically.
I was a lit wire.
Chapter 7
Jamison
