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“You ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.” She hugged me, and I whispered into her ear. “How did I let you talk me into this?”
She laughed as she leaned back. “You love me, that’s how! Now, go show her your stuff.”
I headed with Cal and Ryan across the street and down the side street slightly. The main road was now closed, but there was an area for spectators, plus a lot of production crew and cameras.
Holy shit! What the hell was I doing? I bent over at the waist, putting my hands on my knees, and tried to calm myself. I seriously had never been so nervous in my life. Why? I was only going to dance with a woman. I’d danced with women before, dozens of them, so why was this such a big deal?
It has to be because of the cameras; that was the only thing I could think of or the fact that I wouldn’t say a word to this woman for the four minutes we were together.
“You ready?” Ryan asked.
“Yeah, let’s go.” I stood and inhaled a few times deeply as I tried to center myself. Pretend you are going into a battle zone; people depend on you; it’s a dangerous place, and you need to keep your head on a swivel and focus. I could do this.
“Get ready, when I drop my hand, you start walking toward the corner and get yourself ready. She is already going to be there.”
I nodded, and a few seconds later, he dropped his hand, and it was showtime. As I approached my spot, I tried to remember the dance, but it was hiding under my anxiety. As I reached my place, I saw her knee on the other side of the corner, and I smiled. Holy shit, I was actually going to do this.
I leaned back against the wall, inhaled slowly, and felt the calm descend. We would either have a connection or we wouldn’t. Either way, we were going to have fun.
The music began, and just like that, the dance came back to me as I leaned sideways and peered around the corner. Her dark hair was pulled up in a ponytail, and she wore matching sneakers to mine, jean shorts, and a darker purple shirt. I saw all of this in one single peek before I pulled back and turned my head away.
I waited for the beat and put my hand out; a moment later, her small hand landed in mine. It was almost electrifying, and I stepped out and pulled her into me. My hand skimmed down her side to where I took her hand, and I grinned as I twirled her away from me and then pulled her back.
This time as she returned, her face snapped to mine, and her hand came to rest on my cheek. The cameras did not exist. The spectators weren’t there. Hell, in that single moment, the entire world vanished as I stared down into her energetic green eyes.
It wasn’t until she pulled away from me with a sassy grin on her face that I realized I’d seen this woman before, but I didn’t have time to think on it as we danced and moved over the street, onto the gazebo, and then down the stairs to the fountain.
The entire way, I grinned like a freaking fool. I couldn’t have stopped if I had wanted to. Every time she looked at me, I felt it shoot straight down my spine. I picked her up, spun her around, heard her giggle, and then put her down on the fountain wall. She did a little dance, wagged her finger at me with the sexiest smile I’d ever seen, and then I was there, lifting her into the air.
She was light as a feather, and the only thing I wanted to do was bring her down to my body and hold her close. I wanted to stare into her eyes, suck in her breath, and learn everything about who she was.
The dance went too fast, and before I knew it, she was wrapped in my arms for the final note of the song. Both of us were breathing hard, and neither of us moved away from the other. It was like time stopped again, and nothing else existed. I ran two fingers down the side of her face, and we slowly parted. The two of us stepped apart, and it was almost painful to turn. I held eye contact with her until the very last moment, and then we were walking away from one another. I glanced back; I couldn’t help it, and she did too, her bottom lip tucked under her teeth before she made the turn out of sight.
The smile was still on my face as I came around a bunch of trees, and the camera crew was standing there; a whiteboard faced me off-camera with the question, “How do you feel?”
“Holy crap,” I said as I stood there trying to slow my breathing. “My heart is going a million miles an hour. That was crazy. I’m just—I’m just—um—I’m kind of speechless. That was fantastic; she is fantastic.”
Chapter Ten
Ali
“What just happened?” I said as I stopped in front of the camera. My heart was beating so fast and hard in my chest that I couldn’t hear. “Seriously, what just happened?”
I glanced over my shoulder, but of course, there was nothing to see. The man that I had just danced with was gone.
Tarin came to my side, her smile slightly nervous. “Well, was it good?”
“Oh, my god! It was incredible. He was so handsome, and the moment I looked into his eyes, I was immediately comfortable. It was like I knew that we were going to have fun, and he was going to lead me through it, and he wouldn’t drop me.”
“So, you weren’t worried anymore about him dropping you?”
“No, not at all.”
“Would you say you felt a connection?”
I nodded like a bobblehead doll. “Oh, yes, I felt a connection. It was crazy, but I felt it.”
