Dance With Me: A Dance Off Novel

by Alexis Daria

  When he claimed he was serious and suggested they hop a flight to Vegas, she took that to mean he was drunk enough to drown and dragged him out of the water. The asshole had laughed and laughed, then climbed into his bed soaking wet.

  It was easier when she knew the rules. Easier when she knew exactly where they stood, and what they were to each other. Most of the time, they got drunk at a club, or he showed up at her apartment, or invited her over here. They screwed, she left, and she didn’t hear from him for a while.

  She’d slept in this bed dozens of times before. She trusted him—on that level, at least. But with her heart?

  No way. That was a whole other story.

  Sometimes, it was like she got off on the tension, the difference between going so far with him physically, while completely hiding her feelings. It was like a game with high stakes, her very survival depending on how little she could reveal to him, how deeply she could hide her desire for more.

  It wasn’t something that had been a problem with other men. With Jackson García, they’d had fun in bed, and made small talk about their careers. Jackson wasn’t a big star yet, but he was easy-going, and their connection hadn’t deepened much beyond sex and laughing at internet memes.

  Her old arrangement with action movie star Rocky Lim hadn’t been too different from what she’d had with Jackson. They had a good time together, and she went with him to red carpet events, but when it came down to it, they were just friends. It was easy to keep their conversations on the surface. She didn’t worry about revealing too much. Rocky was back in London now, but he still texted her sometimes. They’d bonded over the British period drama Carlton House, and used to watch episodes in bed together. Whenever he passed a landmark she’d recognize, he snapped a picture and sent it to her. It was sweet, but love? No. And she hadn’t wanted it to be. She hadn’t cared enough.

  She did want more from Dimitri, and the admission was like a sickness inside her. Sure, he was acting the part of the caring beau now, but that was decency, not love. He didn’t mind her staying here because it meant easy ass for him. Hell, he probably felt bad for her. Poor Natasha, no money and nowhere to live. She’d made that rule about no sex, and he must have known she wasn’t going to stick to it. He knew all her weaknesses.

  She didn’t know what to make of Dimitri’s insistence on questioning her about Jackson. He was always intense, but that had been weird, even for him. They didn’t talk about the other people they saw. After her injury, it hadn’t come up again. And what the hell was his problem with Kevin? She’d heard the two of them shouting in the driveway, but couldn’t make out what they’d said.

  One thing was sure. She had to get out of this “playing house” situation. It would look terrible if she were caught living with one of the show’s judges. At least before, she’d convinced herself she was a guest. She had a different bedroom, even her own bathroom, and they weren’t banging. Now?

  She looked over at him again, barely able to make out the curve of his face where it was buried in the pillow.

  Now, she was sleeping in his bed, her toiletries had been moved into his bathroom, and she’d broken the “no sex” rule. She’d never lived with a guy, but this seemed pretty close to it. She even had a spot in the garage.

  Her mother’s words drifted back to her. You can’t rely on men.

  Eventually, Dimitri would tire of her. His offer to let her stay was impulsive, made in the moment because he saw her desperation. Nothing more. Maybe he was getting caught up in playing house with her, maybe he liked having available sex, or maybe he just liked her cooking. Who knew? But there was no chance in hell that what he’d said was true.

  He didn’t love her.

  The certainty of the thought fell on her like a lead blanket, weighing her down. As long as she held on to that, she could keep her heart and her feelings locked up tight, and get through this mess. She’d come out the other side intact, and go back to her life as it was. This time, she’d take care of herself. She wouldn’t rely on anyone. Not Gina, not Dimitri, certainly not her mother.

  There. With that settled, she closed her eyes. The bed was comfortable, and the pain in her ankle had dulled. Dimitri was right, damn him. She did sleep better in his bed. There was nothing in the way of drifting off into a deep, restful sleep.

  Except now she had to pee.

  She breathed deeply and tried to go back to sleep, but now that she was awake, her bladder wasn’t having it. Get up, it urged her. Vete para el baño.

  Puñeta. She was going to have to get up.

  Moving as quietly as she could so as not to wake Dimitri, she pushed the sheet off her and lowered her feet to the floor. She still couldn’t put much weight on her right foot, and she didn’t know where the crutches were, but she could lean on the wall and furniture while she hobbled to the master bathroom.

  In the dark. Without her glasses. This was a great idea.

  Still, it was fewer steps than the hall bathroom.

  She was wincing by the time she made it to the toilet stall in the master bath. When she was done and opened the door to step out, Dimitri was waiting for her, squinting in the light from the stall and looking sexy and sleep-rumpled in nothing but navy blue briefs.

  Her heart gave a lurch. Her blood burned for him. But self-preservation kicked in, and the walls around her heart slammed down.

  You can’t rely on him, a little voice whispered through her mind. Resist him.

  When he murmured her name and reached for her, she jerked back. And because it was the middle of the night and she was tired and emotionally wrought, she forgot all about her stupid ankle and put her full weight on it.

  22

  Natasha didn’t scream, but from the way she gasped and grimaced, Dimitri knew it had to hurt. He leaped to pull her into his arms, taking the weight off her feet.

  “What are you doing, Tasha?” He cradled her close. “Why are you walking around without crutches? You should have woken me up.”

  “Put me down,” she demanded in a firm voice.

  “Kroshka, I’m too tired to argue with you about this. Come back to bed.” He carried her through the bathroom, holding her with care, but she struggled.

  “Damn it, Macho, I said put me down.”

  With a sigh, Dimitri sat on the edge of the jacuzzi and cuddled her in his lap. She squirmed, trying to get away from him, so he set her beside him on the wide lip of the tub but kept her injured ankle elevated across his lap.

  Ignoring her glare, he unwrapped the bandages and skimmed his fingers gently over the fading bruises. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  She was breathing hard. “Dimitri, I need you to stop doing this.”

  “Doing what?” With slow, methodical movements, he wrapped her ankle again. They’d ramp up the light physical therapy exercises tomorrow, to make sure her ankle healed right. “Caring about you?”

  “Yes.”

  He shook his head. “Don’t be silly.” He was too tired for this conversation. He’d stayed up late, flipping through his “Idea Book,” as it was labeled on the front in big block letters written in permanent black marker. When he’d woken to find her side of the bed empty, he’d gone looking for her. The crutches were still in the living room—his fault, for not thinking to bring them into the bedroom—and he’d worried she’d hurt herself. And then she had.

  “There’s no need for it,” she continued.

  “For what?” He yawned.

  “For you to care about me. I don’t need it.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Everyone needs someone to care about them. And I’m good at it.”

  “You never cared about me before.”

  At that nonsense, he pinned her with a hard look. “I have always cared about you.”

  She shrugged. “You’ve never shown it. Why should I believe you?”

  Damn it. She was right. “I’m trying to show you now.”

  “It doesn’t matter anyway,” she muttered, looking away from him. />
  “Why not?”

  And then, to his intense horror, her breathing hitched. His heart broke for her, and he crooned her name as he pulled her into his lap.

  She put up a short struggle, but when he tightened his arms around her, she laid her head on his shoulder and let the tears come.

  These weren’t like before, when she had cried on the sofa. Those tears had been more feeling-sorry-for-myself tears. These spoke of deep inner pain, strumming answering vibrations of his own fears within him.

  She wiped at her eyes. “Will you please just go back to bed and leave me the hell alone?”

  “No.” He rested his cheek on her head and rocked her. “You’re going to let me care about you.”

  “You shouldn’t.”

  “Why?”

  She was quiet for a while. “Because I don’t deserve it.”

  He sighed. “That’s bullshit.”

  She shook her head, her hair sliding against his chin. “It’s true. I’m a mess.” Her body shook harder, and she sobbed out the words. “I’m useless. I can’t get my life in order. Can’t take care of myself. I’ve failed at everything. It’s all going to fall apart.”

  “That’s not true,” he murmured, dropping kisses onto her head. “You’re going through a rough patch. It happens. We’ll get through it.”

  “There’s no we, Dimitri. It’s just me. Alone. And this is it. The end.”

  He shifted her so he could look at her face. Her eyes were red and puffy, but even more alarming was the desolation in her expression. She was giving up.

  “I’m going to lose my job, either because of my ankle or because I haven’t been able to work enough to make the money to move out on my own. When that happens, I’ll lose my main source of income, and that’ll be it. I can’t stick around LA imposing on people. I’ll have to go back to New York. Back h-home.”

  Fresh sobs wracked her frame, and he held on, gritting his teeth against the onslaught. He wanted to make it right. He wanted to fix everything for her. But she wouldn’t let him. So, he just held her and tried to show her without words that he was here for her, however she needed.

  After a few minutes, she sniffled and struggled to speak, gasping the words out.

  “And what then? What if this gets worse?” She gestured at her ankle, now resting on the edge of the massive tub. “All I know how to do is dance, and who’s going to hire me for choreography gigs? I’ll be nothing, nadie. And then she’ll be right.”

  Her sobs strengthened, and it was difficult to follow her rapid-fire verbal spiral into sadness, but he latched on to the last thing she said. “Who will be right?”

  He almost missed it, so light were the words. But he was fully awake now, and listening closely.

  “My mother.”

  Ah. He chewed that over, soothing her with soft caresses. When it her sobs quieted, he asked, “What will she be right about?”

  She hiccupped. “That I’m a failure.”

  “How, exactly?”

  “Nothing I’ve done has ever been good enough for her. Most of the time, she couldn’t even be bothered to come to my shows. And when I got into Lennox, she acted like it was no big deal. A waste of time and money. Why not get a real job, or a real degree?”

  Located near Lincoln Center in Manhattan, Lennox was the most prestigious college for the performing arts in the country, and notoriously difficult to get accepted into. He’d thought about going there himself, but with Alex’s help, he was already pro, and he hadn’t wanted to get off-track.

  “Did you go?”

  “Of course not.” She rubbed at her nose. “Gina did. I told her I didn’t get in. Instead, I worked, and saved, and waited for Gina to finish so we could move out here. But then my abuela died, and I couldn’t stay in that apartment another second. So, I came out here on my own, and that was a fucking disaster, too.”

  Everything she said was new to him. He’d known she was from New York, like he was, and he’d known she moved to Los Angeles with Gina and secured a gig on Everybody Dance Now. But he suspected there were holes in the story, and he was going to hear them now. Since she was finally spilling her secrets, he did his best to be a good listener, to let her know she could trust him with them, that he wouldn’t judge her.

  “What happened?”

  She shook her head and buried her wet face in his neck. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Okay.” There would be time later. He didn’t need all her secrets now. But there was one thing he had to try to make clear to her. “You’re not a failure, Natasha.”

  She sniffled hard. “She makes me feel like I am. Every step I took, every achievement, it was never good enough. I’m not like Gina. Gina wants to be the best, to be a huge success and a household name. I don’t need that. I just want to make a living off being a dancer. To be able to pay my bills and my rent and buy nice things. If I can do that, I’ll show her I’m a success. And I was so close, until all this shit started happening.”

  “What about later, when you can’t dance?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll deal with that when I get to it. Maybe . . . maybe choreography. I don’t know.”

  It was a short-sighted mentality, especially for a career that was so hard on the body. But it was interesting that she’d mentioned choreography again.

  “So, this is why you’re so dead-set on doing everything yourself?”

  She nodded. “It doesn’t count if people help me. I’ll still be a failure. And when they’re gone, I’ll be nothing. You can’t rely on people for help, or you’re just asking for trouble.”

  That sounded like something she’d been told, rather than what she truly believed, but she was crying again so he let it pass.

  He held her through the fresh round of tears, murmuring sweet nothings to her in Russian, pressing kisses to her wet cheeks and bringing tissues to blow her nose. When she was finally quiet, he whispered, “I’m putting you to bed.”

  She nodded, and didn’t struggle this time when he picked her up. She didn’t pull away when he tucked her into the bed and climbed in beside her, cuddling her close. She let him hold her, let him soothe her, and drifted off to sleep.

  Dimitri didn’t rest so easily. He was overwhelmed by all she’d shared, both grateful that she’d trusted him to share it, and determined to do his part to help her. She still had secrets, but he could wait.

  Her mother had done a number on her. But if there was one thing he was good at—other than dancing—it was caring about people. At one point in his life, he’d had nothing but his family. Now, even though they were separated by an entire country, everything he did was for them.

  If she let him, he’d show her he was serious. He’d show her how much he loved her.

  If he’d loved her before, it was nothing compared to the way he felt now. He admired the hell out of her—her quiet strength, her compassion, her work ethic. How could someone so amazing think she was unworthy of love? It was ridiculous to him, but they all had their own demons.

  It was on him to show her the truth. By the time he was done, there’d be no doubt in her mind that she was lovable beyond belief.

  23

  Natasha woke the next morning and stared at the ceiling for a long time. When she was a kid, there was a crack in the ceiling that, when looked at from the right angle, resembled a dragon. Since she’d had a loft bed at one end of the living room blocked off by a couple bookcases, she’d spent a lot of time with that ceiling and dragon.

  Dimitri’s ceiling had that popcorn stuff on it, but with her glasses on, she picked out faces here and there. Her eyes jumped from one to the next. There, a crooked smiley face. To the right, a guy with a big nose and funny glasses. Above that, a sleepy face. Diagonal from there, an elf. And back to the beginning.

  She’d traced this path other mornings when she’d woken in his bed. Warring senses of comfort and awkwardness kept her pinned to the sheets. Did she get up and make herself at home? Did she cuddle? Did she grab her stuf
f and run home?

  Dimitri liked to cuddle, and he never made her feel like she had to get out of his hair, but . . . there was always that worry. No-strings attachments were nice in a lot of ways, but since there was no commitment, it was impossible to feel totally comfortable in the other person’s space. Even now, having spent the last few days in his bed and days before that living in his home, the dual urges of run and stay paralyzed her.

  Especially after last night.

  She closed her eyes and sucked in a breath through her nose at the memory of her breakdown. What a mess. She’d unloaded all her fears and mommy issues on him. Worse, she’d wanted to. All the worry, the pain, the toxic feelings she bottled up—like a dam breaking, the pressure had finally become too much, and it was easier to let it all spill out.

  Maybe now he’d understand why she had to get out of here.

  Not that she could go anywhere at the moment. Her crutches were still nowhere to be seen, and Dimitri had slung a heavy arm around her middle and buried his face in her shoulder. Rather than feeling trapped, his weight was a comfort. He was here. She wasn’t alone.

  She’d shown him her shadows, and he hadn’t run screaming into the night. He hadn’t even gone back to bed. He’d stuck it out, holding her, soothing her, listening and murmuring endearments in Russian. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t known the exact words. The sentiment was there.

  The still-raw feelings wouldn’t let her read too much into it. But it meant something, that he was here, and he wanted her here with him.

  Love was still a stretch. She didn’t believe that was it. But maybe . . . maybe she didn’t have to hold back so much. Maybe she could let him in and put herself out there. After last night, it didn’t seem so scary.

  Why wait to start? No time like the present.

  Before she could talk herself out of it, she turned toward him and cuddled closer to his warmth. His eyes didn’t open, but his chest rose in a deep breath and he shifted his arm, pulling her closer.

  With her face tucked into his chest, she breathed in the lingering scent of his cologne. She’d researched it once to tease out the scents she so closely associated with his masculinity. Most of them she didn’t understand—what the hell were aldehydes?—but the others she could pick up. Something woodsy, citrusy, with an overlying layer of what the color green would smell like, if colors had smells.