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Lacey shook her head. “Huh?”
I took her by the hand and spun her onto the dance floor, and we were swallowed in a welter of bodies, investors, assistants, studio people. Faces I didn’t know, and I doubted Lacey did either. They danced in pairs and in groups, and bumped up against us, sometimes trying to talk to us or draw us away. We clung to each other in the midst of it all, her hands on my shoulders, mine on her hips. She smelled of the ocean and faintly of almonds, and I breathed her in. If this was to be all of her, all I could have, I wanted to bask in it as long as I could. Her scent, her touch. The heat of her eyes. If this was goodbye, then I wanted a sweet one, parting on a high note, not heartbreak and tears.
A while after Berg left, the dancing died down. The band took a break and someone yelled “karaoke!” I thought they were joking, but Grace got up and sang, then a couple of the tech guys, then Lacey grabbed my arm.
“Let’s do it,” she said.
“What, you and me?”
“Come on, it’s our last night. ‘Almost Paradise,’you and me.”
I groaned. “That’s so cheesy.”
“What are you, chicken?”
I opened my mouth to tell her, yeah, I was chicken, but it was too late. The cast had caught wind, and they were crowding us up to the stage, shouting encouragement, whistling over the ruckus. Someone shoved a mic at me, and I took it. Lacey leaned in to share it, to a chorus ofawws.
"I hate you,” I whispered.
She smirked. “You love me.”
I felt my heart stop. We’d never said “love,” not to each other. To the press, maybe, but not like this. Not so sweetly and casually, like it was a given.
A chill ran down my spine, the coldness of drowning. How far had I fallen? Could it be, did I love her? Was this how that felt, this terror, this panic? This sense that the world would soon snatch her away, and I’d be left standing on the beach by myself?
The music cut in and I nearly missed it. I messed up my cue, drawing jeers from the crowd. I flipped them off and kept singing, and pulled Lacey close. She leaned her head on my shoulder, but this wasn’t love. Real love took longer, took seasons to grow. Not a few stolen hours between takes on a movie set. I’d flown close to the fire with her, but I hadn’t landed us in it. We were still getting out in time, if only barely.
Our duet flew by like the rest of the night had, and we must have done okay after my rocky start. We got cheers from the cast and shouts of “encore,” but I took Lacey’s hand and pulled her away. I could make it through onesong with my dignity intact, but more than that would be pushing it. I was no singer.
“Let’s get a drink,” I said, and we headed outside. I grabbed us drinks from the beach bar and we sipped them by moonlight, and where had the night gone? Where had the time gone so fast?
“It’s so beautiful,” said Lacey, staring out at the ocean.
“Beautiful,” I agreed, looking at her. I hadn’t flown into the fire with her, but my wings had been singed. I wouldn’t walk away from this without a dose of heartache.
CHAPTER 20
LACEY
Ididn’t want our last night to end.
I didn’t want it to be our last night.
I wanted the party to go on forever, dancing with Eric, champagne on the beach. Eric had been distracted, but tonight he was back — back how he had been before our big date. From the moment I found him and tapped him on the shoulder, his eyes burned with a passion I thought had died out. He held me close when we danced, spun me and dipped me, laughed with me when a clumsy couple sent us reeling.
We danced and we sang and we toasted the cast, and Eric never left me. Never took his eyes off me. He kept his hands on me, too — an arm around me to shield me from the crowd. His hand finding mine as we walked down the beach. When I stumbled, he caught me with a hand to my elbow, and then it slid down to the small of my back. It felt protective somehow, the way he touched me that night, careful and gentle, full of promise. Of longing?
Sometimes when he looked at me, I thought I saw regret. Other times, I saw fire burning deep in his eyes. I saw my own hopes and dreams, my own passion in Eric, and I held my breath waiting for him to give it voice. Tonight was the night, if he was going to ask me. If we were going to keep going beyond our agreement.
The party raged late, well into the wee hours, but last call stole in with the first gray of dawn. I found myself with Eric, alone on the beach, watching the stars fade as the sky flushed with color. It should’ve been the most romantic thing in the world, holding hands in the surf as the moon went to bed, but my palms had gone sweaty, my stomach in knots. I could feel our time dwindling, our dream running out. Was that all we had been, a sweet, fleeting dream?
Eric turned to face me. “You look beautiful,” he said.
My heart did a somersault. This was it. It was happening.
“I don’t want this night to end.” He let go of my hand and cupped my face gently, and when he leaned in and kissed me, I felt my heart soar. He didn’t want us to end. Of course not. How could he? What we had between us was as real as this kiss, as deep and as passionate, our flame burning bright.
Eric pulled back and sighed, and my heart plunged anew. Unless… had that been a kiss goodbye? Was that joy in his eyes, or pain and regret? Or just the first sunlight over the beach?
