by Ried Reese
Any other time, I would have laughed. All I can manage now is a little twitch of the lip. “This isn’t about him,” I promise. “I just… I can’t find that passion in my heart for dancing anymore. And I’m not good like you are. It’s unrealistic, and I’m a realist.”
“What do you need from me?” It’s a fair question. “Am I asking the right questions? I’m assuming you’re trying to figure out how you feel.”
“You are, and I am.” That’s exactly what I’m trying to do, although I didn’t realize it until Gemma’s blunt comments. “Should I give him a chance to explain himself?”
“Whoa whoa whoa.” Gemma raises her hands, leaning back. “That’s a big question and you know I can’t answer it for you.”
I stare at her expectantly. “But?”
“But yes, you totally should.” Gemma grins widely. “And if you don’t like his explanation, then we sabotage his wiring job.”
“Gemma!” I exclaim, but suddenly I’m laughing. Even if this decision turns out to be wrong, I’ve made it, and that lifts the pressure on my heart. “Okay. I’ll talk to him tomorrow.”
“And let me know how it goes?”
“And let you know how it goes.” And I’ll figure out how I want it to go in the meantime.
Chapter Sixteen: Brandon
Panting, I struggle with the barbell, my left arm threatening to give out with every tense passing second. When I finally manage to replace the bar on the rack, I lie back on the bench, gasping for breath.
My arms shake, my chest heaves, sweat drips down my forehead, and I’ve pushed myself harder than ever before.
I still don’t feel better.
No amount of punishment I force my body through will rewind time or give me a chance to fix things with Taylor.
When I was younger, I had wanted with all my heart to defend my country, and no line of defence stood stronger than the Navy SEALs. They put themselves in danger deliberately, time and time again, to destroy threats before they ever neared Americans or American soil. I didn’t just want to be strong—I needed to be, because how else could I protect the people I loved?
Never, not even once, had it occurred to me that no amount of physical strength on my part could protect those around me from myself.
I can hold Taylor in my arms. I can make myself big and strong and threatening and drive away anyone who bothered her. I can even untangle an expensive shoe on a priceless foot.
But I can’t keep myself from breaking Taylor’s heart.
It had taken me about ten seconds after Taylor ran out of House of Stars to realize what I’d done. Dating a dancer might— might— hurt my reputation. Dating Taylor will definitely give me the kind of happiness money and reputation never will.
I weighed a distant possibility that could make things harder for me against a certainty that already makes my life better, and I chose to plan for the possibility.
What kind of dumbass am I?
“Are you finished with that bench, man?” A face sporting a full beard hovers over me inquisitively.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry.” I stand up, grimacing just a little as my quads scream angry reminders of the squats I’ve done. “One sec.” A few quick wipes with one of the disinfectant towelettes, and I surrender the bench press to the man.
I’m so considerate. The sarcastic thought leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
Oh well. Maybe I’ve worked myself into an exhaustion that will let me catch a few hours of sleep.
On the way home from the gym, I toss my phone restlessly up and down in one hand. When I get home, I take a shower, wrap a towel around my waist, pick up my phone, and set it down again. After dinner, I glance at my phone on the table and reach for it before I snatch my hand back. As I lie down in bed and click the charger into the port, I stare at the prompt to enter the pin, but I just drop the thing on the nightstand.
Taylor doesn’t want to talk to me. I pretty much told her straight up that her dream means we can’t be together. Nothing about the way I acted yesterday entitles me to any kind of explanation.
Is it too late to pick up and start over in another city again?
My bodily exhaustion, mental depression, and shattered soul finally drag me into sleep’s welcome embrace. I oversleep and find that the speed with which I’m forced to get ready to go to House of Stars prevents me from thinking too much, although not from reaching for my phone twice.
Feelings aren’t like thoughts. Busyness doesn’t make those go away, so the sick pointing fingers of guilt and regret follow me no matter how fast I move through my daily motions.
“Have you seen Taylor?” I ask Isabel, the first face I see that belongs to someone who might know where she is. Since I can’t quit my job at House of Stars, I’ll do the one thing I can still do for Taylor—remove myself from sight and sound so she doesn’t have to deal with my presence.
“She’s supposed to be here, but she clearly isn’t,” Isabel sniffs. “Although I suppose I can’t blame her since Cullen is her ride.”
I want to bristle in her defence (Of course Taylor isn’t to blame, she doesn’t have faults, just people around her that ruin her life), but I just slink upstairs before she arrives. I have work to do up here, and the accountants have no reason to go upstairs.
Throughout the day, I make it my personal mission not to demolish Taylor’s life any more than I have already. Staying upstairs out of sight works perfectly, and I can easily get everything else done on her off days.
After an entire workday spent alone upstairs, I slowly gather my tools, resisting the urge to clutch at my chest. Somewhere in the course of the day, my heartache has become a tangible thing.
Every day since I took this job at House of Stars and saw Taylor, I looked for her, hoping to catch her walking nearby so I could smile and see her face light up in return. I listened for her voice, straining to catch words or even just her intonations.
I’ve never felt more alone than I do right now. Understanding of how much Taylor’s very presence meant to me for the past couple weeks has finally hit me, and my very bones want to crumble now that she’s gone.
My watch hands point to a time of 6:45 PM. There’s no way Taylor is still here, so it’s safe for me to leave.
Maybe I’ll go to the gym again. My biceps aren’t sore, which means I didn’t try hard enough with my full-body workout yesterday.
There’s just one little hitch in my plans.
Taylor is leaning against my truck.
I’m so stunned that I can’t even greet her or say her name, so I just stare.
“Hey,” she says finally, scuffing her heel against the ground.
“Hey,” I manage to respond. Shaking fingers threaten to give out on the handle of the black bag I’m holding, so I set it down.
“Hey.” She shakes her head, cheeks pinking as she realizes she already said that. “So I—uh—I was thinking.”
I’ll go purple if I keep taking these shallow breaths.
“I got—I got kind of angry yesterday, and I didn’t listen to what you had to say. I still barely even know what I’m doing here, so just—” She takes a breath, clearly fighting to stay calm. “So just talk, okay?”
A vortex opens in my mind and sucks away my ability to speak. Taylor is here, offering me another chance—no, a chance to explain that I’m worthy of another chance. I’m not ready, I can’t figure out how to voice the regrets and explanations that have plagued my mind since that moment in House of Stars.
It’s the realization that I actually feel faint that finally fumbles around my mind and drags out some thoughts that aren’t oh God, oh shit, what do I say, last chance, last chance, last chance.
I just need to do one thing: Use. My. Brain.
And just like that, I once again remember the English language.
“You mean more to me than any reputation, professional or personal.” I look right into her eyes, because if she doesn’t believe the titanic effort I’m putting into showing the sheer dept
h of my sincerity, I might just crumble into dust right here. “I thought I meant what I said. I was so afraid of trusting my feelings toward you that I couldn’t think, but now I know how I feel. Taylor, I want you to be exactly who you are and do exactly what you want, because you’re perfect no matter what you do. You’re beautiful and talented and smart, and I don’t want you to change what you love or who you are.”
My earnestness carries me toward her. “I almost let myself make the same mistake I made all those years ago. I’ve been down the road of trying to impress people, and I’m really, truly done with that path now. All I can do is be myself and follow my heart.” Softly, I add, “You’ve shown me that.”
Taylor receives the most heartfelt words I’ve ever spoken, but she doesn’t react beyond rubbing her eyes once or twice. “I have to go. Gemma and Cullen are waiting for me.”
Every step Taylor takes away from me crushes my heart, pounding it underneath her heels until nothing is left, not even dust. I failed. Again. She gave me a chance, but honesty wasn’t enough to sway her heart after how much I hurt her.
When I start my car, a little voice calls inside me. By the time I get home, the fucking thing is screaming its lungs out and scrabbling rents into the walls of my heart. I can’t breathe, but I don’t want to anyway.
I pick up my phone. I can’t go to House of Stars again. Cullen needs to know. But before I can touch the green call button, my phone vibrates in my hand. There’s a name I never expected to see again on the call screen.
Taylor.
My hands shake and my thumb fails to flick the ‘answer’ button twice, but I finally manage it.
“Meet me at House of Stars tomorrow after work.”
Maybe nothing can ever truly be destroyed beyond repair.
Chapter Seventeen: Taylor
Is it a gamble? Yes. But isn’t everything?
I’m done analyzing Brandon like one of my accounting spreadsheets. He said something he regrets and I overreacted. The simplicity actually numbs my mind.
Not that I haven’t thought about what he said yesterday. I’ve replayed every word, every movement, every emotion a hundred, a thousand, a million times, and each new rendition only makes me regret I waited so long to call him and didn’t just make up my mind on the spot.
When did I become so indecisive? I’ve never, ever had this problem before, and it’s an ill-fitting look and feel for me.
Maybe that’s a sign. I’m reacting differently to this relationship than I ever have before, and all my other attempts at getting close to someone ended in disaster. The more differences I can name between me and Brandon and the trysts of my past, the better, because I think I finally understand that he isn’t a fleeting passion.
I want this to last. I want to feel this way all the time. I want Brandon. Anyway, I made a promise, and the means to keep it is draped over my arm.
Gemma gives the hanger and dust cover a curious glance as we take the elevator down to meet Cullen. “What’s that for? Going somewhere after work?”
“Maybe.”
For once in her life, Gemma doesn’t press, but maybe that’s because her face lights up at the sight of Cullen.
I’m not a fool. I know Brandon was avoiding me yesterday. Today, he makes every effort to be somewhere within my sight, and I make sure to give him a smile whenever our eyes meet. This is my way of apologizing for the cliffhanger of last night’s drama and promising him something has changed—that I’ve changed.
He’s still in sight when my workday ends, and I get the feeling he’s only pretending to be busy.
“Are you sure you don’t need a ride?” Cullen asks. He’s standing with his arm around Gemma’s waist.
“Positive,” I tell him. Why am I lightheaded?
“Okay. Good work today.” He smiles. Gemma gives me a thumbs up as they turn away, and I roll my eyes.
I head into the staff rooms and shut the door of the one that will be Cullen’s office. With shaking hands, I change, folding my business clothes formally and neatly.
When I leave the room, Brandon is standing at the bar. One look at me, and his face shows he’s blown away.
“I promised,” I say, twirling neatly in my favorite blue dress. My stilettos tap against the wooden floors, and the sound echoes in the silent club.
“You promised,” he agrees, his voice soft as though he fears I might disappear before him.
“I want to show you something.” I take his hand and lead him through House of Stars. We pass the door that leads to the screen room, one that I know he hasn’t worked on, and I open another door, pulling lightly so he goes inside first.
“Wow.” That was how I felt when I first saw this room.
A round, raised stage about ten feet wide is set into one side of the room. A metallic, painted jungle surrounds the stage, glinting green with the flat, leafy blades of palms, still, hanging vines, and fronds of ferns and undergrowth. The pole in the center of the stage gleams, but not with silver—with a luxurious brown, just like the painted trees in the background.
I click a button on a remote built into the wall, and a quiet rushing sound breaks the silence. Blue water trickles from hidden pipes in the walls and fills a shallow, two-foot-wide trough that runs around the stage, and two waterfalls splash in unison into the sides of the filling blue stream.
“I realized something,” I say quietly, taking the front of Brandon’s shirt and maneuvering him backwards toward a lush arm chair. The back of his knees knock into it and he sits down, watching as I stride slowly to the stage.
Taking the pole in my hands, I circle it slowly. I pause and reach between my breasts, pulling out my glasses. I put them on, and watch Brandon twitch and chew his bottom lip. I knew the throwback to high-school-Taylor would send him into a frenzy.
The lights dim, leaving only the mood lights behind the metal foliage—the ones that turn me into a water goddess beneath the shifting lights under the canopy of the jungle. The music comes from everywhere, and it’s slow, haunting, and beautiful.
“I thought I needed this.” I turn my gesture into a graceful dip of my entire body, my dress brushing the stage before I curve my spine and rise seductively. “This stage, the adoration, the lifestyle.”
My stiletto hooks around the pole as I spin around it twice. My dress flares out with my change in speed, and for a moment I can’t tell where the blue fabric ends and the falling water begins. “I didn’t understand why I couldn’t dance. After all, I wanted it so badly….”
Brandon’s fighting to stay still, and I can see my beauty mirrored in his face. I’ve found it. The place I belong. The place I can be an accountant and a showgirl and everything else all at once.
“I couldn’t dance for Zinzy and everyone else,” I whisper, my voice one with the splashing of the falls. “I needed someone to dance for. Someone I love.”
Suddenly, Brandon is at my side, taking me into his arms. “And I don’t want to share you.” His voice is low and husky, like the calls of the creatures in the jungle. “I want you to dance only for me.”
He spins me into a dip, supporting my entire body with just one arm as I hover parallel to the floor. His other hand hooks into the soft spot behind my knee as I wrap my leg around his waist.
“Taylor,” he murmurs, tracing gentle circles on my thigh. “You are… everything.”
I know exactly what he means, but I’m too content to open my mouth.
“Everything I ever wanted, or dreamed, and so much more.” He pulls me up into a deep, soul-penetrating
kiss. He has my heart.
Chapter Eighteen: Brandon
“Taylor!” A snappish, authoritative feminine voice calls.
“That’s Isabel—”
I silence her with a kiss, pressing her against the wall with my body. “And she can wait fifteen more seconds.” My lips find hers again. “Or fifteen minutes,” I add.
“Or….” Taylor pulls away slightly and nibbles at her lip, tilting her head just
slightly to the side.
It’s so damn sexy.
“Or… not.” She giggles as she shoves me away from her. “Come on, we only have—” She grabs my wrist and turns my watch toward her to check the time. “Three more hours of work left. Can’t have you walking around with a big something in your pants.”
Hardworking and business-oriented as always. I sigh and hold my hands up in surrender. “Fine, fine.”
Taylor steps back and snatches her notepad off the floor. “And you can expect to be reimbursed for the expenses in—Isabel,” she says with the most genuine affected surprise I’ve ever heard. “I’m just finishing up with Brandon. He had a couple questions.”
Pacified, Isabel drops the stern set of her mouth. “Just come back to the staff rooms when you’re done.” Isabel disappears the way she came.
Taylor falls into my arms, trusting me to catch her, and gives me one more kiss. “See you later,” she whispers.
I watch her until she disappears around the corner.
She’s my sexy accountant, my dancer, and my jungle goddess, and I can’t wait to find out which one she’ll be tonight. Or tomorrow. Or the next day.
Because the days with her will never end, and I can’t wait to spend every single one of them with every side of Taylor. I reach into my pocket and smile as I spin a diamond ring between my fingers.
She really is, everything.
THANK YOU FOR READING, BIG HAMMER
BY RIED REESE!
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