In the Zone (Portland Storm 5)

by Catherine Gayle

  “You weren’t kidding,” she said, and I spun around to see what she was looking at. Right in front of her were all the pictures of Garrett.

  Fucking hell.

  “Kidding about what?” I popped open my beer bottle and gulped down a quarter of it in a heartbeat.

  “Your brother dancing. You didn’t say he was a ballroom dancer.” She moved in closer to one, and then she picked it up off the mantle, holding it closer to her eyes. “What did you say his name is? He looks familiar to me.”

  “Garrett,” I forced out, my mouth dry. “Garrett Burns. You couldn’t have known hi—”

  “Garrett Burns? And his partner was Monica Simpson?” She spun around to stare at me, her eyes dark with some unnamed emotion that couldn’t possibly come close to everything roiling within me. “You’d said his name earlier, but it didn’t register with me then. Not until I saw this. I competed against them in tons of competitions over the years…until he died. I still run into Monica sometimes. Or I did when I was still dancing.”

  I didn’t know what to do. What to say. All I wanted was to disappear and never have to think about all the shit I’d done wrong in this life, but Brie was still holding that picture of my dead brother and staring at me, and I had most of a beer in my hands.

  I downed the rest of it in a single swallow and went back to the fridge for another.

  GARRETT BURNS’S DEATH had washed over the competitive ballroom dancing community like a tsunami pummeling the shore. The intense magnitude of our reactions wasn’t simply because someone so young and talented and promising had died too young, but because he’d taken his own life. They’d said that his brother had found him hanging from a rafter in the garage one day, that Garrett hadn’t shown up to practice with Monica, and he hadn’t answered his phone, so she’d put in a call to have one of his brothers check on him.

  It happened about a year or so before I’d become partners with Val. I’d been competing against Garrett and Monica for half my life, it seemed, with the various guys I’d been paired with before Val had come along. The two of them had been my age, so once we’d reached a certain level in our dancing abilities, we’d always been in the same competitive class. I hadn’t known Garrett, exactly. We’d probably had a few brief conversations in passing at various competitions, and I’d offered halfhearted congratulations when he and Monica had bested my partner and me from time to time. I recalled sitting across from him at a meal once, but we had never been close.

  His death had crushed me, though. I’d felt as if I was suddenly carrying an extra twenty pounds of dismay with me everywhere I went. Once you get up into the upper echelons of competitive ballroom dance, it’s a pretty small world. Everyone knows everyone else. We were all up in one another’s business all the time. Those of us he had left behind all felt as if we’d lost a good friend, and no one had understood why it had happened.

  Garrett Burns had been one of the best ballroom dancers out of Canada to hit the international competitive circuit in eons. He’d been on track to become the best in the world. He and Monica were being offered professional work—paying work—on films and stage and in countless other avenues. He’d had it all. Or at least it had seemed that way on the surface.

  And then he’d ended everything.

  They’d said there wasn’t a letter, that he hadn’t left any explanation for doing what he’d done. He’d hanged himself and left all the people who loved him to try to wrestle with their grief and shock and questions on their own. Which, of course, they would have had to do whether he’d left a letter or not, I supposed. But there’d been nothing at all.

  And now I was standing in his brother’s living room, holding a photo of him. Keith might have been the one who’d found him in the garage that day. Surely the grief I still carried couldn’t begin to compare to his.

  Keith popped the top off another beer bottle and started chugging it almost as quickly as he’d finished off the first one. Apparently I’d discovered the reason he tended to shut down and change the subject whenever I tried to get him to talk about his family.

  I carefully set the photo frame back on his mantle and made sure I’d left it just as I’d found it. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t realize…”

  He took another long draw from the bottle. “I really don’t want to talk about this right now.”

  I got the impression that he really didn’t want to talk about it ever. Clearly he needed to, but pushing him to go there likely wasn’t the best course of action I could take at the moment. I decided to let it go.

  I headed over to join him in the kitchen. “Is that glass of wine still an option?” He was drinking, after all, so I might as well join him. That might make it easier to move us away from that moment of pain and into something easier.

  He eyed me for a long moment, amber fire in his gaze, and then took a glass down from a rack hanging under a cabinet. “Red again?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  He uncorked a new bottle of Chianti and poured some for me, then handed me the glass. “So you’ve been dancing a long time?”

  Back to safer subjects. “Yeah, I started when I was about ten, I think. Mom and Dad still have some video of my first ever recital. It was awful even though I thought I was doing well. I didn’t trust my partner to lead back then, and so I was pushing him all around the dance floor and anticipating every move too much. How long have you been playing hockey?”

  “My mother tells me I started skating before I could walk. I don’t remember ever not playing hockey.” He took his beer and headed into the living room, so I followed. I took a seat on a big, plush couch near him but not quite touching. He edged closer. “She’s got pictures of me when I couldn’t have been more than two years old, decked out in full hockey gear. My father flooded the backyard every winter to make a rink for us, and I’d go out there and skate until it got too cold to stay out any longer.”

  “Sounds familiar. I used to dance until my feet were covered in blisters, maybe even bleeding, but I couldn’t make myself stop.”

  “When you really love something like that,” he said, “it’s hard not to let it turn into an obsession. I wouldn’t change it. That’s how I got into the NHL.”

  I took a sip of my wine and studied him. He was starting to relax a little, no longer as tense as he’d been after we’d talked about Garrett. He wasn’t drinking his beer as fast anymore, either—a sip here and there.

  “So why did you come to my class with Cole?” I asked, hoping his teammate was a safe subject. At least it wasn’t anything to do with his family.

  “Colesy?” Keith grinned. He leaned back against the cushions and tucked one of his legs up under him, his foot dangling over the edge of the cushion. “He’s new to the team this year. Doesn’t really hang out with a lot of the guys much. I don’t want him to feel left out, so I try to do things with him one-on-one.”

  “That’s it? Nothing to do with dance? Just because you want to hang out with Cole?”

  “Yeah. I don’t want anyone to feel left out. It’s not good for team bonding and morale, and I’m one of the assistant captains. I have to be sure we’re all working together as a team, not simply a bunch of disparate parts that the GM threw together.”

  “That was really nice of you, coming to class with him. I can’t imagine how the rest of your teammates might react if they knew. Cole seems to think it’s better to keep it private, based on what he’s told me.” Plus, I couldn’t imagine it had been easy for Keith to come to the studio, considering it had to have brought up all sorts of memories that we both knew he’d rather not face.

  “I’m a nice guy,” he said, winking at me. Yeah, he was definitely starting to loosen up again, going back to his flirtatious ways. “I do nice things.”

  “Never said you weren’t.”

  “Tell me about the asshole who told you that you weren’t good enough for him. How’d you end up with him?”

  I sighed, wishing I knew a way to ease him into talking
to me the way he wanted me to talk to him. But I didn’t have anything to hide. “Val started out as my partner. We had insane chemistry on the dance floor right from the start, and it kind of naturally evolved into something more.”

  “Val,” Keith murmured, sipping from his beer. “Russian? Like Valentin or Valeri?”

  “Valentin Nazarov. And yes, he’s Russian.”

  “I used to have a Russian teammate in college, Sergei Moskvin, who treated all of his girlfriends like shit, like he was better than them. Granted, that was a coincidence, but I had a hard time not busting him in the balls one time when he crossed the line, yelling at one of them.” One of Keith’s hands drifted closer to me, and he let his fingertips tickle the top of my knee and lower thigh. “I called the cops on his ass. I was worried he was going to hit her. That girl deserved so much better. No one deserves to be treated that way.”

  “That’s part of the Russian culture. Not violence, of course, but the machismo. They expect their men to be very domineering. It tends to work well in ballroom dance because the man is expected to take control on the floor.”

  “Doesn’t make it right. Especially not in a relationship.”

  “No, it doesn’t.” I had to hold back a contented sigh when Keith’s touch grew bolder. My body craved his touch. We may have only spent one night together, but now that his hand was on me, all I could think of was being with him again. “It wasn’t like that with Val at first,” I forced out, unwilling to give in to my desires so soon. “He was a true romantic, bringing me flowers, and writing me poetry in Russian, and wanting to be with me all the time. We moved in together before long, and then we were spending almost all our time together, and then he wanted to move to Providence to work with a new instructor.”

  “And then you started having health issues.”

  “And then I started having health issues,” I repeated.

  “What did he do when you started gaining weight?” He kept slipping his hand farther up my thigh, an inch at a time.

  I shrugged, trying not to let all my old hurts come to the surface. “At first, he acted like it was no big deal. He knew how I ate, and he knew how hard I worked out, so logically he should know that it wasn’t anything that was my fault. But the more weight I gained, the less understanding he was about it. The doctors weren’t able to find a fix right away, and even when they did I didn’t lose much weight, so he started blaming me for it.”

  “Did he hurt you?”

  I shot my gaze up to meet his because of the fierce tone of his voice. That fire was back, only it wasn’t passion or lust burning in his eyes this time. There was no hiding his anger—only unlike Val, I knew Keith wasn’t angry with me. He was angry with Val, or the situation, or Lord only knew what…but not me.

  “Physically, no,” I said, weighing everything I said carefully. “Val only used words to hurt me.” The things he’d said to me had been more than adequate to accomplish the job. There’d been no need for him to inflict any other damage on me. In the year and a half since he’d left me, I’d come to realize that the old saying was a lie. Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me. No one and nothing had ever hurt me as deeply or as permanently as Val, and he’d never laid a finger on me in anger. Hell, in the end, he’d hardly touched me at all.

  But Keith touched me now, lifting his other hand to gently brush the pad of his thumb along my cheek and jaw. “You swear he never hit you?”

  “I wouldn’t lie about something like that.”

  “No.” He cocked a grin. “Just your name. And your job—”

  “I am a teacher,” I interrupted.

  Keith’s smile turned sinfully sexy. “You are a teacher.” He let his hand drop back down to his lap and finished off his beer, setting the empty bottle on the coffee table next to him. “I’m going to be totally upfront with you, Brie. I want this to be more than simply tonight. I want to show you what it can be like to have a nice guy in your life. A man who isn’t going to beat you up with words and make you think you’re not good enough.”

  I wanted that, too, but I wasn’t so sure he was in any shape to be involved in a relationship—not a meaningful one, at least—and I didn’t know what it would take for him to get there. And was I ready for a relationship that meant more than one night? I didn’t know, but Keith Burns might be even more messed up in the head than me, and that was saying something after all that Val had put me through.

  That didn’t stop me from finishing my wine, setting the glass next to his bottle, and sliding closer to him on the couch. It didn’t stop me from tugging his head down toward mine until our lips met. It definitely didn’t stop me from tracing my tongue along the seam of his lips until he opened and I could take the kiss where I wanted it to go. The tastes of wine and beer mingled in our mouths as he groaned and angled me back until he was leaning over me, covering me, steadying me.

  No, it didn’t stop me from doing any of the things that I shouldn’t have done.

  And at the moment, I couldn’t make myself mind, because right here, and right now, this man wanted me just as I was. Maybe if I allowed this to happen, I could start to understand why anyone would want me.

  I’D NEVER HAD sex while standing up in a shower before. Not until now. Keith had the biggest bathroom I’d ever seen, with a giant walk-in shower and one of those rainmaker showerheads that kept the water pouring down over you the whole time you stood in it. Even with all the water and the slick footing, I wasn’t worried about slipping and falling. He’d worked me over in such a way that I wasn’t capable of worrying about anything now. All I knew was sensation—the rasp of his tongue, the heat of his touch, the fullness of him inside me. And the vibrating. Oh, wow, the vibrating.

  I was on my toes on one foot, the other leg raised up over one of his arms supporting me, both my arms wrapped tight around his neck. And I was about to come. Again. He’d already taken me to orgasm with his charmed hands once on his couch, before we’d made our way to the bathroom.

  That was when he’d really thrown me for a loop. He didn’t just put on a condom before we’d stepped under the spray; he’d taken out a pocket vibrator, removed it from its packaging, and brought it into the shower with us.

  “I’m not so sure about that,” I’d said warily. “I’m already so sensitive.” Too sensitive. Painfully sensitive. But then he’d asked me to trust him, and I’d agreed, and now here we were.

  That little toy packed some serious wallop. He held it between us, and every time he thrust, it buzzed even more firmly against my clitoris. Even though I’d already experienced one orgasm tonight, I knew I was on the verge of an even bigger one, maybe the biggest I’d ever had in my life. The toes on my free foot twisted into a claw from the intensity, and I couldn’t seem to take a breath. My whole body tensed. Clenched. Ached.

  “Fuck, Brie,” he said, his mouth beside my ear. “You’re even tighter than I remembered.” He thrust into me again and held still, letting the vibrator go to town on me. He moved his hand to my hip, holding me in place, grinding his hips into mine.

  Tight. Filled. Over-sensitized. About to explode.

  I couldn’t say anything at all since I was still trying to force air in and out of my lungs. Finally, I was able to draw in a gasping breath, and I let it out again with a whimper as everything that had been so tight and tense and desperate within me fractured.

  Then he was moving again, slow and steady, as though he was trying to build me up for more. “You’re so beautiful when you come. Your eyes turn almost pitch black and so fierce. Has anyone ever told you that?”

  I shook my head and held on. It was all I could do to remain upright.

  LATER, WE MADE it to his bed. We didn’t end up lying down and going to sleep, however. The dogs tried to follow us in, but he shooed them out and shut the door, carrying another glass of wine for me and a bottle of beer for himself. We lay there for over an hour, naked, sipping, talking, and touching casually. Every time he looked at me too lon
g, too intensely, I lost all my nerve and tried to cover myself by shifting my position on the bed or angling my arms in a different way, and then I tried to deflect his attention with something else.

  I asked him about scars I found on his body—an appendectomy from a few years before, and a couple of knee surgeries, all related to hockey injuries. His fingers found the scar on my hip from a similar war wound, as he had described his—an injury brought on from my dancing—and he’d kissed me there on the white puckered skin. I turned myself away.

  With his fingers and tongue, he traced the lines of the stretch marks that littered my belly, and he kissed them until I shoved him by the shoulders, my face burning from embarrassment as much as from desire. I rolled over, giving him more of my back.

  “Do you have classes to teach tomorrow?” He touched my arm, a finger trailing whisper-soft over my skin. He didn’t try to turn me around again, but he wasn’t backing off, either.

  “Most of the afternoon and some evening classes, too,” I replied.

  “Damn.”

  “Why damn?”

  He let his hand settle on my hip, gentle but firm. I could tell the fact that I wasn’t facing him bothered him more than he was making out. He wouldn’t force me, though. That much was clear.

  “I wanted you to come to my game,” he said after a moment.

  “Oh.” We’d only been on one date, though. I wasn’t ready for that. I wasn’t his girlfriend. Yes, I was sleeping with him—although how much sleep was involved was debatable—but he didn’t seem ready for more even though he wanted more. I didn’t know if I was, either, if I couldn’t handle him looking at me. Touching me was one thing, but looking was something else entirely.

  “Maybe next time then,” he said, and I nodded even though I wasn’t so sure we were going to make that leap anytime soon. He put a little pressure on my hip, rolling me until I was on my back, and he propped his head up on his hand. His eyes wandered over my body so much that I was antsy to pull the sheet up and cover myself, to turn out the lights, to grab my clothes off the floor and put them on again. Something. Just when I was about to act on my nerves, he took my hand in his, that simple touch as intimate as any between us until now. “Don’t hide from me,” he pleaded. “Let me look at you.”