by Lynn LaFleur
“What do you think? Do I make the grade?” he whispered in her ear.
“Straight As so far.”
Too soon the dance ended. Instead of leaving the floor like the other couples, Brett surprised Abby by keeping his arm around her waist and staying put. She didn’t object. Dancing was one of her favorite forms of foreplay.
She exhaled a contented sigh, her first relaxed breath of the day. Dancing always had that effect on her.
Dancing in the arms of a man she craved, made all those feelings that much stronger.
Until the orchestra struck the first note of the next piece, Villoldo’s timeless tango, Kiss of Fire.
She went rigid in Brett’s embrace. “This is a tango,” she said, her tone sharper than she wanted. She tried to pull away from him. “Surely you don’t want to—“
“Surely I do,” he mimicked her. “Hush now. Try to follow.”
Try to follow? She could tango circles around him. She only hoped he didn’t make complete fools of them. “Lead on.”
To her surprise—no, more like shock—he straightened his spine, rose on the balls of his feet and pulled her to his side, turning her to face him in the classic tango embrace.
Too stunned to do more than react, Abby placed her left hand on his upper arm, above his biceps, raised up on tiptoes until her cheek was within an inch of touching his and allowed him to lead her into la Caminata, the tango walk.
Each new step surprised her more than the last. There couldn’t be another man in Seaside able to hold his own in the Argentine Tango.
Brett matched her step for step, led her through the intricate footwork and into the high extensions. Now she understood why Madame had insisted upon the slash in the skirt of her dress. Without it, she couldn’t have raised her leg beyond her knee.
She was breathless from more than the dance. Brett had listened when she’d told him about the tango club. Not only listened, but remembered and carried the message to Madame. But when, and how?
And where had he learned to tango? The dance took days to learn, weeks of dancing with a new partner to build the trust and synchronicity they’d found in a few minutes. It had to be kismet.
When the dance ended, he swept her up into his arms. She collapsed against him. Both of them struggled for breath, and their skin was covered with the sheen of perspiration. That didn’t stop him from spinning her into a deep bow at the applause from the guests at ringside, and those who watched from the balcony.
“You’re incredible,” she said during their last bow. She knew they’d made a dozen mistakes. Brett must have known it too, but it had been the most fun she’d had in months.
He didn’t comment, but drew her into another dance. They tangoed twice more, alone and in the spotlight. Each step came more easily, each leg kick a little higher, their bodies closer, their passion building. A sensuous dance, every beat sent prickles through Abby. Now the steps were coming more naturally, muscle memory kicking in where she’d had to concentrate when they began. Their bodies were so in sync, if one misstepped, the other compensated. In those few minutes, they’d managed to master something far more important than the precise footwork and high leg extensions. They’d found el alma del tango—the soul of the tango.
By the end of their third dance, both were ready to wave the white flag.
“That was unbelievable,” Abby said between gulps for air and the twinge in her side. Her legs ached where the muscles were tightening in her calves.
At their table, Brett held her chair then dropped into his. “Don’t ask me to do it again tonight, or you’ll have to call the paramedics.”
Their captain, who appeared out of nowhere, waited for them to be seated before he refreshed their champagne. Abby clicked the edge of Brett’s glass with hers. “To shared gurneys.”
“Here, here.”
After a sip, she put hers down. “Okay, the truth and nothing but. Where did you learn to dance like that? Not on a football field.”
He took another long sip, more like a gulp, then mopped the beads of perspiration from his brow. “You mean ex-jocks aren’t supposed to dance?”
She ran her finger across his knuckles. “You’re not an ex-jock to me,” she said. “You’re a gifted dancer who happened to throw a football.”
“Dancing, football, they’re the same.” His tone was off-handed, yet she saw the pleasure he’d taken from her compliment. “If you practice anything long enough you can do it well.”
Was that genuine humility? This was the second time he’d surprised her.
Abby leaned back in her chair. “You’ll get no argument from me about practice.” She raised her glass to her lips. “But you can’t practice something you haven’t learned. That’s the story I want to hear. You didn’t learn to tango reading the back of a cereal box.”
She saw the answer in the way his expression changed. Not a drop of innocence in sight.
“Sylvina, my sister’s suitemate at Duke, came from Buenos Aires. Melanie is renowned for her two left feet but somehow Sylvina managed to teach her to tango. Besides her two left feet, my sis always has to be in charge.”
“Was she a quarterback too?”
“Nope, just captain of her soccer, basketball and field hockey teams.”
“Got it.”
“Sylvina spent Christmas with us one year. Mel insisted she teach me the dance so she’d have a permanent practice partner once Sylvina went home.”
“And you didn’t mind?”
“I was sixteen, big for my age, but still at the bottom of the Kincade hierarchy. My sis was setting academic and athletic records at Duke. Even with regular visits from NFL scouts, I had to earn my way up that ladder.” He smiled into his glass of champagne, obviously remembering something pleasurable.
“You don’t look like you minded too much.”
He chuckled. “I’d had a crush on Sylvina from the day I met her. That Christmas, I got to know her really well.”
“A hands-on instructor?”
“Let’s just say that Sylvina had a special way of rewarding a pupil who studied hard.”
Hard being the operative word. “And that’s when you discovered a ‘good dancer‘ equaled ‘babe magnet’.”
Brett grinned. “Pretty much. I also had a coach in college who made us take dance—ballet, no less. Thought it would enhance our moves on the field. I can do a jete and pas de chat that’ll knock your socks off.”
Abby laughed out loud at the vision of Brett leaping sideways in a pas a chat. “So many Bretts,” she said. “Let’s see, there’s Tango Brett, Practice Brett and Ballet Brett.” She shook her head. “Doesn’t have quite the same ring as Bullet Brett.”
He leaned back in his chair and raised an eyebrow that said much more than his words. “There’s another Brett you haven’t met yet either.”
Her breath caught. “Um…I think I might have met him last night?”
“That was an appetizer. Tonight’s the main course.”
Her throat went dry while his gaze sizzled over her.
He reached for her hand, raised her fingertips to his lips and smiled. “I’ll be anyone you want me to be, just don’t ask me to wear a tutu.”
She leaned across the table until their lips were only inches apart. “Tonight’s not about what you’re wearing—it’s about what you’re taking off.”
Chapter Eight
With another snap of his fingers, Costas summoned the motorized carriage that waited to take Brett and Abby to their dining spa. Their driver, a man who introduced himself as Raoul, spoke with a charming accent.
The carriage reminded Abby of the ones ridden in by Princesses and their Prince Charmings in the fairy tales her mother had read to her. Smaller, less pretentious and without a team of white horses, but with its pumpkin-shaped design, the soft leather seats and silken fabric accessories, it had a definite royal feel. Each new thing she discovered—whether the elegance of the silk against her fingertips, the softness of the leather, the frag
rance of wildflowers, the way her hand fit perfectly into Brett’s—all of it told her a magical night awaited her.
“Breathe in the scent of redwoods, Abby, and the ocean.”
“I’m awed. Do you think my aunt even knows a place like this exists in Seaside?”
Brett answered with an odd look and a chuckle. “Trust me, she knows.”
Abby thought about asking why Brett was so sure, but then she caught a fresh glimpse of the hills surrounding them and the beaches several hundred feet below. Their path turned, circling back and forth between views of the ocean and the stands of pine and fir. From all sides, she was overwhelmed by the perfume of the wildflowers, the beauty of the moon reflecting off the water, and more stars than she’d count in a lifetime.
After they’d stepped outside the ballroom, she’d shivered at the first bite of the cool night air against her skin. Brett had immediately put his arm around her. In the carriage he continued to hold her close. As they began their descent, the foliage grew denser, adding warmth to the air. Still Brett held tightly to Abby, like he feared she’d disappear into the fog if he let go.
Abby remembered the magazine’s review said Whispers had several dining spas. She knew it had to be true, but they were camouflaged so cleverly they blended into the mountainside, the trees and the foliage.
“It’s so lovely here, Brett,” she said, and dropped her hand into his lap. It seemed such a comfortable and natural thing to do. Beneath her fingertips, the muscle in his thigh tensed for a second. Fabulous. She wasn’t the only one primed and ready for their upcoming adventure. “Where are the spas?” she asked. “I know there has to be more than one.”
“They’re all around us.” He ran his hand gently along the inside of her forearm and dropped a light kiss on her shoulder. She shivered from more than the night air. “Whispers started with five, and now there’s fifteen. They’re designed to ensure complete privacy.”
She closed her eyes to enjoy his touch even more. Through a contented sigh, she asked, “How much farther to ours?”
He kissed her temple. “Can’t wait to get started?”
She opened her eyes and looked up at him. With bits of moonlight streaming through the trees, he looked so handsome. She thought her heart might burst with longing. “Do I really need to answer that?”
He whispered the words into her hair, his voice raspy, urgent. “Only a few minutes more.”
As it turned out, less. At the next bend in the road, Raoul slowed the carriage and turned onto a cobbled lane that wound deeper into the forest. At last she saw the spa. The reporter had said his had been a desert oasis worthy of a sheik. In her wildest fantasies, she’d never dreamed something like this.
“Tonight you’re my princess,” Brett whispered. “I chose this one especially for us.”
“Brett, I-I don’t… I’m speechless.”
Peeking out from behind a blanket of scarlet bougainvillea, Chinese wisteria and a variety of tropical flowers, stood a castle, about the size of an airplane hanger, complete with turrets, a drawbridge and a moat.
The wind shifted at that moment, and the heavy perfume of gardenias and forsythia growing next to wild orchids drifted on the ocean breezes in an ever-changing bouquet.
They had descended low enough that at this elevation, Abby heard the tide crashing against the shore. A few yards ahead of where Raoul slowed, and sheltered from view by the trees and hedges, two men waited in a golf cart. As soon as Raoul brought the carriage to a full stop, they piled out of their vehicle and walked quickly toward Abby and Brett. They were dressed in the same type of uniform as the wait staff in the restaurant.
“This is Étienne and D’tore,” Raoul said. “Together, we will tend to all of your wishes.”
They nodded to Abby and shook Brett’s hand.
“This way, please.” Raoul pointed toward the drawbridge and stepped aside so Abby and Brett could walk ahead of them.
From the moment the sole of her slipper struck against the worn metal of the drawbridge, Abby’s soul soared. All the butterflies that set her tummy quivering on and off throughout the day evaporated. Maybe fairy godmothers really existed. Any doubts Abby brought with her, any anxieties about what tomorrow held, disappeared. Even if for one night only, tonight she’d check her inhibitions at the castle gate. Brett promised to fulfill her fantasies. Poor lamb, he had no idea what he was getting into.
Inside, Abby found a mini-version of a castle in the best Anglo-Saxon/Middle Ages tradition. Stone walls hung with tapestries, crossed swords, an authentic-looking coat of arms, and ancient paintings. The flagstone floor looked ancient too and smooth enough to dance on barefoot.
To Abby’s right, a fireplace large enough to hold a small choir blazed with flames leaping and wood crackling. Plank wood doors and curved arches led heaven only knew where. Blazing torches hung in sconces, the only things that lighted the room. At the far end, she saw massive double doors propped open wide. The moon shined in through the misty night.
To her left, Abby saw a carved stone stairway leading to an upper floor.
Sparsely furnished, the great room would easily hold a crowd of two hundred.
In the middle of the room, and most definitely the focal point, Abby saw a cluster of deep couches—or whatever the medieval lords lounged on—each at least six feet long, four feet deep, and close enough to the floor that if one of them rolled off in a stupor, he didn’t have far to fall. The lounges had been pushed close and together formed a playpen on their own, rimming the edge of a wide, rough-hewn wooden table. Fresh fruit spilled out of a pewter bowl, rounds of bread had already been set out in baskets, next to a crescent-shaped collection of covered pewter bowls. Two stacks of china plates, oddly delicate compared to the rest of room, with small sterling forks and spoons, faced the center lounge.
“If it pleases you, we shall serve dinner here.” Raoul pointed to the table. “When you are ready. Unless the mist clears and you’d prefer to dine among the turrets.”
“We’ll decide later,” Brett said. To Abby he whispered, “Wait until you see the view.”
With his arm draped around her shoulder, Brett steered Abby toward the opened doors at the far end of the room. Outside the tide crashed against the shore, and there was the sound of a slow, steady stream of falling water.
Abby had found herself speechless on only a few occasions. This was definitely one of them. Their spa had been hidden from the road by a thick forest, yet the back stood open to the beach and ocean below. How many people walked by or moored their boats with the back of the castle in plain sight? Or did its gray stone walls blend so cleverly into the side of the mountain, it stood unnoticed?
A huge in-ground fire pit blazed and threw enough heat to make the outdoors comfortable no matter what time of year. Almost as if someone had flipped a switch, the mist had cleared in the few minutes they’d been inside the castle. The moon shone fully, a gull cried in the distance to a companion who called back, and below the tide rolled in slowly before slamming against the rocks. In the distance, two yachts at anchor bobbled gently.
“We’re only a hundred feet above the shore,” Brett said. “There’s a lovely garden to play in by day, but I wouldn’t risk the steps at night.”
An understatement, Abby thought. A hundred feet meant a hundred slippery stone steps.
Abby turned and found the source of the falling water. Behind her, cascading down the side of the mountain, a narrow stream snaked its way along a crevice she guessed began at the top of the mountain.
“Where does that go?”
“You can’t see it in the dark, but there’s a natural pool in the garden leading to an underground stream.”
Abby left Brett’s side and walked to the crenellated walls built with merlons that stood no more than three feet in height and wide enough for two people to stand in them comfortably and enjoy an unobstructed view of the ocean.
Behind them, flames leapt out of a fire pit and high into the night.
“Do you think the people on the boats can see us?” she asked.
“Probably the tips of the flames. There’s not much light behind us.” He pointed to a telescope. “Take a look. See if anyone’s noticed.”
Indeed someone had, she soon discovered. A party of six sat on the foredeck of one of the yachts, drinking champagne. One stood at a telescope looking back at her. On a whim, she raised her arm and waved. He returned her wave by raising a bottle.
The boat near them looked deserted.
“I don’t think I’d ever tire of this view.” She thought about her flat in Manhattan, with the neighboring building little more than an arm’s reach away.
She offered the telescope to Brett. Instead of looking through it, Brett rested his hands on her shoulders until she faced him. Then he tilted her chin with a gentle forefinger, forcing her to look into his eyes. “Then stay.” He whisked his thumb across her bottom lip. “Unless, someone special’s waiting for you.”
Abby smiled. “That’s a discussion for another day, not tonight.” She walked back to the opening and stepped up into the merlon. “Thanks to you, Brett, I’m living a fairy tale in the middle of a land I didn’t know existed.” She wasn’t exaggerating. She stood in the battlement of a castle, dressed in silk and satin, teetering on four-inch stiletto heels, with a tomato red thong hidden beneath her dress. It was madness—wonderful, delicious madness. And it made her love Brett that much more.
There, she’d admitted it. The tune that had been playing in her heart since the moment she saw him standing in the doorway of Love In Bloom. She loved Brett Kincade. “Tell me that I’m not dreaming, Brett. Tell me this is real.”
His smile deepened into something so joyful she would have felt it across the expanse of the castle’s great room. For a second she dared hope that smile said more than the fantasy was real. That they were real too.
“Excuse me, señor. Your first course is ready.” Raoul, whom Abby had forgotten, stepped out of the shadows. “Will there be anything else for now?”